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Virtual Book Tour: AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE by C.I. Jerez * March 18 – April 18, 2025 *

“C.I. Jerez’s enchanting novel, AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE is a captivating and poignant debut about a young mother’s struggle to heal from the scars of war following her deployment to Iraq as a U.S. Army medic. Jerez’s deeply moving prose dives into the realities of war for women in combat, the complexities of serving while balancing motherhood, and the sacrifices made. This heartwarming novel captures the beauty of Puerto Rico’s culture and leaves us wanting more!” – Robert Dugoni, author of Suspense Magazine’s 2018 Book of the Year, The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell

“C.I. Jerez’s AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE is an astonishing debut; an eloquent, moving, and heartfelt story about a young mother’s efforts to claw herself back from the precipice for the sake of her young son, even as she is convinced that she is beyond redemption. Jerez’s compelling prose and deep insights into Puerto Rican culture elevate this thoughtful and thought-provoking novel. I loved this book!” – Karen Dionne, author of the #1 internationally bestseller The Marsh King’s Daughter and The Wicked Sister

“Rich with culture, vivid characters, and elegant prose, AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE is a knockout debut by an author who is sure to leave a bright literary mark on this world. I was swept away.” – Boo Walker, bestselling author of An Echo in Time

“C.I. Jerez’s debut novel is a fresh and immersive delight. Somber and heartfelt. AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE offers a flawed but substantiative protagonist plagued by the psychological trauma of war as she returns home to face her family’s failed expectations. It is also a love letter to the island of Puerto Rico and its people, a richly woven tapestry, filled with wonderfully palpable details. From beginning to end, I was utterly transported.”– Barbara Davis, bestselling author of The Echo of Old Books

AN IRAQ WAR VETERAN RETURNS TO PUERTO RICO TO RECONNECT WITH—AND CONFRONT―THE PAST IN A HEART-WRENCHING NOVEL ABOUT DUTY, MOTHERHOOD, AND THE HEALING POWER OF HOME.

Inspired by her time as an Army Officer during the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, C.I. Jerez has written a heartbreaking and gripping debut novel, AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE (Lake Union; March 18, 2025), about a single mother who returns to her native Puerto Rico with her son to heal from the trauma of war. 

Says Jerez, “As a writer, I want my stories to positively promote Latin culture, real-life struggles that deeply affect our society, and representation of people of color and people with disabilities. With AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE I hope to entertain AND elevate these voices.”

As a combat medic, Lina LaSalle went to Iraq to save the lives of fellow soldiers. But when her convoy is attacked, she must set aside her identity as a healer and take a life herself.

Although she is honored as a hero when she returns to the US, Lina cannot find her footing. She is stricken with PTSD and unsure of how to support her young son, Teó, a brilliant, loving little boy with Tourette’s. As her attempts to self-medicate become harder to hide, Lina realizes she must do the toughest thing yet: ask for help.

She retreats to her parents’ house in Puerto Rico, where Teó thrives under her family’s care. Lina finds kinship, too―with a cousin whose dreams were also shattered by the war and with a charming and compassionate veteran from South Carolina who also sought refuge on the island and runs a neighborhood bar.

But amid the magic of the island are secrets and years of misunderstandings that could erode the very stability she’s fighting for. Hope lies on the horizon, but can she keep her gaze steady?

AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE is a harrowing and redemptive novel from an exciting new Latin American voice that sheds light on women war veterans and the debilitating trauma they face, as well as the healing power of family and Puerto Rican culture.

To help celebrate the publication of AT THE ISLAND’S EDGE, we are hosting a virtual book tour with this stellar list of book influencers who will post reviews, features, and giveaways. We hope you will follow along!

Tuesday, March 18: WE LOVE BIG BOOKS AND WE CANNOT LIE

Tuesday, March 18: STOREYBOOK REVIEWS

Wednesday, March 19: BOOKS N BIKRAM

Thursday, March 20: BOOKALONG

Friday, March 21: SUNFLOWER BOOK LOVER

Friday, March 21: MEOWSKINS BOOKSKINS

Monday, March 24: BOOKS AND COFFEE MX

Monday, March 24: SUBAKKA BOOKSTUFF

Tuesday, March 25: THE BOOK CLUB MOM

Wednesday, March 26: BOOKS ON MY MIND

Thursday, March 27: WBTB BOOK REVIEWS

Friday, March 28: THE READING BLACK GIRLS

Saturday, March 29: THE MADDIE HATTER

Monday, March 31: BEE IS FOR BOOKS

Monday, March 31: JENS TOWERING TBR

Monday, March 31: STORIES ON BOOKSHELVES

Tuesday, April 1: NURSE BOOKIE

Wednesday, April 2: NIK’S BOOKSHELF

Thursday, April 3: DANISH MUSTARD READS

Friday, April 4: SUE THE BOOKIE

Monday, April 7: MELANN ROSENTHAL

Tuesday, April 8: LEXIJAVA

Tuesday, April 8: 2 MANY BOOKS 2 LITTLE TIME

Wednesday, April 9: BOOKS AND BIEWERS

Thursday, April 10: GLORIANA WONG

Friday, April 11: SPEEDREADSTAGRAM

Monday, April 14: MICHELLE LOVES BOOKS

Tuesday, April 15: MY BURSTING BOOK BAG

Wednesday, April 16: A BLUE BOX FULL OF BOOKS

Thursday, April 17: WE BREAK FOR BOOKS

Thursday, April 17: LOVE MY BOOKS 2020

Friday, April 18: BOOK DRAGON 217

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August 2021 Virtual Book Tour for TWO SPIES IN CARACAS by Moisés Naím, translated into English by Daniel Hahn

Release date: August 1, 2021, Amazon Crossing

A “gripping political thriller that immerses the reader in the volatile Bolivarian revolution led by Venezuelan army colonel Hugo Chávez…This is a must for anyone who wants to explore this tumultuous and often strange period in modern Latin American history.” – Publishers Weekly

Mark your calendars for this fantastic virtual book tour for TWO SPIES IN CARACAS by Moisés Naím and translated into English by the talented Daniel Hahn.

Moisés Naím has been called “one of the world’s leading thinkers” (Prospect Magazine) and is one of today’s most widely read columnists on international economics and geopolitics. In the early 1990s, he served as Venezuela’s Minister of Trade and Industry, as director of Venezuela’s Central Bank, and as executive director of the World Bank. He is a Distinguished Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, DC and a best-selling author of 14 nonfiction books, including the New York Times bestseller The End of Power, which was selected by the Washington Post and the Financial Times as one of the best books of 2013. Naím’s background and extensive knowledge of the rise and fall of Venezuela in the 21st century offer the perfect foundation for his debut novel.

SYNOPSIS:

TWO SPIES IN CARACAS is the best combination of historical fiction, spy thriller and romance set against the passions and betrayals of Hugo Chavez’s revolution. Although fiction, the story is inspired by more than two decades of research, as well as Naím’s direct access to the best-informed sources about what happened in Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela.  The result is a captivating page turner based on unimaginable real-life events.

Venezuela, 1992. Unknown colonel Hugo Chávez stages an ill-fated coup against a government, igniting the passions of Venezuela’s poor and catapulting the oil-rich country to international attention. For two rival spies hurriedly dispatched to Caracas—one from Washington, DC, and the other from Fidel Castro’s Cuba—this is a career-defining mission.

Smooth-talking Iván Rincón of Cuba’s Intelligence Directorate needs a rebel ally to secure the future of his own country. His job: support Chávez and the revolution by rallying the militants and neutralizing any opposing agents.

Meanwhile, the CIA’s Cristina Garza will do everything in her power to cut Chávez’s influence short. Her priority: control the greatest oil reserves on the planet by ferreting out and eliminating Cuba’s principal operative.

As Chávez surges to power, Iván and Cristina are caught in the fallout of a toxic political time bomb: an intrepid female reporter and unwitting informant, a drug lord and key architect in Chávez’s rise, and personal entanglements between the spies themselves. With everything at stake, the adversaries find themselves at the center of a game of espionage, seduction, murder, and shifting alliances playing out against the precarious backdrop of a nation in free fall.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Moisés Naím is an internationally syndicated columnist and the host and producer of Efecto Naím, an Emmy winning weekly television program on international affairs that has been aired throughout the Americas since 2012 via NTN24/DirecTV. Naím was the editor-in-chief of Foreign Policy magazine for 14 years and is the author of many scholarly articles and 15 books on international economics and politics. In 2011, he received the Ortega y Gasset prize, the most prestigious award for journalism in the Spanish language. His 2013 book, “The End of Power”, a New York Times bestseller, was selected by the Washington Post and the Financial Times as one of the best books of the year. In the early 1990s, Naím served as Venezuela’s Minister of Trade and Industry, as director of Venezuela’s Central Bank, and as executive director of the World Bank.  He was previously professor of business and economics and dean of IESA, Venezuela’s leading business school. Dr. Naím holds MSc and PhD degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and lives in Washington, DC. For more information visit https://www.moisesnaim.com/.

ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR:

Daniel Hahn is a writer, editor, and translator with nearly seventy books to his name. He chaired the Translators Association for two years and served four years as a director of the British Centre for Literary Translation and four years as editor of the journal In Other Words. Recent translations include Juan Pablo Villalobos’s I Don’t Expect Anyone to Believe Me, Julián Fuks’s Resistance, and Carola Saavedra’s Blue Flowers. For more information, visit www.danielhahn.co.uk.

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May 2021 Virtual Book Tour for ALL SORROWS CAN BE BORNE by Loren Stephens

Announcing the fantastic lineup for the virtual book tour for All Sorrows Can Be Borne by Loren Stephens, a beautifully written new novel that explores how families are shaped by political and economic circumstances, tremendous loss and ultimately forgiveness. We are thrilled to have all of these bloggers on board and can’t wait for the reviews, spotlights, guest posts and giveaways! The novel will be out 5/11 from Rare Bird Lit.

SYNOPSIS: Inspired by true events, All Sorrows Can Be Born is the story of Noriko Ito, a Japanese woman faced with unimaginable circumstances that force her to give up her son to save her husband. Set in Hiroshima, Osaka, and the badlands of eastern Montana and spanning the start of World War II to 1982, this breathtaking novel is told primarily in the voice of Noriko, a feisty aspiring actress who fails her audition to enter the Takarazuka Theater Academy. Instead, she takes the “part” of a waitress at a European-style tearoom in Osaka where she meets the mysterious and handsome manager, Ichiro Uchida. They fall in love over music and marry. Soon after Noriko becomes pregnant during their seaside honeymoon, Ichiro is diagnosed with tuberculosis destroying their dreams.

Noriko gives birth to a healthy baby boy, but to give the child a better life, Ichiro convinces her to give the toddler to his older sister and her Japanese-American husband, who live in Montana. Noriko holds on to the belief that this inconceivable sacrifice will lead to her husband’s recovery. What happens next is unexpected and shocking and will affect Noriko for the rest of her life.

ADVANCE PRAISE:

“So many of us have suffered this past year or so.  Many of us have had to dig deep within ourselves to learn how to bear sorrows and loss.  Many of us have looked to the past for inspiration to get through difficult times. For all these reasons, Loren Stephens’ All Sorrows Can Be Borne has come at the exact right time. Inspired by true events and real people, the story looks at pain and suffering but also the ultimate triumph of love, forgiveness, and compassion. I loved the book.” —Lisa See, author of The Island of Sea Women and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan

“Starting with the heart-wrenching opening chapter of All Sorrows Can be Borne, Loren Stephens weaves a tale of love, family and loss with a page-turning plot. Both harrowing and tender, this generous and emotional novel pulls you into a story of character and place that’s hard to put down. This is a beautiful book.” —Barbara Abercrombie, author of The Language of Loss

“All Sorrows Can Be Borne is a harrowing story of love and betrayal, all the more heartbreaking because it is based on family history. Post-war Japan comes alive in these pages, and even the most unforgivable acts make a tragic kind of sense when viewed through the prism of violence that marked every one of the war’s survivors. As this tale makes clear, in the wake of such trauma, humans can do the unthinkable, both to and for the ones they love.” —Aimee Liu, author of Glorious Boy

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Loren Stephens is a widely published essayist and fiction and nonfiction storyteller. Her work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, MacGuffin, the Jewish Women’s Literary Annual, The Forge Literary Magazine, Crack the Spine, Lunch Ticket’s Amuse Bouche series, The Write Launch, The Summerset Review, The Montreal Review, and Tablet travel magazine, to name a few. She is a two-time nominee of the Pushcart Prize and the book Paris Nights: My Year at the Moulin Review, by Cliff Simon with Loren Stephens was named one of the best titles from an independent press by Kirkus Book Reviews. She is president and founder of the ghostwriting companies, Write Wisdom and Bright Star Memoirs. Prior to establishing her company, Loren was a documentary filmmaker. Among her credits are Legacy of the Hollywood Blacklist with on camera narration by Burt Lancaster, produced for PBS and nominated for an Emmy Award; Sojourner Truth: Ain’t I A Woman? produced for Coronet Films and recipient of a Golden Apple from the National Education Association; and Los Pastores: The Shepherd’s Play produced for the Latino Consortium of PBS and recipient of a Cine Gold Eagle and nominated for an Imagen Award. She is a member of the Regional Board of the Anti-Defamation League; a member of its Deborah Awards Committee for Outstanding Women; and a member of Greenlight Women, an organization of women in the entertainment industry who serve as mentors. For more information visit https://writewisdom.com/.

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March and April Blog Tour for THE VINES by Shelley Nolden

Release Date: March 23, 2021 from Freiling Publishing

Mark your calendars for this great Blog Tour lineup for Shelley Nolden‘s THE VINES, which is historical fiction and suspense at its best. It’s both a breathtaking novel that explores a long-forgotten place and an ominous thriller that keeps you on the edge of your seat as the story unravels. In this debut—the first book in a planned series—Nolden skillfully weaves together a page turner, spanning over a hundred years, that’s set on New York City’s abandoned North Brother Island.  

ADVANCE PRAISE: “THE VINES weaves beautiful writing around an unsettling mystery:  Who is the strange, scarred woman living on a seemingly uninhabitable island? Shelley Nolden’s debut seems not just prescient – given the world’s current focus on virology and immunizations – but also timeless, as it illustrates in painful detail how mankind seems destined to repeat our cruelest mistakes. Luckily for us readers, there’s a bright thread of hope running through this book as well as the promise of a sequel.”  —Sarah Pekkanen, #1 NYT bestselling co-author of You Are Not Alone

“Highly original and richly drawn, Shelley Nolden’s THE VINES features one of the most fascinating central characters you’ll ever meet. Drawing on both the dark history of North Brother Island and today’s painfully immediate worries about immunity and transmission of deadly disease, this debut transcends genre to combine history, thrills, obsession, medical ethics, and more into the compelling story of three generations of doctors and one remarkable woman.”— Greer Macallister, bestselling author of The Magician’s Lie and The Arctic Fury 

“Eerily timely and profoundly compelling, THE VINES is an unputdownable, unforgettable saga, the journey of a seemingly helpless, persecuted American woman who survives and battles back, against all odds; this first in what promises to be an explosive series signals the arrival of Shelley Nolden’s masterful new voice in hybrid fiction.”— May Cobb, author of The Hunting Wives

SYNOPSIS: In the shadows of New York City’s North Brother Island stand the remains of a shuttered hospital and the haunting memories of quarantines and human experiments. The ruins conceal the scarred and beautiful Cora, imprisoned there by contagions and the doctors who torment her. When Finn, a young urban explorer, arrives on the island and glimpses the enigmatic woman through the foliage, intrigue turns to obsession as he seeks to uncover her past–and his own family’s dark secrets.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: A graduate of the University of Minnesota, Shelley Nolden is an entrepreneur and writer, now residing in Wisconsin. Previously, she lived in the New York City area, where she worked on Wall Street and first learned of North Brother Island. At the age of 31, Shelley was diagnosed with leukemia and completed treatment three years later. The sense of isolation and fear she experienced during her cancer ordeal influenced her spellbinding debut novel, THE VINES

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February Blog Tour for THE JUICE by Janet Stilson

Release Date: February 9, 2021 from Dragon Moon Press

We are excited to introduce to you a new female voice to the sci fi and fantasy genre, Janet Stilson, a journalist who also writes scripts, novels and short stories that illuminate the human condition in provocative ways.  Her work has been selected to be part of the Writers’ Lab for Women, which is funded by Meryl Streep and Nicole Kidman. And it’s also been published by the esteemed sci-fi literary magazine Asimov’s. Her debut novel, THE JUICE is at turns an espionage rollercoaster ride and a spellbinding romance. Along the way, it explores the future of America and government control of media. Check out the February Blog Tour schedule in the above graphic and also on the author’s website.

SYNOPSIS:

When charisma is a superpower, it’s a mind-bending force.

Jarat Ellington was just an exile from Elite society, trying to lead a simple life, when a genius friend dropped an explosive mystery in his lap. The old pal, Thom Tseng, created a priceless chemical substance called the Juice that turns mildly charming people into almost god-like presences, known as Charismites. But the Juice is stolen, and Thom killed.

With the help of a secret organization, Jarat goes on an obsessive quest to uncover the deadly adversary who now controls the Juice. He must fight his intense attraction to a Charismite named Luscious Melada—once a dirt-poor, homely teen who transformed into an extremely magnetic starlet. And he goes up against Petra Cardinale, a powerful, ambitious media executive with a secret agenda.

About the Author:

Janet Stilson lives in two worlds. On the one hand, she is a journalist. On the other, she writes scripts, novels and short stories that largely fall in the grounded sci-fi and fantasy genres and illuminate the human condition in provocative ways. 

Her work has been selected to be part of the Writers’ Lab for Women, which is funded by Meryl Streep and Nicole Kidman. And it’s also been published by the esteemed sci-fi literary magazine Asimov’s.

As a journalist, Janet got her “chops” at the storied showbiz bible Variety. She has traveled the world, chronicling the business of media and entertainment.

It afforded her many busman’s holidays in places like Shanghai and Paris, for which she is forever grateful. Along the way, she interviewed lots of executives about many aspects of showbiz—most notably, where the heck we’re all going.

Janet lives in New York City with her husband and two mischievous cats. To learn more about her, visit janetstilson.com, or connect with her on Twitter @janetstilson.

Praise for the Novel:

“Stilson debuts with an energetic vision of a dystopian near-future America…This cyberpunk adventure delivers plenty of future tech and social commentary to please genre fans.” — Publishers Weekly

“The Juice is a rollicking, inventive and insightful read — heady, heart-felt but never heavy-handed.”  — Elizabeth Guider, novelist, former executive editor of Variety and editor of The Hollywood Reporter

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