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Wednesday, December 1, 2010

NOW AVAILABLE! -- Africa's Snow White II: Prince Charming

The sequel to Africa's Snow White: Summer Love - Jealous Winter has just arrived at Amazon's warehouses, and is now available from both Amazon and my website.

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Read a sample first

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Africa's Snow White II: Prince Charming

The sequel to Summer Love - Jealous Winter is just weeks away from availability. Since the actual shipping date is out of my hands, I'm reluctant to say when exactly, but it should be shipping from my website and Amazon.com toward the end of the month. Meanwhile, here is the back of the book summary:

A body has been found, but was it suicide or murder? The police investigator isn't sure. As the details begin to emerge, he realizes that not every crime is so easily classified. Elizabeth's romance with Charles serves as a welcome distraction, but when a letter arrives from her old boyfriend that reveals her mother’s manipulative nature, Elizabeth's slow journey toward awareness begins.

Nicholas doesn't understand why Elizabeth hasn't replied to any of his letters, but he's determined to find out. Siesta is small enough, and he plans to find and confront her there.

As the book rockets toward its conclusion, Elizabeth finds an old, unopened letter, which has the potential to reach out from the grave to haunt the living and point the finger of blame.

Meanwhile one of Elizabeth's boyfriends decides to visit her in Wellington. Charles has agreed to stay out of the way, but a few words is all it takes to fire Charles with righteous fury to protect the virtue of his girlfriend—or so he thinks.

And here is the feedback I've recieved so far:

“I'm pleased to see my prediction, of a sequel to Jonathan's first novel, come true. I'm delighted to see the characters from his first book mature in his new novel and go on to experience all the ups and downs and challenges of making one's way in the South Africa of that time, of trying to come to terms with living in a country as divided as it then was. I look forward to seeing how Jonathan deals with the challenges faced by so many individuals and families in South Africa in his upcoming novels. Once again, the references to St. Andrew's School evoke many memories for me from my own years as a student in Bloemfontein. Although I was not at St. Andrews, my father was head of the old boys' association, and therefore, by osmosis, I got to know something of the school and knew many of the pupils and teachers of the 1960's. St. Andrews, which was founded in 1863 in the old zuid-afrikaanse republiek, has seen many changes taking place around it over the years. I hope that Jonathan's books attract many students from abroad to this wonderful school. Jonathan, we are proud of you, keep up the good work and I look forward to the next in the series.”
—Ambassador Leslie Manley, Ambassador from South Africa to Panamá, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Perú

“An alluring tale of love and deception. Jonathan displays exceptional skills painting vivid scenes for the reader. A great escape that will have you glued to your seat.”
—Dr. Sylvie Raymond, English Lecturer, United Arab Emirates University

“Eloff's second novel is an excellent sequel that will leave you wanting to know more about this intriguing story. You're guaranteed to lose sleep as you keep turning the pages late into the night.”
—Jody Hussey, ESL Teacher

“Fear and hope, sadness, love, and conspiracy, all centered around one family, set in the romantic scenery of South Africa. When you remember his first wonderful novel, Summer Love - Jealous Winter, immediately you recognize and appreciate Jonathan Eloff's unique style of writing. Every word comes out of his heart, but he leaves one question open for his readers: What's in this princess's future?”
–Karin Forster, German Journalist and Talk Show Moderator

“In my capacity as editor in chief of a large German news organization, I often interviewed world leaders such as Nelson Mandela and Mikhail Gorbachev. My wife and I have met this talented young author and shared some wine with him, and again I find that some of the most interesting stories are found when interviewing the people affected by the decisions of these world leaders.”
–Kurt Forster, Editor In Chief

“In his new book, Prince Charming, Jonathan Eloff offers vivid, masterful description and colorful insights into the continuing the saga of the two generations introduced in his first book. The innocence of young love contrasts sharply with scenes of vindictive treachery, as this amazing story unfolds. I am intrigued by the young folk as they strive to work out the usual pangs of romance, dismally thwarted by Constance, who contrives to manipulate her world and everyone in it. The plot cleverly navigates some incredible twists and turns as the characters attempt to build their own lives with only a limited awareness of Constance’s determination to control every possible outcome. Ultimately, as Constance manages to conquer her own demons, her daughter, Elizabeth, comes to realize a critical truth of her own. Once again, Eloff has cleverly created a page turner with some unexpected and often surprising results.”
—Margaret Wolf, High School English Teacher, Alberta, Canada

Monday, November 8, 2010

Final Chapters: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here are the last two chapters of Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Click here to read Chapter 47

Click here to read Chapter 48

If you enjoyed the first book, you can preorder the sequel, which is now going to print, and will be shipping from Amazon and my website toward the end of November. Check back on Thursday for details!

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Chapter 32 - 34: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Since the sequel to Summer Love - Jealous Winter is going to print and should be available in about a month, I've decided to release 6 chapters a week, that is 3 on Tuesdays, and 3 on Thursdays. Enjoy!

Click here to read Chapter 32

Click here to read Chapter 33

Click here to read Chapter 34


Check back on the 26th for the next lot!

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Chapter 30 & 31: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Another bonus for my tardiness:

Here is Chapter 30:

Click here to read Chapter 30

And Chapter 31:

Click here to read Chapter 31

Check back on the 21st for Chapter 32!

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

A Piece of Me

Well, tonight I hopped in a time machine and went back 6 or 7 years. That was back before I developed repetitive strain injuries from the computer, back when I could still play the piano.

Makes me kind of nostalgic listening to my recordings, so I thought I'd share a piece of one here. The song is actually 12 minutes long, and that makes it a huge file, so I've trimmed it down to a more reasonable size. Download if you like. Bear in mind it's an original composition. I went to music lessons once, for a year, when I was 8 or 9, and didn't do very well because I didn't like to do my homework :).

Fiat Lux - Let There be Light

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Chapter 27 & 28: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here are another two chapters, a bonus for my tardiness:

Here is Chapter 27:

Click here to read Chapter 27

And Chapter 28:

Click here to read Chapter 28

Check back on the 14th for Chapter 29!

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Chapter 24 & 25: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Looks like I missed my deadline again. Here are another two chapters to make up for it:

Here is Chapter 24:

Click here to read Chapter 24

And Chapter 25:

Click here to read Chapter 25

Check back on the 7th for Chapter 26!

Thursday, September 30, 2010

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Chapter 21 & 22: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Again, sorry for the delay. As a consolation for the ocassaional delays I'll be releasing two chapters today.

Here is Chapter 21:

Click here to read Chapter 21

And Chapter 22:

Click here to read Chapter 22

Check back on the 30th for Chapter 23!

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Friday, September 17, 2010

Chapter 18: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here is the 18th chapter, sorry for the delay:

Click here to read Chapter 18

Check back on the 21st for Chapter 19!

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Friday, September 10, 2010

Chapter 16: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here is the 16th chapter, sorry for the delay:

Click here to read Chapter 16

Check back on the 14th for Chapter 17!

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Chapter 8: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here is the 8th chapter, and the beginning of section 2 in the book:

Click here to read Chapter 8

Check back on Tuesday the 17th for Chapter 9.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Chapter 7: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here is the seventh chapter:

Click here to read Chapter 7

You'll find Chapter 8 here on the 12th of August.

Friday, August 6, 2010

Chapter 6: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here is the sixth chapter:

Click here to read Chapter 6

Sorry for the delay. Check back on Tuesday for Chapter 7.

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Chapter 4: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here is the fourth chapter of Summer Love - Jealous Winter:

Click here to read Chapter 4

Check back here on Tuesday August 3rd for Chapter 5.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Chapter 3: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

Here is the third chapter of Summer Love - Jealous Winter:

Click here to read Chapter 3

From now on chapters will be released twice weekly, on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Chapter 2: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

You can find the second chapter of Summer Love - Jealous Winter here:

Click here to read Chapter 2

Be sure to check back here next Monday for chapter 3.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Chapter 1: Summer Love - Jealous Winter

You can find the first chapter of Summer Love - Jealous Winter here:

Click here to read Chapter 1

Be sure to check back here next Monday for Chapter 2!

Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Serializing Summer Love - Jealous Winter

For those of you who like to read at your computers, I'm going to start releasing Summer Love - Jealous Winter in a series of blog posts. The first chapter coming soon!

For now, here's something to whet your appetite:

What others are saying about

Africa’s Snow White
Summer Love - Jealous Winter


“A delightful read. It evoked in me memories of my own teenage years, growing up in Cape Town. My father was from the Free State Province of South Africa and went to St. Andrew’s School in Bloemfontein in the early 1920’s as a boarder. When we later went back to Bloemfontein as a family in the mid-1960’s, my father was Chairperson of the St. Andrew’s Old Boys’ Association and I got to know the school well, although I never attended St. Andrew’s. I am sure my father would have enjoyed the passages about the school and the typical schoolboy pranks. I now serve the people of South Africa as Ambassador to Panama and have had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know the author. I look forward to reading Jonathan’s sequel to this book, as I am sure there will be one.”
—Ambassador Leslie Manley, Ambassador from South Africa to Panamá, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Perú

“As the title suggests, Summer Love - Jealous Winter is a story of innocence and treachery. On one level there is pure, innocent teenage love in a simpler time, but underneath, controlling even the innocent, is the conniving manipulation of the antagonist. From the start, I was curious to discover how the innocence and treachery would mesh. Well, I was not disappointed. The tension mounts; the suspense is gripping. This seemingly gentle novel became a page turner that threatened to keep me up all night! Eloff has cleverly woven the diver¬gent threads into a powerful ending.”
—Margaret Wolf, High School English Teacher, Alberta, Canada

“This fact-fiction fairytale is the beginnings of an amazing love story intricately woven against the backdrop of South Africa. It is textured and spirited and manages to lure the reader into its pages. I expect to see great things from this young, new writer and am looking forward to the sequel.”
—Geraldine Cilliers, Qualified Librarian and Book Reviewer (worked for Rootz Magazine in South Africa)

“Jonathan Eloff beautifully weaves together true life events of romance, heartbreak, betrayal, and suspense all the while describing South Africa’s natural landscape and daily life at the end of the Apartheid.”
—Jody Hussey, ESL Teacher, B.A. in History from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

“Tender, hilarious, captivating . . .”
—Sue Merralls, Special Events Organizer, Alberta, Canada

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Walmart Clown Commercial (Hilarious!)

Good for a laugh if you haven't already seen it. Make sure you have your sound turned up!

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Impressions of Twilight (the novel)

twilight_book_cover

Genre: fantasy/gothic romance
My rating: 4/5
Content rating: Very Clean: no swearing, no graphic violence, no sex
Comment: A surprisingly good read.

For those of you who haven't read the books, or watched the movies, I'm not going to spoil anything for you, but if you haven't either read or watched Twilight, you should know that I used to be in your camp, and probably for the same reason--I didn't think I'd like it.

So I went into reading this book with a lot of preconceptions, in fact, expecting to be disappointed and confused by the book's popularity. As a writer, however, I felt duty bound to read what everybody else is reading, and at least try to relate to their fascination. Now, upon finishing the book, I'm happy to report that I may now be counted among Twilight's fans.

It is by no means a classical romance, and if you can't appreciate fantasy, you probably won't appreciate this series either. Despite being Gothic Fiction, there was nothing unusually dark about this book. There were no references to Satanism, other than perhaps to occasionally allude to vampires as "demons," but in this story, the vampires are just like anyone else in their propensity for good or evil, except that they start at a deficit, because on a physiological level they crave to kill (for obvious reasons). The “good” vampires found a creative solution to this problem, which almost everyone should be able to relate to. The bad ones just embraced the whole serial killer thing.

If you still think that vampires and romance don't go together, you should probably know that Stephenie Meyer carefully crafted them to be everyone's ideal in terms of physical attributes, and once you get to know a few of them, you might begin to suspect that these "monsters" represent ideals of conscience and morality, too. Moreover, the story taps into the recent superhero craze that has catapulted Marvel movies into the blockbuster category more often than not. Faster than a speeding bullet, invincible, immortal, strong as Superman, agile as Spiderman . . . even with a few of the wilder abilities of the Jedi from Star Wars, these vampires make Dracula look pretty pale by comparison (not literally, since they're all white as ghosts). And then, to cater just a little bit more to the female audience, the heroine, Isabella, is every girl. Literally, I think she embodies every girl's fantasies, fears, and realities. She's described as pretty ordinary, but everyone in the book finds her extraordinary. She has just the right mixture of modesty, shyness, and hidden potential that makes her an easy character to relate to. Personally, I found myself relating more to the vampire hero, but that was probably just a desperate attempt to hold on to my masculinity (the books are written in the first-person, from the heroine's point of view, so she gets to say things like "I love you, Edward," and then when I'm reading it, it sounds like she's putting words in my mouth--no offence Edward, but you're really not my type).

Despite the fact that the books and movies appeal primarily to a female audience, I found that I was still able to relate to and enjoy the story--occasionally I even stopped noticing that my gender had been summarily changed. So, without giving too much away, if you haven't read the books or watched the movies yet (and the more rational part of your mind doesn't object too much to superheroes with superpowers), I'd recommend you stow your preconceptions long enough to do one or the other. I think you'll find the story is surprisingly good.