Giveaway & Spotlight - Rising Shadows by Bridget Blackwood

Rising Shadows

World in Shadows

Book One

Bridget Blackwood

Genre: Paranormal Romance

Date of Publication: February 1, 2014

ISBN: 1494891751

ASIN: B00I6U2ARW

Number of pages: 107

Word Count: 32,404

Cover Artist: The Killion Group

Amazon   Nook

ITunes    Kobo

Book Description:

Rachel Ryan wakes up with no knowledge of where she is or how she got there. Thrown into a world she thought only existed in myths, she finds more questions than answers.

Shape shifters, faeries, and vampires hide in plain sight among humans. There’s a war quietly brewing in the shadows. Rachel stands between mankind and those creatures that live in the darkness.

Enhanced with power she doesn’t understand, she’ll tip the scales, but who is the real enemy?

Excerpt #1

Gates is in the center of the club. I follow behind him curious to see what happens next. I should grab Livia and run. I look up at the loft. People are lined up against the railing watching the display below. My eyes are drawn to one man in particular. From my angle and with the low lighting, I can’t tell much about his features or height. His clothes and hair are dark, he rests one arm on the top rail and holds a pool cue in the other hand. His gaze is a penetrating green and I swear they glow, I have to make myself look away.

“Guns are not appreciated here, sir,” says a young woman behind the bar.

Liquid courage, come to mama! Moving around Gates, I walk over and take a seat in front of her. “Can I get a drink please?” I ask politely.

“What do you think you are doing?” Gates grinds out through clenched teeth. He is standing directly behind me.

“You folks had me locked up playing lab rat. I just want a few minutes of me time before the shit hits the fan.”

Gates doesn’t know what to say to that. Patrons watch me curiously. Let them. I am past the point of caring. The bartender grins at me. She has hair that’s a silvery lavender dancing around her shoulders. Her eyes are a mesmerizing shade of purple. She doesn’t seem real. I am spellbound. Not a shifter, what is she? I have to stop myself from reaching out and touching her.

“What would you like?” She asks me breaking the trance.

Back to reality, in a room full of doom. “What would you recommend for a woman’s last drink on earth?”

About the Author:

Bridget Blackwood is a hopeless romantic and a fan of happily ever after. She grew up in East Texas where she met and married her high school sweetheart. Together they moved to Southern Illinois, it's been home for over a decade now. Bridget began telling stories at an early age, she writes in self-defense because the characters in her head are loud and bossy. A social butterfly by nature, Bridget loves to talk and laugh. When she isn't writing she enjoys watching horror movies, playing video games, and not cooking.

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/bridget.blackwood.9

Twitter  https://twitter.com/author_bridget

Blog  http://bridgetblackwood.wordpress.com/

Website  http://bridgetblackwoodauth.wix.com/book

Pinterest  http://www.pinterest.com/bridgetblackwoo/

Goodreads  https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7735464.Bridget_Blackwood

Booklikes  http://bridgetblackwood9.booklikes.com/

Bonus Materials

Quotes from the Book:

Quote 1

“I whooped the personal guards of the Vampire big kahuna. Whoops. In my defense, it’s not like they wore nametags.” – Rachel Ryan

Quote 2

“Is your plan to make me stupid with your sweet hands so I’ll agree to anything? Because it’s working.”    - Sebastien “Bastien” Bonvillian

Playlist:

1. My Medicine by The Pretty Reckless

2. Freak Like Me by Halestorm

3. Titanium by Madilyn Extreme by Valora

4. Not Strong Enough by Apocalyptica

5. Oceans by Evanescence

6. Echoes of an Empire by Picture Me Broken

7. Carnival of Rust by Poets of the Fall

8. Never Go Back by Evanescence

9. Secret Door by Evanescence

Tour giveaway details

2 personalized signed print copies of Rising Shadows

3 Rising Shadows chainmail charm key chains

US and Canada  shipping only

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Guest Post & Giveaway - No Refuge by Annie Nicholas

GUEST POST BY ANNIE NICHOLAS

Space Travel

Imagine one day a couple going on their honeymoon, but instead of boarding an airplane to Hawaii they board a space ship to the rings of Saturn.  

This all seems like fantasy for us but there was a time where people used to dream of crossing an ocean just like we dream of crossing the universe. This dream gets closer to being fulfilled ever year. Just this January I came across this article.

http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2014/01/nasas-star-trek-future-a-warp-drive-solution-for-faster-than-light-space-travel-a-2013-most-popular.html

Nasa is developing a theory for almost faster than light travel. Woohoo!

I remember as a kid hoping by the time I retire I could go live on the moon. Hey younger generation, you have 25 more years to make this happen before I retire. *wink wink*

The best part of writing science fiction is working with advance technologies that don’t exist yet and playing with the circumstances like what happens inside a space ship when the space station it’s docked to stops spinning?  ;)

Guest Blog - Two for One by Ann B Harrison

GUEST POST BY ANN B HARRISON

When I first started writing I was a little bit scared of writing sex. Why you might ask? Truthfully I have no idea. Maybe I was scared I wouldn’t write believable love scenes. Maybe I thought I sucked at it, period. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a prude by any stretch of the imagination. It felt like the first time you made the decision to do anything you hadn’t done before. It can be exciting or terrifying. I was literally shaking in my boots.

I remember getting to the part in my book where they were going to get it on and thinking, “Can I really do this? Why do they have to do it now?” I shut myself in the office and just wrote, no editing, no thinking, just fingers on keys. Then I got up, walked out and made a cup of tea. “I feel like a voyeur,” I said to my husband. Poor guy didn’t get it.

After I calmed down I went back in and read over my words, made a few changes and carried on. The next sex scene got easier and that book ended up with three all up. That was a huge effort for me, not so much my characters. They enjoyed themselves immensely.

Nerves took hold once again when I sent it to my editor. I waited for her to shred the scenes to pieces. It never happened. “Hey, great sex,” was her reply. Thank goodness for that. It boosted my confidence to no end. After that, it got easier and easier. Now I’m even brave enough to tag my latest book erotic. I hope you enjoy the sex as much as I did

Two for One

The Club Series

Book One

Ann B Harrison

Genre: Erotic/contemporary

ASIN: B00IUMZ0VE

Number of pages: 123

Word Count: 35,914

Cover Artist: Valerie Tibbs

Available at Amazon  

Book Description:

Nothing is going Lizzie’s way. Her sex life is unsatisfying, her job sucks and she has more debt than she needs thanks to her loser brother. Against her better judgment, she lets her best friend sign her up to be auctioned off at a high-rolling venue called the Club. Agreeing to a weekend of adventurous sex with a stranger is one thing, but being bought by the brothers who own the Club means Lizzie is up for a weekend beyond her wildest fantasies.

Ryan and Lizzie hit it off, in bed and out, but it’s his quiet brother, Trace, that has her heart pounding and her panties in a twist. But is Lizzie what Trace needs? Having been burned before, will he take a chance on what his heart is telling him or trust his instincts and send her home after their weekend is over?

About the Author:

Ann swears she was born with a book in her hands and has never put it down. A lifelong love of reader has finally culminated in achieving her dream of writing...and publication.

She lives in the beautiful Hunter Valley with her own handsome hero of many years. Ann has always loved the ups and downs of life in small communities and she shares this with readers in her rural romances.

Strong sexy heroines with a good dash of sass thrown in feature in her stories. Of course these women need an equally strong hero. Bring on the outback hero and watch the passion ignite.

When not writing Ann enjoys reading, gardening, walking her very large dog Hugo and fighting with her computer.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Ann-B-Harrison-Author/311207972338638

https://twitter.com/AnnBHarrison

www.annbharrisonromance.com

Series Spotlight - The Vanguards by Annie Nicholas

The Omegas

The Vanguards

Book One

Annie Nicholas

Genre: Paranormal Romance

Publisher: Lyrical Press

Date of Publication: Jan 2010

ASIN: B00IGFXCTM

Number of pages: 97

Word Count: 25,000

Cover Artist: Renee Rocco

Amazon

Book Description:

Only a vampire is man enough to teach werewolves how to fight.

Pretty librarian Sugar wants her life to stay quiet. That’s hard enough when friends and neighbors turn into furry werewolves every full moon. But when a hot vampire gets involved, life’s bound to get complicated.

The Omegas have always been the pansies of the paranormal. Now Chicago’s top werewolf pack has issued them a life or death challenge. Their only option: hire a vampire warrior to teach them the moves.

Daedalus has been a powerful vampire for ages. Intrigued by the chance to train the geeks of the underworld, he wasn’t bargaining on losing his heart to a human. Can he make the Omegas a success, fit into Sugar’s quiet life, and avoid being ripped to shreds in the process?

The Omegas Excerpt:

Guest Blog & Giveaway - Secrets and Lies by Christine Amsden

GUEST POST - Christine Amsden

A Scorching Hot Kiss

When Literal Hotties posted a glowing review of Cassie Scot: ParaNormal Detective a few months back, April said, “The steamiest you get here is a scorching hot kiss. But there is hope for the next book getting hotter!”

Evan's kiss really is a scorcher. He can, we discover during the first book, bring a woman to orgasm with a single kiss. Cassie doesn't believe him at first, but she learns the truth the hard way. (Or more to the point, in a very arousing way.)

The idea for the kiss came to me in a dream – and oh, I'm sorry to sound like a cliché but it's the truth! I held that dream close to my chest for years before I dared write it down, though. It was the center of many a private fantasy.

I've worked my way into romance, it isn't something I set out to do from the start. But I noticed that the very minor romantic subplots I wrote into my first two books were by far my favorite parts of the stories, so it was clear to me that I needed to surrender to the romantic within, begging to be set free.

Cassie Scot was a great way for me to ease myself into romance. The romantic subplot (mixed with mystery and magic) takes four books to develop. Since it is one of several intertwined subplots, it's never going to get very high on the steam-o-meter, but I promise that I'm no curtain closer. For me it was just a matter of letting Cassie's character drive the story, and Cassie was not ready to have sex in the early books. Between you and me (and now everyone else on the Internet) I have a file with over two dozen discarded attempts to put a sex scene into the first two books. She said no, and no means no. So...

I was left with that scorching kiss. A single brush of lip against lip that no woman can resist.

I was reading a lot of romance in those early days of plot outlining and character sketching, when I was trying to decide whether or not to go for the magic kiss. Women in mainstream romance get thoroughly aroused by simple kisses all the time and they don't even have the fantasy umbrella for shelter. If I'm going to write fantasy, why not mean it? Why not own it?

Okay, so after writing all four books in the series I have an answer: The fun fantasy became quite the challenge when I realized only a total jerk would take advantage of such a power. Which makes foreplay awkward. When they do finally make love, I had to write the foreplay without any kissing lest the reader harbor any doubt as to whether or not Cassie is wholeheartedly embracing the moment.

Despite that challenge, I wouldn't change a thing. Evan is my dream man, including that erotic kiss of his. I hope you enjoy the romantic dynamic, which climaxes in Stolen Dreams (Cassie Scot #4).