Showing posts with label Amtrak. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Amtrak. Show all posts

Sunday, November 7, 2021

Our Trip Aboard Amtrak's Coast Starlight

 

My husband and I just came back from a wonderful trip aboard the Coast Starlight, traveling from LA up to Seattle and back.

 Highlights: viewing the unspoiled California coastlines from our sleeper car bedroom, admiring the fall leaves in the Shasta-Trinity National Forest, and being lucky enough to see the snow-capped top of Mount Shasta peeking through the clouds as the train rolled on and we ate a delicious lunch in the diner car. 

 It was our second trip on the Coast Starlight; we traveled to Salinas two years ago and when I came home, I wrote this bittersweet love story about two ex-lovers who unexpectantly meet again aboard the Coast Starlight.  


Love Gets a Second Chance 

Here's where you can purchase it for $2.99. 

Amazon:

https://amzn.to/3CIiBIk

Barnes and Noble: 

https://bit.ly/37EUcVK

Apple: 

https://apple.co/3fVje7N

Smashwords: 

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1098394

Kobo: 

https://bit.ly/3fUUtIU

Google Play:

https://bit.ly/3wsaUDI


Sunday, October 17, 2021

Amtrak's Coast Starlight

 



I'm so excited about traveling aboard the scenic Coast Starlight a week from tomorrow. This Amtrak route on America's west coast has been described as one of the most beautiful train rides in America.

I'll be traveling from Los Angeles to Seattle and look forward to seeing unspoiled views of the California coastline, fall foliage in the forests of Northern California and Oregon, and the splendor of Mount Shasta and Mount Rainer in Washington. 

This is my second trip on the Coast Starlight and I booked a bedroom in one of the sleeper cars. All meals are included in the price. My room has a sofa that converts into a double-size bed, its own private bathroom and shower, a locked door from the inside, and two comfortable seats on each side of a small table that are right next to a large window where I can watch as the countryside roll by.  

In this time of COVID, the privacy of my own room where I don't have to worry about social distancing or wear a mask, as I would if I were traveling business or coach, is especially appreciated.

I write murder mysteries with my husband (under the pen name Louise Hathaway) and one of my cozy mysteries takes place on the Coast Starlight. I began writing this when I last traveled on the train ride.

Here's what it's about:

In this intriguing cozy mystery, two sisters, one a homicide detective, the other an erotic romance writer, travel aboard Amtrak's scenic Coast Starlight from Los Angeles to Seattle when a famous movie star on the train is murdered. Then, to make matters worse, a forest fire in Oregon stops the train dead in its tracks with the killer still onboard. With a cast of characters who seem to have a motive for murder, will two detectives be able to figure out the killer's ingenious plot in time before someone else ends up dead?


Only $1.99 at the following online bookstores: 


Amazon: https://amzn.to/33NmnzD

Barnes and Noble: https://bit.ly/32RJMR7

Apple: https://apple.co/3kDNe85

Smashwords: https://bit.ly/3ckxp35

Kobo: https://bit.ly/3kCJnIj

Google: https://bit.ly/33QCw7o

Also Available in paperback for $5.99 at Amazon: https://amzn.to/2YXJyJk






Wednesday, August 11, 2021

Love Gets a Second Chance

 


Are you a fan of the movie "The Notebook" or the TV series "Last Tango in Halifax"? If so, I hope you'll enjoy this romance that was inspired by both of them.

In this love story, a couple in their late 60s are reunited after being away from each other since high school. In her late 60s, Madeline has been diagnosed with cancer and told that she has only a few months to live.

She takes a scenic long-distance train trip aboard The Coast Starlight, where she once again sees Jay, her first love, and they pick up right where they left off and have a wonderful time in Seattle, where he proposes and gives her a whole new lease on life. How long does she have left to live? 

Readers will be pleasantly surprised.

Here's where you can purchase it for $2.99. 

Amazon: https://amzn.to/3CIiBIk

Barnes and Noble: https://bit.ly/37EUcVK

Apple: https://apple.co/3fVje7N

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1098394

Kobo: https://bit.ly/3fUUtIU

Saturday, June 5, 2021

Train Stories


Do you like to take long-distance train rides? My husband and I are train buffs and have taken The California Zephyr from LA to Denver, the Coast Starlight from LA to Salinas, and the Sunset Limited from LA to New Orleans. It's a great way to see the country and for writers, like we are, it's a wonderful opportunity to have some peace and quiet in order to write without interruption.

We have written 3 novels that take place on trains while we were in our bedrooms aboard Amtrak's sleeper cars. Two are time travel stories and one is a cozy mystery. We hope you'll take a look. They are available at your favorite online bookstores including, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Apple, Google Play, Smashwords, and Kobo. I've included the Amazon buy links for each of the three novels. Here are their titles and descriptions:

Travelers in Time Aboard the California Zephyr

Do you like trains? Do you like history? If so, take a look at this time travel tale about modern Amtrak travelers who go back in time to the days when the transcontinental railroad was being built. Our passengers become part of a real-life special excursion train and meet Rutherford B. Hayes, George Pullman, and Robert Todd Lincoln. How will our time travelers cope with their new surroundings? Will they ever come back to the 21st Century? Will they want to come back? Find out and take a trip into history.

https://amzn.to/3jniXex


Travelers in Time: A Search for the Missing

In this time travel tale, two sisters go back to the 1860s to search for their missing parents who had earlier gone on a time travel trip of their own and decided not to return home, much to their daughters' surprise. The sisters have many adventures during their journey and meet several interesting characters along the way.

 There is a lot of history and research that went into this story--not to mention, a lot of heart and soul. The story takes place during the building of the transcontinental railroad and the world of post-Civil War America. Meant to be enjoyed as a standalone story, this book is part of the Travelers in Time series.

https://amzn.to/3o5qqj8


Murder Aboard the Coast Starlight

In this intriguing murder mystery, two sisters, one a homicide detective, the other an erotic romance writer, travel aboard Amtrak's scenic Coast Starlight from Los Angeles to Seattle when a famous movie star on the train is murdered. Then, to make matters worse, a forest fire in Oregon stops the train dead in its tracks with the killer still onboard. With a cast of characters who seem to have a motive for murder, will two detectives be able to figure out the killer's ingenious plot in time before someone else ends up dead?

https://amzn.to/3fUr8yM



Monday, March 30, 2015

Time Travel Novel About Trains

Travelers in Time Aboard the California Zephyr is a time-travel story about a group of modern day Amtrak passengers who find themselves suddenly part of a real-life excursion train in the 1860’s during the building of the transcontinental railroad. Come along and read how these modern-day characters try to adapt to their new world in post-Civil War Nebraska.
 I am so excited about this book being finished and at last published! A year ago, my husband and I booked two tickets for one of the sleepers cars of the famous California Zephyr in order to pretend that we had won Amtrak's Writers in Residency Program contest. Although we did not win the contest, we considered this trip a "working vacation" and brought along both of our computers in order to be "Writers". Without the distractions of Wi-Fi--that means no internet and no cell phone connections--we went back to basics and wrote, with only the beautiful scenery of the Sierras, the painted desert of Utah, and the canyons of the Rockies as company. This book is the result.

Travelers in Time Aboard the California Zephyr
by Louise Hathaway

Only $2.99 at most online bookstores.
Paperback available at Amazon