Google Play - 25 Cent Intro Specials

Google is merging their Books, Music, Movies and Appstore into a single Google Play website (and renaming the Android Marketplace app). Your old content will transition to the new site, for those who already have apps and books, so nothing should be lost. To promote the new site, Google is running a 25 cent special in each section and it looks like Amazon is matching them (at least, it is right now). These are the current specials I see active:

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel ($0.25 Kindle; Google), by Jonathan Safran Foer

Book Description
Jonathan Safran Foer follows his best-selling debut novel, Everything Is Illuminated, with an unexpectedly hilarious and affecting story about New York City in the period following September 11.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close recasts recent history through the eyes of Oskar Schell, an unusually intelligent nine-year-old on an urgent quest to find the lock that matches a mysterious key belonging to his father, who died in the World Trade Center. This unlikely adventure takes Oskar through every city borough and into contact with survivors of all sorts, and it's his irrepressible voice—one that few writers could conceive as imaginatively as Foer does—that transforms the tragedy of circumstance into an exhilarating tribute to love.

Where's My Water? ($0.25 Amazon; Google), by Disney

Book Description
Now test your skills with "Cranky's Story"!

Cranky is the toughest alligator around and he has worked up an appetite from sabotaging Swampy's water supply. He eats anything, especially all the rotting and disgusting junk found in the dumps and sewers. Cranky will not eat vegetables however, and now his food is covered with vegetable-like algae. Use the dirty purple water to clean off Cranky's plate so he can eat!

• Enjoy five of these new puzzles for free

• Purchase the Cranky's Story in-app item to unlock more than 50 super-challenging puzzles, including Cranky's Challenge, and enjoy a completely new way to play--Cranky's Challenge is a game within a game: four unique puzzle packs with 16 special levels for the most-skilled puzzle solvers

• Swampy's stories will continue to be updated for free

Please note: The ability to write to external storage is not enabled in this version. Swampy will get his ducks in a row and enable this permission in the next update. In the mean time please send any questions to Disney's Customer Care service accessible via the Where's My Water Facebook page.

Have you "Tri-Ducked" the game yet and completed all the bonus levels?

Puncture ($3.99 Amazon; $0.25 Google), Starring Chris Evans, Vinessa Shaw, Michael Biehn and Marshall Bell

Book Description
An attorney fighting a corrupt system is battling his own demons as he tries to do right by others in this drama based on a true story. Vicky (Vinessa Shaw) is a nurse at a hospital in Houston whose life takes an unexpected turn when she accidentally jabs herself with a used syringe. The needle had been used on a patient who was HIV-positive, and Vicky contracts AIDS. Jeffrey Danfort (Marshall Bell) is a close friend of Vicky's who designs medical equipment, and he's inspired to invent a syringe with a safety point that would prevent such mistakes. However, as Jeffrey tries to sell his new invention to pharmaceutical manufacturers, he discovers how much they're governed by corruption and insider dealings. Jeffrey decides to take on the dishonest firms with a lawsuit, and he secures the services of Weiss & Danziger, a small law office eager for any kind of business. But while Paul Danziger (Mark Kassen) needs the work to support his wife and children, Mike Weiss (Chris Evans) is more concerned with supporting his cocaine habit, which is spiraling out of control. Even though Mike sees the case as a chance to prove himself, his hunger for drugs is a constant obstacle. Puncture received its world premiere at the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival.

Now That's What I Call Music! 41 ($0.25 Amazon; Google), by various (EMD).

Book Description
The 41st volume of Now That's What I Call Music! delivers a variety of pop radio hits and, after nearly 30 years of compilations, continues to showcase the music of the times. The hit-makers are all here, from LMFAO, Gym Class Heroes and Coldplay, to Adele, Katy Perry, Jessie J and Lady Gaga, while T-Pain, Pitbull, and rapper J. Cole add a hip-hop edge. Throughout the 20 songs featured, the formula and momentum never waver. This edition also includes "Now What's Next," four bonus tracks from up-and-comers Sammy Adams, Hunter Hayes, Susan Justice and The Wanted. – Laura Checkoway, Google Music

Bargain Book Roundup

Reckless With a Bonus Excerpt ($0.99 Kindle, B&N), by Andrew Gross, is available to pre-order. You can get a sample from the full price edition.

Book Description
Ty Hauck is shattered by the news. A close friend from his past, along with her husband and daughter, has been brutally murdered in her home by vicious intruders. Now he will risk everything he loves to avenge her death....

A wealthy banker, seeing his world about to crumble around him, knows his family is in unfathomable danger....

A U.S. government agent watches the sudden bank transfers of millions in cash and suspects that this is the first step in a plot to unleash a wave of global panic....

Ty Hauck hunts the murderer of a friend—and steps into the crosshairs of a sinister conspiracy—in this most electrifying novel yet from New York Times bestselling thriller master Andrew Gross.

Private security investigator Ty Hauck, with Naomi Blum, a tenacious agent from the U.S. Department of Treasury, unravels the evidence that joins these seemingly unrelated events—revealing a reckless scheme that stretches from New York to London to central Europe and gives new meaning to the phrase "too big to fail." What began with a tragedy that opened a door to Hauck's past—a door that he thought was long closed—ends with a frantic race to avert a disaster that could shake the very security of our country—and even the world.

Simon and Schuster has the first five novels from Deborah Crombie's Duncan Kincaid / Gemma James series for $3.99 each:

A Share in Death #1
A week's holiday in a luxurious Yorkshire time-share is just what Scotland Yard's Superintendent Duncan Kincaid needs. But the discovery of a body floating in the whirlpool bath ends Kincaid's vacation before it's begun. One of his new acquaintances at Followdale House is dead; another is a killer. Despite a distinct lack of cooperation from the local constabulary, Kincaid's keen sense of duty won't allow him to ignore the heinous crime, impelling him to send for his enthusiastic young assistant, Sergeant Gemma James. But the stakes are raised dramatically when a second murder occurs, and Kincaid and James find themselves in a determined hunt for a fiendish felon who enjoys homicide a bit too much.

All Shall Be Well #2
Perhaps it is a blessing when Jasmine Dent dies in her sleep. At long last an end has come to the suffering of a body horribly ravaged by disease. It may well have been suicide; she had certainly expressed her willingness to speed the inevitable. But small inconsistencies lead her neighbor, Superintendent Duncan Kincaid of Scotland Yard, to a startling conclusion: Jasmine Dent was murdered. But if not for mercy, why would someone destroy a life already so fragile and doomed? As Kincaid and his capable and appealing assistant Sergeant Gemma James sift through the dead woman's strange history, a troubling puzzle begins to take shape -- a bizarre amalgam of good and evil, of charity and crime . . . and of the blinding passions that can drive the human animal to perform cruel and inhuman acts.

Leave the Grave Green #3
When Connor Swann, the dissolute son-in-law of renowned and influential Sir Gerald and Dame Caroline Asherton, is found floating in a Thames River lock, the circumstances eerily recall a strangely similar tragedy. Twenty years ago, the Ashertons' young son, Matthew, a musical prodigy, drowned in a swollen stream while in the company of his sister Julia -- Connor Swann's wife.

Police Superintendant Duncan Kincaid and Sergeant Gemma James quickly discover that Connor's death was no accident, and that nothing in the Asherton family is as it seems. Connor, though estranged from Julia for more than a year, still lives in her London apartment, where his exploits with women and gambling suggest plenty of motives. The Ashertons are far more attached to Connor than to their own daughter, and these are only the first of the secrets that haunt the suspects. New lies cover older lies, as Kincaid finds himself dangerously drawn to Julia Swann, and Gemma must confront her own troubling feelings for Kincaid.

Mourn Not Your Dead #4
An important and powerful policeman has been murdered, bludgeoned to death in his own kitchen. Few in suburban Surrey mourn the violent passing of Division Commander Alastair Gilbert, whose arrogance and cruelty were legendary in his village and in wider police circles -- which only makes the job of Scotland Yard investigators Superintendent Duncan Kincaid and Sergeant Gemma James more difficult. And as every discovery reveals another instance of misplaced trust, festering secrets, and murderous rage, they must put aside their own personal feelings for the victim -- and for each other -- in the name of justice and the law.

Dreaming of the Bones #5
It is the call Scotland Yard Superintendent Duncan Kincaid never expected -- and one he certainly doesn't want. Victoria, his ex-wife, who walked out without an explanation more than a decade ago, asks him to look into the suicide of local poet, Lydia Brooke -- a case that's been officially closed for five years. The troubled young writer's death, Victoria claims, might well have been murder.

No one is more surprised than Kincaid himself when he agrees to investigate -- not even his partner and lover, Sergeant Gemma James. But it's a second death that raises the stakes and plunges Kincaid and James into a labyrinth of dark lies and lethal secrets that stretches all the way back through the twentieth century -- a death that most assuredly is murder, one that has altered Duncan Kincaid's world forever.

Through a Glass Darkly ($2.51), by Karleen Koen

Book Description
Karleen Koen's sweeping saga contains unforgettable characters consumed with passion: the extraordinarily beautiful fifteen-year-old noblewoman, Barbara Alderley; the man she adores, the wickedly handsome Roger MontGeoffry; her grandmother, the duchess, who rules the family with cunning and wit; and her mother, the ineffably cruel, self-centered and licentious Diana. Like no other work, Through a Glass Darkly is infused with intrigue, sweetened by romance and awash in the black ink of betrayal.

Simon and Schuster has a half-dozen of Mary Higgins Clark's novels on sale for $3.99 each.

Where Are The Children?
Neeve Kearny may be the only person in New York worried about the disappearance of Ethel Lambston.

Ethel, a bestselling author famous for her juicy exposÉs, is one of the best customers at Neeve’s exclusive Madison Avenue boutique. But Ethel’s ex-husband, her parasitical nephew, and the fashion moguls skewered in her latest article all have reason to be glad she’s no longer around.

When Ethel Lambston is found with her throat cut, Neeve’s memories of her mother’s long-unsolved murder loom up once again. Now, as an innocent witness in the Lambston investigation, Neeve is drawn into a new nightmare . . . a sinister labyrinth of greed and ambition that will lead her into mortal danger.

All Around The Town
When Laurie Kenyon, a twenty-one-year-old student, is accused of murdering her English professor, she has no memory of the crime. Her fingerprints, however, are everywhere. When she asks her sister, attorney Sarah, to mount her defense, Sarah in turn brings in psychiatrist Justin Donnelly. Kidnapped at the age of four and victimized for two years, Laurie has developed astounding coping skills. Only when the unbearable memories of those lost years are released can the truth of the crime come out -- and only then can the final sadistic plan of her abductor, whose obsession is stronger than ever, be revealed.

A Cry In The Night
When Jenny MacPartland meets the man of her dreams while working in a New York art gallery, she's ecstatic. Painter Erich Krueger -- whose exquisite landscapes are making him a huge success -- is handsome, sensitive...and utterly in love with her. They marry quickly and Jenny plans a loving home on Erich's vast Minnesota farm. But lonely days and eerie nights strain her nerves to the breaking point and test her sanity. Caught in a whirlpool of shattering events, Jenny soon unearths a past more terrifying than she dares imagine...tragic secrets that threaten her marriage, her children, her life.

Weep No More, My Lady (Alvirah and Willy #1)
Elizabeth Lange has arrived at Cypress Point Spa in Pebble Beach, California, weary of heart and soul. Still grieving for her beloved sister, a famous actress who plunged to her death from her Manhattan penthouse, Elizabeth is determined to unearth the truth about how Leila died. Dashing multimillionaire Ted Winters stands accused of her murder, but Elizabeth has doubts.

Along the windswept cliffs of the Monterey coast, in luxurious bungalows, between gourmet meals and beachfront walks, uneasiness stalks Elizabeth while she begins opening doors to the past. As glimpses of the dark truth about Leila's life and death -- and about Elizabeth herself -- start to crash against her mind, an ominous wave from an unexpected source threatens to engulf her entirely.

Where Are You Now?
From America's Queen of Suspense comes a gripping tale of a young woman trying to unravel the mystery of a family tragedy -- a quest with terrifying repercussions.

It has been ten years since twenty-one-year-old Charles MacKenzie Jr. ("Mack") went missing. A Columbia University senior, about to graduate and already accepted at Duke University Law School, he walked out of his apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side without a word to his college roommates and has never been seen again. However, he does make one ritual phone call to his mother every year: on Mother's Day. Each time, he assures her he is fine, refuses to answer her frantic questions, then hangs up. Even the death of his father, a corporate lawyer, in the tragedy of 9/11 does not bring him home or break the pattern of his calls.

Mack's sister, Carolyn, is now twenty-six, a law school graduate, and has just finished her clerkship for a civil court judge in Manhattan. She has endured two family tragedies, yet she realizes that she will never be able to have closure and get on with her life until she finds her brother. She resolves to discover what happened to Mack and why he has found it necessary to hide from them. So this year when Mack makes his annual Mother's Day call, Carolyn interrupts to announce her intention to track him down, no matter what it takes. The next morning after Mass, her uncle, Monsignor Devon MacKenzie, receives a scrawled message left in the collection basket: "Uncle Devon, tell Carolyn she must not look for me."

Mack's cryptic warning does nothing to deter his sister from taking up the search, despite the angry reaction of her mother, Olivia, and the polite disapproval of Elliott Wallace, Carolyn's honorary uncle, who is clearly in love with Olivia.

Carolyn's pursuit of the truth about Mack's disappearance swiftly plunges her into a world of unexpected danger and unanswered questions. What is the secret that Gus and Lil Kramer, the superintendents of the building in which Mack was living, have to hide? What do Mack's old roommates, the charismatic club owner Nick DeMarco and the cold and wealthy real estate tycoon Bruce Galbraith, know about Mack's disappearance? Is Nick connected to the disappearance of Leesey Andrews, who had last been seen in his trendy club? Can the police possibly believe that Mack is not only alive, but a serial killer, a shadowy predator of young women? Was Mack also guilty of the brutal murder of his drama teacher and the theft of his taped sessions with her?

Carolyn's passionate search for the truth about her brother -- and for her brother himself -- leads her into a deadly confrontation with someone close to her whose secret he cannot allow her to reveal.

Just Take My Heart
IN WORLDWIDE BESTSELLING SUSPENSE WRITER MARY HIGGINS CLARK’S SPELLBINDING NEW THRILLER, A BROADWAY STAR’S MURDER IGNITES A SHOCKING SERIES OF DEADLY EVENTS. . . .

After famous actress Natalie Raines is found in her home, dying from a gunshot wound, police immediately suspect her theatrical agent and jealous soon-to-be-ex-husband, Gregg Aldrich. But no charges are brought against him until two years later, when a career criminal suddenly claims Aldrich had tried to hire him to kill her.

The case is a plum assignment for attractive thirty-two-year-old assistant prosecutor Emily Wallace. She spends long hours preparing for the trial, and unaware of a seemingly well-meaning neighbor’s violent past, gives him a key to her home to care for her dog.

The high-profile trial makes headlines, threatening to reveal personal matters about Emily, such as the fact that she had a heart transplant— especially when she experiences eerie sentiments that defy all reason and continue even after the jury decides Gregg Aldrich’s fate.

But little does she know, now her own life is at risk. . . .

Rose Garden ($2.24), by Susanna Kearsley

Book Description
Eva Ward returns to the only place she truly belongs, the old house on the Cornish coast, seeking happiness in memories of childhood summers. There she finds mysterious voices and hidden pathways that sweep her not only into the past, but also into the arms of a man who is not of her time.

But Eva must confront her own ghosts, as well as those of long ago. As she begins to question her place in the present, she comes to realize that she too must decide where she really belongs.

From Susanna Kearsley, author of the New York Times bestseller The Winter Sea and a voice acclaimed by fans of Gabaldon, du Maurier, and Niffenegger alike, The Rose Garden is a haunting exploration of love, family, the true meaning of home, and the ties that bind us together.

Simon and Schuster has a trio of titles from Jonathan Kellerman,, the first three in the Alex Delaware series, for $3.99 each.

When the Bough Breaks
In the first Alex Delaware novel, Dr. Morton Handler practiced a strange brand of psychiatry. Among his specialties were fraud, extortion, and sexual manipulation. Handler paid for his sins when he was brutally murdered in his luxurious Pacific Palisades apartment. The police have no leads, but they do have one possible witness: seven-year-old Melody Quinn.

It's psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware's job to try to unlock the terrible secret buried in Melody's memory. But as the sinister shadows in the girl's mind begin to take shape, Alex discovers that the mystery touches a shocking incident in his own past.

This connection is only the beginning, a single link in a forty-year-old conspiracy. And behind it lies an unspeakable evil that Alex Delaware must expose before it claims another innocent victim: Melody Quinn.

Blood Test
Dr. Alexander Delaware, a child psychologist in Los Angeles, is called in to evaluate the case of a leukemia patient whose parents want to discontinue chemotherapy. When the boy disappears from the hospital and his parents are found dead, the only leads are the boy's sensual older sister and a holistic-meditative cult called The Touch. Delaware's search for the child takes him to a small town near the Mexican border where he finally unearths the dark secrets kept by the boy's family and the townspeople. He also uncovers drugs and group sex in the commune and survives a few harrowing attempts on his life. (Particularly well-drawn is a failed assassination at the tale's end, which has intriguing mythic echoes.) As in his praised first novel, WHEN THE BOUGH BREAKS, Kellerman draws on his experience as a clinical psychologist to enrich and broaden his considerable storytelling talents. Imbued with a vivid sense of place and featuring a strong supporting cast, including Milo Sturgis, Delaware's burly gay detective friend, this second adventure points happily toward an Alex Delaware series.

Over the Edge
When the phone rings in the middle of the night, child psychologist Alex Delaware does not hesitate. Driving through the dream-lit San Fernando Valley, Alex rushes to Jamey Cadmus, the patient he had failed five years before?and who now calls with a bizarre cry for help. But by the time Alex reaches Canyon Oaks Psychiatric Hospital, Jamey is gone, surfacing a day later in the hands of the police, who believe Jamey is the infamous Lavender Slasher, a psychotic serial killer. Wooed by a high-powered attorney to build a defense, Alex will get a chance to do what he couldn?t five years ago. And when he peers into a family?s troubled history and Jamey?s brilliant, tormented mind, the psychologist puts himself at the heart of a high-profile case. Because Alex knows that in a realm of money, loss, and madness, something terrible pushed Jamie over the edge?or else someone is getting away with murder.

Shades of Milk and Honey ($2.99), by Mary Robinette Kowal

Book Description
The fantasy novel you’ve always wished Jane Austen had written

Shades of Milk and Honey is exactly what we could expect from Jane Austen if she had been a fantasy writer: Pride and Prejudice meets Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. It is an intimate portrait of a woman, Jane, and her quest for love in a world where the manipulation of glamour is considered an essential skill for a lady of quality.

Jane and her sister Melody vie for the attentions of eligible men, and while Jane’s skill with glamour is remarkable, it is her sister who is fair of face. When Jane realizes that one of Melody’s suitors is set on taking advantage of her sister for the sake of her dowry, she pushes her skills to the limit of what her body can withstand in order to set things right—and, in the process, accidentally wanders into a love story of her own.

Read an eBook Week - Day 3

It's day three of Read an EBook Week.

Time limited offers for today:

• central avenue publisher has two books up: What Scotland Taught Me by Molly Ringle; Sister Serenity and the War of 2059 by Scott Burkhead; Ramblings of a Love Sick Masochist by Dan Schwartz
• Twilight Times Books has added Monkey Trap by Lee Denning
• The Untreed Reads Store is giving away The Zagzagel Diaries: Forsaken by Bryl R. Tyne
• Dorrance Publishing is giving away Satan’s Looming Identity Crisis! The Final War in the Age of Reason by I. A. Mallone
• RoseDog Books offering New Lives for Old by Fenton and Evelyn Babcock
• Red Lead Press is offering Murder at Hale’s Ferry by Lenora Whiteman

I suggest using Internet Explorer for those last three, as I had problems getting them with FireFox, for the third day in a row (the last confirmation won't run it's script and load the PDF file).

Promos all week:

• Smashwords
• Author promos
• Publisher promos
• Retail outlet promos

Today's Deals

Additional formats on free books:

• Girls to the Rescue (K/N)

Quiver ($1.99), by Holly Luhning, is today's Kindle Deal of the Day. It looked good enough that I bought it the last time it was at this price (but haven't gotten around to reading it...).

Book Description
A masterful debut thriller about the original female Dracula and an underground gothic cult reenacting her ritualized killings in present day London

In sixteenth-century Hungary, Countess Elizabeth Bathory tortured and killed over six hundred servant girls in order to bathe in their blood. She believed this practice would keep her skin youthful and her beauty immortal.

Quiver tells the story of Danica, a forensic psychologist who works at a former insane asylum-turned-forensic hospital. One of Danica’s mental patients is Malcolm Foster, who is imprisoned for murdering a fourteen-year-old girl. Foster is a menacing but fascinating patient and Danica begins to suspect that Foster may have been the head of a gothic cabal idolizing Bathory. Her peers dismiss her discoveries, while disturbing incidents begin following her home from work.

Soon after her arrival in London, Danica receives a mysterious note from Maria, a seductive archivist with whom Danica has had an intriguing and complicated past. Maria claims she has Bathory’s diaries that chronicle her relentless torture of young women. As Maria increasingly insinuates herself into Danica’s life, soon Danica is in too deep to notice that Maria’s motivations are far from selfless; in fact, they may just cost Danica her life.

Mister Creecher ($1.57 / £0.99 UK), by Chris Priestley, is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK (the US edition is $2.51, which is also a decent bargain on this one). I also spotted another of his titles on an even bigger discount, The Teacher's Tales of Terror ($0.70 / £0.44 UK), although this one doesn't have a US edition that I can see.

Mister Creecher
Billy is a street urchin, pickpocket and petty thief. Mister Creecher is a monstrous giant of a man who terrifies all he meets. Their relationship begins as pure convenience. But a bond swiftly develops between these two misfits as their bloody journey takes them ever northwards on the trail of their target . . . Victor Frankenstein.

Friendship, trust and betrayal combine to form a dangerous liaison in this moving and frightening new book from Chris Priestley.

The Teacher's Tales of Terror
Chris Priestley has readers on the edge of their seats in this trio of terrifying stories as a teacher and his pupils share three spine-chilling tales. But, of course, with a very surprising ending that resounds like a slamming door on a quiet night!

Executive's Compass: Business and the Good Society ($2.99 Kindle, B&N), by James O'Toole, is the Nook Daily Find, price matched on Kindle.

Book Description
American society has become increasingly polarized by single- and special-interest groups: the Greens, who demand environmental purity; admirers of Japan who want a national industrial policy; supply-side economists who want government to all but disappear. This collision of values has turned America into a battleground of either/or tradeoffs: the community vs. the individual, the environment vs. jobs, the rights of each ethnic group vs. the needs of the nation for unity. Whose values should prevail? Those of Libertarians? Communitarians? Egalitarians? Corporatists? The nation's leadership role in the post-communist world will be largely determined by how such conflicts in the political economy are resolved.

Increasingly, business executives find themselves drawn into these values wars, forced to make decisions in a hothouse climate in which there are countless and conflicting opinions about what is right and wrong. Business leaders find themselves caught in the values thicket when they attempt to formulate corporate policy on such issues as plant closings, executive compensation, corporate governance, and affirmative action. In The Executive's Compass, James O'Toole guides business leaders through this minefield of modern dilemmas. In the words of ARCO's CEO, Lod Cook, "O'Toole provides business leaders with a practical compass to help them navigate the turbulent waters of social change and political conflict."

O'Toole explores the philosophical and historical underpinnings of contemporary business problems, tracing their origins to the ideas of such great thinkers as Aristotle, Adam Smith, J.S. Mill, and Jefferson. By going to the roots of modern issues, he is able to clarify the sources of political disagreement, and to suggest a practical course of action for corporate leaders who find themselves caught in the gridlock of democracy. He provides an innovative values compass--a tool he has honed for over forty years as a moderator of the Aspen Institute Executive Seminar--which has been successfully applied at FORTUNE 500 firms as an introduction to the values-based management for which the Aspen Institute is renowned. The compass helps executives to understand what is wrong (and right) with our democratic system, and what the role of business is in creating The Good Society.

For top executives, general managers, or anyone trying to make sense out of our rapidly changing world, The Executive's Compass helps managers deal more effectively with today's thorny issues.

Shark vs. Train ($9.99 Kindle, $4.99 B&N), by Chris Barton and Tom Lichtenheld, is the Nook Daily Find for Families. Note that the nook edition will only work on the NOOK Color and NOOK Tablet, while the Kindle edition works on all devices and apps, although it does say it is optimized for larger screens (I suspect an iPad or similar tablet would be ideal).

Book Description
Shark VS. Train! WHO WILL WIN?!

If you think Superman vs. Batman would be an exciting matchup, wait until you see Shark vs. Train. In this hilarious and wacky picture book, Shark and Train egg each other on for one competition after another, including burping, bowling, Ping Pong, piano playing, pie eating, and many more! Who do YOU think will win, Shark or Train?

Four Free Books for Aussies (K)

There are four new pre-orders for Australians in the Kindle store today, all published by HarperCollins. None of these are available for US customers.

Phoenix Rising, a Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences novel by Tee Morris and Pip Ballantine, is the oddest of the lot. This was 99 cents for US customers last December, was delivered, then disappeared from the Kindle market. Now, it's back, but as a free pre-order and only for those in Australia (who could, I suppose, also buy the other version available for Aussies only, which costs $8.72, instead).

Book Description

Evil is most assuredly afoot—and Britain’s fate rests in the hands of an alluring renegade . . . and a librarian.

These are dark days indeed in Victoria’s England. Londoners are vanishing, then reappearing, washing up as corpses on the banks of the Thames, drained of blood and bone. Yet the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences—the Crown’s clandestine organization whose bailiwick is the strange and unsettling—will not allow its agents to investigate. Fearless and exceedingly lovely Eliza D. Braun, however, with her bulletproof corset and a disturbing fondness for dynamite, refuses to let the matter rest . . . and she’s prepared to drag her timorous new partner, Wellington Books, along with her into the perilous fray.

For a malevolent brotherhood is operating in the deepening London shadows, intent upon the enslavement of all Britons. And Books and Braun—he with his encyclopedic brain and she with her remarkable devices—must get to the twisted roots of a most nefarious plot . . . or see England fall to the Phoenix!

The Voice is a novella by Anne Bishop. This one does have a US edition ($2.99), although they are not linked together. Also included is an excerpt from her upcoming Bridge of Dreams (AU/US)

Book Description
In a small village outside the city of Vision, the people know no sorrow or grief. But this seemingly idyllic community is hiding a terrible secret. As a young child, Nalah did not know why she was told to bring a cake to the mute girl known as the Voice whenever she was upset, only that doing so made her feel better. Now grown, Nalah understands the dark truth, and yearns to escape from the oppressive village that has been her life-long home. But it is only after visiting the city of Vision and discovering the Temple of Sorrow that Nalah understands what she must do to be free…

From author Jessica Adams, there are a pair of titles, The Holiday Goddess Handbag Guide to Rome and The Holiday Goddess Handbag Guide to London, from a planned 4-part series (one of which is available,The Holiday Goddess Handbag Guide to New York, just not free, and the last one is not yet listed).

Book Description
Like a trusted and impossibly cool girlfriend you rely on to inspire and surprise you, THE HOLIDAY GODDESS HANDBAG GUIDE reveals the secrets of what women REALLY want to know about four of the world's most fabulous cities: Paris, London, New York and Rome. Born in a handbag from scribbled tips shared between holiday goddesses whose work, love and life adventures scattered them all over the globe, it will take you where few women have been before. Release your inner goddess as you follow Audrey Hepburn's footsteps in Rome, delve into the secret diaries of shopaholics in New York, learn 'chiconomical secrets' in Paris, where to love the nightlife in London, and how to find to-die-for shoes, lustworthy cult local brands,the best vintage markets, heavenly spas or sanctuaries to escape the hustle and bustle, the most original art, the best live music, where to eat, love, and eat some more. Elegantly packaged in red linen, it's as irresistibly chic as a designer handbag and ten times more useful - the must-have accessory for goddesses who love to travel or just enjoy dreaming about it.