Poison Kissed – Spotlight & Review

Poison Kissed by Erica Hayes

Mass Market Paperback: 352 pages

Publisher: St. Martin’s Paperbacks; Original edition (Sep 28 2010)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 0312624700

ISBN-13: 978-0312624705

Genre: Urban Fantasy, Fae

Book Description:

“Mina is a banshee whose greatest power lies in her siren song. She’s beholden to her boss Joey, a snake-shifter who once saved her life and now employs her as a gang enforcer. She refuses to upset the fragile balance between them by admitting that she longs for him, that his embrace is the only thing she craves more than revenge for her mother’s death…

When Mina learns that Joey may have been involved in her mother’s murder, fury threatens to spill out of her note by vicious note. She and Joey have always trusted each other to stay alive, but now she’s not sure what to believe. The evidence stacked against him—or the one man who haunts her dreams and burns her blood…”

My Thoughts:

Erica writes dark, gritty and provocative Urban Fantasy that captures the imagination and takes you on a journey through the dark side of the fae. I love it! Mina’s a rich and engaging character and I loved the chemistry and conflict between her and Joey. I never thought I’d see the day that I found a snake – shifter sexy, but lo and behold, Joey comes along and he is definitely dark, dangerous and SEXY. My heart broke along with Mina’s as she relived some really bad times in her past while trying to find out who killed her mother.  

I love the gritty feel of what could be the underside of Melbourne, Australia. Populated with amazingly unique and dangerous fae characters that would have me looking over my shoulder! Loyalty, passion, betrayal, danger, suspense, and an amazing cast of paranormal beings who thrive on action, emotions and truly intriguing motives.  An excellent story written by a talented writer who paints pictures with her words. Though Poison Kissed is part of a series, all the books can easily be read as stand alones. I highly recommend this book/series to fans of richly detailed, dark, sexy Urban Fantasy.

     

Buy Poison Kissed at:

Chapters

Amazon

The Book Depository

Find out more about Erica Hayes and her books at her website!

Book One: Shadowfae

 

 

Book Two: Shadowglass

Erica Hayes – Guest Blog & Giveaway

It’s my pleasure to have Erica Hayes back here at SVR to celebrate the release of the third book in her Shadowfae Chronicles, Poison Kissed. Here’s the link to her last guest blog where she discusses why we should read her books. Today, she’s discussing Banshee’s, or more to the point, her take on them. Very cool! Let’s give her a warm welcome and be sure to read after the guest blog for the giveaway info. 🙂

Banshee blues

 In fantasy, we’re often hard pressed to find new twists on old material, to make our paranormal creatures fresh and interesting for our readers – and for us, too! Where’s the fun in writing about the same old thing?

 So when I decided to write about a banshee heroine – and she’s a kick-ass heroine, of course! – I wanted her to be a bit different. Dark and twisted. Dangerous. Not your ordinary banshee.

 In old Irish culture, women called keeners sang a lament when someone died. For the great Irish families, the keener was a fairy, called a bean sidhe – and with her magic fairy prescience, she sang the lament even when the dead person was far away. So the banshee’s song often preceded the news of a family member’s death by days or even weeks.

 Cool, I thought: a lady who sings about death. That’s dark and eerie already. But what if she didn’t just sing to signal a man’s death – what if it was her keening that killed him? What if her song itself was lethal? And I’m not talking about a funeral dirge, either. I’m thinking opera. Nerve-shattering soprano. A pure, beautiful, terrible voice from hell.

 Now we’re getting somewhere. Better still, what if she could sing not only death, but pain, or fear, or other emotions too? A lady like that would be a formidable weapon.

 And so Mina the gangster’s bodyguard was born. She’s tough and beautiful. Her voice can peel paint from walls. Her hearing is preternaturally sharp. She can sing you to sleep or into fits of mouth-frothing terror, and her kiss is laced with poison. And if she’s really angry, she’ll kill you with a scream.

 Of course, as befitting any decent UF heroine, Mina has issues. She’s got a desperate crush on her gangster boss, a sexy snake-shifter who struggles to keep her at a distance, even though to show weakness in their world is death. She’s hunting a killer – her mother’s murderer – whose identity she can’t discover. And she has a weird love-hate relationship with her banshee powers:

 “My magical melody swelled and twisted in my chest like a snake, longing to sing free. She’s a cruel deathwish mistress, my song, and she’d warp the world to her capricious will if I let her. She makes me strong, but her hunger shivers ice in my blood. I don’t want to be a killer.

 Sometimes fate doesn’t give a damn what you want.”

 Hell, yeah. This banshee is a lethal weapon! So what does an evil author do to a kick-ass character bent on carving up the scenery? I take her weapons away 🙂 Mina falls foul of a fairy trick, and loses her magical voice, right when she’s about to uncover the shattering secret of her mother’s murder.

 Not the traditional banshee of old Irish legend, it’s true. But in these days of sparkling vampires, anything goes! So I hope you enjoy her story.

Website: http://www.shadowfae.net

Blog: http://faerylite.livejournal.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/ericahayes

 

POISON KISSED ~ Book 3 of the Shadowfae Chronicles

 Beyond the veil of magic, a fairy otherworld pulses with glamour and dark beauty. It’s a place where passions run deep and dark — and death is just one kiss away…

 Mina is a banshee whose greatest power lies in her siren song. She’s beholden to her boss Joey, a snake-shifter who once saved her life and now employs her as a gang enforcer. She refuses to upset the fragile balance between them by admitting that she longs for him, that his embrace is the only thing she craves more than revenge for her mother’s death…

 When Mina learns that Joey may have been involved in her mother’s murder, fury threatens to spill out of her, note by vicious note. She and Joey have always trusted each other to stay alive, but now she’s not sure what to believe. The evidence stacked against him — or the one man who haunts her dreams and burns in her blood…

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Thanks Erica! I’m just working up my review post, but I just have to say that I loved Mina!

Giveaway Details:

Erica Hayes has been gracious enough to supply a copy of Poison Kissed, book 3 in the Shadowfae Chronicles to giveaway to one of my readers! Contest is open to Everyone. Erica’s off globe-trotting right now, but I believe that she’ll be popping by to respond to comments or questions as she’s able, so feel free to ask her questions as well.

Question: What do you find fascinating about the fae? Do you like the Seelie or Unseelie fae? Do they scare you? Entice you? Do you like new twists on the old mythology of the fae? Or do you prefer that writers stick within the parameters of fae myth? Tell us what you think!

For one entry: Please leave a comment with the answer to the question.  (+1 entry)

For extra entries:

• Subscribe to my blog, Sidhe Vicious Reviews, through the links at the top right hand side of the blog, and let me know in your comment. Be sure you verify your subscription through the email you’ll receive or it won’t count. (+1 entry)
• If you’re already subscribed, you’ll receive two extra entries, but be sure to let me know in the comments if you’re an old follower. (+2 entries)
• Post a link to this contest on your Twitter, FaceBook, MySpace, GoodReads, LibraryThing, or on your blog and send me the link either in the comments or by email and you’ll get an extra entry for each place you add a link to. ( add 1 entry each for  however many links you’ve done)
• Follow me on Twitter, Add me as a friend on FaceBook, GoodReads, MySpace, Chapters Community or LibraryThing. (add 1 entry each for however many places you followed/friended me)
• Follow Erica Hayes on Twitter  ( +1 entry )
• Contest is open to Everyone and will run through October 10th until 11:59pm. The winners will be posted here on October 11th.
• Please leave your email addy in your comment for me to contact you if you’ve won, but post it like wilmaflinstone(at)boomshakalaka(dot)com so you don’t get any spam. If I haven’t heard back from the winner in 7 days, a new winner will be drawn from the eligible comments. Winners will be chosen by a random number generator. Good Luck everyone!

Please leave your links in one comment if possible. Thanks!

September 2010 Releases

There are a whole bunch of awesome books being released out into the wild this month! Here are some shiny covers of a few of them that I am DYING to read. 😀 Check out my New Releases page to see all the books along with their release dates. (I’m still working on the title links).

     

     

     

     

Ahh my pretties, how I want you all. Hopefully I’ll get some Chapters gift cards for my birthday next week! 😉

Erica Hayes – Winner

A huge thanks to all the entrants for your great comments! The general consensus was that the dark/dangerous or unseelie fae are more attractive. I’d also like to thank Erica for guest blogging and for supplying the signed copy of Shadowglass! 😀

Random.org gave me #64 from 76 entries. Congrats to Dawn for winning the copy of Shadowglass!! 🙂 Please email me at sidhevicious(at)shaw(dot)ca with your snail mail info so I can forward it on to Erica.

If, by chance, I don’t hear back from the winner, a new winner will be drawn from the eligible entrants.

Erica Hayes – Guest Blog & Giveaway

Today I have Erica Hayes, author of the Shadowfae Chronicles, here to celebrate the release of the second book Shadowglass. I’ll let Erica take it from here, let’s give her a warm welcome!

“So, why should I read your book?”

Well, isn’t that the question every author needs to answer? With so many wonderful books released each week – and because, y’know, we have to worry about boring things, like food and electricity – readers only have so much hard-earned cash in their pockets. Choosing what to read, sadly, is often more about what we’re forced to leave behind.

And it’s part of the author’s job to convince readers why their book is the one you should choose.

So, here I am 🙂 my thirty seconds starts now…

6 reasons why you should read SHADOWGLASS

1. It’s about fairies. And I don’t mean the cute fluffy Tinkerbell kind that sit on your shoulder or hide at the bottom of the garden. These fairies are crazy, colourful, sexy and dangerous, a mad bunch of tricksters and seducers. The heroine, Ice, is a water fairy and a jewel thief, and she and her friends really know how to party. At least, they would, if they weren’t drunk. Or high. Or driven mad by a magic mirror. Which brings me to my next point…

2. It’s a magic mirror story. Seriously, who doesn’t love magic mirrors? “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the sickest of them all?” And this rusty little guy is downright twisted. I mean, he’s serious trouble. He lies. He cheats. He puts naughty ideas in your head. Gaze into him at your peril, Ice. We warned you…

3. It has a demon who’ll actually steal your soul. Y’know, an honest-to-hell demon. Not one of these dudes who merely use the moniker to pick up chicks. Kane is handsome, courteous, charming, seductive, receptive to your deepest desires. That’s right before he drags your soul down to hell. And he’s mighty pissed that a certain cute little fairy thief stole his magic mirror.

4. It has the hottest fairy hero since… well, since forever. Indigo has jagged black hair, glittering silver wings and thighs that could kill you. And he’s hiding a dark, painful secret, so damning he’s never told a soul… until Ice comes along, and lures the bad things out. Yes, Indigo is the hero. Wait till you meet the villain.

5. It has a bodysnatching angel. Yeah. Nice, huh? And ditto on dudes who use the name to pick up girls: this guy’s here on a mission from God! Or from someone, anyway… at least, he thinks so. Still, better not to flash feathers around in a city ruled by an angry demon lord. Better snatch the nearest spare body…

6. And if all that’s not enough… at one point, a guy turns into a snake. Yep. This book is that cool.

Oop. Time’s up. Thanks for listening. Hope I’ve sparked your curiosity. You can read an excerpt of SHADOWGLASS at my website: http://www.shadowfae.net

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Giveaway Details:

Erica has kindly offered one reader a signed copy of Shadowglass!

So answer me this dear readers, What’s your favorite type of Fae? Do you like the Seelie (light, beautiful & cold) or the Unseelie (dark, dangerous & emotional)? Do you like ’em with the long flowing hair and pointy ears? Or are you fascinated by another type of Fae?  

For one entry: Please leave a comment with the answer to the question. I’m not sure if Erica will be able to reply to comments or questions as she resides down under and is in a totally different time zone than us, but we can try. (+1 entry)

For extra entries:

• Subscribe to my blog, Sidhe Vicious Reviews, through the links at the top right hand side of the blog, and let me know in your comment. Be sure you verify your subscription through the email you’ll receive or it won’t count. (+1 entry)
• If you’re already subscribed, you’ll receive two extra entries, but be sure to let me know in the comments. (+2 entries)
• Post a link to this contest on your Twitter, FaceBook, MySpace, GoodReads, LibraryThing, or on your blog and send me the link either in the comments or by email and you’ll get an extra entry for each place you add a link to. (+? entries, insert however many links you’ve done)
• Contest is open Internationally and will run through March 14th until 11:59pm. The winners will be posted here on March 15th. Please leave your email addy in your comment for me to contact you if you’ve won. If I haven’t heard back from the winner in 7 days, a new winner will be drawn from the eligible comments. Winners will be chosen by a random number generator. Good Luck everyone!

 

(I should also mention that if you’re leaving me a bunch of links in your comment, do not panic if it doesn’t show up right away. It just automatically gets held for me to moderate, which I will as soon as I’m online. )