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Do You Like Reading Ghost Stories?

Hello everyone, Who loves to read ghost stories? Do you like to read real life ones or fiction? Which is your favorite? I love to read gho...

Thursday, March 26, 2015

Smoking is Dangerous Quit Now
By Jerri Aubry M.S.
                                                                             
There is an estimated 42 million plus people that smoke in the US, and cigarettes are one of the leading causes of death among these smokers. The majority of people who attempt to quit are unsuccessful. Even though people realize that they increase their risk of getting cancer, they can't deal with the withdrawal that comes with quitting.
This fear of going through withdrawal keeps people from quitting and becoming healthy. Nicotine is considered to be more addicting than any other substance available. It is considered a drug just like cocaine or heroin.
The media portrays withdrawal effects from stopping an addictive substance to be horrible. It is all that most of us have to compare it to, and this tends to cause fear in those that want to quit smoking.
Smoking increases a person's chance of getting cancer, especially lung cancer. According to the Surgeon General Report of 2014, "Women smokers are 25.7 times more likely than women who never smoked to develop lung cancer. For men smokers, it's 25 times the risk of men who never smoked." (http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancercauses/tobaccocancer/tobacco-related-cancer-fact-sheet)
Tobacco is considered a toxic substance or better yet a poison. People who smoke understand that smoking increases risks of cancers and other diseases such as COPD, Emphysema, and Chronic bronchitis, or pneumonia. Once a person begins smoking that person can become addicted very quickly. Teens who begin smoking for social reasons usually end up smoking for a lifetime.
According to the Cancer Society, 9 out of 10 adult smokers began smoking before their 18th birthday, and these smokers tend to have more difficulties quitting smoking as an adult. "Of every three young smokers, only one will quit, and one of those that are remaining smokers will die from tobacco-related causes."(http://www.cancer.org/acs/groups/cid/documents/webcontent/002963-pdf.pdf)
Most young people do not think about the long-term consequences that smoking may have on their bodies. It is often too late once a person begins smoking to stop the process of becoming addicted to nicotine. An addiction to nicotine can happen in the very beginning stages of smoking.
"Nicotine produces physical and mood-altering effects in your brain that are temporarily pleasing. These effects make you want to use tobacco and lead to dependence. At the same time, stopping tobacco use causes withdrawal symptoms, including irritability and anxiety." This anxiety can lead people to either start back smoking in order to stop the withdrawal symptoms. This process causes many people to continue to smoke throughout a lifetime. (http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/nicotine-dependence/basics/definition/con-20014452)
It is the nicotine found in cigarettes that cause the nicotine dependence. Smoking causes higher rates of heart disease, stroke, cancer, asthma, COPD, and emphysema. When a person addicted to any substance tries to stop the use of that substance will cause withdrawal symptoms. It is an inevitable process that one must go through. However, the withdrawal symptoms can be kept in check by following a program that takes the withdrawal process into account.
Hi, my name is Jerri, and I was a longtime smoker of 25 plus years. I started smoking when I was 14 years old and once I began I couldn't stop. In my twenty's I tried to quit smoking several times, but was unsuccessful each time.
By the time I was 25, I had begun having trouble breathing. I used to make up every excuse in the book about my problems, but never did I blame smoking as the problem. When I quit smoking, I would be filled with dread as I began having withdrawal symptoms, and I felt like I couldn't deal with life without a cigarette in my hand.
What I didn't realize was that I needed to have a game plan that would deal with the withdrawal symptoms before attempting to quit. I needed to have my toolbox ready and in hand before quitting. Once I realized what needed to happen, I was able to quit smoking for good and without all the terrible scary withdrawal symptoms.
I have been a nonsmoker for over ten years. Wow, I can't believe it's been that long, but it has. And I will never need to smoke again. I know have strategies that I can successfully use that have kept me from the return to smoking. I no longer need cigarettes to help me through each day. I am free of those horrible things, and I am much healthier because of it.
I am no longer addicted to a substance that seem to be taking over my body and life. I finally feel in charge of myself. You too can become a nonsmoker. It is easier than you believe. I am going to show you how I became a nonsmoker.
You will learn everything you need to know to quit smoking now. Stop procrastinating now is the time to quit for good. You can become a nonsmoker. Don't let fear stand in your way of becoming a healthy individual.
Take the leap and quit today and get this book with all the information you will need to read it quickly and quit smoking now.
This book will teach you how to deal with withdrawal and manage it as well.
  • It will help you to quit today and to move forward on the path to becoming a nonsmoker.
  • You will learn about the mechanism of nicotine addiction.
  • Learn the tools and techniques to finally quit smoking for good.
  • Don't wait..... Grab this book now and get started on your new journey to freeing yourself of smoking.
 
 
 
 
 
 Get a Free Copy of this book from March 30-April 4th on Amazon.
 
 

Saturday, March 21, 2015

Do You Believe in Ghosts?

Do you believe in ghost stories? New England is renowned for its infamous ghostly incidents. Growing up in New Hampshire, Jerri knew what these experiences were all about. How could she know that she would live her life in a ghost story of her own?

Nightly, she would hear whispers coming from the closet. Images would show as shadows on the wall as they moved closer to her. Terrified, she pulled the covers over her head and lay completely still. Every night ghosts would visit her, trying to communicate. As she matured, her ghostly experiences intensified.

Unable to accept the truth, she kept her encounters secret . . . until now. Follow her as she talks openly about her experiences from childhood to present time.
 
Living in a Ghost Story is a book full of short ghost stories that will keep you on the edge of your seat and the book is FREE right now on Amazon.

Hostile Affairs in Kansas is FREE until March 25. 2015

Like to read suspense novels that will keep you on the edge of your seat? This book has 5-star ratings on Amazon and it is FREE right now.
 
 
During a Kansas thunder and lightning storm, Frances is rendered unconscious. Frances wakes in the hospital frantic and afraid. Unable to remember the faces around her, leaves her feeling devastated, and depressed. Determined to recover, Frances turns to her family for help.

As her memories begin coming back, she realizes that her family has been keeping secrets. Fear immobilizes her as she begins to unfold the memories that have been locked away for many years. She realizes that it is no longer safe for her to be at the farm house.

When she meets charming young Justin, she wonders if he will be able to love her if he knows the truth. She tries to keep her memories secret from him as she realizes that she is in love with him. She manages to keep her secrets until....

One night when a terrible accident happens that will change her life forever. As the police investigate, Frances knows that she cannot tell them the truth. She must protect her family from the horror of what has happened. As time begins to run out, Frances must make a decision that will affect her for the rest of her life.
 
This book is FREE on Amazon until March 25th. Grab your copy today.
 

Forgiving Cancer: A Mother and Daughter's Journey to Peace is FREE for the Next Five Days

Forgiving Cancer: A Mother and Daughter's Journey to Peace is now Free from March 21-25 on Amazon.
 
More and more people are being diagnosed with cancer these days and doctors expect this to continue to rise. When I was going through this process with my mother, I felt lost and wished that I had the support of a book like this before I faced this type of situation.
 
As part of my healing and letting go process of losing so many people to cancer, I wrote this book in hopes to help others who may be facing what I faced.
 
This book is about my story, but also contains information about what I had to do.
 
This book has a 5-star rating on Amazon, and people tell me that they found this book helpful, so I hope you all grab a copy while it is free.
 
Excerpt
On my next visit to the hospital the social worker for the hospital wanted to meet with me. The nursing staff let me know this, and so I visited my mom until she came for me.
I left and followed the woman. She was about 5ft 2 in tall, with wavy blonde hair. She seemed to be in her mid to upper 40s. I followed down the hallway until we came around a corner to her office.
She told me to have a seat while pointing at one of the two chairs available to sit in. She closed the door and sat down. She had a warmness to her, she made me feel safe.
We talked for the next half hour regarding my mom’s ability to care for herself. She told me that she would need 24-hour care and that she needed to have two people who were strong enough to pick her up to get her transferred into a wheelchair.
She told me that the doctors would be recommending for her to enter into a nursing home at the end of the six weeks of treatment. In the meantime she would stay until that day.
I didn’t know what to think. What was I supposed to do? I promised I wouldn’t put her in one, and here I was facing the choice about what to do. She suggested a few homes for me to go and check out, and that she wanted to make arrangements as soon as possible.
I was so upset I started crying right there in her office. She was supportive telling me that she understood what I was going through. She too had to go through the same predicament with her dad.
She told me that to hire a nurse to come in would cost too much and under my mom’s insurance, which is Medicare like most seniors her age. There were only few homes they paid for and those were some of the bad ones in town.
I had no choice. I didn’t have the money to put her into a better home. My mom didn’t have the money to pay for a better home or to hire someone.
I asked the social worker to write down names and addresses of the homes, and that I would visit them the following week for walk through visit and choose one.
The next day during my lunch break I went to look at one of the homes. I thought it looked okay and the people seemed happy who were there.
The staff seemed pleasant and the place was clean. I liked it and it was close to my work ,so I could visit during my lunch breaks.
I went to look at the other places and the looked pretty bad and I didn’t want her going to them. I chose the first one I saw and let the social worker now so she could set it up.
Now I had to tell my mom the bad news.
 
Grab your free copy now on Amazon
 

Thursday, March 12, 2015

Slow Cooking Saves both Time and Money

Slow Cooking Saves both Time and Money
 
I recently purchased this as an e-book and just wanted to take a minute and share with you.
 
I love this cookbook, because it starts off with information about slow cookers and how to use them properly. I am excited to make more of the recipes in this book. I have made almost all of them, and I especially love the breakfast recipes and now I wake up to a warm breakfast to start the day off right. If you are looking for some tasty, and easy recipes for your slow cooker, this is the book for you. I have been trying to eat healthy and the morning quinoa recipes are wonderful. I get up each morning to warm food ready to eat, which, works out great when you are on the go.
 
The cost was only .99 on amazon so I just couldn't pass up the deal. If you want a copy here is where you can get it

Monday, March 9, 2015

Remembering Kaylee Cooper a Book Review

A 5-star rating
 
Remembering Kaylee Cooper is an intriguing story between reality and the unknown. The author does a wonderful job of narrating a story of a preteen boy and a girl caught between two worlds. I found this book to be very engaging and just the perfect length for young readers. Follow Alex on the adventure of a lifetime and find yourself in an engrossing story of coming to age and being caught between this world and beyond. Once I began reading this book, I couldn’t put it down, and thought how my own children would enjoy reading this story. If you are looking for a good book to read and like the stories about life in middle school and ghost stories you will surely enjoy reading this book. This book was written for the middle class or junior high level children, ages 10-14, and many children would be able to relate to this book on many levels.
 
From the back of the book, Kaylee Cooper is certain that Alex will become friends with a ghost this year. Alex thinks that he is far too old to be listening to a first grader and encourages Kaylee to stop jeopardizing his important sixth grade social life. Kaylee doesn’t listen and finds awkward ways to spend as much time with Alex as possible, even if it means following him into the boy’s washroom.

Fed up, Alex develops a strategic plan to ultimately help him get rid of Kaylee Cooper for good.

However, he soon learns about the mysterious legend of Screaming Ridge that pulls an unlikely group of friends together, including the girl of his dreams, and the school’s meanest bully. When they discover that the legend is real, and that Kaylee Cooper is at the core of the mystery, Alex stares death in the face and helps save her from an eternal life of misery and confusion.
This book covers many of the issues children are dealing with in Junior High and this story can help give these children solutions to dealing with these issues.
About the Author Christopher Francis
Born in Brisbane, Australia, Christopher was accepted at age 19 into Sheridan College's Animation program before earning a degree in sociology from McMaster University. He then enjoyed a two-year adventure overseas working with children, before completing his Bachelor of Education degree at New York University. He is now teaching junior and intermediate level students in Burlington, Ontario.
Through his work with children, he found writing and illustrating to be one of his passions. Currently working on a middle grade series, he recently completed and illustrated the first three books. He has also created seven other children's picture books and illustrated Children's novels for independent authors.  Want to more about Christopher's books or his illustrations?
Here is a sample of his illustrations
 
Check out his website and contact Chris at http://www.francisart.com
 
 
 
Get your copy today on Amazon.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Thursday, March 5, 2015

Lucid Dreaming: A Beginner's Guide Book on How to Become Conscious in Your Dream by Sam Siv Review

I was very interested in reading this book, because I practice lucid dreaming and I tend to give dream interpretation readings to help others understand the meanings within their own dreams.
This book was referred to me by another professional and since I love to read new books regarding dream interpretation and history, I thought this was a definite for my reading list.
I was very impressed with how well written this book is and how it is laid out. The author delicately shares information that makes you think about dreams and what they may mean. This book is written in a very professional manner by someone who has detailed experience helping others in the dream world. Readers will learn about lucid dreaming and can follow exercises that teaches the reader how to engage in lucid dreaming. The opening of the book covers an in-depth history of dream research and the stages of sleep one reaches each night.
Readers can learn how to affect their dreams and how to remember them as well. The book is an easy read and the author has done a wonderful job of engaging the reader throughout the entire book.
The book speaks of the types of dreams one may have along with techniques to use to help readers remember their dreams. The author does a good job introducing and explaining how to dream and the different stages one will go through during dream state. Readers will learn how to control dreams and how to have out of body experiences.
She even covers the delicate issue of out of body experiences and how science interprets these types of experiences. For those interested in learning how to have out of body experiences, there is a section within the confines of this book that cover this area in depth.
The book contains a dream dictionary with dream interpretations. Readers will learn about dream recall and techniques on how to remember dreams once awoken from one. This book is very educational, and I really enjoyed reading it, and am excited to try some of the techniques listed in this book.
I would definitely recommend this to anyone wanting to change how they dream and or understand dream states and sleep cycles. If you are looking for more information about lucid dreaming and get the low down info about why we dream than this book is for you.
Currently, you can find this book on amazon for .99
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Monday, March 2, 2015

Writing Horror and Avoiding Cliches

THE HORROR GENRE: ON WRITING HORROR AND AVOIDING CLICHÉS

 
“The three types of terror: The Gross-out: the sight of a severed head tumbling down a flight of stairs, it’s when the lights go out and something green and slimy splatters against your arm. The Horror: the unnatural, spiders the size of bears, the dead waking up and walking around, it’s when the lights go out and something with claws grabs you by the arm. And the last and worse one: Terror, when you come home and notice everything you own had been taken away and replaced by an exact substitute. It’s when the lights go out and you feel something behind you, you hear it, you feel its breath against your ear, but when you turn around, there’s nothing there …” — Stephen King
The horror genre is something that I’ve always been fascinated with. Luckily, I don’t think I’m the only one. People like to be frightened. If they didn’t, Stephen King wouldn’t have a thousand novels and you wouldn’t find every horror film ever made running on AMC at this time, every year. Seriously. Click over to AMC, I can almost guarantee Halloween, or one of its sequels, is on right now.
And horror has adapted. Yes, you can still find the slasher movies and those “gross-out” moments that King references. But it’s mental now. “Found footage” movies can be terrifying because it seems so normal, so everyday. The more real, the better. And the scarier. It’s the dark basement where the only thing you can hear is the beating of your own heart. That’s real horror. The kind of stuff that makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up, as if someone was standing inches behind you.
But writing horror isn’t so easy. With any type of fiction, it’s difficult to think of something that hasn’t already been done. With horror fiction, it’s especially true. Creepy basements, loud noises from the attic, hidden rooms, Indian burial grounds, old hotels, multiple personality disorder, etc.—it’s all been done before, and it’s all out there. These clichés shouldn’t restrain you, however. They’ve simply defined the space you’re working in. You know what’s there, now create your own story.
Below are Ramsey Campbell’s thoughts  on “Avoiding What’s Been Done to Death” in On Horror Writing, edited by Mort Castle. Be sure to read it all the way to the end. That last sentence is breathtakingly creepy.
*   *   *   *   *
Some people . . . claim that there’s nothing new in horror. In a sense, that may be true. More than sixty years ago, H.P. Lovecraft drew up a list of the basic themes of weird fiction, and I can think of very little that the field has added to that list since then. But that’s by no means as defeatist as it sounds, because the truth is surely that many of the themes we’re dealing with are so large and powerful as to be essentially timeless.
For instance, the folk tale of the wish that comes true more fully and more terribly than the wisher could have dreamed is the basis not only of “The Monkey’s Paw,” but of Stephen King’s Pet Semetary and of my own novel, Obsesssion, yet the three stories have otherwise far more to do with their writers than with one another. That suggests . . . that one way to avoid what has already been done is to be true to yourself.
That isn’t to say that imitation never has its uses. Here, as in any other of the arts, it’s a legitimate and useful way to serve your apprenticeship. . . . If you’re writing in a genre, it’s all the more important to read widely outside it in order to be aware what fiction is capable of. It’s less a matter of importing techniques into the field than of seeing the field as part of a larger art. Depending wholly on genre techniques can lend too easily to the secondhand and the second-rate. There’s only one Stephen King, but there are far too many writers trying to sound like him.
It’s no bad thing to follow the example of writers you admire, then, but only as a means to finding your own voice. You won’t find that, of course, unless you have something of your own to say. I did, once I stopped writing about Lovecraft’s horrors and began to deal with what disturbed me personally. I began to write about how things seemed to me, which was more important and, at first, more difficult than it may sound. I tried (and still do try) to take nothing on trust to describe things as they really are or would be.
I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that the horror field is riddled with clichés. The house that’s for sale too cheaply, the guy who must be working nights because he sleeps during the day . . . , the attic room the landlady keeps locked, the place none of the topers in the village inn will visit after dark—we can all have fun recognizing these and many others, which is by no means to say that they haven’t been used effectively by masters of the craft. But I think there are more fundamental clichés in the field, and I think today’s writers may be the ones to overturn them.
Take the theme of evil, as the horror story often does. Writing about evil is a moral act, and it won’t do to recycle definitions of evil—to take them on trust. Horror fiction frequently presents the idea of evil in such a shorthand form as to be essentially meaningless—something vague out there that causes folk to commit terrible acts, something other than ourselves, nothing to do with us. That sounds to me more like an excuse than a definition, and I hope it’s had its day. If we’re going to write about evil, then let’s define it and how it relates to ourselves.
All good fiction consists of looking at things afresh, but horror fiction seems to have a built-in tendency to do the opposite. Ten years or so ago, many books had nothing more to say than “the devil made me do it.” Now, thanks to the influence of films like Friday the 13th, it seems enough for some writers to say that a character is psychotic; no further explanation is necessary. But it’s the job of writers to imagine how it would feel to be all their characters, however painful that may sometimes be. It may be a lack of that compassion that has led some writers to create children who are evil simply because they’re children, surely the most deplorable cliché of the field.
Some clichés are simply products of lazy writing. Tradition shouldn’t be used as an excuse to repeat what earlier writers have done; if you feel the need to write about the stock figures of the horror story, that’s all the more reason to imagine them anew. . . . It’s only fair to warn you that many readers and publishers would rather see imitations of whatever they liked last year than give new ideas a chance. But I’ve always tried to write what rings true to me, whether or not it makes the till ring. If you don’t feel involved with what you’re writing, it’s unlikely that anyone else will.
There’s another side to the field that is overdue for attack by a new generation—its reactionary quality. A horror writer I otherwise admire argued recently that “it has been a time-honored tradition in literature and film that you have a weak or helpless heroine”—implying, I assume, that we should go on doing so. Well, tradition is a pretty poor excuse for perpetrating stereotypes (not that the author in question necessarily does); time-honored it may be, but that certainly doesn’t make it honorable. In fact, these days, so many horror stories (and especially films) gloat over the suffering of women that it seems clear the authors are getting their own back, consciously or not, on aspects of real life that they can’t cope with. Of course, that isn’t new in horror fiction, nor is using horror fiction to define as evil or diabolical whatever threatens the writer or the writer’s lifestyle. But, at the very least, one should be aware as soon as possible, that this is what one is doing, so as to be able to move on. I have my suspicions, too, about the argument that horror fiction defines what is normal by showing us what isn’t. I think it’s time for more of the field to acknowledge that, when we come face-to-face with the monsters, we may find ourselves looking not at a mask but at a mirror.
 
*   *   *   *   *
How to Write HorrorYou can read more from accomplished horror authors, such as Stephen King, Joyce Carol Oates, Harlan Ellison, David Morrell, Jack Ketchum, and more, in On Writing Horror, edited by Mort Castle. Also be sure to check out Mort Castle’s Dracula: The Annotated Classic, from Writer’s Digest Books, in Spring 2014!