Welcome to Issue 104 of the SUPERIOR BOOK PRODUCTIONS newsletter.
Happy Holidays, Everyone!
This holiday season I’m especially excited to announce the release of my twenty-fifth book and my tenth Marquette novel: The Mysteries of Marquette. Here’s a short description of it:
When the Marquis de Marquette chooses to spend the summer of 1908 in Marquette, Michigan, a city named for his illustrious Jesuit relative, the residents are all astir with excitement. People begin vying to rub shoulders with the marquis, but he remains very private until he hosts a masquerade ball at the Hotel Superior. Only the finest families are invited, and even they feel slighted when he has eyes for only one dance partner.
Soon, inexplicable events begin to occur, events that threaten to expose the secrets of some of Marquette’s finest families. People begin to play a dangerous game to expose others’ crimes while maintaining their own façade of respectability.
When all is over, who will have survived the marquis’ revenge?
For more information on The Mysteries of Marquette, you can visit www.MarquetteFiction.com. It’s also available in Marquette stores and as an ebook at Amazon and other online booksellers. Be forewarned, this is my biggest novel ever at 815 pages, and it’s full of crime, corruption, murder, blackmail, and redemption. If you like a thick novel with multiple plots, endearing characters, and lots of suspense, this is the book for you!
You can also get a copy at this year’s TV6 Christmas Craft Show at the Superior Dome in Marquette. I’ll be there as always selling and autographing copies of all my books. This year’s craft show dates are December 6-8. Hours are Friday 5-9, Saturday 10-6, and Sunday 11-4.
And don’t forget that books are the best gifts to give at Christmas. Some other wonderful books to consider as gifts are listed below. I’m sure you’ll find one you or someone you love needs this holiday season.
Enjoy the holidays. I’ll be back in 2025 with some more fascinating books to share!
Tyler Tichelaar
This Month’s Great Book Quote:
“A great book should leave you with many experiences, and slightly exhausted at the end.
You live several lives while reading.”
— William Styron
Sparks of the Revolution is an exciting new novel about the roles that James Otis and his sister Mercy Warren Otis played in the events leading to the American Revolution. Author Todd Otis, an indirect descendant of the family, not only captures these historical patriots in an engaging way that makes them come to life on the page, but he shows them interacting with many better-known patriots such as Samuel Adams and John Hancock. The result is a better understanding of the sources and causes of the American Revolution, its goals, and its key players.
The novel begins with James Otis arguing in court in 1761 against the Writs of Assistance that the British government imposed upon the colonies, allowing the British to search any ship or building without a warrant. Otis saw this as a breach against the liberties of Englishmen, and what he said in court that day was credited later by John Adams as the spark that started the American Revolution. The novel shows how controversial Otis’ arguments were at the time, and how they started the colonies down the difficult road of breaking with England.
As the novel progresses, we see James Otis questioning himself as he tries to justify further action and words against the British Crown’s tyranny toward the colonies.
For more information, visit Sparks of the Revolution.
Dr. Pamela (Pam) George’s new book, Sparkle: Your Seven-Step Guide to a Joy-Infused Life, does more than just offer ideas for finding joy; it’s a practical guide through life’s challenges, from enhancing your self-worth to spiritual fulfillment, overcoming fear, and healing past traumas. It’s an invitation to a transformative journey toward authentic joy.
Pam has divided Sparkle into two sections. Part I focuses on how joy gets sucked out of our lives. She uses the biblical metaphor of “leaky cisterns,” inspired by God’s words to the Prophet Jeremiah in Jeremiah 2:13. These leaks are subtle but will gradually drain our happiness if the holes are left unchecked. Pam then discusses in detail the leaky cisterns of comparison, performance, and societal pressures and explains how they affect our ability to be joyful. For example, she tells us, “whenever I catch myself feeling less than joyful about someone else’s success, I recognize the culprit: the joy-stealing leak of comparison.”
Using a scripture-based approach, Pam offers ways to overcome these leaks, including providing practical exercises and room for reflection. While she knows there are many self-help guides out there, she considers Sparkle a “God-help” book and “a beacon guiding you from transient desires to eternal joy.”
For more information, visit Sparkle.
Conrad Toner’s new book Tapping Into the Power Within: Your Journey to Empowered Success starts with a powerful opening sentence: “We all know better than to spend our time living in fear, but too many of us do exactly that every single day as if there were no alternative.” Toner then goes on to state, “None of us should be living in pain. We were not put on this earth to suffer.” However, many of us have been taught to suffer and live in fear by religion, the mainstream media, and our families, schools, and environment. Toner knows it’s time to change that, and that change can happen by changing our thoughts first.
Toner compares changing our thoughts to learning to ride a bicycle. He recalls that no matter how many times he fell off his bike when he first learned to ride, he was determined to get back on and try again. By staying focused on the process, he achieved the balance and success needed. The same is true with our thoughts. If we make a conscious effort to change them, and we persevere and stay focused, despite setbacks, in time we will succeed, and that change will open up new possibilities for us.
For more information, visit Tapping Into the Power Within.
Award-winning author Mary Flinn is known for writing complicated and nuanced novels, often with a romantic twist. Whatever side of the abortion issue you are on, TORN will give you much to think about, but while it is issue-driven, more importantly, it is character-driven. We are introduced to a group of characters so real that you will feel you know them, you will want to know what happens to them after the novel ends, and you will miss them for days after you put down the book. Flinn achieves this by not offering easy answers to the abortion debate or black-and-white situations for her characters. In fact, the title reflects the difficulties, as clarified by the novel’s dedication: “To all who are torn about a woman’s right to choose. You are not alone.”
The novel opens with Merilee, an almost-eighteen-year-old high school senior, running from chemistry class to the bathroom to deal with morning sickness. Soon everyone in the school knows Merilee is pregnant by her chemistry lab partner and boyfriend, Micah. Merilee’s complications ensue because both her parents have died and she is in the foster care system. Her foster parents and Micah’s parents don’t believe in abortion so they want her to have the baby and give it up for adoption. Merilee agrees to this, but she has an extremely difficult pregnancy, including suffering from HG (hyperemesis gravidarum), which causes severe nausea and vomiting.
For more information, visit TORN.
Whether you are just starting to save, are ready for retirement, or are wondering if you’ll ever be able to afford to retire, Tanisha Souza’s new book Creating Your Income SnowballTM: Your Passive Investing Cheat Code to Mastering Wealth will provide you with insight, advice, and a world of possibilities to better your financial situation.
This is far from your typical book of investment advice. Souza shares her personal story of how she and her husband overcame debt, began investing, and began teaching others their methods. The result was Souza’s Income Snowball method and the founding of her and her husband’s company, Tardus. For years, Souza, her husband, and their team of wealth coaches have been helping Tardus’ clients reduce their debt and grow their wealth. Now in Creating Your Income SnowballTM, Souza shows how her family and her many clients have achieved financial freedom. The book is divided into two sections—Part I: Creating Your Income Snowball, and Part II: Designing Your Next Investment Journey—both of which contain advice, information, and practical application.
In Part I, Souza shares how you can achieve complete financial freedom in less than ten years and how it is even possible to do it in five. In fact, Souza and her husband did it in two.
For more information, visit Creating Your Income Snowball.
John Martinka is a consultant who assists people in buying and selling businesses. He is also the author of four previous books, including If They Can Sell Pet Rocks, Why Can’t You Sell Your Business (For What You Want?) and Buying a Business That Makes You Rich. Now he has published his fifth book, which he coauthored with his daughter, Jessica Martinka. Exit With Style, Grace, and More Money: Creating a Large Exit for Your Small Business focuses on the process of selling your business so you know what to expect, how to be prepared to make the transition as smooth as possible for you and the new owner, and how to ensure you get what the business is worth.
This book is not for selling large corporations but rather for the small and lower middle market business owner. That said, while all businesses are different, the Martinkas note that all business sales have one thing in common: frustration. Most business sellers are not prepared for what the process entails. In fact, an article in the Wall Street Journal once showed only 10 percent of medium-size businesses are ready to sell for full value.
The Martinkas walk the reader through what to expect so they are ready, beginning with some key questions business owners need to answer to be prepared to sell, including “Why are you selling?”
For more information, visit Exit With Style, Grace, and More Money.
