Rachel Simmons is the author of the New York Times bestseller Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls. Simmons works internationally with girls, parents, and teachers to develop strategies to address bullying and to empower girls. A graduate of Vassar College in 1998, Simmons won a Rhodes scholarship and attended Oxford University, where she began studying female aggression. Simmons is the founding director of the Girls’ Leadership Institute, a summer program for middle-school and high school girls, and currently serves as a consultant to schools and organizations around the world. Simmons lives in Brooklyn, New York.

You can see Rachel Simmons’ website HERE.

About The Curse of the Good Girl

In her New York Times bestseller Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls, Rachel Simmons was the first to explore the phenomenon of female bullying.  Now, in THE CURSE OF THE GOOD GIRL: Raising Authentic Girls with Courage and Confidence , she exposes the myth of the Good Girl, a myth that diminishes girls’ power and potential by teaching them to accept only an artificial and very limited version of selfhood.

Unerringly polite, nice, modest, and selfless, the Good Girl paradigm is so narrowly defined it’s unachievable. With self-esteem tied to perfection, girls are unable to know, express and manage a complete range of feelings. The need to be “perfect” leaves girls uncomfortable with feedback and failure, making it difficult to recover from even minor setbacks; a conflict with a peer or a mistake in the classroom is often enough to unleash paralyzing self-criticism. Deprived of the permission to articulate their needs, strengths, and goals, girls are confined by a psychological glass ceiling that can extend into adulthood, stunting the growth of vital skills and habits essential to personal and professional success.

Drawing from the stories of the women and girls who attend her workshops, Simmons traces the impact of Good Girl pressure on girls’ development and provides strategies to teach girls to not only to listen to their inner voice, but also to empower and embrace their real selves. She shows how true freedom of the self is permission to take the healthy risks that can result in great triumphs, and to accept and grow from the mistakes we make along the way.

Rachel Simmons’s THE CURSE OF THE GOOD GIRL is a call to arms from a new front in female empowerment, providing tangible lessons and effective strategies to help Good Girls become Real Girls.

Rachel Simmons’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Tuesday, September 1st - This Full House

Monday, September 7th – The Scholastic Scribe

Tuesday, September 8th – Juggling Life

Thursday, September 10th – As Many As We’re Given

Friday, September 11th – this blessed life

Thursday, September 17th – In the Gutter

Monday, September 21st – A Striped Armchair

Tuesday, September 22nd – Mrs. Magoo Reads

Wednesday, September 23rd – smiles miles trials

Thursday, September 24th – Laughing Through the Chaos

Tuesday, September 29th – Overstuffed

Friday, October 2nd – not that you asked…

Monday, October 5th – Petit Elefant

Wednesday, October 7th – A Mom on Spin

Also mentioned on Radical Parenting

Date TBD – Raisin Toast

Date TBD – Major Bedhead

Date TBD – dutch blitz

Date TBD – 5 Little Monkeys

Date TBD – VodkaMom

Financial expert Dale Robyn Siegel recently took her 20 years of experience as an attorney and mortgage broker and rolled it into a book titled, The New Rules for Mortgages.

The complex real estate market requires deft knowledge, timing and on going support. In her seminars, regular blogging and appearances, Dale informs and educates the consumer as they should be! No gobbledygook!

Dale Robyn Siegel is a licensed attorney in New York and owner of Circle Mortgage Group, a boutique mortgage broker in White Plains, New York. She is an adjunct professor at Baruch College as well as NYU Schack Institute of Real Estate. Dale has been speaking to the public and teaching real estate professionals about mortgage finance for the past ten years. The New Rules for Mortgages, (Penguin) is a short, concise book, packed with information on qualifying for a mortgage and getting the best deal in today’s market. Due out in the fall, it is perfect timing for the housing market rebound. She is currently working on a second book, The Mortgage Loan Originator Certification Course Textbook. The Federal Government now requires this 20 hour course to be taken by all persons in the mortgage industry with direct contact to the consumer. Dale is not only writing the book, but will teaching the course in the state of New York. Dale lives in the New York Metro area and is an avid cycler and world traveler.  Lately, she has spent a lot of time at the local Border’s Bookstore writing and editing her books.

You can see the website for Dale Siegel and The New Rules for Mortgages HERE. You can also find Dale at her blog, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and at Circle Mortgage Group.

About The New Rules for Mortgages

The New Rules For Mortgages is the latest and most current book on how to get the best mortgage and the lowest interest rate out there…..but it is very different!

This book is different from all in the rest in that the material is kept current with frequent updates online. The publisher allowed Dale to do the final rewrite of the book in early 2009 so as to get the last bit of updates in before print. Dale Robyn Siegel vows to keep the material current with online updates available on her blog and book site. It is the only way to have a how-to book on real estate with current material!

The mortgage industry has been transformed into the Wild Wild West and you need to be prepared before you get out there. Dale Robyn Siegel does just that for you in this short, concise and humorous book covering all you need to know about getting a mortgage in today’s world. A how-to book on real estate written by an attorney, 20 year veteran in the mortgage industry AND a college level professor. The material is a combination of her classroom format, her every day knowledge and expertise combined with real life experiences to bring the point home. This works and you will love it!

The book is short, around 200 pages, so there is no room for fluff or filler. It is easy to read, set up in chapters and short essays on specific topics. You can read the entire book in an afternoon on the beach or in a few short train commutes. You can even flip through and easily pick out parts you want to concentrate on.

A few interesting and favorite topics covered in 300 words or less:

• What are the new guidelines for FICO scores and loan to values and how do they affect mortgage rates?
• What is Rapid Rescore Response and can it really improve your credit score in 48 hours?
• How to establish an alternative credit profile for foreigners and students
• How to get money from your 401k without a penalty
• When is a loan from my father-in-law called a gift?
• Why is so important to show as much money in reserves as you can?
• What is the difference between a reduced documentation loan and a no-income verification loan?
• PMI v self insured. Which one is the bigger rip-off?
• What will it cost you to refinance your home and pull cash out?
• What do you do when your bank goes out of business while they are working on your mortgage?
• Appraisal fraud and how is it affecting the value of your home
• You mean my mortgage banker is not a real bank!
• What is an appraisal contingency clause vs. a mortgage contingency clause and how can you lose your deposit if you do not know?
• Points, origination fees, discount fees and broker fees. How do you avoid them all?
• What really affects the mortgage rates?
• Where do you find the best lawyer in town?

Dale Siegel’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS

Monday, September 14th: Bargaineering

Wednesday, September 16th: Spilling Buckets

Thursday, September 17th: Poorer Than You

Allyson Roy translates into Alice & Roy, husband and wife collaborating authors. Roy, a graduate of the University Of The Arts in Philadelphia, has a background in theater, art and standup comedy. Alice, dancer/choreographer/teacher, double majored in dance and philosophy at the State University of New York. They spent many gypsy years living and working in the different neighborhoods of New York City and Philadelphia. Aside from being marriage and writing partners, they are also best friends, which is reflected in the heartfelt, go-the-distance friendship of their two main characters.

Allyson Roy’s website

About Babydoll

Combining wacky humor with gritty, urban suspense and a dash of romance, BABYDOLL is the second book in the Madcap Noir Saylor Oz mystery series set in Brooklyn’s DUMBO neighborhood.

Three dead fashion models. A womanizing agent on the hunt for virgin talent. A daredevil boxer turned high-rise window washer. A burned out porn actress with a grudge. A pretty boy Irish illegal who’s good with a knife. A world famous lawyer with a bad case of self-importance.

It would all be just another tabloid headline to Saylor Oz — except the young Nuyorican artist wrongly convicted of the killings is the brother of Benita Morales, her best friend.

Height-challenged, warmhearted oddball, Saylor Oz, is convinced someone is reenacting murders from an old, X-rated movie called Bad, Bad Babydoll. But no one else thinks so, not even the sexy PI on the case. In her hunt to find the killer, Saylor ends up being part of a young genius designer’s zany plan to tweak the fashion world — and becomes the killer’s next target.

“Babydoll is a fast, fun read with action that never stops. Allyson Roy is a future star.”
—New York Times bestselling author Karen Robards

“Gripping . . . fun . . . exciting . . . hard to put down . . . comparable to Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum novels (with) a bit more substance and more going for it . . . a sure-to-be successful series”
—Bookreporter.com

” . . . will leave you breathless. I would recommend this to any hip, modern adult who likes thrilling rides, hot men, and women who know how to hold their own.”
– Front Street Reviews

” . . . fast paced . . . laugh out loud escapades.”
– Follow The Clue

Allyson Roy’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS

Tuesday, August 18th: The Eclectic Book Lover

Wednesday, August 19th: Jenn’s Bookshelf

Tuesday, August 25th: Jen’s Book Thoughts

Wednesday, August 26th: Cheryl’s Book Nook

Thursday, August 27th: Reading With Monie

Monday, August 31st: Books on the Brain (guest post)

Wednesday, September 2nd: Chick With Books

Monday, September 7th: Stephanie’s Confessions of a Book-a-holic

Tuesday, September 8th: GalleySmith

Wednesday, September 9th: Bookgasm

Thursday, September 10th: I’m Booking It

Richard Bandler’s books have sold more than a half a million copies worldwide. Tens of thousands of people, many of them therapists, have studied his blend of hypnosis, linguistics and precise thinking in the United States, Europe, and Australia. Bandler is the author of Trance-formation, Using Your Brain! for a Change, Time for a Change, Magic in Action, and the Structure of Magic. He coauthored Frogs into Princes, Persuasion Engineering, The Structure of Magic II, and Magic in Practice. Visit Richard’s website at www.RichardBandler.com.

About Owen Fitzpatrick

Owen Fitzpatrick is a psychologist, hypnotherapist, coach, and co-founder of the Irish Institute of NLP and the youngest licensed NLP master trainer. Fitzpatrick has helped thousands of people with a wide range of problems and is one of Europe’s top motivational speakers. He is the host expert on a primetime Irish television show, Not Enough Hours. Visit www.owenfitzpatrick.com.

About Conversations with Richard Bandler

A rare, intimate encounter with one of the world’s most innovative masters of personal change and growth.

Richard Bandler is known worldwide for his ability to captivate audiences and to change people’s lives for the better. His insights into the human mind have undeniably ignited the worldwide phenomenon of Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) and catapulted and transformed the field of personal change forever.

Conversations with Richard Bandler recounts professional and personal revelations between Richard Bandler and a young NLP practitioner and Bandler protégé, Owen Fitzpatrick, who is on a quest to discover the real-life application of what Bandler defines as “personal freedom,” or what is truly possible for the human mind.  With conversations covering diverse topics as happiness, heartbreak, rejection, compulsions, and perfectionism, the dialogues between Bandler and Fitzpatrick uncover the solutions to complex issues including depression, social anxieties, phobias, and more.

Presenting never-before-heard insights from Richard Bandler on the field of NLP, plus specific exercises to ignite effortless change, and numerous anecdotes from past clients and personal stories, Conversations with Richard Bandler offers a way to think and live in a radically different way.

Richard Bandler’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Tuesday, July 21st: life@work

Tuesday, July 28th: Quest for Balance

Tuesday, August 4th: Leading Questions

Thursday, August 6th: The American Monk

Tuesday, August 11th: Goodness Graciousness

Tuesday, August 11th: Cynthia Lou

Thursday, August 12th: Raptitude

Tuesday, August 18th: A Garden Carried in the Pocket

Thursday, August 27th: Happy Lotus

Date TBD: Alex Shalman

Miriam Gershow is a novelist, short story writer and teacher. Her debut novel, The Local News, was published in February 2009. It has been called “deftly heartbreaking” with “urgency and heft” by The New York Times, as well as “an accomplished debut” (Publisher’s Weekly) with a “disarmingly unsentimental narrative voice,” (Kirkus Reviews).

Miriam Gershow graduated from the Program in Creative Writing at the University of Oregon and was a Fiction Fellow at the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing. Her stories have appeared in the Georgia Review, Black Warrior Review, andQuarterly West, among other literary journals. She lives in Eugene, Oregon, where she is a college instructor with the English Department at The University of Oregon.

About The Local News

Format:  Hardcover, 368 pages

“Going missing was the only interesting thing my brother had ever done.”

Even a decade later, the memories of the year Lydia Pasternak turned sixteen continue to haunt her. As a teenager, Lydia lived in her older brother’s shadow. While Danny’s athletic skills and good looks established his place with the popular set at school, Lydia’s smarts relegated her to the sidelines, where she rolled her eyes at her brother and his meathead friends and suffered his casual cruelty with resigned bewilderment. Though a part of her secretly wished for a return of the easy friendship she and Danny shared as children, another part of her wished Danny would just vanish. And then, one night, he did.

In the year following Danny Pasternak’s disappearance, his parents go off the rails, his town buzzes with self-indulgent mourning, and his little sister Lydia finds herself thrust into unwanted celebrity, forced to negotiate her ambivalent–often grudging–grief for a brother she did not particularly like. Suddenly embraced by Danny’s old crowd, forgotten by her parents, and drawn into the missing person investigation by her family’s intriguing private eye, Lydia both blossoms and struggles to find herself during Danny’s absence. But when a trail of clues leads to a shocking outcome in her brother’s case, the teenaged Lydia and the adult she will become are irrevocably changed, even now as she reluctantly prepares to return to her hometown.

Relentlessly gripping, often funny, and profoundly moving, The Local News is a powerful exploration of the fraught relationship between a brother and sister and how our siblings define who we are.

For more information on The Local News, including a Reading Group Guide and an excerpt, check out the author’s website HERE.

Miriam Gershow’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Monday, June 15th:  Everyday I Write the Book Blog – online book club (and guest post)

Monday, June 22nd:  Books on the Brain (and guest post)

Wednesday, June 24th:  Book Club Classics!

Monday, June 29th:  Worducopia

Thursday, July 2nd:  Redlady’s Reading Room

Tuesday, July 7th:  Peeking Between the Pages

Wednesday, July 8th:  Becky’s Book Reviews (and interview)

Thursday, July 9th:  Caribousmom (and guest post)

Tuesday, July 14th:  Stephanie’s Written Word

Wednesday, July 15th:  A Lifetime of Books

An Eckhart Tolle-esque examination of life in the great lane. 

Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi. Most would agree—these were great people. But what about those individuals with whom we interface on a daily basis? Chances are many of them are good people, but would we dare to call them great? And if so, why?

Inspired by this question, the authors set out to discover the inner secret of greatness, traveling through India, France, Chile and Spain in search of an answer to the question, “What is it that causes someone to act in ways that others hail as great?”

They interviewed a wide range of people from the then president of India to a saintly French Jesuit priest. They found that in each case the following three things came into play: the person saw with love, acted from the heart, and was at the right place at the right time. To help them make sense of what they were learning, they turned to a man of science, Humberto Maturana, a renowned neurobiologist and a leading exponent of modern systems thinking, and a woman of God, Dadi Janki, a spiritual leader and chief of the Brahma Kumaris, where her primary focus is on bringing spiritual wisdom to the world. Together, they share a scientific and spiritual approach to the concept of greatness and their complimentary ideas are both fascinating and enlightening. 

About Judy and Gayatri

Judy Rodgers is a writer and communication consultant who has worked extensively with thought leaders. She has held a range of executive positions in large media companies such as CBS Video, CBS-Fox Video, and New World Entertainment. She has worked with opinion leaders such as Tom Peters, Peter Senge and David Cooperrider. She is also founding director of Images and Voices of Hope, an international dialogue initiative with media, journalism and the arts that seeks to strengthen the role of media as a constructive force in society.

Gayatri Naraine has been the Brahma Kumaris’ (BK’s) representative to the United Nations since 1980.  In that capacity, her role was to connect what the UN was doing on a global scale in the social and humanitarian fields of development with what the BK’s were doing in those same areas using their expertise in spiritual growth of people on a personal scale.  Gayatri was pivotal in the development of the Living Values Education program and worked closely with UNICEF and UNESCO in its implementation.  She has also contributed to ILO’s (International Labor Organization) Agenda on Decent Work in their consultation with non-governmental organizations.

TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS for Something Beyond Greatness:

Monday, June 22nd:  Reading, Writing, and Retirement

Tuesday, June 23rd:  Worducopia

Wednesday, June 24th:  Joyfully Retired

Monday, June 29th:  In The Shadow of Mt. TBR

Wednesday, July 1st:  The Bookworm

Thursday, July 2nd:  Happy Lotus

Tuesday, July 7th:  The Jungle of Life

Wednesday, July 8th:  Create a Balance

Thursday, July 9th:  Book Reviews by Bobbie

Monday, July 13th:  Positively Present

Jennifer Cody Epstein is the author of The Painter from Shanghai, an imaginative retelling of the life of Chinese prostitute-turned-post-Impressionist Pan Yuliang. Her  fiction has also appeared in Thema, Confrontation, Carve, and Small Spiral Notebook and has been a finalist selection for Glimmertrain. She has also lived and worked in the U.S., Japan, China, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Italy for publications including The Wall Street Journal, The Asian Wall Street Journal, Mademoiselle, Self and Parents, as well as for the NBC and HBO networks. She has a Masters in International Relations from Johns Hopkins University and an MFA in fiction from Columbia University, where she is an adjunct professor in the School of the Arts. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and two daughters.  You can read more about Jennifer on her website.

About The Painter from Shanghai

Reminiscent of Memoirs of a Geisha, a re-imagining of the life of Pan Yuliang and her transformation from prostitute to post-Impressionist.

Down the muddy waters of the Yangtze River and into the seedy backrooms of “The Hall of Eternal Splendor,” through the raucous glamour of prewar Shanghai and the bohemian splendor of 1920s Paris, and back to a China ripped apart by civil war and teetering on the brink of revolution: this novel tells the story of Pan Yuliang, one of the most talented
—and provocative—Chinese artists of the twentieth century.

Jennifer Cody Epstein’s epic brings to life the woman behind the lush, Cezannesque nude self-portraits, capturing with lavish detail her life in the brothel and then as a concubine to a Republican official who would ultimately help her find her way as an artist. Moving with the tide of historical events, The Painter from Shanghai celebrates a singularly daring painting style—one that led to fame, notoriety, and, ultimately, a devastating choice: between Pan’s art and the one great love of her life.

Discussion questions for reading groups can be found HERE.

Jennifer Cody Epstein’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Tuesday, June 2nd:  The Literate Housewife Review

Wednesday, June 3rd:  Book-a-Rama

Thursday, June 4th:  Book Nut

Monday, June 8th:  She is Too Fond of Books

Tuesday, June 9th:  S. Krishna’s Books

Wednesday, June 10th:  Becky’s Book Reviews

Thursday, June 11th:  Redlady’s Reading Room

Monday, June 15th:  Dolce Bellezza

Tuesday, June 16th:  Peeking Between the Pages

Wednesday, June 17th:  A Work in Progress

Monday, June 22nd:  Beth Fish Reads

Tuesday, June 23rd:  Do They Have Salsa in China?

Wednesday, June 24th:  Bookworm with a View

Thursday, June 25th:  So Many Precious Books, So Little Time

Friday, June 26th:  Savvy Verse and Wit

Tuesday, June 30th:  Pop Culture Junkie

Monday, March 23rd: Literary Menagerie

Tuesday, March 24th:  Joyfully Retired

Thursday, March 26th: Texas Red Books

Friday, March 27th: Bermuda Onion

Monday, March 9th: Bookfoolery and Babble

Wednesday, March 11th: Not Quite What I Had Planned

Thursday, March 12th: Reading, Writing, and Retirement

About John Marco

I’ve always felt that I was a writer, even as a little boy. I can remember pecking away at an old portable typewriter, coming up with my first stories when I was around ten years old. I like to think I’ve gotten a lot better since then! And yet there’s still that little boy in me, the one who loves imagination and exploration, and loves to tell stories. Just like Peter Pan, writers never really grow up.

I was born in Long Island and live here still. For a long time I was a technical writer before making the transition to fiction. I worked in many different industries for a lot of different companies until my first book,The Jackal of Nar, was published in 1999. That book was a springboard into a whole new world for me, one that’s given me great and deep satisfaction. I’m also a husband and a father, and although I often define myself as a writer, nothing gives me more happiness than my wife and my son.

Besides my family and writing, my other two big interests are aviation and Disney World. When I’m not working, there’s a good chance you’ll find me with my nose in a flying magazine, or listening to one of the many Disney podcasts on the web.

For more information, visit John’s website. You can also read his blog here.

About Starfinder

What would life be like if you could fly? Young Moth of Calio wants to know. He’s obsessed with the airships around his mountain home and dreams of becoming a Skyknight one day, to take to the air like his heroes.

So begins Starfinder, the first book of The Skylordstrilogy. Not only is it a story of coming of age for the two main protagonists, Moth and his friend Fiona, but it’s also about mankind’s coming of age. The world ofStarfinder is very much like our own at the turn of the last century, with steam trains and electricity and budding technologies. And thanks to the inventive genius of Fiona’s grandfather Rendor, humans have finally taken to the sky, not only in giant airships but in small, ornithopter contraptions called dragonflies as well. Not everyone is happy to see mankind’s progress, however. For thousands of years, the mysterious and powerful race known as the Skylords have jealously guarded their heavenly domain. In all this time, an uneasy peace has existed between humans and Skylords, but Moth and Fiona are about to breach the magical boundary between the two worlds.

John Marco’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Wednesday, May 20th: Fantasy & Sci-Fi Lovin’ News & Reviews

Saturday, May 23rd: Fantasy Book Critic

Tuesday, May 26th: Steph Su Reads

Wednesday, May 27th: Shooting Stars Mag (Part 1 and Part 2)

Thursday, May 28th: Becky’s Book Reviews (and interview)

Monday, June 1st: Stuff as Dreams are Made On

Wednesday, June 3rd: Juiciliciousss Reviews

Friday, June 5th: Beth Fish Reads

Monday, June 8th: Books By Their Cover

Wednesday, June 10th: In Search of Giants

Friday, June 12th: The Tome Traveller

Monday, June 15th: At Home With Books

Friday, June 19th: Medieval Bookworm

Tuesday, June 23rd: The Magic of Ink

Thursday, June 25th: Reader’s Respite

Monday, June 29th: Drey’s Library

Tuesday, June 30th: The Written World