Archive for October 2016

5 Things to Love About Violet Streiff in Without You

By: Lindsay Detwiler

Who is your favorite character you’ve written?

I find myself coming back to the same answer when asked this question: Violet Streiff from Without You.

Without You, my second novel, is a new adult novel that follows two women, Jenna and Violet, through a year of big changes. Both women are in their late twenties and live in the same town, but they have very different lives. Jenna is married to the hunky Camden and works as an accountant. She’s rational to the core. Violet is the zany redhead who started her own bakery slash coffee shop out of college. After a horrible breakup, she’s feeling forever alone, struggling with the single life.

Violet is my favorite because she’s everything I’m not. She’s wild and a bit free-spirited. She thinks with her heart while I, like Jenna, tend to think with my head. She’s an eternal optimist, a believer in love, and a dream chaser.

But that’s not all Violet has going for her. Read on to find five reasons you’ll be rooting for Violet Streiff in Without You. Plus, be sure to check out my giveaway at the bottom of this post where you can win a gift basket of Violet’s favorite things!

1. Violet’s a cat lady.

Violet has an eighteen-pound cat named Bob whom she adopted from her elderly neighbor when she had to go to a nursing home. Bob loves cupcakes and goes with Vi on Sunday to visit his previous owner.

My real life Bob is on the left...and he likes cupcakes, just like Violet's Bob.

1. Violet has an awesome, hilarious best friend named Ray.

Violet met Ray in college when he asked to borrow her pen. Ray’s not afraid to call Violet by her most hated nickname—Purple—or to tell her she’s being too uptight. Violet’s not afraid to tell Ray his girlfriend Raina is creepy. Their friendly, playful banter will make you want your own Ray in your life.

2. Violet loves literature, coffee, and cupcakes.

Although we’re very different, she’s a girl after my own heart. She started her bakery/coffee shop called Vi’s, which is the setting for much of the book, to combine her love for all three.

3. She’s got a great sense of humor.

Even when she’s going through some intense moments in the book and heavy drama, she doesn’t lose her sense of humor. She isn’t afraid to laugh at herself or to see her own faults. She’s relatable because she doesn’t take herself too seriously.

4. She’s loyal to her family and to her values.

She helps her sister out by babysitting her niece. Despite her mom’s botched blind date attempts, she still turns to her for advice. Most of all, when Vi’s morals are put to the test in Without You, she stays true to who she is. She’s not perfect, but she does her best to be a woman she is proud of.

There are so many reasons you’ll love Vi, and so many reasons she’s my favorite character I’ve written. Be sure to find your own reasons by picking up a copy of the book. Also, enter my Vi’s Favorites Giveaway to get a basket of her favorite things and a copy of the book. Contest ends October 31^st, 2016, so hurry and enter!

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/share-code/NjQ3YjRlZjBhMTcwMWU2OTNmZWFkZTA3MGJhMmZkOjEz/?

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Mermaids Are Real… And They’re Going To Kill Us All.

Hi everyone, my name is Derek Murphy (D.S. Murphy) and I write dark fantasy based on history and world mythology. My first book, Shearwater, is a mermaid romance set in Ireland, with a lot of magic, death and mayhem. Part one has 250 reviews and I’m working on part two now – here’s a sneak peak.

You can get the rest for free on Amazon and I hope to finish part 2 soon. The other book I think you’ll like is Scarlet Thread, based on Greek Mythology, it’s kind of a Percy Jackson meets Fallen story.

Below is a *possible* scene for the not-yet-released part two.

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My name is Kaidance Monroe, and sometimes when I touch people, I see how they die.

At least that’s how this story began. But last night changed everything. A few days ago I saw Matt die. I saw the sword sticking out of his beastly chest, blood gurgling from his lips. The golden sword, glittering with blue jewels, glowing in the mystical darkness of Able’s ancient mansion… the crown that symbolized Zeus’s kingdom shining like a beacon. All of Zeus’s winged army had swords like that—hunters, created to rid the world of magic.

In the past, every time I had a vision of someone’s death, it came true.

But last night, when hunters broke through the ceiling like bolts of lightning, it was my death they were after. So I couldn’t let them kill Matt. I couldn’t let him die for me. I was supposed to use the shotgun and sword Sitri gave me, but I couldn’t do it. Not when I saw Puriel. His tall, angelic form. His amber eyes and nearly white hair. The shimmering mirrored wings behind him. I couldn’t destroy something that beautiful. And I didn’t want any more deaths. I just wanted it to stop. So I offered myself to him. Let them take what they came for. In that moment, I was prepared to die.

Instead…Puriel burst into flames, and Matt lived.

Which means, my visions don’t have to come true.

Which means, I might not be the monster everyone always thought I was.

But why did Puriel hesitate? Why not destroy me like Zeus ordered him to? He’d become a torch, cast off from Zeus’s favor. After serving obediently for thousands of years. How could that have happened? I was about to find out.

I snuck downstairs after everyone was sleeping and peeked through the rusted iron bars of the small window on the door where Puriel was being kept. I could barely see him in the dark. His pale, white body made him look like a ghost, surrounded by walls of solid concrete. Ash and soot stuck to his skin in dark patches, and he smelled like charcoal, singed hair and burnt feathers. I heard the grating noise of heavy chains being dragged across the stone floor and noticed that the dark cuffs around his neck and wrists were fixed to the wall. That’s when he noticed me.

I gasped when he looked up, his eyes were black sockets, gaping voids of desolation and heartbreak. The beautiful thing Puriel had been yesterday was gone, and this thing was ruin incarnate. His eyes sparked like glowing coals, as furious patches of bright orange burned in the darkness of the room. He moaned, straining against his restraints, his muscles tense as he reached towards the door. Towards me.

I choked back a sob at the thing he’d become.

Then I took the heavy skeleton key, turned the giant lock, and stepped inside.

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You can get it for free on Amazon here. I just finished my PhD in Literature on Paradise Lost so fallen angels and forgotten gods are kind of my thing, but I like slow, mysterious stories with lots of tensions and build up.

On my site, UrbanEpics.com, I do lots of giveaways with other authors. Right now we’re running a giveaway of 28 dark fantasy books for fans of Fallen, in celebration of the release of the Fallen movie.

Lauren Kate herself actually shared our giveaway on Facebook and Twitter, which was pretty awesome.

Click here to enter the giveaway.