Welcome to the Fall Christian Fiction Scavenger Hunt!

If you’ve just discovered the hunt, be sure to start at Stop #1, and collect the clues through all the stops, in order, so you can enter to win one of our top 5 grand prizes!

  • The hunt BEGINS on 11/7 at noon MST with Stop #1 at LisaTawnBergren.com.
  • Hunt through our loop using Chrome or Firefox as your browser (not Explorer).
  • There is NO RUSH to complete the hunt—you have all weekend (until Sunday, 11/10 at midnight MST)! So take your time, reading the unique posts along the way; our hope is that you discover new authors/new books and learn new things about them.
  • Submit your entry for the grand prizes by collecting the CLUE on each author’s scavenger hunt post and submitting your answer in the Rafflecopter form at the final stop, back on Lisa’s site. Many authors are offering additional prizes along the way!

Hi! My name is Lynn H. Blackburn and I write romantic suspense with a southern accent.

You can learn more about me and all my books here on my site and on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

The best way to stay up to date is by subscribing to my newsletter or hanging out over at my Facebook reader group, The Deep Divers. My most recent novel is One Final Breath, the third and final (sniff!) book in the Dive Team Investigations series. Here’s what it’s about: 

When investigator Gabriel Chavez had his cover blown by an aggressive reporter, the silver lining was being able to rejoin the dive team. The downside? Dive Team Captain Anissa Bell—a woman who both fascinates and frustrates him.

Anissa grew up a missionary kid on an Indonesian island and always planned to return after college. But she remained stateside, determined to solve the case that haunts her—the murder of her best friend and the disappearance of a three-year-old child.

When Anissa’s fractured past collides with Gabe’s investigation into the tragic shooting death of a teenage boy in Lake Porter, they’ll have to put their complicated history with each other aside in order to uncover the identity of a killer. What they’ll discover is that revenge has no statute of limitations.

I’m a Carolina girl and I set the Dive Team Investigations series in the fictional city of Carrington, North Carolina.

WHY I CHOSE A FICTIONAL SETTING

Carrington, North Carolina isn’t real, y’all, but I wish it was! 

One of the reasons I chose a fictional setting for my Dive Team Investigations series was that the city in my mind doesn’t exist! But that’s what makes fictional settings so fantastic. They can be whatever you need them to be. I set Carrington in central North Carolina, roughly in the area between Chatham and Randolph counties. In my mind, I simply squeezed those counties to the sides and put Carrington County and the all-so-important to the story Lake Porter right there in the middle. 

The fictional Lake Porter is modeled off several major lakes in that area of North Carolina including Badin and Jordan, but also three of the lakes of the Upstate of South Carolina—Keowee, Hartwell, and Jocassee. I learned to scuba dive in Keowee and Jocassee and definitely had those lakes in mind when I pictured the diving scenes. Jocassee has multiple dive sites and I can envision the team teaching Dr. Sabrina Fleming (from In Too Deep) to dive there. And the point where Leigh lives in Beneath the Surface—and where the opening scene of One Final Breath occurs—is a version of a real area on Lake Keowee. 

If you want to see some of the images I used to inspire the story scenes, I have Pinterest boards for all three books and I’d love for you to visit me there!

Here’s the Stop #21 Skinny:

If you’re interested, you can order One Final Breath on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBook.com or at your local bookstore! 

Clue to Write Down: adjectives

Link to Stop #22, the Next Stop on the Loop: Deborah Raney’s site! 

But don’t go just yet!

I’m offering any one of my Dive Team Investigations series books to three entrants.

All you have to do is sign up to get my e-newsletter (top right of my home page) or note that you’re already a subscriber. Additional points to those who join my reader group, The Deep Divers and to those who follow me as an author (@LynnHBlackburn) on Goodreads, Instagram, BookBub, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter! (USA only)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Grace and peace,


One Final Breath is out in the world and the reception has been amazing!

To celebrate the release of One Final Breath and the conclusion of the Dive Team Investigations series, my publisher, Revell, has put together an absolutely fabulous giveaway.

The Grand Prize

is a Carolina Basket from Southern Supreme and a full set of Dive Team Investigations books. Southern Supreme is located in central North Carolina and I’m 100% sure that it is a favorite of the Dive Team! 😉 It’s absolutely a favorite of the author!

The First Prize

is a Coffee Sampler and a full set of Dive Team Investigations books. Let’s face it, Anissa’s not the only one who can’t live without her coffee in the morning. 🙂

The Second Prize

is a $10 Starbucks gift card and a full set of Dive Team Investigations books. If your heart is warmed by some pumpkin spice lattes, then you’ll be able to grab one and maybe another to share with a good friend!

To enter, you can click here. You’ll have opportunities to grab more entries by signing up for my newsletter, checking out my author page on Facebook, following me on Twitter, and following me on Goodreads.

I hope you’ll take advantage of this fabulous opportunity and I cannot wait to find out who wins!

Grace and peace,

 

It’s Here!

ONE FINAL BREATH

BOOK 3 IN THE DIVE TEAM INVESTIGATIONS SERIES is now available for purchase in paperback, audio, and digital formats!

About One Final Breath:

When investigator Gabriel Chavez had his cover blown by an aggressive reporter, the silver lining was being able to rejoin the dive team. The downside? Dive team captain Anissa Bell–a woman who both fascinates and frustrates him.

Anissa grew up as a missionary kid on the Micronesian island of Yap and always planned to return after college. But she remained stateside, determined to solve the case that haunts her–the murder of her best friend and the disappearance of a three-year-old child.

When Anissa’s fractured past collides with Gabe’s investigation into the tragic shooting death of a teenage boy in Lake Porter, they’ll have to put their complicated history with each other aside in order to uncover the identity of a killer. What they’ll discover is that revenge has no statute of limitations.

Award-winning author Lynn H. Blackburn closes out her nail-biting Dive Team Investigations series with a story that will have you wondering how long you can hold your breath.

Y’all, I love this book. I really do. I love the way Gabe and Anissa overcome so many obstacles and how they rely on their faith in their darkest hours. I love the way their friendship with each other and their friendships with Ryan, Leigh, Adam, and Sabrina have continued to deepen and flourish. I can imagine them hanging out together by Lake Porter for the next forty years, and it makes me happy. 

For those of you who’ve already read Beneath the Surface and In Too Deep, I hope One Final Breath more than exceeds your expectations. And for those of you who are new to the Dive Team Investigations series, I hope One Final Breath leaves you excited to go back and read the previous books in the series. 

Most of all, I hope that as you read One Final Breath you grow closer to Jesus – because He is the BEST!

Note: If the backstory between Gabe and Anissa intrigues you, I’ve written a short story (5K words) that explains, maybe not everything, but a lot! It’s available today to my newsletter subscribers. If you haven’t subscribed, now would be a great time! You can subscribe here!

And tonight, at 9PM (Eastern), we’ll be celebrating the release of One Final Breath, LIVE on Facebook! I’d love for you to join us!

Grace and peace,

 

You know what’s true about August? It’s brutal. Every year.

I know it. I try to be ready for it. I never am.

This August will go down in the history of Augusts as a doozy. But if you looked at my calendar, you wouldn’t be able to tell what had happened.

  • I went to MurderCon. It was AWESOME.
  • Our family went to the lake. It was AWESOME.
  • The boys started baseball practice. Their teams and coaches are AWESOME.
  • Emma started a new high school. Her teachers and the culture there – AWESOME.
  • Our homeschool year began. My boys are doing AWESOME. Our community is AWESOME.
  • One Final Breath releases in a few days. Y’all. My 5th book. AWESOME.

Are you sensing a theme here? August was AWESOME! Right? 

Um . . . Yes . . . But . . .

August brought a lot of change to our family and especially to my personal routine, and here’s a fun fact for you: I don’t have a great relationship with change. It takes me longer than your average bear to regain my footing after any sort of upheaval. I get there. But it’s work, and I can’t say I enjoy it. At all.

I’m exhausted – physically, mentally, and creatively. For reasons that don’t show up on a list of highlights, that don’t make it into social media posts, that aren’t shared with the world, August has just been hard. 

But as August bows out and September takes the stage, the thing that I am most overwhelmed by isn’t the chaos and confusion.

It’s the grace.

Y’all. God is so good. In the past week, He has showered me in grace.

Subtle, quiet grace.

The grace of my mother-in-law having Emma spend the night with her. The grace of friends jumping in to help with the boys when I unexpectedly had to pick Emma up early from school this week.

The grace of a friend quietly saying, “The Lord has already gone before you” in some initial moments of confusion. The grace of takeout for dinner. The grace of a friend joining me for a long drive.

The grace of beautiful music and talented artists. The grace of coffee, chocolate, and grocery delivery.

The grace of the postal employee (shout out to Mindy at the Ace Hardware post office on Woodruff Road) whose kindness and willingness to offer a solution to what would otherwise have sucked an hour of my life away, quite literally brought me to tears.

A week ago, I told some friends that while I knew God was in control, the knowledge was all in my head. I knew it. I just couldn’t feel it. And I asked them to pray that the certainty of God’s presence and plan during this season would move from my head to my heart.

He has more than answered that prayer.

He is so, so good.

Let those who fear the LORD say, “His steadfast love endures forever.” Out of my distress I called on the LORD; the LORD answered me and set me free. The LORD is on my side; I will not fear. What can man do to me?

~ Psalm 118: 4-6 (ESV)

I am thrilled to be joining the mystery panel at Fiction Addiction on September 7th at 2 p.m. We will be talking books and writing and it’s going to be fantastic and fun!

Tickets are $10. And here’s the best part–that $10 can be put toward the purchase of a novel at Fiction Addiction! So if there was a book you happened to be interested in . . . maybe One Final Breath? You could pick it up while you’re there!

I would love to see some familiar faces so please make plans to attend!

Tickets are required for this event and can be purchased here.

If you can’t join us on September 7th, you can still order your copy of One Final Breath from the lovely folks at Fiction Addiction. The information for pre-orders can be found here.

Fiction Addiction

1175 Woods Crossing Rd

Suite 5

Greenville, South Carolina 29607.

Grace and peace,

Everything

hinges on this!

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared.

And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.

While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel.

And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.”

And they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest.

Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles, but these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them.

But Peter rose and ran to the tomb; stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves; and he went home marveling at what had happened.

~ Luke 24:1-12 (ESV)

 

Happy Easter!

 

Hey y’all!

I shared this photo on my FB author page and Instagram earlier today and I’m thrilled with how excited y’all are about One Final Breath!

I also did a video (how goofy do I look in this thumbnail?!) with a little bit of  “behind the scenes” information and a few questions for my readers.

 

I’d love for you to check it out and give me your thoughts!

 

One Final Breath releases September 3, 2019, and is available for pre-order at your favorite bookseller!

 

 

Grace and peace,

Do you BookBub? 

Here’s the description from the BookBub site…

BookBub is a free service that helps you discover books you’ll love through unbeatable deals, handpicked recommendations, and updates from your favorite authors. BookBub doesn’t actually sell books. We simply introduce you to books you’ll love that are available on retailers like Amazon’s Kindle store, Barnes & Noble’s Nook store, Apple Books, and others.

When you sign up, you choose which genres you’re most interested in and which authors you want to follow, and then you’ll receive a daily email with a listing of books that are curated to appeal to you, and that are steeply discounted. Typical e-reader prices are less than $3.

If you do most of your reading on an e-reader, BookBub is a slam dunk. You’ll receive an easy to scan email every day with book deals that are designed to appeal to you.

But what if e-readers aren’t really your thing? I get that! I didn’t jump on the Bookbub train right away because while I do read on a Kindle from time to time, I prefer the feel of a book in my hand.

But I’ve found BookBub to be an excellent resource for several reasons:

  1. It’s a great way to try out a new-to-me author. Sometimes $15 is a bit much to spend on the unknown. But $1? I can take a chance on an author for $1!
  2. Author updates! I follow my favorite authors on BookBub, and BookBub sends me an email whenever they have a new release. They also will send me recommendations from my favorite authors.
  3. Sale priced e-books can often be used to land steeply discounted audio books. What? Follow me on this. When you purchase a book on Amazon, it is not uncommon to see an “add Audible” option. While many audio books run $20+, when you purchase the e-version for $1.99, you can often grab the Audible version for an additional $3-$9. You wind up with both the e-version and the audio version for under $10! THAT is a STEAL! (And an Audible account is NOT required). I have recently fallen in love with audio books, so this feature has been a game changer for me!

So why am I talking about BookBub now? Well, it turns out that the e-version of Beneath the Surface, Book 1 in the Dive Team Investigations series, is currently discounted to $0.99 (and sometimes as low as $0.79) and if you follow me on BookBub (@LynnHBlackburn), you should see something about that later this week (3/27/19). And at the time of this post (3/24/19), you can add the Audible version of Beneath the Surface for just $7.49 which will land you both the e-version and the audio version for less than $10.

If you already have your copy of Beneath the Surface, THANK YOU! If you don’t, this would be a great time to claim one before the price goes up in April.

Grace and peace,

 

It’s here!

Dive Team Investigations Book 3 has a cover and a title and I couldn’t be happier!

Say hello to One Final Breath!

Here’s the blurb:

When investigator Gabriel Chavez had his cover blown by an aggressive reporter, the silver lining was being able to rejoin the dive team. The downside? Dive Team Captain Anissa Bell—a woman who both fascinates and frustrates him.

Anissa grew up a missionary kid on an Indonesian island and always planned to return after college. But she remained stateside, determined to solve the case that haunts her—the murder of her best friend and the disappearance of a three-year-old child.

When Anissa’s fractured past collides with Gabe’s investigation into the tragic shooting death of a teenage boy in Lake Porter, they’ll have to put their complicated history with each other aside in order to uncover the identity of a killer. What they’ll discover is that revenge has no statute of limitations.

One Final Breath will release in September and the pre-order links are already active at Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Christianbook.com.

There’s a lot going on behind the scenes over here in my world and more exciting news to share in the days ahead. Stay tuned!

Grace and peace,

An invitation to join us on on Facebook, Thursday, February 7th, from 7PM – 9PM (Eastern).

Click here to go straight to the Facebook Event page. 

If you have questions you’d like for any of us to answer, feel free to leave them in the comments.

 

Grace and peace,

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