Giveaway Archives

The Great Ghost Thief Giveaway

November 14, 2016 TechyDad Books, Giveaway, Stories, Writing

You might have heard that I’ve published a book – Defenders of Shadow and Light: Ghost Thief. It’s a tale about a thief named Murray Gastev. Murray’s just going about his day to day life “liberating” items in exchange for cash – as thieves often do – when he winds up getting fantastic abilities.

Murray finds that he can pass through walls and float about. There’s only one problem, though. He can’t really control his abilities. Alright two problems. He also can’t breathe while “ghosting.” Oh, and there’s the little issue of a “Dark One” who hunts and kills people with powers.
The story is the tale of how Murray meets up with other people who can help him use his powers and the great threat he encounters along the way.
Of course, this book is just the beginning. This is the start of a likely trilogy and I’ve already written one of many short stories based in the same universe. (The character in my short story is likely to appear in Book 2, so the short story can be her introduction.)

With as much enjoyment that I got from writing this book, it would be a shame if it sat on the virtual shelves of Amazon.com and nobody read it. So I’m trying to get the word out with a giveaway. I want to make this fun, so imagine that you inhabited the world of Ghost Thief and were granted special abilities. Given that people in this world don’t tend to put on colorful costumes and act like superheroes, what ability would you like to acquire and how would you use it? Perhaps you’d get super-speed so you could run into work – avoiding traffic and cutting your commute time down. Or maybe you’d like super-strength so you could vacuum behind the sofa with ease. Perhaps you’re a parent who would choose the ability to heal a person’s injuries and illnesses with a touch so that you could make your child feel better when they are ill.

Giveaway

One of my readers will win a signed copy of Defenders of Shadow and Light: Ghost Thief. To enter, follow the steps in the Rafflecopter widget below.

The contest starts today, November 14th and ends at midnight on December 19th. You must leave a valid e-mail address to enter so that I can contact you for your mailing address once the giveaway is over. Your e-mail address won’t be used for anything else – unless you sign up for my newsletter in which case it will be used to send you periodic updates. It will not be shared with anyone else. I will select the winner using Rafflecopter and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to Continental U.S. residents only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Room On The Broom DVD Review/Giveaway

August 21, 2013 TechyDad Books, DVDs, Giveaway, Movies, Review

I’m a sucker for stories with lessons. I also love when books are turned into films, though I’m always wary when a short story is turned into a longer movie. It’s easy to bog down the story with unnecessary details, completely ruining the tale. Thankfully, Room On The Broom is exactly the opposite of this.

The book was fantastic. A witch and her cat would keep losing items of hers. Animals would kindly return them and ask to ride on her broom. The witch would agree until the broom was so overloaded that it snapped in two. Unfortunately, one animal – a dragon – was not so kindly and tried to eat the witch. The animals had to work together to try to save their friend.

The movie follows the same plot, but you begin before the witch and cat even take off for the first time. Instead, you get to see some of the cat’s life alone with the witch. As each item is lost and found, the animal returning it gets fleshed out more. The dog is eager – bounding around the witch and sniffing the broom. The bird is green – while all other birds were black and excluded her. The frog was clean – in stark contrast to the messy frogs surrounding him.

While the witch is glad to have more friends, the cat sees each new animal as a threat to its life with the witch. It tries to deny them access, but the witch is too kindly and takes them all in. The cat must learn that these “intruders” are actually friends and work with them when the witch’s life is in danger from a scary dragon.

I loved how the movie not only used plot elements from the book, but took minor illustration components and turned them into scenes. For example, one picture in the book showed them flying over a crane, sheep, fish, and beaver. In the movie, this turned into a series of scenes where these animals turn up as they search for the witch’s wand, In addition, the added elements (such as the cat’s annoyance towards the new animals) made the story even better. I would definitely recommend both the book and DVD to parents for both entertainment value and the lessons they can teach children.

Giveaway

One of my readers will win a copy of Room on the Broom on DVD. To enter, follow the steps in the Rafflecopter widget below.

Contest starts today, August 21st and ends at midnight on September 7th. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for your mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using Rafflecopter and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. and Canadian residents only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: I received both the book and DVD version of Room on the Broom to facilitate this review/giveaway. All opinions expressed above are my own.

Giveaway: Cooking with Land O’Lakes

April 19, 2012 TechyDad Food, Giveaway

During Passover, if there is one food we eat more than anything else (well, besides Matzo), it’s eggs. Scrambled, hard boiled, egg salad, matzo brie, and more. Even with Passover over, we’ll be cooking with eggs a lot.

Land O’Lakes sent me a package (pictured on the side) including a mini muffin tin, small (single-egg) frying pan, egg tray, and coupon for a free carton of Land O’Lakes eggs. I also browsed their website. I was surprised to find so many interesting recipes there. Given my quest to find a non-boxed macaroni and cheese, I’m definitely going to have to try this stovetop Macaroni and Cheese recipe.

Giveaway

One of my readers will win a Land O’Lakes gift pack. To enter, simply leave a comment below answering this question: How do you like eating your eggs?

You can also earn bonus entries by doing any (or all) of the following items. Just be sure to leave a separate comment for each item that you complete. (Don’t just leave one comment listing everything you did.)

Follow @TechyDad on Twitter. (1 bonus entry)
Follow @landolakesktchn on Twitter. (1 bonus entry)
Tweet about the giveaway on Twitter. Be sure to include @TechyDad, @landolakesktchn and a link to this post in the Tweet. (1 bonus entry per day) For example: Scramble over to @TechyDad to win a @landolakesktchn prize pack #Giveaway http://bit.ly/Jkx8Ko
Circle Me on Google Plus. Let me know your Google Plus name in the comments. (1 bonus entry)
Leave a comment on any of my non-giveaway posts from March/April. Leave a comment here letting me know which post you commented on. (1 bonus entry per comment, maximum 3 entries)

To enter, please follow the rules above within the comment section. Contest starts today, April 19th and ends at 10pm EST on May 7th, 2012. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using random.org and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. residents only.

Disclosure: The gift pack, coupons, information, and additional gift pack have been provided by Land O’Lakes through MyBlogSpark.

Your Shape Fitness Evolved: Week 5 Review and Giveaway

March 1, 2012 TechyDad Fitness, Games, Giveaway, Video Games

For the past 4 weeks, I’ve been working out using Your Shape Fitness Evolved for the XBox 360. The past four weeks were dedicated to keeping track as I tried Your Shape Fitness Evolved’s various types of workouts. This week, however, I will review the overall game as well as give what I feel is the best workout routine.

I found Your Shape Fitness Evolved to be quite an effective workout. The paces it put me through made me sweat and left me sore the next day just like any good workout should. There is a wide variety of workouts too to help keep your workouts from getting stale. In addition, there are "games", such as Stack ‘Em Up, that burn calories while you play.

I did run into some issues while working out with Your Shape Fitness Evolved, however these mainly seemed to relate to the Kinect system. Mainly, my living room was too small for Kinect. I wound up working out with the heels of my feet nearly pressed against our couch. This meant that I couldn’t move as freely as if I had moved a foot or so forward. Online searches revealed that Kinect does have problems with smaller rooms.

Overall, however, I found the workouts to be very nice. I could definitely see how regular Your Shape Fitness Evolved workouts could help as part of a weight loss regime.

Now for my "Recipe for Success". I’d say the best workout is one that alternates what gets worked out. The times when I did back-to-back arm or leg workouts were brutal. In addition, I’d recommend starting slow, ramping your workout up and then cooling down with a slower routine. For example, I’d start with a workout "games" like Wall Breaker or Juggle It. Next, I’d use one of the Run the World courses. After that, I’d shift to Cardio Boxing. I’d follow this with a toning workout which works the legs such as Build Strength. Finally, I’d cool down with some Yoga. This routine should burn about 170 calories.

Giveaway

You could win a copy of Your Shape Fitness Evolved from Ubisoft. Simply post a comment to this blog post. You can enter multiple times by leaving one comment in each of the posts of this series: Week 1, Week 2, Week 3, Week 4.

One week from today, on March 8th at 10pm, I’ll select one winner from across the comments posted to all five posts. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using random.org and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. residents only.

Disclaimer: I was given a copy of Your Shape Fitness Evolved by Ubisoft and financially compensated for this Clever Girls Collective, Inc. campaign. In addition, I was loaned an XBox 360 and Kinect for the duration of the campaign. The opinions expressed above, however, are my own.

Your Shape Fitness Evolved: Week 4 Diary and Giveaway

February 23, 2012 TechyDad Fitness, Games, Giveaway, Health, Video Games

This week, I tried out Your Shape Fitness Evolved’s Humana Health series: Strengthen Your Heart, Active Kids, and Aging With Grace. Each of these is targeted to a particular demographic/purpose.

Strengthen Your Heart had me moving with squat punches, knee-up punches, tap backs, jumping jack punches, kick crosses, jab knee-ups, dumbbell squats, goblet squats, and triceps skating. All of these workouts burned 49 calories.

Next up, I tried Active Kids which is targeted more towards the younger set. Though I did these by myself, I could picture my son doing the squat kick combos, knee-up punches, shuffle cross punches, front kick punches, squat punches, jab knee-ups, combo arms switches, jumping jack punches, and kick crosses with me. This workout wound up burning 56 calories.

If Active Kids is aimed at younger folks, Aging With Grace is geared towards an older crowd. This workout wasn’t strenuous but still managed to burn 49 calories using step touches, knee fronts, tap backs, Z-Steps, Open-Close, squat punches, dumbbell squats, scaptions, and braced squats.

Giveaway

You could win a copy of Your Shape Fitness Evolved. Simply post a comment to this blog post. You can enter multiple times by leaving one comment in each of the posts of this series: Week 1, Week 2, and Week 3. When my five week series is finished, one commenter from across the five posts will win a copy of the game from Ubisoft.

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