A Howl for the Highlander by Terry Spear My rating: 5 of 5 stars Publication Date : Feb 5, 2013 Terry Spear is fast becoming one of my favorite authors so as soon as this one popped up on Netgalley I was very excited. As usual Spear has managed to take her wolves to places I would never have thought. This time we find our wolves in the Cayman Islands. Of course not on vacation, but they will have some fun. Summary:
Duncan MacNeill is on a mission—find gray wolf and former stockbroker Silverman who has stolen his family fortune and is purported to be living in the Grand Cayman Islands. As a Highland wolf, Duncan rarely leaves his native homeland, and taking a trip to an island paradise is not his dram of whiskey. But keeping the MacNeill's ancestral castle depends on making Silverman pay.
Silverman never believed that MacNeill would actually track him down, and he's ready to run. But when a beautiful botanist catches Silverman's and MacNeill's attention, these two alphas realize they have even more to fight over...
My Take:
Now As usual I have not been reading these in order but if you have this one takes place after Hear of the Highland Wolf. It seems that the MacNeil clan has found themselves swindled out of all of their cash and is hot on the trail of the man, who is actually a wolf, responsible. That trail leads Duncan to a tropical paradise and a hot female wolf who is there doing research but finds herself swindled by the same wolf. This book definetely has a high hotness factor. Spear's wolves are usually totally sexy alpha males but Duncan is sexy times two! Just imagining the accent.. And of course are heroine is pretty alpha herself. This is another thing I love about Spears werewolf series. All of her female leads are strong and independent. There are no damsels in distress waiting to be saved. These lady wolfs can take care of themselves with their sharp wit and equally as sharp fangs. Of all the different werewolves out there Terry Spear's are the most fun. Be sure to add this one to you TBR pile!
Waitress and single mom Jessica “Jessie”
Mann is practical to a fault. Even if she had time to date, which she doesn’t,
she’d be determined to provide her son with a more secure upbringing than the
one she had—and that would mean a husband with big bucks. When Jack Morrison—a
sexy-as-sin, seemingly broke customer with a cowboy hat and a seductive
grin—tries to flirt with her, she shoots him down. She doubts a carefree
dreamer like Jack can provide the financial stability she needs. Yet with
Christmas just weeks away, and Jessie not wanting to spend it alone, the
charming Texan is proving hard to resist.
As the heir to the Morrison luxury hotel
empire, Jack is used to being fawned over. But Jack needs someone who will fall
in love with him—not his wealth. He’s set his sights on Jessie, though her
hardened heart just might get in the way…To be sure, he conceals his true
identity and offers to help Jessie find the rich husband she seeks. But Jack’s
daring charade may rob him of the holiday wish he wants most of all…
My Take: I loved this book. I wasn't sure that I was going to get into a book that had no supernatural players but this one was great. Maybe because even though none of the characters are supernatural, Jack is still a real fantasy! Rich and still down to earth Jack is out to find a woman who will really love him. He falls hard for a Denny's waitress and spends the rest of the book trying to win her over. This is one of those feel good kinds of novels. The characters are lovable, honest and hard workers. There are no bad guys, just life and its hard knocks. A total win I will be looking out for the next one!
About the Author:
New York Times bestselling author Catherine
Bybee was raised in Washington State, but after graduating high school, she
moved to Southern California in hopes of becoming a movie star. After growing
bored with waiting tables, she returned to school and became a registered
nurse, spending most of her career in urban emergency rooms. She now writes
full-time and has penned the novels Wife by Wednesday and Married by Monday.
Bybee lives with her husband and two teenage sons in Southern Californiaa Rafflecopter giveaway
Check out another great tour... Book info: Guardian of the Abyss
Supernatural Singles
Shannon Phoenix
Genre: Paranormal
Romance
Number of pages:
127
Word Count: 43,500
Book Description:
Buried at sea by
the sorcerers who created him, Abaddon is unable to heal himself and unable to
replenish his energy. He has lived here for longer than he can remember, with
no hope of escape. Time is against him as the sea eats away at him, body and
soul.
When her diving
partner tries to kill her to take over her company, Sarah finds herself trapped
beneath the waves and dying. Having brought light to Abaddon's dark existence
at last, only she can grant him the courage to do what must be done to escape
his watery prison.
Abaddon must
sacrifice his wings to save her. Sarah must come to terms with being trapped with
someone she has been raised to believe is a demon, and face the betrayal that
nearly destroyed her and the company she built. Together, they must take on the
ocean and their own fears. The consequence of failure is death. My Take: This is another win for Shannon Phoenix. I actually almost missed this tour. With work being so crazy I have not been keeping up with my emails. Lucky for me there was still a slot available! I reviewed the first book in this series earlier this year and am happy to say this one is even better than the first. With the amount of books I tend to go through originality is something I truly appreciate. Shannon has created a fantastic world where Gargoyles are more than just the scary statues on old churches. Her creatures as compassionate and tortured and easily lovable. This story worked well as a standalone. You could easily pick it up and not feel lost at all. Even so it does a great job building upon the original novel and peeking the readers interest in regards to what is to come. I will be keeping a lookout for the next book and you should be too.
About the Author:
Shannon Phoenix
always wrote stories. She watched the characters take on their lives within her
mind, and began to write down what they were doing. She would write the stories
and then let them go. But a few years ago, she got caught writing those stories.
You know... those stories.
To her surprise,
the person who found her stories loved her characters as much as Shannon did.
She tentatively allowed others to read the stories, as well, and it was from
that first foray into the scary world of letting others read her 'little tales'
that Shannon Phoenix Books was born.
Shannon lives in
New Hampshire with her husband John, her daughter, and their family cat, Song.
Her full time job is parenting, her part time job is as a mother's helper to a
family friend, and her passion is letting the characters in her mind out on
paper--or keyboard, as the case may be.
Welcome to Shannon
Phoenix Books. May you find the magic in your own life.
"We came to stop a war before it came to Cercia. And it seems the war has come to us."
Responsibility and patriotism spur Cercia's new leader, Quentin, to protect his beloved country at all costs and he assigns Asahel and Felix to serve as ambassadors and secret agents to Anjdur. Their journey quickly turns awry and Asahel and Felix barely escape a devastating shipwreck, walk a tightrope of political tension, and rescue an empress before they learn they must face an enemy closer to them than they thought.
Will they be able to uncover an assassin's plot before it's too late? Will Asahel be able to unearth a secret that is vital to their mission? Will Cercia survive its own revolution? In The Jealousy Glass, Perkins boldly continues a series of unforgettable characters and events that will leave you begging for more.
"You're not the only one who was
trapped, you realize." Felix
said. Asahel glanced up, taking a few
extra steps to catch up with the quick pace that Felix set. "We were all trapped by the Heresies. Any law that prohibited you was held over my
head from the time I was born."
The Heresies were laws that bound
magicians alone. Among them, the
foremost being the prohibition against using magic against humans, whether to
harm or to heal. Other Heresies governed
more mundane areas—using magic to steal or to read another's thoughts without
their consent was forbidden. Each Heresy
was enforced by the Council—or had been.
Quentin's ascension had changed all of that. Now the Heresies were in flux and no magician
knew quite what laws governed their behavior.
Old habits die hard. Asahel wondered whether the old rules had
been put back into place after the Serenissma had left port. He found himself remembering something that
they'd been told in university—that the Heresies themselves changed depending
on the spirit of the age.
"Heresy. It's such an odd word," he murmured,
wondering if Cercia had found itself in another time of transition.
"Not so odd, considering. We had a god...once."
"And then he was killed." Asahel became even more thoughtful. "No one ever questions that either. Just like no one questioned why we had laws
that prevented us from using magic on living beings."
Felix turned to Asahel and smiled.
"I thought you'd be done with
dangerous questions," he replied.
Asahel ducked his head, glancing over at the bushes as he tried to think
of a suitable response.
"Someone ought to ask," he said
finally.
"And why?" Felix countered. "So we can create new gods? Or should we come here to seek them out? If we take their beliefs for our own, then
there's no point to war, is there? We'll
already have given them the best of our country."
"What is that?" Asahel asked.
"The one freedom we had left,"
he said. "The freedom not to
believe. The freedom to rely on
ourselves for our own morality and to know for certain that our goodness came
from ourselves and not some distant unknown."
"And you believe faith in a god
would erase that?" He wasn’t sure
himself what he believed. Everyone grew
up with the stories of the dark times when Cercians had worshiped a vengeful
god. Everyone knew the
consequences. The idea was so distant
that Asahel considered it little more than an idle theory to pass the time.
It was clear that Felix had thought about
it more often as he answered, "Yes, I do."
"I don’t think so," the younger
man said. "People are the same
whether they believe in a higher being or not.
I shouldn’t see that having a god absolves anyone of
responsibility. Rather, it ought to give
them more of it."
Felix laughed. "I hope you’ve the right of it,
Soames."
Please note that to make this giveaway valid for all bloggers on the blitz, this giveaway is available for ALL countries. This is an international prize so have no fears in promoting it—Gwen will ship the book and assorted swag anywhere. (The swag may vary, of course, depending on where the book ultimately ends up going.)
The giveaway officially ends on December 21, 2012—the author's birthday and supposed date for the oncoming apocalypse.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Gwen Perkins has always regarded the deep rainforest of the Olympic Peninsula as the one place that she feels most at home. Gwen grew up in small towns across the Pacific Northwest, going to slug races and strawberry festivals when she wasn't scribbling on any scrap of paper she could come by. She boasts the dubious distinction of going to a public school with only eight students, learning Irish sea chanteys from a man who sang with the Clancy Brothers, and catching tadpoles during classes.
Her adult life is generally just about as much fun.
She lives in the City of Destiny (better known as Tacoma, Washington). Her hobbies include wandering beaches, baking pies and lampworking. In between all of this, Gwen has written two novels in the Artifacts of Empire series: The Universal Mirror and The Jealousy Glass. The Universal Mirror has been nominated for a 2013 Endeavour Award.
She is presently at work on future novels in the Artifacts of Empire series while working on another series in collaboration with Wilson Fabián Saravia.
A Howl for the Highlander by Terry Spear
