Waiting On Wednesday - The Fire Artist

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine and it allows readers to share the books that they are most looking forwards to reading.

This week the book I have chosen to feature is The Fire Artist by Daisy Whitney.

Title: The Fire Artist

Author: Daisy Whitney

Series: Standalone (I think)

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Publication date: October 14th (US)

Links: Goodreads | Amazon

Synopsis

A forbidden romance literally heats up in this new fantasy from acclaimed author Daisy Whitney.

Aria is an elemental artist—she creates fire from her hands. But her power is not natural. She steals it from lightning. It’s dangerous and illegal in her world. When she’s recruited to perform, she seizes the chance to get away from her family. But her power is fading too fast to keep stealing from the sky. She has no choice but to turn to a Granter—a modern day genie. She gets one wish at an extremely high price. Aria’s willing to take a chance, but then she falls in love with the Granter . . . and he wants his freedom. Aria must decide what she’s willing to bargain and how much her own heart, body, and soul are worth.

In a world where the sport of elemental powers is the most popular form of entertainment, readers will be swept away by a romance with stakes higher than life and death.

My Thoughts

This book just sounds utterly amazing. I'm getting back into reading a lot more Fantasy and Paranormal novels at the moment at this is just the sort of book I am looking for. To top it off, though I haven't read any of the other Daisy Whitney books I am a HUGE fan of the authors NA novels under her pen name.

What books are you looking forwards to this week?

Review of Into The Storm

Synopsis

She is a woman on the run. Pain, loneliness and terror are what she is leaving. Where she is headed doesn’t matter as long as it’s away from the hell her life has become.

Joshua Bennett is trapped in a prison of his own making by the memories of his past. Traumatized and isolated, he is a reclusive writer, living a quiet, lonely life, his only companion his dog, Bear. It is what he knows, what he has accepted to be his life.

One dark night, one huge storm, and one ice patch brings them together. He finds himself with an unexpected houseguest with no memory. She wakes up a stranger to herself and the man watching her. Even more mysterious is the lack of any sort of identification with her or in her car. She is an enigma to both of them.

Trapped by the storm and isolated from the outside world, they slowly open up, learning to trust and love, until the world once again shows up, threatening the fragile peace of their newly discovered world, and tearing them apart.

There are many twists and turns as they struggle to find each other, overcoming both the mental and physical elements that keep them apart.

A story about overcoming our fears, finding love and learning to live again.

Goodreads | Amazon | Amazon UK

Review

This book sat in my queue for a while as I never seemed to be in the mood for a story revolving around someone with amnesia.  I was sorry I put it off after I read the first few chapters though because the premise really drew me in.  The book starts with her fleeing someone who abused her.  You don’t know who the abuser is or her particular circumstances but you know the threat is very real.  Then she gets turned around in a horrendous winter storm and ends up crashing her car and sustains a head injury.  She is rescued by a reluctant hero who tries to help her piece together the mystery of who she is and their relationship develops from there.  Of course, there are some significant hurdles for them to overcome and there were times it was a really tense read because I knew something bad was coming but I didn’t know exactly what would occur.  There is a happily ever after and there is some karmic retribution but I feel kind of ambivalent about the story on a whole even though it had some good things going for it.

 

The premise of the book is great.  She manages to escape her abuse only to have no recollection of it when she comes to.  Rather than those stories you read where the heroine is simply too ashamed or scared to share her burden with someone, she can’t, and as a result, ends up thrown back to the wolves until her handsome knight finds a way to rescue her.  Another great thing about this book is the dog, bear.  He is an instant protector and I loved how his personality was portrayed whenever his owner displeased him.  The author also writes a fabulous villain.  The control, isolation and abuse he inflicts upon the heroine are starkly defined and definitely pull you into her plight.

 

As for what I didn’t quite enjoy about the book, I didn’t really get into the initial development of the relationship between the two main characters.  The hero behaves a little erratically and that really threw me off because I couldn’t buy into the subsequent progression of their relationship.  The relationship certainly grew on me and I will say that, by the end of the story, it felt like a rather epic love story but my initial disconnect kept me from enjoying a substantial chunk of the book.  I didn’t really like how the main conflict was resolved and felt supreme frustration with all of the people who turned a blind eye to what was going on.  The karmic end was awesome but a little too tidy and convenient.  The story is also rather long which usually is not a negative for me but there is a difference when a story feels long and this one did.  I appreciated that the author tied up every loose end and gave those glimpses into the future that we rarely get enough of but it felt like we were flipping through their life to hit all the milestones which didn’t flow very well. 

 

So, in conclusion, while I really enjoyed the premise of the story and there were aspects that I really enjoyed, there were enough detractors and missteps that I didn’t get to enjoy the book in its entirety.  I don’t regret reading it because there were certainly parts that I connected with emotionally and I was anxious to see what would happen next but the overall execution was just missing something from my standpoint.

Try it for yourself! Goodreads | Amazon | Amazon UK

Katie

Interview with Natasha Boyd

So next month I am off to the Romance Author and Reader Event (RARE) in Edinburgh to meet amazing authors such as Abbi Glines, Monica Murphy, Cora Carmack, K.A Tucker and of course Natasha Boyd amongst many more. I'm not the only person excited for the event, all the attending authors are too! Today I am sharing a little pre-event Q&A with Natasha whose books Eversea and Forever, Jack I utterly love.

Eversea by Natasha Boyd

Synopsis

You loved Nicholas Sparks' Noah Calhoun. You lusted after Jamie McGuire's Travis Maddox. You'll be dreaming about Jack Eversea...

An orphaned, small-town, southern girl, held hostage by responsibility and self-doubt.

A Hollywood A-list mega-star, on the run from his latest scandal and with everything to lose.

A chance encounter that leads to an unlikely arrangement and epic love affair that will change them both for ever.

As powerful as the pounding surf, as intoxicating as the sea breeze, this is one love affair you won't be able to forget about...

Don't miss the electrifying sequel, FOREVER, JACK, coming soon...

My review | Amazon | Amazon UK | Goodreads

Q&A with Natasha Boyd

What's your favourite thing about writing romance?

The frailties and the strengths of someone's personality are never more exposed than when they fall in love.  I find it fascinating to watch, to explore and write about.  People need and want romance, I love that I'm able to create something that can give it to them. 

 

Do you consider kilts to be sexy?

Uh, Braveheart, duh ...  Yes, totally ... And seriously? You do wonder about the design. They must have been a horny lot, easy access and all that.  I refuse to entertain any more practical purpose. *sticks fingers in ears* 

 

Are you willing to try haggis?

I didn't hear the question, sorry. 

 

If you had only one day in Edinburgh, how would you spend it?

Ahhh, well. The castle- definitely the castle- then a nice long pub lunch where I can check out the local flavor, and the afternoon at a local scotch distillery.  Oh, and kilt spotting. 

About The Author

Natasha Boyd is a writer with a background in marketing and public relations. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Psychology, and lives in the coastal Carolina Lowcountry, complete with Spanish moss, alligators and mosquitoes the size of tiny birds. She has a husband, two sons and a cat named Tuna. She has written two full-length novels: the award-winning Eversea, and its much anticipated sequel Forever, Jack.

https://www.facebook.com/authornatashaboyd 
http://pinterest.com/ lovefrmlowcntry/
@lovefrmlowcntry
http://www.natashaboyd.com 

Guest Post: How 'The Highwayman' Poem Inspired me to Write GLIMPSE

Synopsis

Liz just wants to be normal. Her life is anything but.

Seven years ago Liz lost her mother and ten years' worth of memories. When she inherits the infamous Highwayman Inn, she hopes the move will be a fresh start. Then she meets Zachary. Zachary who haunts her by night and in dreams; who makes her question everything she is and wants to be; who seems scarcely real - yet makes her feel so alive.

Inspired by Alfred Noyes' classic poem 'The Highwayman', Glimpse is a ghost story, a love story, and a story of a girl fighting for her future by confronting her terrible past.

Goodreads | Amazon | Amazon UK

How "The Highwayman" Poem Inspired Me To Write GLIMPSE

I have a confession: I've never been a big poetry fan. English was my favourite subject at school, and I studied it at university, but novels were always my thing, not poems. Yet there are poems that have stuck with me—like those that tell stories as dark and dramatic as the classic gothic novels I always loved. Poems like Poe's 'Annabel Lee', Samuel Taylor Coleridge's 'Christabel', or Alfred Noyes' 'The Highwayman'.

I don't remember first reading 'The Highwayman'—it feels like I've always known it—but it must have been when I was at school. (Incidentally, I find it very cool that 'The Highwayman' was taught to my eighty-six year old grandmother, and is still taught today—impressive work, Mr Noyes!) I love everything about it—the dashing highwayman, the ill-fated romance, the ghosts. It's the perfect YA paranormal romance, only published in 1906.

So when I decided to write a romantic ghost story of my own, 'The Highwayman' poem instantly came to mind. I wondered, how could I write a story that captured the same passion and darkness as this amazing poem? I could write a retelling, of course. After all, retellings of fairy tales are fairly common in YA, why not do the same with a poem?

That's what I initially set out to do, but I quickly realised that a straightforward retelling was a little unimaginative. So I decided to set my retelling in the present day. Bess would be the daughter of a pub landlord, the highwayman would be the sexy bad boy, and the stable boy Tim could make it a love triangle. (Paranormal romance clichés—tick and tick! Please don't judge me, I know better now!) But it still wasn't imaginative enough, and I knew I'd get bored writing it.

So finally I thought...how about I write a modern setting, in which the inn is now ancient and cob-webbed. How about my main character isn't Bess, but a new character, with her own story and her own mysteries to solve. Bess and the highwayman's love story will have to be important—after all, that's what 'The Highwayman' poem is all about—but it doesn't have to be the sole focus.

So that's what I started writing, and Glimpse was the result—a story that wouldn't exist without Noyes' poem, but is also something fresh.

I'm looking forward to hearing what readers who love 'The Highwayman' think, as well as introducing the poem (which will be printed at the beginning of my book) to those who haven't read it. Whichever camp you fall into, I hope you'll enjoy it! 
Try it for yourself! Goodreads | Amazon | Amazon UK 

I have a copy of this book myself that I will be reading shortly so keep your eyes out for a review coming soon.

Ebooks, Giveaways and Piracy

So the book and blogging world always seems to be surprisingly full of drama. I say surprisingly because before I saw all the drama for myself I imagined the bookish community to (virtually) be sat around in a big circle contentedly drinking tea, loving books, being respectful of people opinions, never doing anything hurtful and generally just being happy to share their love with other people. I now know that is a very naïve thought.

A large amount of drama tends to stem from plagiarism and piracy; people doing things they shouldn't with things that don't belong to them. Most authors know that piracy is a terribly unpleasant but unfortunately unavoidable part of publishing. Piracy hurts authors and affects their livelihood; imagine how much more it must hurt to find out that an instance of piracy comes from a blogger and "fan".

You may be wondering what I'm talking about in which case jump over to Teresa Mummert's blog where it all started. Basically a thoughtful and concerned reader contacted the above (fantastic :P) author as she had received a book won in a giveaway direct from the blogger rather than through the author or gifted from amazon or similar. This was without the authors knowledge and was therefore piracy.

Piracy
Noun

2 - The unauthorized use or reproduction of another’s work

Unfortunately this one case is not where it ended. After Teresa Mummert posted her story yesterday many more readers realised that books they had won through giveaways may not have been authorized copies. Multiple authors have now reported readers telling them (with proof) about pirated ebooks that they unwittingly received.

As a blogger this saddens me as how are authors and publishers supposed to trust us with arcs and review copies if some people are illegally sharing them. These are by no means the majority of bloggers but the few rotten apples just tar peoples image of the rest of us. All bloggers need to be aware that ebooks are for YOUR EYES ONLY unless stated otherwise though I think most are and those pirating are doing it knowingly and without shame. People  also need to remember that their actions do not affect only themselves.

The one silver lining to this story are the readers who alerted authors to the wrongdoings that were occurring and the outrage by many bloggers that someone had dared to do this. Most people do not tolerate things like this from taking place.

If you are ever suspicious about the legality of a giveaway PLEASE contact the author whose book it is. They will truly appreciate you if it is indeed a case of piracy. We all just need to keep our eyes peeled for things like this occurring. Hopefully know that it is getting around that if you are receiving an e-file from a blogger rather than author it may be pirated it will be harder for people to get away with this in the future.

I could go on about how wrong piracy is and the duty we have as book bloggers for hours (and I fully intended to have a rant when I started writing this post) but once I start I probably won't stop and the truth is this topic makes me sad :(

It would be nice to have one month in the book world without drama you know. Can we do that? How about 1 week? Lets try :P