Book Blitz: Skip Carter: Henchman for Hire by J. Von Swan

 

Skip Carter: Henchman for Hire
J. Von Swan
Publication date: October 13th 2026
Genres: Action, Adult, Humor

From the award-winning author of the Wolf of Vanaheim series comes a story about the guy nobody roots for — until now.

Skip Carter isn’t a hero. He’s a former soldier, ex-con, and lifelong screw-up whose only real talent is taking punches and showing up anyway. So when a shady agency offers to rent him out as muscle for supervillains, he figures it’s just another paycheck.

But between ridiculous costumes, insane bosses, and jobs that always end in broken bones, Skip starts to realize the real losers are the guys stuck cleaning up after the chaos. And when a world-ending threat finally hits Skytropolis, he gets one shot to stop being the disposable henchman and start being the man his daughter believes he can be.

Darkly funny, surprisingly heartfelt, and packed with action, Skip Carter, Henchman for Hire is for anyone who’s ever felt like the sidekick in their own story.

Goodreads / Amazon

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EXCERPT:

Mrs. Fuller glanced down her list. “Okay! Next we have… Mr. Carter.”

Peggy turned around in her chair and locked eyes with me. Her smile wasn’t just excitement. It was encouragement. A silent You can do this.

My chest tightened as I stood, smoothing the front of my suit jacket with sweaty hands. The room stared at me with pure, unfiltered child curiosity. No judgment yet. Just curious attention like they were hoping I might be someone I’m not.

I walked to the front of the classroom, facing a row of small faces that believed adults were all responsible, stable people with their shit together. And I realized, with sudden clarity, that I had no idea what to say.

I opened my mouth but nothing came out.

Awkward, uncomfortable silence stretched. The kind that crawls across your skin and whispers everyone is watching you screw this up.

I cleared my throat and glanced at Dr. Ramirez. He studied me like he was trying to place how he knew me from his emergency room.

“Uh. Hi, kids.”

A few of them waved like I was a minor celebrity. Someone whispered something and giggled.

“My name is Skip Carter. I’m Peggy’s dad.”

Peggy sat up straighter at that. Pride radiated off her like a heat lamp.

“I, uh… I used to be in the military.” That part was safe and true. Technically documented despite the dishonorable discharge. “And now I work in… private security.”

That sounded boring enough to pass. Mrs. Fuller nodded approvingly.

Jayden, the dog lover, raised his hand immediately. “Do you protect people?”

Every instinct screamed at me to lie. To say yes. To let that be the end of it. Protecting people was clean. Simple. Noble.

Instead, honesty slipped out like a bad habit.

“Not really,” I said.

Jayden frowned with confusion. “So then what do you do?”

I choked a little. “I… help make sure certain situations go the way they’re supposed to.”

That felt vague enough to dodge the truth while still being technically accurate. I had spent years perfecting that skill.

A girl with neat, black braids and a pink sweater raised her hand. “Do you stop bad guys?”

“No,” I said, and immediately regretted it. “I mean, sometimes other people stop them.”

She also frowned like I’d just told her Santa wasn’t real.

Another hand shot up. “Do you stop burglars from stealing stuff?”

I shook my head. “No.”

The kids started exchanging confused looks. The magic was leaking out of the room.

From the back, a voice cut through the air. “My mom says he’s a henchman.”

Some of the kids immediately giggled.

I looked toward the sound. It was Billy from next door. He was wearing a Captain Justice T-shirt and a smug expression. The kind of kid who repeated adult conversations without understanding why they hurt.

Peggy whipped around in her seat. “Shut up, Billy!”

Mrs. Fuller stepped forward. “Billy, that’s not appropriate–”

Billy wasn’t done. “She says henchmen work for supervillains and help them hurt people.”

Every pair of eyes swung back to me.

I felt heat crawl up my neck, into my face. The suit suddenly felt too tight.

Peggy stood up in her seat. “My dad knows all the superheroes!”

That part was technically true. Unfortunately.

Billy smirked. “Then does he know Captain Justice?”

I exhaled slowly. “Yeah,” I said. “I know Captain Justice.”

Billy’s eyes lit up. “Is he awesome in real life?”

I thought about Captain Justice and all the times he had knocked out my friends. About him swooping in to stop us even when the jobs were small. About the time he punched a henchman who was injured and trying to surrender.

“He’s kind of a blowhard,” I said.

Author Bio:

J. Von Swan is the award-winning author of the Wolf of Vanaheim series. He retired from law enforcement as a Sergeant in 2024 after the birth of his first daughter. During his career, he served on both the SWAT team and the mental health unit, experiences that now influence his writing and dark sense of humor. He now writes full-time and instructs law enforcement part-time at the community college.

J. Von Swan lives in Colorado with his family, where he spends his time enjoying the outdoors and imagining dragons that still need slaying.

Website / Goodreads / Facebook / Instagram

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Skip Carter: Henchman for Hire Blitz

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Release Blitz: Stormhold by Ember Raine

STORMHOLD

 Ember Raine

Release Date: October 17 

Connect with Ember Raine:

https://www.instagram.com/authoremberraine/ 

Blurb:

STORMHOLD is a standalone, dark romance set in a hierarchical Gotham-inspired city ruled by the Stormholds. This is a slow-burn, forced-proximity, Beauty and Beast meets Batman romance that follows an assassin, who, on the path of avenging her family, makes an unlikely alliance with the most powerful and ruthless heir to Twin City and ends up tangled in the storm’s eye with him.

She's an assassin on the hunt for justice

He's the heir on the hunt for revenge

The rules are simple in Twin City: follow the word of the Stormholds, and order will be maintained. But someone has disobeyed.

Arkane Stromhold, the sole heir, also known as the Beast of the Twins, is an unemotional strategist who will do anything to keep his family legacy safe. So when a sinister threat called the White Hand wants both his city and his head, Arkane devises a complicated trap to lure the enemy. Only to be blindsided by the beautiful assassin who breaks into his house, stirring an unrecognizable emotion in him.

At sixteen, Bellerose Esteal has had everything taken away from her. Now, stationed as a Lower resident of the Twins, she works as a librarian by day and a deadly assassin at night, never forgetting the blood promise she made all those years ago.

On one such hunt, she infiltrates the Beast’s mansion and finds the city’s threat has somehow connected to her family’s demise. With little choice, the Beauty proposes an unlikely alliance with the Beast. And the Beast, surprisingly, agrees. To bring down the enemy or keep her close—he’s not sure.

Soon, Arkane and Belle find themselves right in the eye of the storm, caught in a tangle of lies, betrayal, and fiery passion. But the enemy is closer than she thought, and the path demands blood, and when blood falls, death must follow…

Author's note: This book is intended for mature audience and contains some intense themes and graphic violence. Please visit the author's website for a full list of content warnings or contact the author.

Buy Link:

https://a.co/d/01z9PXCk 

Available in KU 

 

Teaser: Not Done Yet by Brian Nelson

 

 

The Magical Run of the College Team That Lost Its School

Nonfiction; Sports, Baseball

Date Published: 11-17-2026

Publisher: Mission Point Press

In the spring of 2024, Birmingham-Southern College’s baseball team learned that their 170-year-old school would close before their season ended. Rather than surrender to disappointment, Head Coach Jan Weisberg and his players rallied around the program’s culture of playing for the person beside them. Amid uncertainty, grief, and growing national attention, the young team mounted a remarkable final run built on resilience, brotherhood, leadership, and purpose. More than a baseball story, Not Done Yet explores how people respond when the future they expected disappears—and what it means to finish with integrity when everything around you is ending.

Excerpt

The rise and ultimate fall of Birmingham-Southern College, a small liberal arts school on a hilltop in Birmingham, has a history that mirrors the fortunes and struggles of the United States since the mid-nineteenth century. In 1859, Alabama Southern University opened its doors in Greensboro but nearly closed them two years later when most of its all-male student body left to fight in the Civil War. By 1866, the student body had dwindled to twenty-eight. The school quickly rebounded, however, and in 1889, the graduating class numbered 289 students, including the first woman graduate.

In 1898, another Methodist school, Birmingham College, was established less than a hundred miles away. The new college was perched on a hill near the western edge of the rapidly growing city of Birmingham. After the Civil War, the two cities were a study in contrasts. While Greensboro was still largely dependent on cotton, Birmingham had made the smart move to steel, and its booming economy led to its nickname: “The Magic City.” By 1918, it was clear that two Methodist colleges this close together would be unsustainable. The answer: merge the two and call the new school Birmingham-Southern College.

The merger solved an immediate problem, and BSC thrived—for a while—but faced a devastating enrollment drop during World War I. The college hung on during the Great Depression but lost most of its male students and faculty during World War II. Two decades later, the Civil Rights Era brought new challenges. BSC became an early supporter of the movement, enrolling its first Black students in 1965, and continued to embrace diversity as a core part of its mission.

 

About the Author

 

 Brian Nelson is a lifelong baseball fan, former player, and dedicated coach whose love for the game spans generations. A pitcher at the University of California, Santa Barbara in the 1980s, he later coached his three sons and their teammates through Little League, high school, and college. Drawing inspiration from a deeply literary family—especially his grandfather and mother—Nelson brings an analyst's brain, a storyteller’s heart, and impressive baseball knowledge to his writing. After a multi-decade career in finance, he has returned to his earliest passion to tell this story. This is his first book.

Contact Link

Goodreads

Preorder Links

https://mybook.to/NotDoneYetMagicalRun

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

Mission Point Press

Cover Reveal: You and Me for Evermore by Jordan Bates

 

YOU AND ME FOR EVERMORE

Jordan Bates

Release Date: November 20 

Meet Jordan Bates:

A romance author, who writes true romance about couples who just want to live a full life.

Connect with Jordan Bates:

https://www.instagram.com/authorjordanbates/

Blurb:

Jemma Hall has spent her adult life creating art to call her own. After leaving Nashville seventeen years ago, she built a quiet life centered on her studio, her work, and the one friendship she trusts. That is, until her past comes back—the boy she loved as a teen, who broke her heart. He now threatens the very life she’s worked so hard to preserve—distancing herself from her family, memories she’s buried, and the carefully constructed life she’s built without him.

Beckett Lowry has spent twenty years regretting one decision that changed his life completely. He never thought he’d see Jemma again, but when he does, he’s determined to not let her get away. Leaving Nashville gave him the opportunity to create his own music career away from his family and with his best friend. He now has the chance to build his own family with the woman he has always loved, if he plays by her rules.

Thrust into each other’s lives thanks to their best friends’ relationship, rules are set in place to maintain boundaries, but what starts as something meant to be fun quickly turns into something more complicated as emotions resurface. Haunted by their past, can Jemma and Beckett work through years of history to achieve their evermore?

Pre-Order Link:

https://books2read.com/u/mgA2G7

Cover Reveal: Winning Season by Felice Stevens

 

WINNING SEASON

Felice Stevens

Release Date: November 10 

Meet Felice Stevens:

Felice Stevens writes romance because what is better than people falling in love? Her favorite part of a romance novel is that first kiss…sigh. She loves creating stories of hopes and dreams and happily ever afters. Her stories are character-driven, rich with the sights, sounds and flavors of New York City and filled with men who are sometimes deeply flawed but always real.

Felice writes M/M romance because she believes that everyone deserves a happily ever after. Having traveled all over the world, she can safely say that the universal language that unites people is love. 

Felice has written in a variety of sub-genres, including contemporary, paranormal and has a mystery series as well.

Felice is a two time Lambda Literary Award nominee and the Lambda Literary Award winner for Best Gay Romance for her book, The Ghost and Charlie Muir.

Connect with Felice Stevens:

https://www.instagram.com/felicestevens/

Blurb:

Xavier Lord is a bitter man. Outed by his teammates and his college football scholarship withdrawn, life has taught him not to trust or believe in anyone but himself. Xavier—or X, as he calls himself to preserve his anonymity—has built a business on athlete’s mistakes. His hit podcast, You F'ed Up, dissects and calls out their bad plays with zero mercy. Lately his favorite target is Phoenix Young, the Lancaster Legends’ gorgeous but struggling new quarterback.

Phoenix Young has it all: the stats, drive, and championship dreams. Yet since his trade to the Legends, he’s unable to deliver, stumbling to a losing record. As one of the few out, gay players, he feels like he’s let the team and fans down. He’s bearing the burden alone—along with a secret he refuses to reveal: Someone’s been leaving him ugly, anonymous notes. He tries to ignore them and takes the blame for losing solely on his shoulders, but he’s never felt so alone and defeated.

When Xavier and Phoenix hook up on a dating app, one night turns into more, and both fall hard and fast—until Xavier panics and shuts things down, certain Phoenix wouldn’t want a man who makes a living tearing him apart.

Except he does.

But a relationship runs the risk of Xavier losing credibility with his listeners and Phoenix losing his teammates’ trust and friendships. Meanwhile, the ugly notes haven’t stopped. And they have no idea who’s writing them.

Pre-Order Link:

https://a.co/d/00siha3M 

Release Blitz: Craving Silence by Freya Barker

 

Title: Craving Silence (Silence Series, #5) Author: Freya Barker Genre: Romantic Suspense Release Date: October 16, 2026 Hosted by: Buoni Amici Press, LLC.

Nurse practitioner, Dana Kerrigan, finds her steady and comfortably predictable life suddenly turned upside down as the result of a family emergency. With no choice but to take a leave from work, she has to hustle to keep Silence’s favorite pub running and her parents looked after. When heartbreak brings with it an unexpected opportunity to realize a long-held dream, it presents a new set of problems. One that involves murder, and the man sent to investigate.

As a recent transplant to Silence, sheriff’s detective, Rick Althof, was aiming for less stress and more solitude. Instead, he finds himself frequently drawn to The Kerrigan, a popular pub in town, to enjoy a meal, a beer, and—if lucky—a friendly chat with the owner’s pretty daughter. Still bearing the invisible scars of past mistakes, he’s determined to keep things friendly, despite a growing attraction.

However, his resolve is put to the test when she lands in the middle of an elaborate development scheme involving bribery, blackmail, and even murder.

AMAZON | APPLE BOOKS | NOOK | KOBO

“What’s the deep sigh for?” he asks from his perch on the ladder, as I fold the last of the towels. “It’s a satisfied sigh,” I explain, picking up the stack of laundry to carry upstairs. “The kind that comes with being able to check a box off my list.” A faint smile appears on his lips. “You’ll have another to check off soon,” he offers. “I’m almost done here.” I’ve been so busy studying the man, I failed to notice how quickly he’s made his way around to the last remaining wall in the kitchen. “I see that. It looks amazing.” I glance around the space, mentally noting some patchwork that will need to be done, but at least the horrific wallpaper is gone and the walls will be ready for some paint soon. Maybe I can do some of that after work this week. “Let me run these upstairs real quick, and I’ll help with the clean up.” My linen closet sports organized stacks of linens and towels, everything sorted by type and size. I guess I’m a little anal, but I love when everything has a place. It makes life so much easier. Maybe that need for predictability is why my life had become such a rut before Mom’s health took a nosedive and forced me to pivot and adapt. But that process also showed me there is so much more to life if you can be open to change. That kind of flexibility takes time though, and like a muscle that has been dormant for a long time, it needs to be used and exercised. I’m working on it. Half an hour later I haul the last garbage bag stuffed with discarded wallpaper to the back porch. Leaning over the railing, I twist my head to look up at the sky which is studded with stars. I missed the sun going down, and the temperature must’ve dropped about fifteen degrees. It’s cold out, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we drop below freezing tonight. Inside, I find Rick in the kitchen with a serious expression on his face. He may have been watching me. “You have to go…” I guess. He shakes his head in response and slowly approaches. His hands slide around the sides of my neck as he tilts my chin up with his thumbs. His eyes are deep blue pools I find myself drowning in. His voice is low and his words send a delicious shiver down my spine. “I wasn’t planning on going anywhere.” Closing my hands around his wrists, I lift up on my toes until my lips almost touch his. “Yippie,” I whisper, before taking the initiative.

USA Today bestselling author Freya Barker loves writing about ordinary people with extraordinary stories.

With forty-plus books already published, she continues to create characters who are perhaps less than perfect, each struggling to find their own slice of happy.

Recipient of the ReadFREE.ly 2019 Best Book We've Read All Year Award for "Covering Ollie, the 2015 RomCon “Reader’s Choice” Award for Best First Book, “Slim To None”, Finalist for the 2017 Kindle Book Award with “From Dust”, and Finalist for the 2020 Kindle Book Award with “When Hope Ends”, Freya spins story after story with an endless supply of bruised and dented characters, vying for attention!

GRAB YOUR COPY AND START TODAY!

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Release Blitz: Rain or Shine by Eva Simmons

 

RAIN OR SHINE

Eva Simmons

Release Date: October 16 

Meet Eva Simmons:

Eva Simmons writes dark and dreamy romance with complex heroines and broken, dirty-talking bad boys who fall hard for them.

 

When Eva isn’t dreaming up new worlds or devouring every book she can get her hands on, she can be found spending time with her family, painting a fresh canvas, or playing an elf in World of Warcraft.

 

Eva is currently living out her own happily ever after in Nevada with her family.

CONTACT: HELLO (@) EVASIMMONS.COM

Connect with Eva Simmons:

https://www.evasimmons.com/links 

Blurb:

A biker strikes a deal with a cowgirl runaway bride in this opposites attract, western motorcycle club romance. Sons of Anarchy meets Yellowstone with high-stakes danger, small town grit, a delicious slow burn, and scandalous spice.

The moment I climb on the back of Shane Donovan’s motorcycle in my wedding dress, I know I’m in trouble. His club is at war with the local ranchers in my small Texas town, and worse, he’s at war with my ex. One bad decision puts a target on my family’s back, and now Shane is the only one who can help.

So we strike a deal. I’ll pretend to be his girlfriend to improve his reputation around town and he’ll protect me from my ex-fiancé.

Strictly business. No feelings. No attachments.

Until stolen kisses turn into late-night confessions, and our fake relationship starts to feel very real. In Shane’s dark eyes is the acceptance I’ve always wanted. And beneath his inked hands is the freedom I’ve been searching for.

But when someone attacks my family’s ranch and sets my home on fire, our arrangement sends both our lives up in flames—literally. Shane isn’t the only one with secrets hiding in his past. I’ve paid in blood for my mistakes. This time, if I’m not careful, I’ll pay with my heart.

Buy Link:

https://a.co/d/00kNUgAS 

Available in KU