Showing results by author "Nicole C." in All Categories

Adam and his bandmates have a little ritual: every night, after their performance, they compete to see who can bag the hottest girl. Adam is usually the winner, despite being the short, skinny guy. He’s got a certain charm that girls like.

Coffin Blossoms. A reminder that hope does spring eternal. In death itself, there is often beauty, life, and on rare occasions, even humor. The 24 stories in this anthology straddle the line between humor and horror in unique ways. Some wearing a wry smile. Others with tongue firmly in cheek. Ghosts, demons, vampires, myths, monsters, and murderers turned on their heads and shaken ‘til dizzy, then presented for you here, in Coffin Blossoms....

Xavier Stone, a well-known investigative journalist, doesn’t normally do client work, but it’s hard to turn down Brian Ashdale Sr., who is desperate to find his lost son. Brian Ashdale Jr. had just turned eighteen when he vanished, leaving behind nothing but a cryptic note. Many have tried to find Brian; none have succeeded.

Michael’s life was normal, until his manager convinced him to dress up as a girl for a promotional TikTok video. It was meant to be silly, and then the video went viral. Michael is the reason for the video’s success; his transformation in that ten-second clip has strangers coming into the store to get selfies with Michael. All over the country, guys are sending pictures of a dolled-up Michael to their friends, trying to prank their buddies into admitting they think he looks ‘hot’.

Ryan never thought he would step foot into the town’s new massive apartment/mall/recreation mega-complex. It always seemed like some consumerism nightmare dystopia… Until one day, Ryan needs a place to live, and the prices in Mayland Park are just too good to be true. And it turns out, life in the mega-complex is actually pretty fantastic: modern living, amazing affordable food, and happy people everywhere.

In the vastness of the human experience, we sometimes overlook the relationships most precious to our hearts. That of our sacred privilege and responsibility to nurture all children. Conscious Brain Training from your heart is a key to cultivating happiness.

Eli is in an awkward position. An injury has sidelined his twin sister, Madison, just a week before the most important figure skating competition of her season. She can’t compete—but she has an idea. Eli used to skate too, before the bullying at school drove him off the ice. Now, if he wants to help his sister, he’ll have to put the skates back on—and slip into a blonde wig and Madison’s tiny, sparkling skating dress.

Born Bright, C. Nicole Mason's powerful memoir, is a story of reconciliation, constrained choices, and life on the other side of the tracks. Born in the 1970s in Los Angeles, California, Mason was raised by a beautiful but volatile 16-year-old single mother. Early on, she learned to navigate between an unpredictable home life and school, where she excelled. By high school, Mason was seamlessly straddling two worlds.

Callum keeps hearing rumours: impossible tales about a mysterious trans woman. Guys are saying that if you touch her private area and make a wish, that wish will come true. Absurd. But those rumours keep circulating, and some guys insist that it’s real. Then, one night, Callum sees her. And by chance, he finds himself alone in a bathroom with her—so he decides to take the risk. He touches it and makes a small wish, and then the wish comes true…

Bobby wants to lose weight, so he’s thrilled when one of the most sought-after personal trainers in town offers him an unbeatable deal. Maeve is determined to whip Bobby into shape using her refined but unorthodox program, which includes her own brand of protein shakes and huge stack of motivational DVDs, which Bobby is supposed to play each night as he goes to sleep. Within weeks, it’s obvious that the program is working. But something else is happening. Bobby’s body is changing—and not just in terms of weight loss.

Mike made a joke about the way his girlfriend dresses, and now he’s in big trouble. On the way home from an out-of-town wedding, Ellie kicks Mike out of her car, way out in the middle of nowhere. He thinks she’s just bluffing when she drives off… but she never does come back. And to make matters worse: Mike is wearing the tiny dress and heels she wore at the rehearsal dinner the night before. He put it on as a joke at that wedding, right before making the joke that prompted their early exit. Now, Mike has to figure out how to get home, stuck in that dress, with no money and no phone.

In tales buzzing with possibility, hope, innovation, anger, and tenderness, Tasting Light offers a dazzling challenge to connect with open minds, hearts, and senses in a fast-changing world.

Lou just found out he’s got a rare cancer, and only has a few months left to live. He’s naturally distraught for a few days, and then he gets a call from an experimental research facility. They’ve been testing a ‘cure’ for that specific cancer, and Lou has been accepted into the trial. He’s not ready to celebrate yet, but he’s hopeful… though the trial is much stranger than he expected, involving a wet-nurse instead of an injection.

When Myles goes to the hospital to get his ankle X-rayed, he doesn’t expect to find a gorgeous blonde young woman sobbing in the cafeteria. He approaches her to see if she’s okay, and then discovers that she was just given six months to live.

Damian just landed a dream apprenticeship with a famous luthier. There’s just one issue: it’s unpaid. He needs to find a way to live during his apprenticeship, and weekends at Subway aren’t cutting it. Thankfully, an old high-school classmate can get Damian into an experimental drug trial that pays thirty bucks a day, and more than likely, Damian will be put into a control group and given a placebo. What is there to lose?

Every year, Finn dreads the company’s mandatory talent show. If he puts in real effort, his coworkers laugh. If he phones it in, his managers raise their eyebrows. But this year, there’s a way out—or so it seems. His coworker Anthony is organizing a group act: twenty guys dressed up as women for a goofy mock fashion show. It’s low-effort, low-stakes, and the perfect excuse to blend into the background. But Finn’s transformation turns out too convincing. So convincing, in fact, that no one believes there’s a guy beneath the minidress and lipgloss.

Everyone knows about Anika’s Book of Secrets. She’s spent years gaining the trust of her classmates to find out their secrets, which she keeps in her heavily-coded secret-encyclopedia. No one’s ever seen the book, never mind had the opportunity to attempt to crack the code. That is until Keith finds out his secret is catalogued in the book. He will do anything to get that book to stop others from finding out what he did. By some miracle, he gets his hands on it, and he gets right to cracking the code so that he can have his page removed.

This book provides an insightful, sometimes humorous guide to help abolish the notion that you have to be superwoman in order for your life to matter. The idea of being all things to all people could be at least part of the reason why you are not truly happy and healthy. The goal of this book is to help you truly examine the elements in your life that serve as stressors disguised as necessary evils. Let's face it - many of the evils we manage on a day-to-day basis are not necessary.

With The Healthy Kidney Handbook, you’ll learn what you can do before your kidney health starts to suffer, including understanding the anatomy of the kidneys and exactly what makes them function, learning good nutrition and how you can upgrade your diet, improving your access to consistent exercise, discovering how current weight-loss drugs and diabetes can affect your kidney health, and so much more.

Dr. C. Nicole Swiner---wife, mother, best-selling author and publisher, family doctor and #nosuperwoman expert. Ric Swiner--husband, father, veteran news anchorman and journalist, photographer, videographer and DJ Big Fella NC. ---------- This all began as an Instagram Live series, which was a lot of fun and, hopefully, there are little nuggets that we shared and will share here. We also did this for posterity, so that our kids can watch and read it later, when they grow up, and see how Mom and Dad survived the pandemic. We also wanted to carry on the tradition of what we've been doing for ...