Murder Mystery Suspect - Queen Solenne

I'm participating in the Murder Mystery Blogfest hosted by Sharon Bayliss, and here's the introduction of my suspect:

My suspect for the murder of Lenny Glow is the witch Queen of Shadows and Souls herself, Solenne. She is the main antagonist of my novel Black Widow Witch. Queen Solenne has been sole ruler of the witch realm, the Aeverneath, for over two hundred years after brutally murdering the previous (and up till then the only) queen of the Aeverneath. Ever since then she has cared less about the well being of her people and more about cursing and killing any witch for any reason. Her likes include carriage rides around the Aeverneath, accompanied by her guards and her self made Shadow Monsters, to wipe out random cities and towns and massacre their populations. She's been known to flay her gardeners alive if there is so much as a crushed petal on one of her flowers. She also likes to collect beautiful, sexy men for her bedroom activities, but she goes far beyond lovemaking; nothing gets her off more than carving up her men and bathing in their blood. Another hobby of hers is cursing witches and exiling them to the human world. For example, she parted a witch from her body, rendering her only a floating head because she thought that witch's body too close in beauty to her own. And she cursed one of her musicians, who was so beautiful eyes were straying from her to him, to look like a putrid, rotting corpse. So as far as stuffing Lenny full of poisonous spiders? Maybe that sort of thing is too beneath her, too much of child's play compared to her usual fare.

Or is it?

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun Bloghop

This time it's the girl's turn! Last month Jaycee DeLorenzo and Victoria Smith hosted a Oh My Hero! Blog hop where we got to introduce our novel's hero's and interview them, and now we get to do the same for the heroine. I'm choosing a heroine from a different novel than the one my hero was from, because she's a fun gal =)

We were supposed to include a picture, but I always prefer to do my own character drawings rather than use another picture, and this time my artistic muse wasn't able to produce a picture of my heroine in time, but once I do I'll add her.

Now, without further ado I'd like to introduce Selene Vanream, who is a necromancer who helps ghosts settle their affairs so they can head to the afterlife, or else they turn into monsters. I decided to let her answer all of the questions Jaycee and Victoria posed.

1. How would you describe your hero?

A royal pain in my ass! At least in the beginning. Micah was hostile towards me for no reason, but it's not like I cared too much about what crawled up his butt. Though alright, he's gorgeous, but he's plowed through half the women in the office, including me, one drunken night. He actually turned hateful after that night, and I always figured it was because he thought I'd be so enamored with him afterwards I'd throw myself at him and beg to be his girlfriend. And that definitely didn't happen.  But recently things have been changing, Micah and I had a heart to heart about a lot of things, including the true reason for his hostility, and I have to say waking up in a hospital room and seeing him there changed a lot for me...

2. What's your biggest date horror story?

HA, only one? Well suffice to say I get around a lot, oh, that really makes me sound like a big tramp doesn't it? Okay, I get around...periodically, how's that? One time a guy took me out and his idea of a date was pizza then drinking at a seedy bar in the West Village; which I was okay with don't get me wrong, any night that can combine pizza and liquor for me is a good night. But when prince charming got so hammered he ended up throwing up on me but still wanted to get into my pants, I'd have to say that date belongs in the sucky pile.

3. What turns you off from a guy the most?

Throwing up on me is a pretty big turn off, but since I'm an aggressive sorta girl I have to say someone who can't match me on that isn't someone whose gonna get the goods if you know what I mean. 

4. What's the best date you ever had? 

I'll get back to you on that one, see I'm only now realizing my hitting and quitting ways aren't quite working for me any more...Micah seems to be interested in me for more than a good time between the sheets, but I'm terrified of messing this up. Because let's face it, making a mess of things is sorta my MO.

5. Kiss on the first date?

Sure, we can start with a kiss... 

6. What gets a guy a second date?

Again, I'll get back to you on this.

7. Boxers or briefs on your guy?

Boxers for sure, you can't get me hot and bothered if you're coming at me in tightie whities.

8. What is one thing you believe can tell a lot about a person?

What they will do for you when it really matters. If you end up in the hospital, will they drop everyone and come even if it's not life threatening? Or will they leave you an expensive necklace on your desk at work then expect you to come and thank them for it? Because I've experienced both, and the behavior of the person who did the latter taught me a lesson almost too late.

9. What attracts you to a guy the most?

Scenario A from above. And nice biceps. And abs. And Micah's gray eyes...

Now her approach in her dating life isn't all there is to Selene, but since these questions were geared towards men and dates, I'm going to choose Maneater by Nelly Furtado as a song to describe her.

Maneater - Nelly Furtado 

First Fight/First Kiss Blogfest - Day 2

Today is kiss and make up day! Later on in the book, Selene and Micah get past the reason for all the hostility, and have their first kiss.

“You know, I have to say, this is all a little strange,” I said. It wasn’t possible that the intense emotion I saw on Micah’s face was for me. “You’re throwing me for a loop, Micah, going from hostile to caring so quickly…”

“Would you like me to go back to hostile?” he asked, his mouth twitching in a smile. I shook my head.

“No, but…you’re confusing me, I don’t know what to make of this.” His hand around mine was strong, and the strength I felt was very appealing. Where Andrew’s touch carried a crushing strength, Micah’s seemed more like a supporting strength.

“Then I guess I’m not going to help matters by doing this…” Before I knew it Micah had moved forward, slipped his hand around my neck, and kissed me. I was shocked for only a split second before my body was rippling in pleasure from the feel of his lips on mine, and I closed my eyes and melted into the kiss. Micah pulled me closer, careful of my slung arm, and deepened the kiss. His tongue whispered across my lips like he was asking rather than demanding, and I found this thrilling. I opened my mouth, and when our tongues brushed, his hands slid up my back under my shirt and he groaned low in his throat. He moved his hand to cup my face and slide through my hair, and he arched my head back and moved his lips moved down my neck, planting whisper soft kisses there that literally made my toes curl. He moved his mouth back to mine and kissed me slow and deep, as though he was taking his time to explore the contours of my mouth. It was a novelty to me after months of having my mouth roughly savaged by Andrew, along with my body. I had thought the way things were with Andrew had been the perfect scenario, but now I realized I had just never been kissed like this before; like the person on the other end of the kiss was it in for more than just the pleasure it brought him. There was a strength and intensity in the way Micah held me, possessively, but not like he thought he owned me, more like he was afraid I would slip away from him. All of these realizations, plus the body weakening ache that had erupted in my body from his touch, was overwhelming me.

First Fight/First Kiss Blogfest

Today is day one of the First Fight/First Kiss blogfest hosted by Danielle and Jackie. Up first we're supposed to share the first fight, be it physical or verbal, between our MCs. I decided to share a fight scene from my most recent novel (adult UF) between the main character Selene and love interest Micah. Of course it takes a little time for the love to blossom ;). They actually spend a good part of the novel being at odds. Enjoy!

“What’s up your butt?” I asked, leaning my hip against the edge of his desk. Okay, maybe that wasn’t the best opening line I could have come up with.

“You get on my last fucking nerve, do you know that?” Micah said. He was staring very decidedly at his computer screen although it was booting up so there wasn’t anything of interest to see there. 

“I get that from a lot of people,” I said. “And even some ghosts. What I don’t get about you though is why I work your poor nerves so badly.”

“You’re reckless and you get everything handed to you, how’s that to start?” Micah said, angry eyes finally snapping to my face. “Andrew had me tailing you for weeks; he took me off working with clients so I could build a report on you. After the first two weeks I had enough dirt to warrant your reassignment or suspension, but Andrew told me to keep following you, claiming he needed more evidence. Sounded more to me like he was turning a blind eye towards the things you were doing.” He shook his head. “If you were fucking Andrew he’d probably let you get away with outright murder.” I almost had a reaction to those words then remembered that he hadn’t accused me of anything; he’d said ‘if.” Instead of looking guilty, I gave him a thin smile.

“I guess this is the part where I defend myself, but I can’t do that,” I said. “I’m fully aware of the choices I’ve made, Micah, and I don’t regret anything I’ve done. If you ask me, my rule bending saved you and a lot of people in here from being forced to do more than one necromancer circle, so I’d say I was doing everyone a service.”

“Save it,” Micah said. “You just don’t get it.”

“I really don’t,” I said, shrugging. “But maybe it would be better if you didn’t let me bother you so much. I got in trouble and am being punished, and that’s my business, why let it be such an issue for you?”

“Because,” he said sharply, and I was a little taken aback by the intensity in his voice. He looked away. “Never mind. You’re not worth it.”

“Precisely,” I said brightly, though there was a little part of me that withered when he’d said I wasn’t worth it.

Looking forward to sharing their first kiss on Thursday!

All About BEA

I know I don't have to say it but I will - BEA was awesome! I went on Tuesday and Wednesday and I came away with a total of 27 books. I'm so happy I bought a rolling suitcase to help me haul the books home. I also chatted with a lot of bookish people and what can be better than conversations about books? And of course I got to see and meet a lot of authors and score a few signed books.

And FYI, at the end of this post I will list a few books that I scored at BEA that I will be giving away, a couple of them are even signed.

One of the most interesting things I did was sit in on a panel with Ya authors Melissa Marr, Bethany Griffin, Jenny Han, Siobhan Vivian, Elizabeth Norris, and Tonya Hurley where they discussed the ongoing evolution of YA:

It was awesome going around to all the publisher booths and checking out (and grabbing) their books, here's a visual of my haul:

I also took a pics with some awesome authors: Melissa Marr, Becca Fitzpatrik, Kady Cross, Katherine Applegate & Michael Grant, and Julie Kagawa.

BEA was a blast and so tiring! But I will definitely be going back next year and now I have to figure out how to rearrange my bookcase to make all my new books fit. But that's a problem I don't mind having.

So in the spirit of sharing the wealth, here's what I have to give away. This is not a contest, I am not drawing winners, if you are interested in any of the books simply leave a comment and let me know which book you want and I will send it to you (please leave your email address as well). If you would like more than one book that's fine. I will give the books to whoever asks for them first.

The Fault in Our Stars - John Green (SIGNED)

Raven Boys - Maggie Stievater (ARC)

Pushing the Limits - Katie McGary (ARC)

Magisterium - Jeff Hirsch (ARC)

Origin - Jessica Khoury (ARC)

The Darkest Minds - Alexandra Bracken (ARC)

False Memory - Dan Krokos (ARC)

Speechless - Hannah Harrington (ARC)