Author Ambush & Giveaway with Pamela Palmer

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Pamela Palmer Intro

Happy Weekend Book Monsters and Literal Addicts! Book Monster Reviews and LITERAL ADDICTION are very pleased to welcome NY Times and USA Today bestselling author Pamela Palmer back to our sites today.

Pamela writes under two pseudonyms. Contemporary dark aranormal and urban fantasy  (ESRI, FERAL WARRIORS and the new VAMP CITY series) for Avon Books and Harlequin Nocturne as Pamela Palmer and Scottish historical time travels (JEWELS OF TIME series) for Berkley as Pamela Montgomerie.

Pamela wrote a great bio about herself for her website so we copied it here so you can learn more about her…….

I grew up in the Air Force. No, no, I didn’t wear little fatigues or salute my parents (although I have a snapshot of me attempting to do push-ups beside my pilot dad at age four), but as anyone in a career military household knows, it’s not just a job, it’s a life that includes the entire family and one that can provide some unique experiences. At a year old, I thought any man in an Air Force uniform was my daddy. At nine I received a government-issue set of dog tags, and at ten I rode an elephant in Bangkok and later watched an earthquake ripple like ocean waves across our front yard in the Philippines.

Unlike a lot of authors, I didn’t grow up wanting to be a writer. I didn’t even want to be a pilot like my dad. I wanted to be an astronaut. I spent hours alone in my room either reading, watching Star Trek, or imagining other worlds filled with magic, strange creatures and dashing space pirates. The dream followed me to college where I studied engineering with plans to head for NASA when I graduated. But at nineteen I woke up to the reality of the modern space program and the stars finally fell from my eyes. The Space Shuttle was never going to take me where my imagination wanted to go.

           Instead, I graduated from Auburn University with a degree in Industrial Engineering and went to work for a major computer manufacturer. I still devoured books (almost exclusively romances) and even tried writing one, but after the first exciting chapter I had no idea what to do with my characters. I thought I couldn’t write. In hindsight, I simply had no idea how to plot.

I set aside the dream of writing for a few years while I had babies, though I continued to create stories in my head. Then one night as I did the dinner dishes, one of those daydreams became too big to keep in my head. I had to write it down. This time, however, thanks to the recent opening of a brand new library down the street, I discovered a wealth of books on plotting and character development and realized I could learn how to turn scenes into books and craft entire stories. The process was neither fast nor easy, encompassing four manuscripts, half a dozen partials, and eleven years of hard work before I sold my first book. Fortunately, I had a lot of encouragement along the way. With my very first book I finaled for Romance Writers of America’s most prestigious award for unpublished writers, the Golden Heart. Each of my subsequent books also became a Golden Heart finalist, the third winning the award outright. The fourth, through the Golden Heart, sold.

Now I spend my days in those fascinating worlds filled with magic, excitement and dashing heroes, and my evenings with my real-life hero and two wonderful kids.

Today we are helping Pamela promote her brand new dark paranormal romance/urban fantasy series VAMP CITY.  The first book in the series "A Blood Seduction" was released on May 29, 2012 so let's take a look at the first book in this great new series!  You can check out Book Monster's 5 Skull Review of "A Blood Seduction" HERE.

A BLOOD SEDUCTION

by Pamela Palmer

VAMP CITY series, Book 1

Genre:  Urban Fantasy

Publisher:  Avon Books

Publication Date:  May 29, 2012

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Amazon / Barnes & Noble / BAM / Indie Bound

 

Vampires live only for lust and pleasure in the eternal twilight of Vamp City. But the city's magic is dying. The only person who can restore it? A beautiful woman from the mortal world...one who knows nothing of the power she wields.

Quinn Lennox is searching for a missing friend when she stumbles into a dark otherworld that only she can see--and finds herself at the mercy of Arturo Mazza, a dangerously handsome vampire whose wicked kiss will save her, enslave her, bewitch her, and betray her. What Arturo can't do is forget about her--any more than Quinn can control her own feelings for him. Neither one can let desire get in the way of their mission--his to save his people, hers to save herself. But there is no escape from desire

in a city built for seduction, where passion flows hot and blood red. Welcome to Vamp City...

RT BookReviews calls A Blood Seduction, “A wonderfully intriguing and chilling launch!”

Kerrelyn Sparks, New York Times bestselling author of the Love at Stake series says A Blood Seduction is “An amazing, action-packed series! I'm as hungry as a Vamp for the next book!"

To read a longer excerpt or watch the book trailer, go to www.pamelapalmer.net. And for a chance to win one of two copies of A Blood Seduction, tell me who your own favorite bad boy hero is (t.v., movie, or book). You can also join me over at LiteralAddiction today (Saturday, July 7^th) at 2:00pm EST (1:00om CT, 12:00pm MDT & 11:00am PDT) where I’ll be answering questions during a Live Chat, giving away more books, and offering up a teaser or two from my upcoming Feral Warriors novel, A Love Untamed. See you there!

Hero or Antihero? Sometimes it’s hard to tell

The dictionary defines an antihero as a central character in a story, movie, or drama who lacks conventional heroic attributes. Not a bad guy, exactly. Just a main character who isn’t particularly heroic. A lot of bad boys fall into this category, or seem to…until we get to know them better. Or until the right woman comes along—one who calls to those heroic qualities that perhaps he didn’t even know he had, a woman who makes him want to become a better man.

Think of Damon Salvatore from The Vampire Diaries. Early in the television series he’s killing innocents right and left. At one point he even kills the heroine, Elena’s, brother. Fortunately for Elena, and Damon, Jeremy was wearing a ring which brings him back to life. At first look, Damon is a villain through and through. But as we get to know him, we find a tortured soul who has turned off his humanity because it hurts too much to feel. And as he falls in love with Elena and struggles to become a better man, and a somewhat heroic vampire, we fall in love with him in return.

Eric Northman from the True Blood series in another example. When he first comes on the scene, he’s ruthless and dangerous, a vampire to avoid at all costs. We watch him torture innocents in his dungeon. But as he falls for Sookie, as he begins to soften, we see within him the capacity for great love and a willingness to sacrifice for that love. And we begin to fall in love a little bit, too.

In my fourth Feral Warriors book, Rapture Untamed, the Jag defines the word antihero. He’s an ass to everyone, foul-mouthed, disrespectful, driving his brothers to fury on a regular basis. But as the heroine, Olivia, watches him, she sees small little anomalies, small cracks in his persona. She watches the way he protects the weakest among them—or simply steers clear of those he could actually hurt with his nastiness. She glimpses the tortured hero buried deep within. And she ever so slowly begins to fall in love.

In my most recent book, A Blood Seduction, the first book in my new Vamp City series, you’ll meet another male who, on the surface, appears to define the term antihero. The vampire Arturo Mazza. Like many bad boys, Arturo has no interest in playing the role of hero. He’ll be the first to tell you he is what he is—a dangerous predator at the top of the food chain, a vampire through and through—and he’s perfectly fine with that. But that will change when he meets the right woman. Arturo’s world slowly begins to unravel when Quinn Lennox stumbles into Vamp City, at once victim and savior, prey and warrior. A beauty who will turn his life upside down.

To illustrate my point, here’s a short excerpt from chapter 17:

With a shake of his head, Arturo forced himself to harden his heart as he’d done all too many times over the centuries. How many times had he looked away? How many times had he turned a blind eye or a deaf ear to the torture, to the barbarity? Too many to count, and he would continue to do so because he was a vampire. This is what they were.

And he was loyal to his kind, to his kovena. Above all, to his master.

Quinn Lennox, like so many before her, could not be his concern.

But as he turned toward the door, she stirred, the low sound of misery in her throat damning him.

He couldn’t help her. She was suffering as Cristoff wanted her to and he must leave her the way he’d found her.

Golden lashes fluttered up, brows drawn in terrible pain above green eyes swimming in agony.

Her fear poured forth, sinking into his pores, sliding down his throat, easing his terrible hunger. A fear he both craved and detested. He didn’t want her fear. Not hers.

The darkness. He could see perfectly well despite the lack of light, but with her human eyes, she could not. All she knew was that someone was in there with her.

“It is me, cara. Let me find a light.” He lit the oil lamp that had been left in the corner for her, a lamp she’d probably not even known was there.

He turned to find her watching him as her fear slowly began to fade. In her eyes, he saw no damnation, no hatred, no bitterness. Nothing but a terrible emptiness. And unbearable pain. And it killed something inside of him.

 All his reasoning fell away as the sheer need to relieve her suffering slew his better judgment. Kneeling beside her, he gathered her into his arms, aching at the sound of her agony as he moved her that small amount. Dipping his head, he bit into her wound, sucking out the poison which could not hurt him, as he drank a small amount of her blood. His feeding on her should alleviate some of her pain and promote the healing of her other wounds.

He couldn’t think about the anger, the betrayal, he’d see in Cristoff’s eyes when his master realized what his loyal one had done. The only thing that mattered at this moment, was Quinn.

As the horrible tension in her body slowly eased, he drew back from the sweetness of her blood before he stole too much, and found her gazing at him with confused, weary eyes.

“Vampire?”

He brushed her damp hair back from her face. “Sleep, tessoro. You are safe.”

Her eyes softened with a pain of a different kind. “Please don’t make me believe in you again. It hurts too much when you betray me.”

Her words sliced him open. “I have warned you over and over against trusting me.”

“And yet I keep doing it anyway.”

“Don’t.” His muscles bunched to push her away, to rise and leave her there. But before he could lower her back to the stone floor, her eyes drifted closed and she slept again.

He stared at her throat, at the slowly healing wound. Never had he gone against Cristoff’s wishes. Never. His master would not be pleased. But what was done was done.

He settled on the floor, pulling Quinn firmly onto his lap, tucking her head against his neck. For a long, long time, he sat like that, stroking her hair and back, feeling her warm breath against his throat, and listening to her heart beat. It would take time for the poison to fully leave her system, but little by little she melted against him and he knew the worst of the pain was gone.

He pressed his cheek to her sunlit hair and wondered what in the hell he was going to do.

Arturo’s and Quinn’s story won’t wrap up in one book. In fact, by the end of book 1, it’s just getting started. A Blood Seduction is only the first book of a multi-book romance. At first, Arturo defines the term antihero. But there are definitely heroic qualities inside him. It will take the right circumstances, and the right woman, to force them out. That bad boy has a long journey ahead of him and a long way to go before he’s deserving of Quinn’s trust, let alone her heart. And it’s going to be a heck of a ride.

If you'd like to keep up wit Pamela and her latest news, you can visit her Website or follow her on Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads.

Pamela is giving away an autographed copy of "A Blood Seduction" to one winner from Book Monster and another winner over at LITERAL ADDICTION.

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