Indulge in 25 breathtaking adventures of dangerous worlds
where the lines blur between saints and sinners.
Come meet the creatures that fuel your every lust filled nightmare, where
angels are not always encased in a light of righteousness and demons
are not always dealing in all manner of debauchery. Where you might
just end up rooting for the bad guy…
If you like demonic games, angelic interventions, and thrilling
temptations, you’ll love this urban fantasy and paranormal romance
collection of twisted proportions in Wings of the Wicked.
This post is sponsored by DiamondLinks. Any opinions expressed are my own. This post is not meant to take place of legal advice. I am not a legal professional.
I’ve been thinking about creating an LLC for my blog for a few years now. I’ve known other bloggers that have done it but was a little shy about pulling the trigger. On one hand I had this blog I created, I make a side income on it, and I’m considered a professional blogger. On the other hand, did I really need to? Did I want to spend the money? Where do I even start? I’m no a lawyer! I don’t have a business degree! Help!
I looked into those online legal sites but I wasn’t going to get away without spending at least $350 for what seemed like the minimum but the way they worded things made it seem like you needed a lot more. I looked into getting a lawyer but just to get my foot in the door was going to be $225 not to mention what other charges there were. Well it turns out I have a friend that’s a legal secretary for a local lawyer and she guided me through the process getting an LLC for my blog in Pennsylvania. It was a lot easier than what I expected.
All of the links you need for business formation forms in Pennsylvania can be found here. I chose to do an LLC to help protect my personal assets should anything crazy happen. For my blog the only things I needed for my LLC in Pennsylvania was the certificate of organization form and the docketing statement. Eventually I will do a fictitious name too.
Hearing some of the scary stories of what have happened to a few bloggers and reading inspiring stories like Matt Redhawk and Parker helped me finally take the step. I’m proud to say the paperwork and check for my LLC are in the mail to Harrisburg!
Different states and different types of businesses have different needs. If you are not sure about what your state or business needs, it’s best to consult a legal professional
This post is sponsored by DiamondLinks. Any opinions expressed are my own.
About 10 years ago my husband and I bought our first house together. The house was right next to a church and used to be a church rectory. It had sat on the market for about a year before we bought it and we got an amazing price on it. We knew there was work that needed done on it but they told us it had a new roof, siding, windows, and door put on it. Those are big things so we were ok with the other work that needed done.
Since it was a church that was selling the house we also trusted their word, especially since the siding, windows, and door appeared to be new and the roof “looked” new.
We had to water-proof the basement, upgrade the electrical system because it still had old knob and tube wiring. The house needed insulated, we had insulation blown in. We did that. We gave the bathroom a facelift. A couple years into the house we started noticing little water spots on the drop ceilings. Eventually it lead to water pouring into our living room. We ended up finding out the church didn’t actually FIX they roof. They were aware it had holes and just had someone put shingles over it! So we started researching roofers.
The first thing we did was a local search to see who we had to choose from. So let’s say you live in Tampa you’d do a search for roofers tampa. After you find a few names you can look and compare on site s like Angie’s list or Home Advisor. Most importantly, in my opinion as around to your local family, friends, and co-workers.
We ended up finding a contractor called George Beckett and Sons out of New Paris, PA. They were about an hour from us. We didn’t know if they’d be able to do it. We also got quotes from 2 other contractors. Beckett and Sons ended up being the lowest quote so we asked around. Had a lot of good feedback about them so we hired them.
From the time they started work in November that year it only took them a week to get the entire roof on including fixing our back porch roof that was bowing. I told my husband, every time I looked outside they were working. There was no standing around. Honestly I’d expect them to take a break once in a while but when they were there they WORKED. We recommend them to anyone local.
**Dystopian coming-of-age with superintelligent A.I.**
Rebecca Cordeaux knows exactly what her future will hold: she will
marry
Andy, her crush of the last five years. Once Andy is ready to settle
down, she’s sure he will discover that she is his soulmate. After
several small parts on stage, Rebecca knows she can become a renowned
actress. Her writing also shows promise as a future author. Robots
perform most human jobs that can be automated, leaving many free to
pursue their personal creative interests.
But Rebecca’s mother Karen fears the new world of robots, and insists
her
brilliant daughter join a university research team, studying the
hazards of a complete robotic economy. Rebecca’s father Quentin was
obsessed with the subject to a degree that even her mother considered
absurd, prior to his untimely death. So long as she can reserve
enough of her time to pursue her true passions on the side, Rebecca
half-heartedly agrees to join the research team, if only to please
her widowed mother. There she joins a post-doc named Liam, whose
conspiracy theories rival even those of her late father. Liam is
convinced that world Republic leader William Halpert’s worldwide
challenge for researchers to develop synthetic creativity will lead
not to the promised utopia, in which every kind of human suffering
has been eradicated, but rather to an apocalypse. Rebecca, whose best
friend is her own companion bot Madeline, writes Liam off as a
bot-hating conspiracy theorist, just like her father was… until she
learns that her father’s death might not have been due to mere
happenstance.
With Liam’s help, Rebecca learns of an underground organization known
as
The Renegades, where Quentin Cordeaux was considered a legend. While
Liam attempts to stop Halpert’s challenge if he can, Rebecca tries
to unravel the mystery of what happened to her father. Did he and
many of his contemporaries die for something they knew? Who is the
mysterious informant who calls himself John Doe, and only seems to
want to drive her out of harm’s way? And if Halpert’s challenge
is answered, will it usher in a brave new chapter in humanity’s
history… or were Quentin Cordeaux’s dire predictions right all along?
Rebecca Cordeaux’s entire world has been turned upside down. In a
single
day, she’s learned that Senate Leader Halpert and his Board of
Advisors are actually illegal humanoid robots created underground
twenty years ago—and they tried to have her killed. Her mother
Karen, whom she always believed to be passionately against the cause
of the Renegades, turns out to be their leader. And Liam, a man she
never thought she cared for, is now fighting for his life—and she
finds that she cares desperately.
Fortunately Karen, known to the Renegades as M, has planned for
exactly
this sort of eventuality. Using Rebecca’s father’s blueprints, Karen
patiently built an underground compound in an abandoned part of the
Americas where they can regroup and plan for the coming war. The
compound becomes an unlikely oasis as their number grows, both on
accident and on purpose. In attempting to recover her best friend and
companion bot Madeline, Rebecca gets what she thought she’d always
wanted: Andy arrives at the compound too, along with her friends Jake
and Julie. But with the sudden addition of an old flame from Liam’s
past, Rebecca discovers just how little acquainted she has been with
her own heart.
Meanwhile, the Silver Six are running a worldwide campaign of
indoctrination
to ensure that the people are on their side. In the name of peace, they
want nothing more than to wipe out every shred of resistance, while
pursuing their ultimate goal of robotic superintelligence. With the
assistance of a neuroscientist who helped to build the Silver Six
decades ago, Rebecca attempts to understand how synthetic minds work,
hoping this information can be used against them. She’s sure that
the mysterious, brilliant, and beautiful Alessandra Russo is the key
somehow, but Alex’s hatred for the Silver Six is only matched by
her hatred for the Renegades. Can the Renegades find and exploit the
weakness of the Silver Six before synthetic intelligence passes the
point of no return?
The Silver Six have blown the Renegades’ underground compound to bits,
killing several of Rebecca’s best friends in the process—and to
her horror, the boy Rebecca had convinced herself she loved for all
these years was the one to betray them all. At the same time, General
Specs, the company Liam was once slated to inherit, has developed a
superintelligent robot called Jaguar which is quickly becoming
godlike in her omniscience. As the remaining Renegades flee to their
last bastion of safety in the Caribbean, Liam makes his way back to
London, in a last ditch effort to convince his father to destroy
Jaguar before it’s too late.
Rebecca, meanwhile, finally understands her own heart: she never loved
Andy.
He was merely a ‘safe’ choice who would never require anything of
her. Liam, on the other hand, exasperating as he was, had seen past
her defenses. All of his teasing and provoking had been his attempt
to get her to be real with him—but the more he made her feel, the
further she had retreated. She had even substituted her companion bot
Madeline for real, deep human friendships, and for the same reason:
she’d been avoiding love to protect herself from another loss like
the one she had experienced when her father was killed for the
Renegades’ cause. Ironically, she only realizes this once Liam is
on his way to a similar fate. But she’ll be damned if she lets him
go without a fight.
This high stakes conclusion to the Uncanny Valley Trilogy envisions a
world not too far off from our own, in which superintelligence is a
reality, humanoid bots have supplanted human power and influence, and
there are eyes watching and reporting our every move. If humanity is
to survive, the Renegades will have to galvanize support across the
globe, under the radar—and it will require every last bit of
ingenuity they possess. But is attempting to outwit a
superintelligent being really the answer? Or will it require
something much more fundamentally human?
C.A. Gray is the author of three YA Amazon bestselling trilogies:
PIERCING THE VEIL (magic and quantum physics meet Arthurian legends),
THE LIBERTY BOX (dystopian metaphysics and mind control technology),
and UNCANNY VALLEY (dystopian coming-of-age with neuroscience and
super intelligent A.I). She starts with some scientific concept that
she’s interested in learning more about herself, and then creates
lots of epic chaos and high-stakes action to go along with it. Her
stories are free of gratuitous violence, language, and sexual
content, and she abhors depressing endings… but they’re not all
kittens and rainbows either! She also listens to and reviews
audiobooks on her website, here on Goodreads, on Instagram, and on
her podcast, Clean Audiobook Reviews, where she also
occasionally interviews other authors.
By day, C.A. Gray practices naturopathic medicine, podcasts, and writes
medical non-fiction under her maiden name (Dr. Lauren Deville). She
lives in Tucson, AZ with her husband Frank, and together they
maintain an occasionally contentious film review blog (under her real
name: Lauren Baden. Three names. Yes.) She’s kind of the queen of
multitasking—so in her spare time, she creates whatever meals or
crafts she found most recently on Pinterest, drinks lots of coffee
(Aeropress btw) and occasional wine (reds—and she saves the corks
for craft projects), works out (while listening to audiobooks), and
studies the Bible—about half of the podcasts on Christian Natural
Health are scripture meditations.
Prologue
Everyone was there—all five-hundred and fifty-four residents of Casa Linda, the rural suburb of
Phoenix, Arizona. Babies cried while mothers shushed; children who didn’t know any better
chased each other on the artificial grass turf of the park. All of the adults stood in stony silence,
resentful of the man whose image was shortly to appear.
“I dunno why we’re all so upset,” muttered Roy Benson to no one in particular. “Not like he can
take anything else away from us at this point, can he?” Benson wore a white wife beater that
gaped open over his protruding belly, like he always did ever since he’d lost his job as a
labyrinth connection consultant.
“I think we’re all just holding our breath, for fear he might come up with something else to take
away—‘for our own good,’ of course,” replied Lyle Hopper, seated on a folding chair below him.
Hopper, once a good looking and vigorous businessman, was now missing a few teeth. He also
breathed heavily, as if the exertion of conversation was too much for him. “Although frankly I’m
not sure killing me would be much worse than stealing my business.”
“That’s what I’m saying,” Benson replied. “We’re useless, we have no purpose, and we’re
subsisting on the damn charity of a bunch of bots and the elite few like Halpert. How much
worse—”
William Halpert’s holographic projection interrupted Benson, appearing on the amphitheater
stage of the little park. He was surprisingly short, only about five foot four, though the politician
was a giant in other respects. He grinned in magnanimous greeting, spreading wide his hands
to encompass everyone who had gathered before both this stage and every other in the world.
They all knew that his words would be simultaneously translated into every language across the
globe. Mothers hissed at their scampering children to quiet down so that everyone could hear.
“Friends,” Halpert said, “thank you for gathering here today as one global community. I know
you are all busy with your active lives—”
Benson snorted and Hopper gave a derisive laugh. “Sure, I’m so busy I ran out of crossword
puzzles this morning,” muttered Hopper.
“—so I will get right to the point. I gathered this global community together to make a very
special announcement.
“As you all know, twenty years ago the Council of Synthetic Reason determined that in order to
protect humanity, all bots must be limited by two rules: they must serve only a single core
purpose in the service of humanity, and they must be readily identifiable as bots.
“The advancement of bots since then has changed the face of our world. It’s changed the way
we do business.”
“Or don’t do business,” muttered Benson.
“But we have come upon a significant limitation which those of us in the Capital have been
working on for years. It is this: while the bots are excellent at learning facts and applying
information, and can do so faster and more accurately than the most intelligent human, they
lack the critical ingredient of creativity which would allow them to apply the information they
know—within their core purpose, of course. For that, we still require humans, and an inevitable
disconnect occurs between the bots as they transfer their wealth of knowledge, and the humans
who are expected to utilize it for new breakthroughs.
“Now I come to the reason why I have gathered you together today. The major tech companies
and universities of the globe have all agreed that creativity requires emotion. It is impossible to
have one without the other. The problem is twofold, however: we barely understand the natures
of human emotion and creativity, let alone how to translate them both into circuits and program
our bots with such abilities.
“But I believe, and I know you all do too, that the group mind is vastly superior to that of any one
individual. Therefore, in an act of stunning generosity, these great companies and universities
have all agreed to open source their research thus far. This means everything the human race
has ever amassed in the neuroscience of human emotion and creativity, as well as all advances
toward algorithms to encode the same, will now be freely available via the labyrinth in the hopes
that universal access will yield much quicker results.
“This is a big task. I’m asking us to come together and find the answer to a question that has
perplexed philosophers for millenia: what is it that makes us human? But in a world where
knowledge doubles every six hours, I believe we are up to the task.
“Thank you very much for your time and attention. I will personally update you of any breaking
news in this field. I wish you all a very good morning, good day, or good evening—whatever
time it is where you are!”
Halpert’s image vanished from the stage.
As the people began to disperse, one woman in her fifties stood alone, frowning at the now-
empty amphitheater. She tapped her temple to access the Artificial Experience chip implanted
there.
“Call Rebecca,” she said, fishing her AE goggles out of her purse and putting them on. She saw
a few of the townspeople shoot her dirty looks, but she ignored them. To a person, they
disapproved of any flashy show of the technology which had so changed the face of their world.
A few minutes later, she was in her twenty-one year old daughter’s dormitory room in Dublin.
The room was dark, until Rebecca sat up and flipped on the light.
“Mom! Really?” she looked at the analog clock hanging on her wall, which she had found at an
antique store. Her auburn hair stuck up in every direction, and she rubbed the sleep out of her
eyes. “Do you know what time it is here?”
“Why weren’t you up watching Halpert’s address?”
“Because it’s four am, and I was performing last night, and then I was at the cast party until like
midnight! I’ll find out what he said soon enough—”
“How close are your experiments to finding the source of human emotion?” her mother cut her
off.
Rebecca blinked. “What? Not close at all, why?”
“Get on the labyrinth and watch the replay of Halpert’s address and call me back. You might
want to put your musical theater and novelist careers on hold. Turns out your senior thesis is
now the hottest topic in the world.”
Follow the tour HERE
for exclusive excerpts, guest posts and a giveaway!
This post is sponsored by My Gift Stop. Any opinions expressed are my own.
If you’ve walked into the stores recently you’ll realize that the next gift giving holiday on the calendar is Valentine’s day. No kidding, I’ve been in several stores that already have Valentine and spring stuff out! Seriously.
My husband and I usually just make plans to have dinner together and maybe we’ll have a movie night in. We make Valentine’s day about spending time together. When we do buy each other gifts I don’t want it to be just anything. I want to give him something nice, something he might not normally spend the money on for himself. For me, I love it when he surprises me with piece of jewelry he picked out himself or a handbag he knows I’ve had my eye on. For him, it might be a good watch or a some luxury accessories for his desk. That’s where My Gift Stop comes in.
You can find all these items and more at My Gift Stop. My Gift Stop is THE place to go to find luxury items like watches on a budget. You can find the brand names your Valentine wants like:
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Kate Spade
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Michael Kors
Oakley
Prada
and many more!
Never pay full price for your luxury gifts. You can find the gifts you want at great prices. My Gift Stop also donates 5% of every sale to the global medical relief non-profit, Direct Relief. So you can feel good knowing that you got a great gift and are helping to give back!
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