27 August 2008
Literary Escapism is going to be participating in the upcoming Book Blogger Appreciation Week which takes place September 15th - 19th. Already, there are over 200 blogs participating and the organizers are starting to get things in order. This also means we’re eligible for the 2008 BBAW Awards. This is where I’m going to need help from my readers. In order for Literary Escapism to even be in the running, I need someone to nominate me. There is a huge list of categories that a blog can be nominated in, so click here to find out all the details. You DO NOT have to have a blog to make nominations.
As I said, there are over 200 blogs participating, but there isn’t a list of them up yet. There will be so if you’re looking for another blog to read (what’s one more?), then keep an eye out and I’ll post it the link for it as soon as I get it.
Just as heads up, during the week, I will have a contest running, but I’m not sure what I’m going to offer yet, so keep an eye out and I’ll announce the contest next week sometime.
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27 August 2008
So I’m reading this novel for review - Quondam by Jayel Gibson - and I love the artwork on the book, so I went looking for the artist. Michele-lee Phelan did the cover and has quite an extensive collection of artwork on her site. FYI…her main site is currently undergoing so renovations, but you can still see her gallery. I’ve been browsing through her site and I am loving a lot of the work I am seeing. The featured piece is called DarkBringer.
Phelan has a few other ventures in the fantasy artwork as well. She also has her first full color book coming out with a lot of illustrations, some which have never been seen before. The book, Dreams of Magick, is being released by Blue Angel Publishing, and we can expect to see it sometime in late 2008, early 2009. I’ve already checked Amazon and there isn’t anything up for her book yet, but I’ll keep an eye out for it. However, she has been featured in a few other books, for example - she was the illustrator for Templeton Turtle Goes Exploring and she’s one of many illustrators contributing to Enchanted Artists: Visions of Atlantis.
Currently, Phelan is spending all of her energy creating the Dreams of Gaia tarot card set. The set will include over 78 new illustrations as well as a book written by Phelan and will be published by Blue Angel Publishing. She just started working on it, so don’t expect it anytime before 2010.
If you’re looking for something sooner, Phelan contributed 45 illustrations that are going to be used in the upcoming Mythic Oracle deck written by Carisa Mellado, which will also be published by Blue Angel Publishing sometime this winter.
So now that I shared this new artist with you, I’ll leave you with few more samples of her artwork. The pieces are in order: Lady of the Water, The Cailleach Bhuer, Demeter.
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27 August 2008
So I’ve just been shown this great new site. It’s called FieldReports and it’s a unique place for both writers and reviewers.
On the outside, FieldReports is a contest, big enough to get a lot of people involved. On the inside it’s a community of writers and readers dedicated to great storytelling and to breaking down walls of human isolation.
It allows everyday people a chance to write about their experience and share what they’ve learned. Everything on the site is real and completely not fiction. It appears to me that for everyone who contributes a story, they have a chance to win $1000. The site gives away over $20,000 each month and they have a huge giveaway happening in the next 120 days.
It’s also a great way for writers to get published. Once you submit a story, it gets tossed in their huge list of stories that random people can select and publish into their own collection…
Choose your favorite FieldReports from the site, the top FieldReports, or create a book of your own FieldReports for you, your friends or your family. Choose a special interest and make a collection. You write the introduction. You choose the book cover. FRBooks will publish it for you and send it.
FieldReport writers will earn a 15% royalty of the net revenues from every FRBook sold, based on the number of words they contributed.
You don’t have to be a contributor to take part in this service either. You can sign up to be a reviewer and help choose which story gets picked for the $1000 prize each month.
I’m still looking around the site, so I can’t tell you everything about it, so I suggest going over and looking for yourself. There’s a Quick Start Guide that gives basic rundown of what they do, but I found more information just searching through the site than using their guide. But it is a good place to start.
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27 August 2008
Laurell K Hamilton is the guest author at the Center Stage this week. She’ll be answering questions while she’s there, so make sure you head over and she what she has to say.
Interviews:
The final installment of Jeri Smith-Ready’s Aspect of the Crow fantasy series will conclude on November 1st with the release of The Reawakened. Here’s an excerpt. The first two novels - Eyes of the Crow and Voice of Crow - are available via Amazon now.
Bitten by Books has Sapphire Phelan guest blogging today and she is taking about how a horror author can write the same scary stuff for dark paranormal romance. There’s a contest as well, so make sure you stop on by.
Rachel Vincent has posted another entry in her crazy summer giveaway. She still has 3 books to give to someone and you have until tomorrow night to get your name in the hat.
Bookfinder.com has compiled an interesting list. They looked at the top 10 books that are the most sought after, yet are out of print and they over a lot of different genres. Here are some of the authors on the list:
- Murmurs of Earth: The Voyager Interstellar Record by Carl Sagan (Popular Fiction & Technology #1)
- Mother Goose by Tasha Tudor (Children’s #5)
- The Roman Republic by Isaac Asimov (Children’s #9)
- Promise Me Tomorrow by Nora Roberts (Fiction & Literature #2)
- Get Lucky by Suzanne Brockman (Fiction & Literature #7)
- Ties That Bind by Lora Leigh (Fiction & Literature #8)
And here’s the list for Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Horror
- Rage by Stephen King (as Richard Bachman)
- Halloween by Curtis Richards
- Turnabout by Andy Mangels
- Second Sight by David Williams
- Masques by Patricia Briggs - although I heard a rumor they were going to be reprinting this series soon.
- Dark Carnival by Ray Bradbury
- She Is the Darkness by Glen Cook
- Codex Seraphinianus by Luigi Serafini
- Nightworld by F. Paul Wilson
- The Return by E.C. Tubb
Today’s artist spotlight is Donato Giancola who I found via Tor.com. This print is titled The Golden Rose.
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26 August 2008
I think I just fell in love again. Another author I’ve been hearing great things about, Nightwalker by Jocelynn Drake is a whole new experience and I can’t wait for the second novel in the Dark Days series.
We’re introduced to Mira, a 600+ vampire who has a unique talent among her own kind - she’s a fire starter and is thus immune to fire. Being a vampire, this is really handy talent. However, it makes her very valuable to other people and thus she is found in the middle of a war where she is left with very few choices. Through it all, an odd relationship is formed between a nightwalker and a hunter…two enemies who are fighting side by side in order to be the one to kill the other.
I loved this novel. We’re given a new perspective in vampire literature and we’re given a romance that is very Shakespearean. The entire tale is centered on Mira and the choices she must make as she wades through the vampire politics, yet she’s still considered one of the strongest ones out there so she has power of her own. No one considers her weak and she’s a force to be reckon with. You can tell that just from her personality and Drake delivers beautifully when she develops her character. We’re given information about her past and we get to see inside her head while she works things out. The novel is told in the first person and yet it drags you into the story and doesn’t let go. The plot is fabulous with twists and turns in every chapter and it doesn’t leave you waiting for anything. There is some romantic element, but instead of the happy ever after ending type of story, we’re given a more realistic courtship where both parties know where they want their relationship to end up and it’s a place that we’re not all familiar with.
Overall, Jocelynn Drake is an author is getting added to my “buy immediately upon release” list and there are not that many authors on it. If all of her books are as good as this one, then I know I’m going to be in for a wild ride and will be loving every moment of it. I haven’t found an author that I became instantly in love with since Jeaniene Frost, but now I have and I plan to spread the word. Do not go out and borrow this book from the library, but go out and buy it. You won’t regret it.
Also reviewed by:
Amberkatze
Blogcritics Magazine
PNR Bookworm
Musings of a Bookish Kitty
SciFiGuy
Merry Genre Go Round Reviews
Posted in Fae, Jocelynn Drake, Magic, Reviews, Urban Fantasy, Vampires No Comments »
26 August 2008
It’s the last release day in August and boy is it loaded. There are quite a few coming out…
Wanderlust by Ann Aguirre (excerpt)
Sirantha Jax doesn’t take chances…she jumps at them…
Sirantha Jax is a “Jumper,” a woman who possesses the unique genetic makeup needed to navigate faster than light ships through grimspace. Jax has worked for the Farwan Corporation her entire career. But now the word’s out that the Corp deliberately crashed a passenger ship, and their stranglehold on intergalactic commerce has crumbled—which means that Jax is out of a job.
She’s also broke, due to being declared dead a little prematurely. So when the government asks her to head up a vital diplomatic mission, Jax takes it. Her mandate: journey to the planet Ithiss-Tor and convince them to join the Conglomerate.
But Jax’s payday is light years away. First, she’ll have to contend with Syndicate criminals, a stormy relationship with her pilot, man-eating aliens, and her own grimspace-weakened body. She’ll be lucky just to make it to Ithiss-Tor alive…
Hunter’s Prayer by Lilith Saintcrow
Another night on the Nightside…An ancient evil looms over Santa Luz. Prostitutes are showing up dead and eviscerated. And Jill Kismet just might be able to get her revenge against an old enemy.
There’s just one problem. Someone wants Jill dead–again. And if they have to open up Hell itself to kill her, they will.
Sometimes, even when you’re Jill Kismet, you don’t have a prayer…
Everlasting Bad Boys by Cynthia Eden, Shelly Laurenston, and Noelle Mack (Anthology)
They’re bad boys–with that little something extra. Sexy, wild, out-of-this-world talents that can leave any woman feeling weak at the knees (among other body parts), they’re the ones to call when you want pleasure that lasts…and lasts…
Can’t Get Enough by Shelly Laurenston: Even for a dragon, Ailean the Wicked has a bad reputation. For 150 years he’s been renowned for his fighting prowess, but now he’s got a new conquest in mind–a gorgeous dragoness known as Shalin the Innocent. Ailean suspects she’s anything but. And while he’s saving her from her enemies, he plans to prove that, even in human form, a bad-boy dragon can show a girl a good time that’s truly off the scale…
Spellbound by Cynthia Eden: No witch in her right mind would summon an immortal soul-hunter to her aid, but Serena Tyme needs Luis D’Amil’s help to destroy the warlock who’s stalking her coven. And she’s willing to pay any price he names…especially when the tall, dark, sexy-as-hell assassin shows her he can work some sensual magic of his own…
Turn Me On by Noelle Mack: Finally, Beth Danforth has found a man who can flip her switch. That’s because supersexy Justin Watts, CEO of SpectraSign, is literally made of light. His dazzling, custom-built body can’t ever wear out. And talk about energy–Beth can’t get enough of the guy. The sex is electrifying. The love will never fade away…
Legacy by Jeanne Stein
Anna Strong was a tough-as-nails bounty hunter until the night she was attacked by a vampire – and changed forever…
Since then, Anna has struggled to adapt to her supernatural status while clinging to the vestiges of her humanity. Avery - the sinister vampire who transformed her - is dead, and Anna learns that she’s entitled to his vast fortune. Then a predatory werewolf comes forward, claiming to be Avery’s widow. She demands the entire estate and makes it clear that she and her pack think nothing of killing Anna – and those who matter to her – to get what’s owed them. Now Anna must protect those she loves from a werewolf out for the two most precious things in the world: blood…and money.
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25 August 2008
Dewey over at the Hidden Side of a Leaf started up a bookworm carnival and guess who is participating in it. Here’s the idea behind it:
The aim of the Bookworms Carnival is to build the community of book bloggers. You don’t have to have a book blog to participate, though; bloggers are welcome to submit any post relevant to the current theme from any blog.
The Bookworms Carnival is held once a month
I’m not hosting it until December, but I thought I would put this out there for anyone interested in submitting any reviews. For my month, the theme is going to be Historical Fiction. I chose this topic in anticipation for Diana Gabaldon’s new release An Echo in the Bone which will be the seventh novel in her Outlander series. She is one of my all time favorite authors and I always read all of her novels before one comes out. Since the smallest book is over 600 pages and one book is close to 1500 pages, it’s obvious I’m a devoted reader.
So I’m hosting the Historical Fiction month for the Bookworms Carnival. All submissions need to be emailed to me at myjaxon AT gmail DOT com by December 11th. I won’t begin accepting entries until November 11th, one month prior to the deadline.
Nothing official yet, but I’ll also be hosting another month for the Bookworm Carnival, but I don’t know which month yet. I do have some ideas on a theme though. I’m tossing around speculative fiction at the moment, and that’s what I’ve told Dewey, but we’ll see if that stays true. Don’t expect it to be any time before next summer though. Dewey actually has quite a list going on.
To give you a taste of previous Bookworm Carnivals, here are the past themes:
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25 August 2008
So I just found out about this author tour that is coming to Michigan. Meijer (it’s a supermarket chain that’s better than a super wal-mart and has been around a lot longer) is bringing a long list of authors to the state and they are going to be at a few stores. Here’s the list of authors:
CT Adams & Cathy Clamp
Jessica Anderson
Allison Brennan
Kathryn Caskie
Colleen Coble
Kresley Cole
Jordan Dane
Deeanne Gist
Tom Grace
Kristan Higgins
Elizabeth Hoyt
Angela Knight
Leslie Langtry
Jade Lee
Robert Liparulo
Susan Mallery
Monica McInerney
Sophia Nash
Deborah Raleigh
Gena Showalter
Chip St. Clair
Roxanne St. Clair
Sherry Thomas
They are going to be at the following locations…can you guess where I’ll be on the 21st?
- Friday, September 19
10:30am Kalamazoo/5800 Gull Rd.
3:00pm Grand Rapids/Cascade
5:00pm Grand Rapids/Knapp’s Corner
- Saturday, September 20
10:30am Lansing/2055 W. Grand River Rd.
3:00pm Ann Arbor/5645 Jackson Rd.
5:00pm Canton/45001 Ford Rd.
- Sunday, September 21
10:30am Rochester Hills/3175 Rochester Rd.
12:00pm Royal Oak/5150 Coolidge Hwy
4:00pm Monroe/1700 Telegraph Rd.
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25 August 2008
OMG!!! Jeaniene Frost has just posted the new cover for At Graves End, the third Night Huntress novel and it is sooo gorgeous. She was also able to post the inside cover as well and we get another look at our favorite vampire, Bones.
Here’s the teaser from the back of the book:
SOME THINGS WON’T STAY BURIED…AT GRAVE’S END
It should be the best time of half-vampire Cat Crawfield’s life. With her undead lover Bones at her side, she’s successfully protected mortals from the rogue undead. But though Cat’s worn disguise after disguise to keep her true identity a secret from the brazen bloodsuckers, her cover’s finally been blown, placing her in terrible danger.
As if that wasn’t enough, a woman from Bones’s past is determined to bury him once and for all. Caught in the crosshairs of a vengeful vamp, yet determined to help Bones stop a lethal magic from being unleashed, Cat’s about to learn the true meaning of bad blood. And the tricks she’s learned as a special agent won’t help her. She will need to fully embrace her vampire instincts in order to save herself - and Bones - from a fate worse than the grave.
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25 August 2008
The final ballot for the World Fantasy Awards has been released. I’m not really seeing anyone on the ballot I’ve read or even heard of, so it might be interesting to go through and get a couple of these books. The winners are going to be announced at the World Fantasy 2008, which is held in Calgary, Alberta.
Some happy news, I’ve been told that True Blood is going to be available for download via HBO and iTunes, so for those of us cable/HBO deprived, we’ll still have a chance for the series.
Interviews:
Here’s a brief look at Midnights Daughter by Karen Chance.
Nalini Singh is running a contest over at her blog to celebrate the release of Hostage to Pleasure, which comes out in one week (Sept. 2nd). The winner is given a $75 gift certificate, so make sure you check out her site for the details.
Julie Kenner, author of Deja Demon, is guest blogging about her first sale over at Dear Author
And the artist in today’s spotlight is James Carl McKnight, who can be found at Elfwood. The feature print is called Boy Wizard.
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