Thursday, February 28, 2013

Rare Disease Day 2013 - Info & G!veaways

On this day, millions of patients and their families will share their stories to focus a spotlight on rare diseases as an important global public health concern.

“There are nearly 30 million Americans—and millions more around the world—affected by rare diseases,” said Peter L. Saltonstall, president and CEO of NORD.  “Everyone knows someone with a rare disease.  But, while many of these diseases are serious and lifelong, most have no treatment and many are not even being studied by researchers.  This leaves patients and families without hope for a better future.”

On Rare Disease Day, people with rare diseases around the world promote awareness of the challenges of living with a rare disease.  The global theme for 2013 is “Rare Disorders Without Borders.” 

World Rare Disease Day was launched in Europe in 2008 and last year was observed in more than 60 nations.  It is always observed on the last day of February.  On that day, patients and patient organizations will post stories, videos and blogs online and host events to raise awareness of these diseases, which are often called “orphans”.

This year, the observance has special significance in the U.S. because 1983 is also the 30th anniversary of the Orphan Drug Act, which provides incentives to encourage companies to develop treatments for rare diseases, and of NORD, which was established by patient advocates in 1983.

“More than half of the people who have rare diseases are children,” Saltonstall said.  “Challenges faced by patients and their families include delayed diagnosis, few treatment options, and difficulty finding medical experts.  Many rare diseases have no approved treatment.  Insurance may not cover treatments that aren’t approved.  Also, treatments for rare diseases tend to be more expensive than those for common diseases.”

In 1983, the Orphan Drug Act was passed by Congress to create financial incentives for companies to develop treatments for rare diseases.  Since then, more than 400 orphan drugs and biologics have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).  It is estimated that approximately 15 million Americans benefit from these products, but that still leaves millions more with diseases for which there is no approved treatment.

For more information about Rare Disease Day activities in the U.S., go to www.rarediseaseday.us.  For information about global activities, go to www.rarediseaseday.org).

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In conjunction with Rare Disease Day, Pandora Poikilos' books will be free from 28th February 2013 till 15th March 2013. To download your free copy, please click on the links below.

Excuse Me, My Brains Have Stepped Out is free via KDP Select (Kindle) from now till 3rd March.
Dora's Essentials - Examining Anxiety is free via Smashwords from now till 15th March.
Genetically Modified Foods vs. Sustainability is free via Smashwords from now till 15th March.
Pandora's Reading Room (Short Story compilation) is free via Smashwords from now till 15th March.

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Orangeberry Book of the Day – Birds of A Feather by Kara Stefanowich

birds of a feather

When Shiloh Lashley, an International Assassin, breaks all the rules and falls in love with Monty Wright, her latest target, she finds herself in a conspiracy with her own name on the hit list — and a deep, dark secret surfacing in the fight to save her love, her life and a past she’s hidden for so long.

Birds of a Feather is a sexy tail spin of murder, money and conspiracy that gets blown to bits when Monty Wright and Shiloh Lashley are both hired by opposing agencies to kill each other. When the assassins finally meet the sparks fly, along with a hail of bullets which lead them straight into each others arms. But when their agencies discover their affair, cities crumble and a barrage of car chases, explosions and gun fights stalk the lovers around the globe, from Berlin, Germany to Tijuana, Mexico. Even as their affair blossoms, the shock still grips the pair as there are secrets a plenty in the world of spies and contract killers.

Can their love withstand the smoke of gunfire, or will their secrets tear them apart and take their lives?

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Genre – Suspense / Thriller

Rating – R

More details about the author

Connect with  Kara Stefanowich on Facebook & Twitter

Monday, February 25, 2013

Orangeberry Book of the Day – No Foolin’ by Lisa Scott

Welcome to Willowdale, North Carolina, a small town where the folks are friendly, the romances are as sweet as the tea, and the biddies at the diner gobble up gossip like it’s peach cobbler. This may be their biggest scoop ever.

When sexy Hollywood bad-boy Teague “T-Rex” Reynolds comes to this quiet Southern town, he needs a fake girlfriend to hide the secret that brought him there. School nurse Kate Riley takes the job, but she won’t fall for a movie star, no ma’am. That’s fine with Teague. He hung a closed sign on his heart years ago.
Convincing the press they’re in love is one thing. Fooling each other they’re not is getting harder each day. Despite scandal, heartache, and misunderstandings galore, they might just find the sweet thrill of true love. Book one of The Willowdale Romances.

Lisa Scott is a former TV news anchor who now makes up stories instead of sticking to the facts. Learn more about where her ideas come from and what’s on the way at ReadLisaScott.com

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Genre – Contemporary Romance

Rating – PG15

More details about the author

Connect with Lisa Scott on Facebook & Twitter

Saturday, February 23, 2013

Review - Marching With Caesar: Civil War by R.W. Peake

Marching With Caesar: Civil WarMarching With Caesar: Civil War by R.W. Peake
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

What alternative title would you choose for this book? Battling with Caesar or Caesar: Battling his way to Emperor

Were there any other especially interesting characters? All but a few minor characters were interesting.

From whose point of view is the story told? Titus in the first person is telling this.

Were the characters and their problems believable? There were a few spots that seemed a little farfetched, however this did not take away from anything in the book.

Disclosure: I received a review copy of this book from the author.

View all my reviews

Author Interview – RW Peake

rwpeake

 

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Genre – Historical Fiction

Rating – PG13

More details about the book

Connect with RW Peake on Facebook & Twitter

Blog http://blog.rwpeake.com/

 

What was the hardest part about writing this book? Maintaining the authenticity, knowing that my audience is very educated about the time period and will be quick to spot things like misplaced tactics or weapons that wouldn’t have shown up in the Republican period. Also, while there’s a lot of historical record for the Roman army of the period about a century before, and even more for the Imperial period immediately following this, there’s a real dearth of sources for the Late Republican period. This is a blade that cuts both ways; as an author it gives me a bit of latitude, but as a historian who wanted to make this as close to nonfiction as one could get, it meant that those things that I did invent, I had to be able to support why I drew these conclusions.

Did you learn anything from writing this book and what was it? Besides wearing socks with sandals?

How do you promote this book? Every way I can think of. I know there’s a lot of debate in the indie community, for example, about the merits of social media, and I’ve gotten some very…spirited resistance to the idea. All I can say is that for the first book I used Facebook to great effect, helped a great deal by that “secret weapon” of my cover.

I also do things like this, with Orangeberry, and I’ve tried a few other things. Being brutally honest, it’s a learning process and there have been some dry holes along the way. But probably the best promotion is through the readers themselves. In a really short period of time (at least so I’m told), for an unknown, self-published author, in the 8 months that the first book has been out, I’ve garnered more than 100 reviews, and 95 of them have been 4 or 5 stars. The word of mouth has been outstanding, and now that I’m sitting at more than 10,000 copies sold for the first title, and several weeks in the #1 spot in the Ancient Rome genre, I would have to say that the word of mouth promotion has been the most effective.

Will you write others in this same genre? Ah, the 64K question. For some time I’d been wavering about this. I hate it when people use the “But I’m an artist” crap, and yet I found myself saying, “But I want to do more than just write about Rome. I’m an ARTIST.” Thanks to a very loyal, and vocal, group of fans, I’ve seen the error of my ways. Yes, the “Marching With Caesar” will continue, and I’ve already begun creating a “genealogy” that has my character Titus Pullus as the founder, where characters from that family tree will be Marching With Caesar throughout Rome’s history. After the release of the fourth and final book of the Titus Pullus series, in May of 2013, I’ll be announcing what comes next.

Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp? Although my first goal is to entertain, the goal of informing is a very, very close second. I wouldn’t be true to my historian roots if I didn’t. But the overriding message I want to impart to readers is to connect them, through Titus and his friends, to the young men and women who are even as I write this, standing in harm’s way somewhere in the world. I don’t get political in my book, outside of the actual politics that took place in the story of Julius Caesar, so I don’t pass judgment on any of the actions of anyone in the book, unless it’s through the eyes of Titus. But Titus, Vibius and all their friends are alive today, sitting in a prefab bunker in Afghanistan, talking about the same things, sharing the same worries, and laughing at the same stuff as their counterparts 2,000 years ago. More than anything else, I want readers to make that connection. And from the reviews, I’ve been successful at that, which makes me very happy.

Have you included a lot of your life experiences, even friends, in the plot? As I say in my author’s bio, I’ve been the pointy tip of the spear of my nation’s policy, so there is inevitably some commonalities between my story and that of Titus and his friends.

How important do you think villains are in a story? Never given it much thought, to be honest. I think because I don’t necessarily buy into the idea that anyone is pure good or pure evil, so that even the ‘villians’ in my story, like Spurius Didius, will show himself to have redeeming qualities. While my hero Titus does some really dickish stuff to others in his climb to the top.

What are your goals as a writer? Win a Nobel Prize for Literature, become mentioned as one of the great American writers, and have my historical fiction books on Rome become required reading in colleges around the country. You know, nothing big.

Orangeberry Book Tours – Marching With Caesar: Civil War by RW Peake

In the second book of the critically acclaimed Marching With Caesar series, Titus Pullus and his friends in the 10th Legion are called on to serve as the agents of change as their general, Gaius Julius Caesar singlehandedly changes the Roman Republic to Empire. From Spain and the dusty plains of Pharsalus, to the streets of Rome itself, Titus must survive the battlefield and navigate the treacherous world of Roman politics.

Helping Titus are his surviving tentmates, including his best friend Vibius Domitius, but like the rest of the Republic, their friendship is tested by the strife and fratricide that comes with civil war. At the same time, Titus has to deal with the challenges that have confronted career military members throughout the ages as he tries to balance the demands and heartache created by the long absences from his young family.

Nevertheless, through it all Titus and the men of the 10th Legion continue Marching With Caesar.

Buy Now @ Amazon

Genre – Historical Fiction

Rating – PG13

Connect with RW Peake on Facebook & Twitter

Blog http://blog.rwpeake.com/

Orangeberry Book of the Day - Kaleidoscope World - Tomica Scavina

Tomica Scavina

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Genre – Psychological Thriller

Rating – PG

More details about the author & the book

Connect with Tomica Scavina on GoodReads & Twitter

Website http://www.tomicascavina.com/

 

A collector of kaleidoscopes and lousy relationships, Dahlia Kasper leaves her possessive alcoholic mother and moves from New York to Barcelona. In search of lost bits of her childhood, she starts living in an apartment where her father was murdered when she was four. As soon as she enters the apartment, strange things begin to happen.
Her favorite kaleidoscope becomes a gateway to another dimension where she encounters a ghost of a famous physicist from the 19th century who tries to persuade her that reality is like a moth-eaten sweater - full of holes. He needs her to help him plug up these holes and save the world from vanishing, while the only thing Dahlia really wants to save is her sanity.
This is just a part of Dahlia's problems. An elderly cello-playing neighbor turns her emotional world upside down and her longing for lost home takes her further than she ever imagined she could go. To collect all the scattered kaleidoscope-bits of her life together, Dahlia needs to go through an intense inner transformation that takes courage and a sharp sense of humor.

Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Orangeberry Book of the Day – Undertow by Elle Chardou

undertow

Five years ago, Evie Sandstrom and Finn Reilly were best friends and each other’s first love. Although neither has forgotten this time of their lives, they have moved on from one another and the secrets that continue to haunt them from the past.

Evie, now a college student, has decided to transfer for her junior year to Boston University to be closer to her family…and Finn Reilly is still there — waiting for her — in Charlestown.

During part of a gorgeous summer, the beauty of their love is rekindled again only to be torn apart by Evie’s mother, the beautiful and untouchable superstar, Athena Donahue.

Evie, angry and humiliated, is determined to avenge her mother for what she has done. Athena’s recently married Etienne Fournier, a thirty-year-old French model, and he is dangerously attracted to Evie.

Love and lust collide in the cruelest ways and now Evie finds herself conflicted, swept in the undertow and caught in the crossfire of temptation and desire for Etienne though she desperately wants to maintain the loyalty and fidelity she has promised to Finn.

Evie learns the most valuable lesson of all: falling in love is easy but for a young woman who doesn’t like to commit, maintaining a relationship is the hard part.

Publisher’s Note: Due to mature behavior, sexual references, drug references and language, this novel is recommended for those 17+.

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Genre – Contemporary Romance

Rating – R

More details about the author

Connect with Elle Chardou on Facebook & Twitter

Blog http://thebeautifulpeopleawritersjourney.blogspot.com/

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Orangeberry Book of the Day - Secrets by Liz Schulte

Secrets by Liz Schulte

While Olivia Martin observed life through her camera, the Abyss gazed back at her. She discovers mysterious men follow her around, people close to her are dying, and her dreams are no longer her own as she falls head over heels for a perfect stranger. A chance encounter leads to an obsession that could destroy everything she has ever known or loved. Olivia is about to find out there is a lot she doesn’t know and sometimes what you don’t know can kill you.

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Genre – Paranormal Romance

Rating – PG13

Connect with Liz Schulte on Facebook & Twitter

Website http://www.lizschulte.com/

Monday, February 18, 2013

Orangeberry Book Tours – The Lucky Escape by Dr. Heather Manley

Merrin and Pearl’s little brother Robbie has swallowed a penny. Now through magic and imagination they find themselves on an adventure through his digestive system where they must grab the penny, save Robbie, and narrowly escape his poopy diaper.

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Genre – Children’s Book

Rating – G

Connect with Dr. Heather Manley on Facebook & Twitter