Guest Post by Constance Phillips

 Real People Behind Characters? By Constance Phillips

Since Fairyproof’s release last week, I’ve been asked if any of the characters are based on real people. I can understand why someone would think that a writer would draw on the people around them, but the real truth of the matter is that each individual character carries traits of several people I know, and other traits of people I’ve only just met.

For example, let me talk about my heroine Monique. Obviously, I’ve never met someone who is really magical, or fairy, but I have met people who are dynamic. I’ve encountered people who have tried to get me to see their point of view with a wink and smile. In the beginning of the book, Monique is in a desperate situation, using what she thinks, at the time, are her best assets. To construct that character I had to think about the people I have known or met that had that kind of confidence. I then gave Monique bits and pieces from the handful of influences.

But sometime having those reference points isn’t enough for me. When I get really stuck as to how a character is going to act in a given situation or react to something that has happened to them, it’s usually because I don’t have a clear picture in my mind. The solution to that problem is just what you might think. I sit down with a stack of old magazines or start perusing stock photography sites until the blurry image in my mind comes into focus.

I had this happen while writing Fairyproof too. Early in the book, Keiran – Monique’s brother – appears to be colder than his sister. More calculated too. Because I spent the first part of the book writing him as guarded, I was having a hard time connecting with what was underneath. I also knew if I didn’t figure out a way to do that, my reader certainly would have trouble connecting too. It was only when I came up with picture shown here that I was able to imagine what he was really like…what the reader sees as the story develops.

So, while I may not have based any of the characters of any particular person, each one is a conglomerate of the people I know and those I’ve met and sprinkle in some images with my imagination.  

Author Bio:

Constance Phillips lives in Ohio with her husband, two ready-to-leave-the-nest children, and four canine kids. Her perfect fantasy vacation would involve hunting Dracula across Europe with her daughter, who also digs that kind of stuff. When she's not writing about fairies, shifters, vamps, and guardian angels, she's working side-by-side with her husband in their hardwood flooring business.
Constance is actively involved in her local Romance Writers of America chapter (MVRWA) and the Southeast Michigan chapter of the United States Pony Club. When not writing or enjoying the outdoors, she loves reality television or can be found at a Rick Springfield concert (just look for the pink Converse high tops).
Constance blogs regularly at www.constancephillips.com. You can also follow her on Twitter or friend her on Facebook.

http://www.Constancephillips.com   

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/CPhillips

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ConstancePhillipsRomanceAuthor

Goodreads http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6470282.Constance_Phillips

Dangerous Shift ~ Jill James

Dangerous Shift
By Jill James

Genre: paranormal romantic suspense

ISBN: 9781476499673

ASIN: B008RDPN72

Number of pages: 222

Word Count: 76,000

Cover Artist: Elaina Lee, For The Muse Designs

Amazon   Barnes & Noble    Smashwords   All Romance eBooks

Book Description:

HE IS MR. BY-THE-BOOK, WITH A SECRET...

Shapeshifters live among us but remain unknown to most people except for the highest echelons of law enforcement, the military, science, and medical fields—until now.

SHE IS A LOOSE CANNON WITH AN ATTITUDE PROBLEM...

When a fatal virus strikes Shapeshifters all over the West coast, including members of the Shapeshifter Task Force in San Laura, California, reinforcements are called in from around the United States.

TOGETHER, THEY JUST MIGHT CATCH A KILLER

Lt. Nikki Hill of Missouri comes to San Laura and is partnered up with Lt. Sean Evans. They quickly butt heads on everything from proper police procedures to the moral ethics of euthanasia. They can’t seem to get a lead on the serial killer even as members of their own families are stricken with the virus. In their grief they turn to each other and hope they have time to discover if their relationship stands a chance or if they might just be the next victims of the species extinction disease.

My Take:
The number one thing that stuck out to me about this novel was the shifters themselves. Stories focused on shifters have always been my favorite, so I have read a vast amount of them. That being said this is the first time I have ever read anything where the shifters change gender, not species. I'm not sure why changing gender seems more drastic than changing into an animal. Maybe its because animal shifters are the norm.
It took a little while to wrap my head around the fact that Nick and Nikki could be the same person. After I adjusted to it though I did appreciate the originality of the idea.
Beyond the shifters themselves the story focuses on two cops trying to save their race from a disease which seems to have appeared out of nowhere and to this point kills 100% of the shifters who contract it.
The story moves fast and keeps the reader on the edge of their seat. The ending felt a little rushed but other than that I really enjoyed Dangerous Shift and think you will too.

Be sure to leave a comment for your chance to win a free ebook copy of Dangerous Shift.

 Dangerous Shift Excerpt

Prologue

Fort San Laura Army Base

San Laura, California

May 2017

Sean Evans turned away as tears rolled down his ex-partner Colin Rodriguez’s face. The man sat by his fiancée’s bedside, her hand clasped in his, waiting for her to die. The sound of boot heels echoed up and down the hospital corridor. All marched past the closed door, none brave enough to stop at this room.

Sean stared at the dying woman. Paulette’s red hair was the only color in the monochrome-toned hospital room. Colin’s hand shook as he brushed the hair back from Paulette’s sweaty face. The virus wreaked havoc on the young woman.

Sean swallowed bile rising in his throat as the young Shapeshifter in the bed screamed. Her flesh boiled, roiling beneath the surface, and she screamed again. Her back arched off the bed. For months now, the Shapeshifter Task Force had been working to track down the cause of the virus and it struck close to home, killing two of their own. First, his own partner, Barry, and now, Paulette.

Her fingers turned into talons that dug into Colin’s hand. Blood dripped from the cuts onto the crisp, white sheet. Colin held her hand; the only sign of his pain was the grimace on his tanned face.

Sean rubbed his burning eyes, surprised to find tears on his own cheeks. He scrubbed the wetness away and raked his fingers through his hair. His tears wouldn’t help Paulette or Colin. Nothing could help them now. His hands clenched into fists at his side. He ached to punch a wall, anything to kill the tension in the room.

A scream built in his throat. Just last week he had sat here, forced to watch the young man, new to the task force, breathe his last. He stared into the ceiling lights, his eyes watered with the brightness. He repeated his personal mantra of calm and cool until his emotions mellowed, until they no longer threatened to overwhelm him.

He turned his head back as Paulette’s screams died down to whimpers. She had lost all control of her shifting. She grew fur and it disappeared. Her head changed shape as she shifted into a canine form, then a feline form, then back to her own. Her limbs flopped against the mattress as she convulsed. The shifting now happened every few seconds.

Colin threw himself across her body as if he could stop the tragedy from its conclusion.

“Noooo.” His voice ricocheted across the room and down the hall.

Sean rushed to his best friend’s side and ripped him up off of the dying Shifter. No one had discovered yet how the virus was transmitted. They didn’t need masks and gloves anymore, not in the last several months at least, but no one wanted to find out what full-body contact might do.

Colin struggled against Sean’s hold. Tears blurred Sean’s vision as Paulette struggled to breathe, and Colin’s cries became anguished sobs. His shoulders shook under Sean’s hands.

The monitor blared as Sean searched Paulette for any life signs and found none. Her chest didn’t move. She was gone. Just like Barry. Just like all the other Shifters in the past few months.

Sean turned away as Paulette’s flesh jellified and sank into the mattress, only a slight bump under the covers to show a living being had been there.

Colin’s anguish pierced his soul, and when Colin threw himself across the bed again.  Sean didn’t bother to stop him.  What did it matter when his friend had just lost his partner and the love of his life?

The sounds of harsh breaths and sobs still echoed in Sean’s ears when the door opened and the Captain of the Task Force rushed in. Sean turned to the man and shook his head.

Captain Connors motioned for Sean to talk to him outside. Sean shot a quick look to Colin and followed the captain outside to the hallway.

“Lieutenant Evans, with Robertson’s death today, added to the others, the task force is low on numbers. We will need to send word to the other task forces and ask for reinforcements.”

Sean’s hands formed into fists at his side. The human captain made no bones about his dislike of Shapeshifters, but Paulette’s body wasn’t even cold yet and he drudged up business decisions.

He took deep breaths and relaxed his hands. As the Lead Lieutenant in the task force, business took priority. Even over death.

“Will you send a request to the Southwest office in Las Vegas?” Their own task force office covered the Northwest—Northern California, part of Nevada, and all of Oregon, Washington state, and Idaho.

The captain shook his head. “A few cases have been reported in Los Angeles. We can’t risk it. I’ll request someone from the Midwest. No cases have been reported yet out there. There is a small task force in Columbia, Missouri, an hour outside St. Louis.”

 Author Bio:

Jill James didn’t start out wanting to be an author. Along the way she wanted to be an astronaut, President of the United States, a lawyer, and a doctor. Once married with children she realized she could be all those things in the pages of the stories she wrote.

She lives in Northern California with her husband, who is the inspiration for all her romance novel heroes.

http://www.jilljameswrites.com

http://www.twitter.com/jill_james

http://www.facebook.com/Jill.James.author

http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4654661.Jill_James

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Guest Post by Jill James

Wolf Majick Reviews would like to  thank author Jill James for stopping by and saring for us her insight in regards to the shape shifters in her novel, Dangerous Shift......

I wanted my shapeshifters to be a little different. I love wolf shifters, jungle cat shifters, I saw a book recently with a horse shifter, all kinds of shifters are great. So, I wrote my shifters to gender-shift. Men are told to embrace their feminine side. Women are told to act like a lady, but think like a man. What is that were possible? What if you could embrace the yin and yang of your body and mind?

In an early rendition of my chapter one I had a great line from the Captain of the Shapeshifter Task Force. He is the only human in an office of shapeshifters and he doesn’t hide his bigotry.

Original beginning to Dangerous Shift - 2007 - Jill James

“Damn loser recruit,” Captain Connors muttered, as he sweltered in the alleyway, forced to endure the scents of week-old Chow Mein coming from the Dumpster he leaned against. 

A mingled odor of sweet citrus and coconut strong enough to turn his stomach overpowered even the stench of the restaurant refuse surrounding him as the hairs rose on his arms.  It was one of them, had to be. Shapeshifters were the only species to give off that cloying scent only a recruiter could detect.  He inhaled the rancid fumes rising from the pavement to clear the oversweet smell from his nostrils.

Connors stayed leaning, body tense, as a gorgeous blonde strolled into the cramped, trash-filled alley like it was a neighborhood park at lunchtime.  Shifter females were breath-taking, making you want, until you remembered what they were and worried about going to bed with Sue Ann and waking up with Jim Bob.  He pushed out from the metal at his back, spit on the ground, and thought for the umpteenth time, God, he hated when they were female. 

He inhaled deeply of her Shifter scent, verifying she was what she appeared to be and said, “Nick or Nikki?”

She reached up and grasped her breasts in two overflowing handfuls, looking him straight in the eye as she uttered in sultry tones, “It seems it is Nikki today.”

His breath caught in a gasp as she reached down and grabbed her crotch, his gaze forced to follow. 

“Definitely Nikki.”

#####

Readers loved the interaction but there was some confusion of how he could be the hero (he isn’t) and hate her scent so much, so I rewrote the beginning with the hero and heroine meeting but left in their human captain’s prejudices and misunderstandings of the Shapeshifter race.

Be sure to stop by My review of Jill James novel Dangerous Shift, for a chance to win a free ebook copy and enter the tour wide giveaway for an Amazon Giftcard or a Print copy of the book

TV Review ~ Doctor Who Asylum of the Daleks

TV Review ~ Doctor Who Asylum of the Daleks

4.5 stars

I have to say I was pleasantly surprised by this seasons opener of Doctor Who. For anyone who has been watching since season one (this time around) the show has taken some interesting turns the last few years. Most noticeably to me was that last seasons intro was narrated by Amy Pond making the show seem like it was more about the companions than about the Doctor himself.

This seasons intro was more classic Who, just the theme song and the Tardis spinning through space and time, the way I prefer it. Hopefully this means the direction of the show is back on track. I think last season the writers were trying to write for an American audience. Don't do it! AMericans who love the show enjoy it as a British show. It bad enough Starz took Torchwood, we can't lose the authentic Doctor Who as well.

Anyways as far as the episode itself; we find the Doctor, AMy and Rory fighting for there lives and their humanity as they fight the Doctors most hated enemy the Daleks. Amy and Rory seem to be having some martial problems and the Doctor does his best to not only save their lives but save their marriage.

This was a fun episode with classic jokes and Doctor Who style twists, a real win in my book.

The Beauty Series ~ Anne Rice

Anne Rice, the master who brought us Interview with a Vampire and The Queen of the Damned has recently re released her Erotica Fractured Fairytale series. Having read the first in the series years ago , The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, I was eager to re read the series after picking it up Via Netgalley. Now I must point out this is an erotica series. Mrs Rice has crafted a world of dark fantasy where Princesses must learn to serve long before they can rule.

The books and their blurbs:

The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty
In the traditional folktale of "Sleeping Beauty," the spell cast upon the lovely young princess and everyone in her castle can only be broken by the kiss of a Prince. It is an ancient story, one that originally emerged from and still deeply disturbs the mind's unconscious. Now Anne Rice, writing as A.N. Roquelaure, retells the Beauty story and probes the unspoken implications of this lush, suggestive tale by exploring its undeniable connection to sexual desire. Here the Prince awakens Beauty, not with a kiss, but with sexual initiation. His reward for ending the hundred years of enchantment is Beauty's complete and total enslavement to him . . . as Anne Rice explores the world of erotic yearning and fantasy in a classic that becomes, with her skillful pen, a compelling experience. Readers of Fifty Shades of Grey will indulge in Rice’s deft storytelling and imaginative eroticism, a sure-to-be classic for years to come.

Beautys Punishment
This sequel to The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, the first of Anne Rice's (writing as A.N. Roquelaure) elegantly written volumes of erotica, continues her explicit, teasing exploration of the psychology of human desire. Now Beauty, having indulged in a secret and forbidden infatuation with the rebellious slave Prince Tristan, is sent away from the Satyricon-like world of the Castle. Sold at auction, she will soon experience the tantalizing punishments of "the village," as her education in love, cruelty, dominance, submission, and tenderness is turned over to the brazenly handsome Captain of the Guard. And once again Rice's fabulous tale of pleasure and pain dares to explore the most primal and well-hidden desires of the human heart. Preceding the visceral eroticism of E.L. James’ Fifty Shades of Grey and even more haunting than her own novelBelinda, this second installment is not to be missed. 

Beautys Release

Before Fifty Shades of Grey, there was Anne Rice’s provocative take on the timeless fairy tale “Sleeping Beauty. “ In the final volume of Anne Rice's deliciously tantalizing erotic trilogy, Beauty's adventures on the dark side of sexuality make her the bound captive of an Eastern Sultan and a prisoner in the exotic confines of the harem. As this voluptuous adult fairy tale moves toward conclusion, all Beauty's encounters with the myriad variations of sexual fantasy are presented in a sensuous, rich prose that intensifies this exquisite rendition of Love's secret world, and makes the Beauty series and incomparable study of erotica. In it, Anne Rice, writing as A.N. Roquelaure, makes the forbidden side of passion a doorway into the hidden regions of the psyche and the heart.

My Take;
This is an adult only series. I believe the erotica starts by the second or third page and continues on through the whole series. Written long before Fifty Shades of Grey this is a series 
of novels with a compelling story. As the characters work through pain and pleasure the story actually builds keeping the readers interest and making you want to continue on to find out what happens to Beauty and those around her.
The fetish scenes are intensely written, opening a world most of us could never even imagine. Anne Rice is a magician with a pen, who has the ability to make me blush and that is saying a lot. If you have never experienced erotica this series may come as a surprise, so be prepared! If you think after reading Fifty Shades of Grey that you know all there is to know then I dare you to read an erotica series written by a fantastic author like Anne Rice, you don't know what your missing!!