Fantasy/Sci-Fi Lovin' Giveaways!

Short Story Giveaway!

2010-10-19T23:14:00.000-07:00

Check my main page for a new SHORT STORY GIVEAWAY. Update your links because giveaways are moving back to the main page and will no longer be posted here.

Giveaway! "The Silent Army" by James Knapp

2010-10-07T15:34:00.000-07:00

Ack! I almost forgot to mention I had a giveaway up on my main page for "The Silent Army" by James Knapp. This one is for U.S. and Canadian entries (I'm not doing the shipping on this one) and it features 3 signed copies. Be sure to CHECK IT OUT.

Winners!

2010-10-03T16:57:00.001-07:00

I have wrapped up several contests and need to announce the winners!

"Lady Lazarus" by Michelle Lang--

The winner is: Debbie Lester; Morehead, KY

"The Reapers Are the Angles" by Alden Bell--

The winners are:

Pilar Scott; Juneau, AK

Don Randall; Whitehall, PA

and

Raelena Pavey; Portsmouth, VA

Warner Bros. Blu-Ray Giveaway (featuring "The Matrix Reloaded," "Mars Attacks," and "Lost in Space," "THX 1138," "A Scanner Darkly" and "Forbidden Planet")

The winner is: Les Slusarczy; Hampton, VA

"The Lord of the Rings" prize pack giveaway--

The winner is: Nat Stephens; San Diego, Ca

Congrats everyone! I hope you enjoy your prizes.

Ann Aguirre Giveaway!

2010-09-21T22:33:00.000-07:00

I am moving my giveaways back to my main page (I finally got rid of a really annoying advertiser and don't have to shuffle things around anymore). I'll put up a couple of alerts on this page as I post my next few giveaways, but after a few weeks they will only be posted on my main page.

Right now I have a giveaway featuring 3 books by Ann Aguirre's Sirantha Jax series. If you're interested, be sure to CHECK IT OUT.

Giveaway! "Lord of the Rings" Trilogy Blu-Ray Prize Pack

2010-09-13T22:58:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Warner Bros. Home Video I have one of the best prize packs I've ever been able to offer on my humble blog.

To coincide with the release of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy on Blu-Ray I have ALL THREE movies on Blu-Ray up for giveaway.

But it gets better. The prize pack also includes:

* One New Zealand Jade Necklace
* One Navy Blue Ornament
* One deck of LOTR Playing Cards
* One Travel Candle
* One Poster

The Fellowship of the Ring
In mythic pre-historic times, a young hobbit named Frodo Baggins inherits a magic ring from his elderly cousin Bilbo. Wise to the powers that the magic ring holds, the dark Lord Sauron wants it, knowing it will enable him to enslave the people of Middle Earth. In his effort to thwart Sauron, Frodo recruits the fellowship of a wizard, an elf, a dwarf and others, on a mission to destroy the ring by casting it into the volcanic fires of Mount Doom, where it was made. However, the ring unleashes its own powers as a result of the struggle...

The Two Towers
Set in a time of uncertainty in the land of Middle-earth, a tale which charts a heroic quest which centers around an intrepid hobbit. The future of civilization rests in the fate of the One Ring, which has been lost for centuries. Powerful forces are unrelenting in their search for it. But fate has placed it in the hands of a young Hobbit named Frodo Baggins, who inherits the Ring and steps into legend. A daunting task lies ahead for Frodo when he becomes the Ringbearer as his assigned duty is to destroy the One Ring in the fires of Mount Doom where it was forged. But he canâ€™t accomplish this task alone. A Fellowship bands together to lend Frodo all that he needs to carry out his mission: the wisdom of Gandalf; the loyalty of his friends Sam, Merry, and Pippin; the courage of Aragorn and Boromir; the precision of Legolas; and the strength of Gimli. They are aided in their quest by Arwen, Galadriel and Elrond, whose knowledge of the Ring brings to light the true danger and importance of their journey.

The Return of the King
The Fellowship's journey is coming to an end. Sauron's forces have attacked Gondor in his final siege against mankind, and the once great kingdom has never been in more desperate need of its king. Will Aragorn find the strength to meet his destiny? As Gandalf desperately tries to move the broken forces of Gondor to act, Theoden unites the warriors of Rohan to join in the fight. Even in their courage and passionate loyalty, the forces of men are no match against the swarming legions of enemies raining down on the kingdom. Despite their great losses, The Fellowship charges forward to keep Sauron distracted and give Frodo a chance to complete his quest. Traveling across treacherous enemy lands, Frodo must rely increasingly on Sam and Gollum as The Ring continues to test his allegiance and, ultimately, his humanity.

Nice huh?

For U.S entries-- Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick one winner by Tuesday September 28th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded.

For worldwide entries-- I cannot ship the whole prize pack internationally, but I would like to offer the Blu-Ray discs ONLY for international prizing. International entries will be accepted with the understanding that the giveaway is for the movies only. I will confirm that stipulation if a winner outside the United States is picked as the winner (thanks for understanding).

**Contest Closed**

Winners!

2010-09-13T15:45:00.001-07:00

Time to wrap up my finished contests and announce some winners (all randomly chosen of course).

"Shades of Milk and Honey" by Mary Robinette Kowal:

The winner is: John Speelman; Canada

"The Last Page" by Anthony Huso:

The winner is: Walter Shirmacher; Sterling Heights MI

"The Truth of Valor" by Tanya Huff:

The winner is: Ronda Noel; Wichita, KS

And the 5 winners of "Dust" by Joan Frances Turner are:

Patricia German; Roslyn; SD

David Manning; Portland, OR

Larry Davenport; Liberty, TN

Kim Coomey; Monroe, NY

and

Sue Rojo; Bronx, NY

Congrats to all the winners!

Giveaway! 6 Sci-Fi Titles Now Available on Blu-Ray

2010-09-07T22:32:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Warner Bros. I have 6 awesome sci-fi action titles to offer for giveaway to one lucky winner to commemorate their release on Blu-Ray.

Mars Attacks!
Awake, Earthlings! It’s later than you think. Don’t miss this hilarious frenzy as Tim Burton (Alice in Wonderland) directs – and Mars Attacks!

See! Stars that shine across the galaxy. Jack Nicholson (in a dual role), Glenn Close, Annette Bening, Pierce Brosnan, Danny DeVito and a dozen more!

Shriek! At mean, green invaders form the angry red planet! Armed with insta-fry ray guns, endowed with slimy, humongous brains – and enlivened with out-of-this-world but state-of-the-art special effects.

Gasp! As the U.S. Legislature is overwhelmed. Don’t fear, we have two out of three branches of the government working for us, and that ain’t bad!

Thrill! As Earth fights back with an unexpected weapon. Take that, Martians!

Director:
Tim Burton

Starring: Jack Nicholson, Glenn Close, Pierce Brosnan, Sarah Jessica Parker, Michael J. Fox, Martin Short, Danny De Vito, Natalie Portman, Jim Brown, Lukas Haas, Rod Steiger, Tom Jones, Pam Grier, Paul Winfield, Annette Bening, Sylvia Sidney, Lisa Marie, Christina Applegate, Joe Don Baker, Jack Black, Barbet Schroeder, Brandon Hammond and Ray J. Norwood.

THX 1138 Director’s Cut
Master filmmaker George Lucas (Indiana Jones, Star Wars trilogies) makes his directorial debut in this futuristic sci-fi thriller. Academy Award® and Golden Globe®-winner Robert Duvall (Falling Down, A Civil Action) stars in this story of a computerized subterranean world, where sex is forbidden and emotions have been eradicated. When one computer-matched couple discovers love, this perfectly controlled world is turned upside down. Co-starring Tarzan’s Johnny Weismuller.

Director:
George Lucas

Starring:
Robert Duvall
Donald Pleasence

Special Features Include:
1. Commentary with George Lucas and Walter Murch
2. Theater of Noise (Sound Effects Only Track)
3. Master Sessions with Walter Murch
4. A Legacy of Filmmakers: The Early Years of American Zoetrope
5. Artifact from the Future: The Making of THX 1138
6. Electronic Labyrinth TXH 1138 4EB
7. BALD
8. Theatrical and Re-Release Trailer

Lost in Space
TV's Robinson family takes a galactic wrong turn with state-of-the-art visuals and effects. Starring William Hurt (One True Thing, Michael) and Gary Oldman (The Dark Knight, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix) as Dr. Smith.

Director:
Stephen Hopkins

Starring:
William Hurt
Mimi Rogers
Gary Oldman
Heather Graham
Lacey Chabert
Matt Leblanc
Jared Harris

A Scanner Darkly
Set in a not-too-distant future where America has lost its "war" on drugs, Fred, an undercover cop, is one of many people hooked on the popular drug, “Substance D,” which causes its users to develop split personalities. Fred is obsessed with taking down Bob, a notorious drug dealer, but due to his “Substance D” addiction, he does not know that he is also Bob.

Based on a classic novel by Philip K. Dick and starring Keanu Reeves (Constantine, The Matrix trilogy), Academy Award®-nominee and Golden Globe®-winner Winona Ryder (Girl, Interrupted, Mr. Deeds), Academy Award® and Emmy-nominee and Golden Globe®-winner Robert Downey Jr. (Good Night, And Good Luck, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang), and Academy Award® and Golden Globe®-nominee and Emmy-winner Woody Harrelson (North Country, The People vs. Larry Flynt). Directed by Academy Award®-nominee Richard Linklater (Me and Orson Welles, Before Sunset, Dazed and Confused). Filmed in live-action and then animated using the same critically acclaimed process that Linklater used in his previous film, Waking Life.

Director:
Richard Linklater

Starring:
Keanu Reeves
Rory Cochrane
Robert Downey Jr.
Woody Harrelson
Winona Ryder

Matrix Reloaded
In the second chapter of The Matrix trilogy, Neo (Keanu Reeves), Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) and Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) continue to lead the revolt against the Machine Army. In their quest to save the human race from extinction, they gain greater insight into the construct of The Matrix and Neo's pivotal role in the fate of mankind.

Directors:
Andy Wachowski
Larry Wachowski

Starring:
Keanu Reeves
Laurence Fishburne
Carrie-Anne Moss
Hugo Weaving

Forbidden Planet
A dutiful robot named Robby speaks 188 languages. An underground lair provides astonishing evidence of a populace a million years more advanced than Earthlings. There are many wonders on Altair-4, but none is greater or more deadly than the human mind.

Forbidden Planet is the granddaddy of tomorrow, a pioneering work whose ideas and style would be reverse-engineered into many cinematic space voyages to come. Leslie Nielsen portrays the commander who brings his spacecruiser crew to the green-skied Altair-4 world that's home to Dr. Morbius (Walter Pidgeon), his daughter (Anne Francis), the remarkable Robby...and to a mysterious terror. Featuring sets of extraordinary scale and the first all-electronic musical soundscape in film history, Forbidden Planet is in a movie orbit all its own.

Director:
Fred M. Wilcox

Starring: Leslie Nielsen, Walter Pidgeon and Anne Francis

How awesome is that?

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick one winner by Wednesday September 22nd. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "The Reapers Are the Angels" by Alden Bell (3 copies-- U.S. entires only)

2010-09-02T14:51:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the awesome people at MacMillan Books (Henry Holt and Co.) I have 3 copies of The Reapers Are the Angels by Alden Bell to offer for giveaway.

This is far and away the best book I've read this year (you can read my review HERE) and I can't recommend this book enough. Be sure to enter this one!

Zombies have infested a fallen America. A young girl named Temple is on the run. Haunted by her past and pursued by a killer, Temple is surrounded by death and danger, hoping to be set free.

For twenty-five years, civilization has survived in meager enclaves, guarded against a plague of the dead. Temple wanders this blighted landscape, keeping to herself and keeping her demons inside her heart. She can't remember a time before the zombies, but she does remember an old man who took her in and the younger brother she cared for until the tragedy that set her on a personal journey toward redemption. Moving back and forth between the insulated remnants of society and the brutal frontier beyond, Temple must decide where ultimately to make a home and find the salvation she seeks.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest ends) and I will randomly pick 3 winners by Friday September 17th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open in the U.S. only.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Lady Lazarus" by Michelle Lang

2010-08-25T23:01:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Tor Books I have a copy of Lady Lazarus by Michele Lang to offer for giveaway.

With the romance of Twilight, the suspense of The Dresden Files, and the delicious thrills of True Blood, the enthralling saga of Magdalena Lazarus unfolds. Descended from the legendary witch of Ein Dor, she alone holds the power to summon the angel Raziel and stop Hitler and his supernatural minions from unleashing total war in Europe. The Nazis have fighters more fearsome than soldiers, weapons more terrifying than missiles, and allies that even they are afraid of SS werewolves; the demon Asmodel who possesses a willing Adolf Hitler, and other supernatural creatures all are literally hell-bent on preventing Magda from possessing the Book of Raziel, a magical text with the power to turn the tide against Hitler’s vast war machine.

Magda, young and rebellious, grew up in the cosmopolitan city of Budapest, unaware of her family’s heritage. When her mother dies, Magda--ready or not--is the Lazarus, who must face the evil that holds Europe in an iron grip. Unready to assume the mantle of her ancient birthright, but knowing that she must fight, she sets out across Europe searching for the Book. Magda is desperate enough to endanger her soul by summoning the avenging angel Raziel. When she sees him in the glory of his celestial presence, her heart is utterly, completely lost…

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday September 16th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners!

2010-08-25T22:56:00.001-07:00

I have randomly selected the winners of two giveaways that just ended.

The winner of The Circle Series by Linda Robertson is:

Melissa Hardy; Salt Lake City, Utah

and

The winner of "The Hypnotist" by M. J. Rose is:

Thomas Semesky; Hammond, Indiana

Congrats to the winners!

Giveaway! 5 Copies of "Dust" by Joan Frances Turner (U.S. entries only)

2010-08-19T15:12:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have 5 COPIES of Dust by Joan Francis Turner to offer for giveaway (U.S. entries only).

Nine years ago, Jessie had a family.
Now, she has a gang.
Nine years ago, Jessie was a vegetarian.
Now, she eats very fresh meat.
Nine years ago,
Jessie was in a car crash and died.
Nine years ago, Jessie was human.
Now, she’s not.
After she was buried, Jessie awoke and tore through the earth to arise, reborn, as a zombie. Jessie’s gang is the Fly-by-Nights. She loves the ancient, skeletal Florian and his memories of time gone by. She’s in love with Joe, a maggot-infested corpse. They fight, hunt, dance together as one—something humans can never understand. There are dark places humans have learned to avoid, lest they run into the zombie gangs.

But now, Jessie and the Fly-by-Nights have seen new creatures in the woods—things not human and not zombie. A strange new illness has flamed up out of nowhere, causing the undeads to become more alive and the living to exist on the brink of death. As bits and pieces of the truth fall around Jessie, like the flesh off her bones, she’ll have to choose between looking away or staring down the madness—and hanging onto everything she has come to know as life…

Can I just say that this sounds fantastic?

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick 5 winners by Tuesday, September 7th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open in the U.S. only.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "The Truth of Valor" by Tanya Huff

2010-08-18T23:09:00.000-07:00

The Truth of Valor by Tanya Huff (Daw)

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of "The Truth of Valor" by Tanya Huff to offer for giveaway.

The "rousing military adventure"(Locus) continues with a brand-new Valor novel.

Former Marine Gunnery Sergeant Torin Kerr is attempting to build a new life with salvage operator Craig Ryder on his ship, the Promise. Turns out civilian life is a lot rougher than she'd imagined-salvage operators are losing both cargo and lives to pirates. And when they attack the Promise, Craig is taken prisoner and Torin is left for dead.

When Torin finds out why the pirates needed Craig, she calls in the Marines to get him back-and to stop the pirates from changing the balance of power in known space.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday September 2nd. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "The Last Page" by Anthony Huso

2010-08-16T22:40:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of the super-awesome people at Tor Books I have a copy of The Last Page by Anthony Huso to offer for giveaway.

The city of Isca is set like a dark jewel in the crown of the Duchy of Stonehold. In this sprawling landscape, the monsters one sees are nothing compared to what’s living in the city’s sewers.

Twenty-three-year-old Caliph Howl is Stonehold’s reluctant High King. Thrust onto the throne, Caliph has inherited Stonehold’s dirtiest court secrets. He also faces a brewing civil war that he is unprepared to fight. After months alone amid a swirl of gossip and political machinations, the sudden reappearance of his old lover, Sena, is a welcome bit of relief. But Sena has her own legacy to claim: she has been trained from birth by the Shradnae witchocracy—adept in espionage and the art of magical equations writ in blood—and she has been sent to spy on the High King.

Yet there are magics that demand a higher price than blood. Sena secretly plots to unlock the Cisrym Ta, an arcane text whose pages contain the power to destroy worlds. The key to opening the book lies in Caliph’s veins, forcing Sena to decide if her obsession for power is greater than her love for Caliph.

Meanwhile, a fleet of airships creeps ever closer to Isca. As the final battle in a devastating civil war looms and the last page of the Cisrym Ta waits to be read, Caliph and Sena must face the deadly consequences of their decisions. And the blood of these conflicts will stain this and other worlds forever.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday August 31st. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Shades of Milk and Honey" by Mary Robinette Kowal

2010-08-11T23:54:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Tor Books I have a copy of Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal to offer for giveaway.

The fantasy novel you’ve always wished Jane Austen had written

Shades of Milk and Honey is exactly what we could expect from Jane Austen if she had been a fantasy writer: Pride and Prejudice meets Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. It is an intimate portrait of a woman, Jane, and her quest for love in a world where the manipulation of glamour is considered an essential skill for a lady of quality.

Jane and her sister Melody vie for the attentions of eligible men, and while Jane’s skill with glamour is remarkable, it is her sister who is fair of face. When Jane realizes that one of Melody’s suitors is set on taking advantage of her sister for the sake of her dowry, she pushes her skills to the limit of what her body can withstand in order to set things right—and, in the process, accidentally wanders into a love story of her own.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday September 2nd. No multiple entries please -- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners!

2010-08-06T01:22:00.001-07:00

I'm sorry for being so late (again!) in getting the winners announced for the contests I've had up. I've had a busier month than usual and, since I'm already easily distracted, I've been struggling to keep up my normal blogging. The good news is that school starts in less than two weeks (though my kids would call that bad news) so I should be able to get back on track soon. I am prompt with mailing off prizes though, so the winners should expect to receive their books as soon as media mail can get it to them!

So here are the winners of the contests that have recently ended.

"Countdown" and "Final Crisis" by Greg Cox--

Shannon YonerKnysh; Canada

"The King's Bastard" by Rowena Cory Daniells--

Doreen Riopel; Canada

"Omnitopia Dawn" by Diane Duane--

Kerry Dustin; New Zealand

"Tracking the Tempest" by Nicole Peeler--

Jo White; Las Cruces, NM

"Labyrinth" by Kat Richardson--

Anita Yancey; Barnesville, GA

Congrats everyone, the books are on their way!

Giveaway! "The Hypnotist" by M.J. Rose

2010-08-03T01:42:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of M. J. Rose I am able to offer a copy of "The Hypnotist" for giveaway (U.S./Canada entries only).

Haunted by a twenty-year-old murder of a beautiful young painter, Lucian Glass keeps his demons at bay through his fascinating work as a special agent with the FBI’s Art Crime Team. Currently investigating a crazed art collector who has begun destroying prized masterworks, Glass is thrust into a bizarre hostage negotiation that takes him undercover at the Phoenix Foundation — dedicated to the science of past-life study — where, in order to maintain his cover, he agrees to submit to the treatment of a hypnotist.

Under hypnosis, Glass travels from ancient Greece to nineteenth-century Persia, while the case takes him from New York to Paris and the movie capital of the world. These journeys will change his very understanding of reality, lead him to question his own sanity and land him at the center of perhaps the most audacious art heist in history — the theft of a 1,500-year-old sculpture from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
International bestselling author M. J. Rose’s The Hypnotist is her most mesmerizing novel yet. An adventure, a love story, a clash of cultures, a spiritual quest, it is above all a thrilling capstone to her unique Reincarnationist novels, The Reincarnationist and The Memorist.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday August 24th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! The Circle Series by Linda Robertson

2010-07-27T00:10:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Simon & Schuster I have ONE SET of the first three books of the Circle Series by linda Robertson to offer for giveaway.

Vicious Circle

Being a witch doesn't pay the bills, but Persephone Alcmedi gets by between reading Tarot cards, writing her syndicated newspaper column, and kenneling werewolves in the basement when the moon is full -- even if witches aren't supposed to mingle with wolves. She really reaches the end of her leash, though, when her grandmother gets kicked out of the nursing home and Seph finds herself in the doghouse about some things she's written. Then her werewolf friend Lorrie is murdered...and the high priestess of an important coven offers Seph big money to destroy the killer, a powerful vampire named Goliath Kline. Seph is a tough girl, but this time she bites off more than she can chew. She needs a little help from her friends -- werewolf friends. One of those friends, Johnny, the motorcycle-riding lead singer for the techno-metal-Goth band Lycanthropia, has a crush on her. And while Seph has always been on edge around this 6'2" leather-clad hunk, she's starting to realize that although their attraction may be dangerous, nothing could be as lethal as the showdown that awaits them.

Hallowed Circle

Persephone Alcmedi has been persuaded to compete for the position of High Priestess of the Cleveland, Ohio, coven -- now that the former priestess, Vivian Diamond, has strangely gone missing. Unfortunately, there are a few small problems with the idea. Not only does Seph know rather more about Vivian's disappearance than the other witches realize, but the epic struggle she's just survived has left her with some highly unusual powers -- ones that could be dangerous to reveal. Despite her reluctance, she agrees to participate, if only to prevent snooty Hunter Hopewell, an obnoxious but talented witch, from ending up in the winner's circle. Can Seph hide her secrets -- including her connection to the master vampire-wizard Menessos -- from the terrifyingly wise judges? Plus, there's her rock 'n' roll werewolf boyfriend, Johnny, and some angry fairies to deal with....

Once the competition begins, a finalist turns up dead. It looks as if one of the contestants is willing to do anything -- including murder -- to win. Suddenly Seph has even more on her plate than she thought: from solving a murder to working out what her new powers really are...and exactly why they're creating so much havoc in her love life.

Fatal Circle

There was a time when Persephone Alcmedi thought her life was hard to manage, what with wondering how to make sure she took adequate care of both her grandmother and her foster daughter, Beverley, whether she’d end up in the unwanted position of high priestess of a coven, and whether her wærewolf lover, Johnny, would resist the groupies who hang around his band Lycanthropia.

But that was before the fairies started demanding that Seph’s frightening, unpredictable ally—the ancient vampire Menessos— be destroyed . . . or the world will suffer. Seph and Menessos are magically bonded, but that’s a secret she dares not reveal to her fellow witches lest they be forced to reject her and forbid her use of magic. And, despite the strain this casts on her relationship with Johnny, as a showdown with the fairies nears, she and Menessos badly need the wærewolves as allies.

Life, death, and love are all on the line, but when destiny is calling, it doesn’t help to turn away. With the individual threads of their fates twisted inextricably together, can Seph, Johnny, and Menessos keep the world safe from fairy vengeance?

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday August 17th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Labyrinth" by Kat Richardson

2010-07-14T23:11:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of Labyrinth by Kat Richardson to offer for giveaway.

The toughest case yet for Greywalker Harper Blaine, "a great heroine" (#1 New York Times bestselling author Charlaine Harris).

Harper Blaine was your average small-time P. I. until she died-for two minutes. Now she's a Greywalker, walking the line between the living world and the paranormal realm. There are others who know about her new powers-others with powerful tools and evil intentions, and now that the man who "killed" her has been murdered, the police are also paying close attention. That means Harper has to watch her step while searching for the ghost of her "killer"-who could be a valuable clue in the puzzle of Harper's past and her father's death, as well as a key to figuring out who's trying to manipulate her new powers and why. But with her growing powers pulling her into the Grey, Harper might not be able to come back out...

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday August 5th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Omnitopia Dawn" by Diane Duane

2010-07-13T00:31:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of Omnitopia Dawn by Diane Duane to offer for giveaway.

A near-future techno-thriller from New York Times bestselling author Diane Duane.

In an increasingly wired and computer-friendly world, massive multiplayer online games have become the ultimate form of entertainment. And the most popular gaming universe of all is Omnitopia, created by genius programmer Dev Logan. For millions of people around the world, Omnitopia is an obsession, a passionate pastime, almost a way of life. But there's a secret to Omnitopia, one that Dev would give his life to protect-the game isn't just a program or a piece of code. It's become sentient-alive. And it's Dev's job to keep it that way...

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday August 3rd. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck.

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Tracking the Tempest" by Nicole Peeler

2010-07-11T01:13:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Orbit Books I have a copy of Tracking the Tempest by Nicole Peeler to offer for giveaway.

Valentine’s Day is fast approaching, and Ryu – Jane’s bloodsucking boyfriend – can’t let a major holiday go by without getting all gratuitous. An overwhelming dose of boyfriend interference and a last-minute ticket to Boston later, and Jane’s life is thrown off course.

Ryu’s well-intentioned plans create mayhem, and Jane winds up embroiled in an investigation involving a spree of gruesome killings. All the evidence points towards another Halfling, much to Jane’s surprise…

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Sunday July 25th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Contest Winners!

2010-07-11T00:44:00.001-07:00

I've had several contests wrap up over the last week or so and I need to announce the (randomly selected) winners.

"Procession of the Dead" by Darren Shan goes to--

Eszter Balogh: Budapest, Hungary

"Terminal World" by Alastair Reynolds goes to--

Laura Armstrong: Ontario, Canada

"Distant Thunders" by Taylor Anderson goes to--

Dave Wyatt: Fulton, Maryland

"Pretty Monsters" by Kelly Link goes to--

Kathy Martin: Duluth, Minnesota

and

"Undead and Unfinished" by MaryJanice Davidson goes to--

Crystal Caruthers: Norman, Oklahoma

Congrats everyone-- These will be in the mail very soon!

Giveaway! "The King's Bastard" by Rowena Cory Daniells

2010-06-30T23:51:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Rowena Cory Daniells I have a copy of The King's Bastard to offer for giveaway.

I almost half-way through the book and it's very good so far. I didn't intend to read it just yet--just wanted to read the first couple of pages to check it out-- and I got hooked. So you'll want to enter to win this one!

Book One of The Chronicles of King Rolen’s Kin

Cloaked in silent winter snow the Kingdom of Rolencia sleeps as rumours spread of new Affinity Seeps, places where untamed power wells up. Meanwhile, King Rolen plans his jubilee unaware of the growing threat to those he loves.

By royal decree, all those afflicted with Affinity must serve the Abbey or face death. Sent to the Abbey because of his innate Affinity, the King’s youngest son, Fyn, trains to become a warrior monk. Unfortunately, he’s a gentle dreamer and the other acolytes bully him. The only way he can escape them is to serve the Abbey Mystic, but his Affinity is weak.

Fiercely loyal, thirteen year-old Piro is horrified to discover she is also cursed with unwanted Affinity. It broke their mother’s heart to send Fyn away, so she hides her affliction. But, when Fyn confesses his troubles, Piro risks exposure to help him.

Even though Byren Kingson is only seven minutes younger than his twin, Lence, who is the king's heir, Byren has never hungered for the Rolencian throne. When a Seer predicts that he will kill Lence, he laughs. But Lence Kingsheir sees Byren’s growing popularity and resents it. Enduring loyalty could be Byren’s greatest failing.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday July 15th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Countdown" and "Final Crisis" by Greg Cox!

2010-06-22T00:30:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have one set of Countdown and Final Crisis by Greg Cox to offer for giveaway. (I hate to give these up but, gosh darn it, I can't get to everything).

Countdown

The explosive novelization of the events that followed the cataclysm of Infinite Crisis.

Cosmic legend has it that when the primordial gods of antiquity perished in some bygone cataclysm, the universe gave birth to a new breed of gods who reigned from two eternally warring worlds, the heavenly New Genesis and the hellish Apokolips. Now, a vast conspiracy of evil is determined to eradicate the New Gods, stealing their souls to wield universal power that can destroy all of reality.

At the end of an age in which time, space, and reality may bow before such sinister forces, the fate of the Earth lies in the hands of five unlikely super heroes who have one destiny to fulfill: to save the world at all costs, regardless of the consequences.

Final Crisis

The novelization of the superhero event starring Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, and the heroes and villains of the DC Comics Universe

Victorious at long last against his enemies on the world of New Genesis, Darkseid has unleashed the forces of Apokolips on Earth. With the secret of the Anti- Life Equation at his command, Darkseid now possesses the ability to eradicate all free will from humanity-and usher in an end to the age of super heroes.

Facing an ever growing army of mindless slaves and corrupted heroes, Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and the remnants of the Justice League of America find themselves consumed by the ever spreading darkness. They remain humanity's only hope-the only light that will not be extinguished in the world's darkest hour.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday July 13th. No multiple entries please (I can allow for mistakes-- just no spam please) multiple entries will be disqualified. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Undead and Unfinished" by MaryJanice Davidson

2010-06-18T00:16:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of Undead and Unfinished by MaryJanice Davidson to offer for giveaway.

Vampire Queen Betsy Taylor returns in the ninth novel in the New York Times bestselling series.

Vampire Queen Betsy Taylor is having a tough time getting through the Book of the Dead-until the Devil strikes a bargain. She offers Betsy a chance to finish the cursed (literally!) thing, and finally discover all its mysteries. There's just one catch...

Betsy and her half-sister Laura have to go to Hell long enough for Laura to embrace her dark heritage (after a rebellious youth of charity work) and finally make nice with her mother, aka Lucifer. That means interacting with their family's past. In doing so, they're impacting the future in ways they never anticipated. Of course that's what Mother wanted all along. Damn her.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Friday July 9th. No multiple entries please--all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Guest Post & Giveaway! Kelly Link--Author of "Pretty Monsters"

2010-06-14T18:09:00.001-07:00

Kelly Link, author of the newly released and already well regarded YA collection of short stories Pretty Monsters was kind enough to take time out of her busy schedule to write a guest post for me today. As an added bonus, I also have a copy of "Pretty Monsters" to offer for giveaway--just read to the end of the post to find out how to get your hands on a copy!

Kate Wilhelm is a writer of mystery novels, classic science fiction novels like Where Late the Sweet Bird Sang, a short-story writer, and an anthologist. Along with her husband Damon Knight, she co-founded the Clarion Workshop. Although she was no longer an instructor when I went to Clarion in 1995, one of the most useful pieces of writing advice I've ever come across was something Wilhelm said. To roughly paraphrase, she suggests that every writer indirectly collaborates with her subconscious -- she calls this collaborator your Silent Partner -- who supplies you with ideas that you then turn into stories.

Your Silent Partner doesn't discriminate between the good, the bad, the ugly, and the odd. That's your job. When you reject certain kinds of ideas, Wilhelm says, the S.P stops supplying them. If you are too picky, and turn up your nose at all of the ideas that are coming from your subconscious, eventually the S.P stops offering any at all. When you begin to recognize certain kinds of ideas as useful and welcome, Wilhelm suggests that you stop and offer positive reinforcement. That is, think to yourself, "Yes, that's a terrific idea. More like that, please, S.P." -- and the S.P will begin to produce more and more ideas of these fruitful and generative kinds of ideas. As you begin to recognize the kind of ideas that are going to turn into the kind of stories that you want most to write, your subconscious gets even better at fine-tuning the kind of things it provides, as well as faster at giving you useful material. A couple of years ago, when we published Kate Wilhelm's book on writing and workshops, Storyteller, I decided to try out her suggestion about recognizing, welcoming, and fine-tuning the S.P.'s collaborative input, and found that I was having much more fun with the ideas that ended up in the front of my brain, as well as having more ideas of the kind that went somewhere I wanted to go.

Perhaps you're a writer who already has a very good well of story ideas. But if, like me, you sometimes run dry, here's an exercise for generating story ideas that I hope fits well with Kate Wilhelm's advice. What I decided to do was to sit down and, very quickly, make a list of things that I most liked in other people's fiction -- these could be thematic, character driven, very general or very specific. I found that when I started this list, it began to incorporate ideas and items which I was inventing as I went along. Here's the list:

theme parks

cults

haunted houses

funny!

subterranean lakes

book within a book, also made up tv shows -- any kind of invented narrative

dog walkers

pet tragedies

twins

old mysteries -- bad things that have happened in the past

people who know they are doing stupid things, but keep on doing them

people who are blamed for doing things they didn't do

people who make things

people who stage amateur plays / make amateur movies

ghost stories

governesses & parole officers -- people with power who can make you miserable, or make you do pointless tasks in order to demonstrate their power

electrical outages

imaginary friends

Cat in the Hat-types characters/antagonists/allies

poltergeists

owls or infestations of wild animals

demolition

ne'er-do-well relations

the octopus

the color green

pet named "the unsub" b/c mother loves forensic mysteries

mocking celebrities

metafiction

fraught family dynamics

weird sexual dynamics

plague

zombies

attics or basements full of things

girls who kick ass, not necessarily for a good reason

Every once in a while, I revisit this list, to see if there's something on it that generates an idea. I add things as they occur. It's a bit like window shopping.

One more way of generating more story ideas. This is something that the writer Greg Frost suggested -- he got it from a talk that the poet/novelist/short story writer Stephen Dobyns gave, and said that Stephen Dobyns himself came up with it after he once asked Raymond Carver about how Carver approached writing short stories. Carver said, "I write the first sentence, and then I write the next sentence and then the next." Apparently this answer at first annoyed Dobyns, whose usual method involved much more planning etc; later, when Dobyns was marooned for two days in a hotel room, feverish, and unable to catch a flight home, he sat down and tried Carver's method. So here's the exercise: without too much preparation, and without spending too much time -- say, more than an hour -- write down 50 first sentences. Later on, sit down with those 50 sentences, pick half of them, and write 25 first paragraphs. Out of those first paragraphs, Dobyns eventually got half a dozen short stories. I've done this exercise with a couple of workshops, and although I can't vouch for the final stories, many of those 50 first sentences were terrific. Speaking as an editor, I was immediately interested in what came next.

A couple more random things about story ideas: I often think about stories or characters for a long time before I begin to write them -- during that period when I'm playing around with the things that will go into one story, I will often find that another story begins to take form as well, and that both stories will begin to get bigger, lumpier, and more interesting -- a bit like rolling two Katamari balls at once, if you've ever played Katamari Damacy. Sometimes these story ideas stay separate, and then I'll have a project ready to pick up as soon as I've finished the first story. Sometimes the various story strands will combine into one bigger story ball, and I've learned that this almost always turns out to be interesting and useful as well.

Even when you do have a terrific idea for a short story, sometimes it's difficult to know how best to approach it. So far the method that's worked best for me has been to start with dialogue and nothing else -- not even speech tags. If I can get two characters talking to each other, in such a way that their voices and situation are distinct enough to identify w/o descriptions or speech tags or any other kind of distraction, a story begins to take shape. Eventually I go back and revise, but the characters have already begun to come to life in a way that drives the action.

As well as useful ideas, there's a particular category of ideas that you, the writer, will never ever use, but which are pleasing, for whatever reason, to contemplate. I welcome these ideas even as I recognize them as ridiculous. They seem like but-wait-there's-more bonus! ideas that you get, for some reason, along with the useful ones -- and sometimes I like these bonus! ideas even better than the ones that become stories or projects. In this category are two titles for anthologies that I will never ever edit, but which I love to contemplate: Manthology is one; the other is Unicats!.

One last category of ideas, to end on: those ideas which are fabulous, but which you may not be the best writer to tackle, or which are too complicated to pursue for other reasons. For example, I've never written a script. I have lots of other things I need and want to be working on. And yet, wouldn't it be a blast to remake the movie "Bringing Up Baby" as a paranormal romance? I keep having this vision of the scene in which Cary Grant's character is wearing Katherine Hepburn's negligee. Doesn't the reason why seem obvious? He's just turned back from were-leopard into Cary Grant.

~Kelly Link

To enter to win a copy of "Pretty Monsters" just add your information to the form below (all information guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday June 29th. No multiple entries please--all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck.

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Readers as yet unfamiliar with Link (Magic for Beginners) will be excited to discover her singular voice in this collection of nine short stories, her first book for young adults. The first entry, The Wrong Grave, immediately demonstrates her rare talents: a deadpan narration that conceals the author's metafictional sleight-of-hand (Miles had always been impulsive. I think you should know that right up front); subjects that range from absurd to mundane, all observed with equidistant irony. Miles, hoping to recover the poems he's buried with his dead girlfriend, digs up what appears to be the wrong corpse (It's a mistake anyone could make, interjects the narrator), who regains life and visits her mother, a lapsed Buddhist (Mrs. Baldwin had taken her Buddhism very seriously, once, before substitute teaching had knocked it out of her'). Other stories have more overtly magical or intertextual themes; in each, Link's peppering of her prose with random associations dislocates readers from the ordinary. With a quirky, fairytale style evocative of Neil Gaiman, the author mingles the grotesque and the ethereal to make magic on the page. Ages 12–up.

**Contest Closed**

Winners!

2010-06-14T01:09:00.001-07:00

I have a bunch of winners to announce to some contests that have ended-- and I need to mail off some prizes!

Contest #1-- "A Taint in the Blood" by S. M. Stirling:

The winner is: Jesse Conrad; Alexandria, VA

Contest #2-- "Secret Prey" by John Sandford:

The winner is: Sue Ahn; San Francisco, CA

Contest #3-- "Storm Prey" by John Sandford:

The winner is: Jessica Lay; Dallas, TX

Contest #4-- "Bullet" by Laurell K. Hamilton

The winner is: Neville Thomson; South Africa

Contest #5-- "Roadkill" by Rob Thurman

The winner is: Roberta Padoan; Italy

and

Contest #6-- "Black Blade Blues" by J.A. Pitts

The winner is: Van Pham; Torrance, CA

Sorry for the delayed announcements, but these will be shipped off right away. Congrats to all the winners.

Giveaway! "Distant Thunders" by Taylor Anderson

2010-06-05T23:49:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of Distant Thunders by Taylor Anderson to offer for giveaway.

The fourth thrilling adventure in the Destroyermen series.

After the battle in which the men of the destroyer Walker and their Lemurian allies repelled the savage Grik, Lieutenant Commander Matthew Reddy is shocked by the arrival of a strange ship captained by one Commodore Jenks of the New Britain Imperial Navy-an island-nation populated by the descendants of British East Indiamen swept through the rift centuries before.

With the Walker undergoing repairs, Reddy already has a great deal on his hands. For the Grik will return, and Reddy will need all hands on deck to fight them off when they next attack. But Jenks' uncertain loyalties make Reddy question whether he can trust the man.

As tension between the Allies and the Imperials mount, Reddy will come to realize that his suspicions are not misplaced-and that a greater danger than the Grik is closer than he ever suspected...

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Sunday June 27th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Updated (Form Fixed) Giveaway! "Terminal World" by Alastair Reynolds

2010-06-02T08:00:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of Terminal World by Alastair Reynolds to offer for giveaway.

A brand-new novel from "the most exciting space opera writer working today" (Locus).

In a far distant future, an enforcement agent named Quillon has been living incognito in the last human city of Spearpoint, working as a pathologist in the district morgue. But when a near-dead angel drops onto his dissecting table, his world is wrenched apart.

For the angel is a winged posthuman from Spearpoint's Celestial Levels, and with the dying body comes bad news-to save the angel's life, Quillon must leave his home and travel into the cold and hostile lands beyond the city.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Wednesday, June 23rd. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Procession of the Dead" by Darren Shan

2010-05-30T17:59:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Grand Central Publishing I have a copy of Procession of the Dead by Darren Shan to offer for giveaway.

Young, quick-witted and cocksure, Capac Raimi arrives in the City determined to make his mark in a world of sweet, sinister sin. He finds the City is a place of exotic dangers: a legendary assassin with snakes tattooed on his face who moves like smoke, blind Incan priests that no one seems to see, a kingpin who plays with puppets, and friends who mysteriously disappear as though they never existed. Then Capac crosses paths with The Cardinal, and his life changes forever.

The Cardinal is the City, and The City is The Cardinal. They are joined at the soul. Nothing moves on the streets, or below them, without the Cardinal's knowledge. His rule is absolute.

When Capac discovers the extent of The Cardinal's influence on his own life, he is faced with hard choices and his own soaring ambition. To find his way, Capac must know himself and what he is capable of. But how can you trust yourself when you can't remember your past?

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Monday June 21st. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners! "Pinon" by Jay Lake and Dark Void Swag Packs

2010-05-28T08:57:00.000-07:00

I have randomly selected the winners of the "Pinion" by Jay Lake and the "Lost Planet 2: Swag Pack" giveaways.

The winner of the contest featuring "Pinion" by Jay Lake is:

Charles Gramlich: Abita Springs, LA

And the 5 winners of the "Lost Planet" swag packs are:

Myra Castellano: Edinburg, TX

Thierry Tito: Clay City, KY

Abbi Wallarab: Matherville, IL

Thom Weeks: Burien, WA

and

William Barnes: La Grange, NC

Congrats everyone!

Giveaway! "Black Blade Blues" by J. A. Pitts

2010-05-24T23:08:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Tor Books I have a copy of Black Blade Blues by J. A. Pitts to offer for giveaway.

Sarah Beauhall has more on her plate than most twenty-somethings: day job as a blacksmith, night job as a props manager for low-budget movies, and her free time is spent fighting in a medieval re-enactment group.

The lead actor breaks Sarah’s favorite one-of-a-kind sword, and to avoid reshooting scenes, Sarah agrees to repair the blade. One of the extras, who claims to be a dwarf, offers to help. And that’s when things start to get weird. Could the sword really be magic, as the "dwarf" claims? Are dragons really living among us as shapeshifters?

And as if things weren’t surreal enough, Sarah’s girlfriend Katie breaks out the dreaded phrase… “I love you.” As her life begins to fall apart, first her relationship with Katie, then her job at the movie studio, and finally her blacksmithing career, Sarah hits rock bottom. It is at this moment, when she has lost everything she has prized, that one of the dragons makes their move.

And suddenly what was unthinkable becomes all too real…and Sarah will have to decide if she can reject what is safe and become the heroine who is needed to save her world.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday June 8th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Book Review and Giveaway! "Roadkill" by Rob Thurman

2010-05-21T07:50:00.000-07:00

The laptop dropped onto the ground in front of me.

Well shit.

When I refused to drop my head and read the screen, teeth nipped me hard over the ribs. I hissed, glared at the wolf and read what was typed on the screen. He'd used the caps lock again, either to get his point across or because he didn't believe much in my reading skills.

SUCKS TO BE ONE OF A KIND.

He rested his chin on my shoulder, sneezed at the dust and waited.

"Yeah," I commented after a long pause. "It does, Good Wolf or bad Auphe, it sucks to be the only one." Great. First Delilah, then him. They both had me pulling shit out of layaway early.

This time he nipped my shoulder before retrieving from the dirt the ink pen he'd dropped to bite me. He typed: ALL AUPHE WERE BORN BAD. YOU ARE NOT ALL AUPHE. YOU HAVE A CHOICE. YOU CAN BE GOOD. He considered, then backspaced, deleting the GOOD and changing it to NOT SO BAD. At least he was honest, the fur ball.

Then he punctuated the sentence. Joy. "I didn't know there was an emoticon for a dog humping another dog. Thanks for sharing." I took off the glasses and rubbed my eyes.

There was more typing. I glanced at the screen. At least now that he was sure he had my attention, he'd stopped with the capitalization. Cal smart monster. Cal can read. Good for me.

Knock knock.

"You've got to be kidding me," I groaned.

Knock knock, he persisted, growling around the pen.

"Okay, just to shut you up: Who's there?" I gave in. Why not? At this point, it was almost ludicrous. An Auphe being counseled by a butt-sniffing pound reject.

No one. The Auphe ate everyone in the house.

"You son of a bitch," I growled.

Knock knock. This time he didn't wait for the "Who's there?" Twenty cocker spaniels the Auphe is going to skin to make a pimp coat.

Seriously, quit it or I will shoot your mangy ass."

Knock knock.

God, he was as relentless as Niko. "Last one," I warned. "Last one or your ass is grass." The threat didn't hold much weight when it was followed with "Who's there?" I went on, resigned.

You, and what happens behind the door is up to you.

~Excerpt from Roadkill by Rob Thurman

Urban fantasy is frequently an amalgam of certain ingredients using involving magic, werewolves and/vampires, an urban setting an a smart-mouthed protagonist. I'm usually drawn to most of the elements thrown into the mix, but I will often complain about the snarky one-liners thrown in when I review most paranormal fiction. But the Cal Leandros series by Rob Thurman is the one series that I think uses this element effectively-- and actually has me looking forward to seeing what the characters are going to say next.

"Roadkill" is the fifth book in a series about Caliban and Niko Leandros. Technically Cal and Niko are half-brothers, but you wouldn't say that to Niko's face. Cal is the result of an unholy union between an Auphe and a Gypsy mother. The Auphe are the monstrous creatures that somehow became the basis for the elf myth-- even if the only thing the Auhpe have in common with elves are the pointy ears. Cal has spent most of his life running from the Auphe who had planned to use Cal to wipe humanity from the planet.

After defeating, and hopefully destroying, the Auphe, Cal has finally found some peace in his life. Working for his brother as a kind of supernatural private investigator and spending time with a very attractive female werewolf have done great things for Cal's mood. Yet good times seem to be fleeting for Cal, and when he is attacked by a werewolf he realizes that the wolves may not be too happy that one of their kind is sleeping with a man who is half-Auphe--but relationship troubles turn out to be the least of Cal's worries.

An ancient evil, known as the Plague of the World, has been stolen from his prison and an old Gypsy woman hires Cal and Niko to stop the man that created the Black Death before he has a second chance to unleash Hell on Earth.

I'm going to come right out and say it-- I'm a huge fan of Rob Thurman. She's one of the few reliable authors when it comes to urban fantasy. Five books in and I like the fifth book as much as the first-- and every one in between are worthy of reading again.

The relationships are the thing. Most of the books are told through Cal's perspective, though the last two books have seen a shift to include Niko, and even a werewolf's point of view. But Cal is who it is really all about. He is one of a kind-- and not in a good way. And if he has a smart-mouth, it's driven primarily out of the fear of what he may become if he loses his touch with his human side. The Auphe aren't known for their sense of humor. Cal's life line, in a very literal sense, has been his brother Niko. And there is no doubt that Cal will do anything to make his brother proud-- well, as long as he gets to complain about it first. But there is still always the danger than Cal's Auphe side will lose control and he'll do something that isn't just stupid, but potentially deadly. Niko's faith in him has not completely eased Cal's worries that he may, one day, harm his brother-- So it's a good thing Niko can kick Cal's butt ten times out of ten-- as Niko is only to happy to remind him.

Much of "Roadkill" is told as a sort of road-trip story, just one that has a half-Auphe, two werewolves, a Puck and a human along for the ride. These are the times when Cal really lets the snark show, and it could be annoying if wasn't balanced against the personalities of the other characters. Fortunately, all of Thurman's characters are strong enough to hold their own opposite Cal. His brother Niko is a super-disciplined martial arts expert who never fails to remind Cal that Cheetos do not belong in a major food group and Robin Goodfellow (famously known as the puck from William Shakespeare's "A Midsummer's Night's Dream) is on the trip to test a vow of monogamy and act as a general distraction.

Thurman keeps up the action, but also throws in a few, slightly disturbing, interludes to keep the pace from being too fast. This dark fantasy isn't for the faint of heart, but it's as fun as it is grim. Thurman always adds intriguing mythology to her warped world and I look forward to seeing what she comes up with. "Roadkill," for my money, is as good as urban fantasy gets.

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have one copy of "Roadkill" to offer for giveaway. Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Friday June 11th. No multiple entries please. All multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners! "Jane Slayer" and "Bitter Seeds"

2010-05-16T10:14:00.000-07:00

I am quite the procrastinator, but I completely underestimated how overdue some of my contests were.

Yikes.

But I have randomly selected some winners, and I promise not to procrastinate on the shipping!

First up, I had 3 copies of "Jane Slayer," by Charlotte Bronte and Sherri Browning Erwin, up for giveaway and I have randomly selected the winners, and they are:

Teresa Warner; Berwick, OH

Jason Bradley; Fort Worth, TX

and

Aik Chien; Malaysia

And I have also selected the winner of the "Bitter Seeds" by Ian Tregillis contest I had up, and the winner is:

Michael Hying; Westerville OH

Congrats to all the winners!

Giveaway! "Bullet" by Laurell K. Hamilton

2010-05-11T22:52:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of the ever wonderful Penguin Books I have a copy of Bullet by Laurell K. Hamilton to offer for giveaway.

The all-new novel in the #1 bestselling Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series.

The triumvirate created by master vampire Jean-Claude, necromancer Anita Blake, and werewolf Richard Zeeman has made Jean-Claude one of the most powerful vampires in the U.S. He's consolidating power in himself and those loyal to him, doing in America what Belle Morte did in Europe when she was at her height of power. She almost owned Europe, and there was those who are determined that Jean-Claude won't do the same in America. Jean-Claude's motives may be kinder, but as any lawyer will tell you: motives matter, but you're just as dead.

Assassins are coming to St. Louis to kill them all. Anita knows they're coming, but even being forewarned doesn't mean you can win.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all entries guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Wednesday June 2nd (give or take a few days with my tendency toward procrastination). No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winner!- Debut Giveaway

2010-05-10T08:29:00.000-07:00

I'm late to get this up, as always, but I have randomly selected the winner of the "Debut Giveaway" featuring "and Falling, Fly" by Skylar White, "Touched by an Alien" by Gini Koch, and "Deadtown" by Nancy Holzer and the winner is:

Judi Szabo; Canada

Congrats Judi!

John Sandford Book Tour--Extra Giveaway!

2010-05-07T08:21:00.001-07:00

Woo hoo! Thanks to the ever wonderful people at Penguin Books, I just found out that I will also be able to offer an ARC (advance reading copy) of Storm Prey -- the latest release in John Sandford's "Prey" series.

The brilliant new Lucas Davenport thriller from the #1 New York Times-bestselling author.

"Sandford's track record as a best0selling author is amazing, but it's not an accident," wrote Booklist of Wicked Prey. "His plotting is sharp, his villains are extraordinarily layered, and his good guys are always evolving.

And this time, there's a storm brewing...Very early, 4:45, on a bitterly cold Minnesota morning, three big men burst through the door of a hospital pharmacy, duct-tape the hands, feet, mouth, and eyes of two pharmacy workers, and clean the place out. But then things swiftly go bad, one of the workers dies, and the robbers hustle out to their truck-and find themselves for just one second face-to-face with a blond woman in the garage: Weather Karkinnen, surgeon, wife of an investigator named Lucas Davenport.

Did she see enough? Can she identify them? Gnawing it over later, it seems to them there is only one thing they can do: Find out who she is, and eliminate the only possible witness...

Just add your information to form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Friday May 28th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open in the U.S. and Canada.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

John Sandford Book Tour: Review and Giveaway Featuring "Secret Prey"

2010-05-06T23:39:00.000-07:00

I don't often do reviews that aren't 'genre' as it relates to this blog. But when I do, it's frequently detective fiction that I feature-- specifically books by John Sandford. He's easily my favorite author when it comes to that genre and when I was given the opportunity to be part of a book tour spotlighting the twenty books in Sandford's "Prey" series I jumped on it. If you haven't read Sandford yet, be sure to enter the giveaway at the end of this post-- you won't be disappointed.

As part of the book tour, we were asked to fill out questionnaires about the book we chose to review-- neat idea don't you think? The book I selected was the ninth book in the series, Secret Prey.

Year published: 1998

Tell us about Lucas Davenport:

Lucas is a Minneapolis cop, whose current rank is that of Deputy Chief of the Minneapolis Police Department. He has a well deserved reputation as a tough guy and a tenacious investigator. He's not the stereotypical cop though. He made a bunch of money designing web games, drives a Porsche 911 and loves nice clothes-- but he also plays hockey and doesn't back down from a fight.

* What is Lucas doing when he first appears in the book? Set up the scene.

Lucas is fighting off a lingering depression that's the result of a break-up with his fiance after another one of his cases spilled over into his personal life. He's called in to investigate the murder of a bank president and begins to feel a flicker of interest in the case-- which helps to fight off the malaise he's been dealing with.

* Give us a sense of time and place.

The book is current to the time-frame it's set in-- the late 90's. Cell phones are common but you don't have the characters texting each-other. The investigation starts out at a hunting lodge where the murder takes place, but moves back to the Cities pretty quickly. The main suspects are very wealthy bank executives, so the story tends to move from the bank boardroom, Lucas' home, the wealthy neighborhoods of the suspects and the police station.

* Lucas’s occupation or professional role?

Lucas' title is that of Deputy Chief. He takes lead on any investigations that his boss, Chief Rose Marie Roux, assigns to him.

* Lucas’s personal status (single, dating, married):

Lucas starts out single, and he's really only interested in being with Weather, the woman he was going to marry. But he does start seeing a female detective he's always had chemistry with.

* Lucas Davenport is a known clothes-horse; did you notice any special fashion references?

He said that he prefers Italian suits. American suits are utilitarian and British suits aren't quite right-- definitely Italian.

Let’s talk about the mystery:

* Avoiding spoilers, what was the crime/case being solved?

Right in the middle of a big bank merger-- one that could set up certain executives as millionaires and see others unemployed-- the CEO of one of the banks is murdered and the main suspects are the executives in line to take over the bank.

* Does the title of your book relate to the crime?

Absolutely. As the story evolves it becomes clear that many crimes have been committed surrounding a particular person that have remained secret for years. The sequence of events slowly unfolds and layer after layer they are revealed as the book progresses.

Who was your favorite supporting character, good or evil?

That's a tough one. This book has a lot of good supporting characters-- one of the things I think Sandford does best actually. Oddly, it's one of the smaller roles (I guess you could call it) that I liked. One of the executives, James T. Bone, whose status as good or evil should remain a mystery, is one I liked. His rapport with Lucas seemed very natural.

What was your favorite scene or quote?

That's another hard question. I like the small moments, the ones that make a story seem real. Lucas is kind of a flirt, so it's fun when he banters with the women he meets. But he's also a guy's guy, so I also appreciate how Sandford includes the trash talk between him and the other cops. If I had to pick one scene though... I think I'd go with the part where two small-town sheriffs are trying to intimidate Lucas and he goads them into a fight. It's not super important as far as the story goes, but it's set up in such a way that it really shows how Lucas handles himself as a cop and as someone who won't be intimidated. Like I said-- it's the small things.

Finally, how do you envision Lucas Davenport? If he were to be portrayed in a movie, what celebrity would play him?

It's so hard to put the face I've created in my head to one particular actor. If Clint Eastwood (in his heyday) hadn't already played "Dirty Harry" he would have been a great Lucas Davenport. Now I lean toward Hugh Jackman because Lucas is a big, good looking guy. But Jackman would have to be somewhere between his clean cut look and "Wolverine." Maybe grow his hair out a little bit.

If you're interested in checking out the rest of the book tour (and maybe a chance at winning some other titles in Sandford's "Prey" series), here is the book tour schedule.

John Sandford and the DAYS OF PREY Tour Schedule

Monday, May 3rd:

Rules of Prey: Rundpinne

Shadow Prey: Boarding in my Forties

Tuesday, May 4th:

Eyes of Prey: Jenn’s Bookshelves

Silent Prey: Chick with Books

Wednesday, May 5th:

Winter Prey: The Bluestocking Guide

Thursday, May 6th:

Mind Prey: Jen’s Book Thoughts

Sudden Prey: Starting Fresh

Friday, May 7th:

Secret Prey: Fantasy & SciFi Loving News & Reviews

Certain Prey: My Two Blessings

Monday, May 10th:

Easy Prey: Lesa’s Book Critiques

Chosen Prey: Reading with Monie

Tuesday, May 11th:

Mortal Prey: Musings of a Bookish Kitty

Naked Prey: Dan’s Journal

Wednesday, May 12th

Hidden Prey: Novel Whore

Broken Prey: You’ve GOTTA read this!

Thursday, May 13th:

Invisible Prey: Booktumbling.com

Friday, May 14th:

Phantom Prey: The Novel Bookworm

Monday, May 17th

Wicked Prey: A Bookworm’s World

Tuesday, May 18th:

Storm Prey: Bermuda Onion

And, finally. courtesy of Penguin Books, I have a copy of "Secret Prey" to offer for giveaway. Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Friday May 28th. No multiple entries please -- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open in the U.S. and Canada.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Exclusive Look at "Lost Planet 2" and Swag Pack G

2010-05-05T23:02:00.000-07:00

As part of the ongoing roll out of "Lost Planet 2," Capcom games is allowing me to share a sneak peek -- with some exclusive footage-- of "Lost Planet 2" (5/11 release date!) and a chance to giveaway 5 swag packs of goodies to some lucky winners. The cool thing about this video is that it's pretty much 'real time' and lets you see what the actual game play looks like.

The swag packs include: a t-shirt, stickers, a T-ENG branded aluminum bottle and 2 posters (sent separately as they are in tubes). Prizes are as shown here. I have FIVE sets of swag packs to offer some lucky winners. Just add your information to the form below to enter (all entries guaranteed confidential and all information will be discarded once contest is over) and I will randomly pick FIVE winners by Thursday May 20th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. U.S. entries only (sorry!)

**Contest Closed**

Good luck!

Giveaway! "A Taint in the Blood" by S. M. Stirling

2010-05-02T00:48:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of A Taint in the Blood by S. M. Stirling to offer for giveaway.

Eons ago, Homo Lupens ruled the earth. Possessing extraordinary powers, they were the source of all of the myths and legends of the uncanny. And though their numbers have been greatly reduced, they exist still- though not as purebreds.

Adrian Breze is one such being. Wealthy and reclusive, he is more Shadowspawn than human. But he rebelled against his own kind, choosing to live as an ordinary man. Now, to save humanity, he must battle the dark forces of the world-including those in his own blood...

Just add your information to the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) to enter and I will randomly pick a winner by Sunday May 30th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Pinion" by Jay Lake

2010-04-26T22:49:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the generosity of Tor Books I have a copy of Pinion by Jay Lake to offer for giveaway.

Rejoin the Librarian and the Chinese submarine captain, the British sailor, the clockwork man, and the young sorceress who has gone south of the great equatorial wall. This adventure in Lake’s Clockwork Earth continues the tale begun in Escapement.

"The very cosmology of this world is an enigmatic astonishment, and it underpins every single bit of action and character….Lake has a ball transporting his characters up and down this magnificent world, subjecting them to all sorts of perils and escapes in a wild variety of settings. His three main protagonists all exhibit distinct and memorable personalities that allow us to filter their world through three prisms of intelligence and attitude….Fantasy has always been "escapist" in the best sense of the word, and Lake engineers a fine tale of humans in search of liberation from the clockwork and customs that ensnare them and us as well."
--Sci-Fi Weekly on Escapement

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick one winner by Tuesday May 18th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Bitter Seeds" by Ian Tregillis

2010-04-19T22:30:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Tor Books I have a copy of Bitter Seeds by Ian Tregillis to offer for giveaway. (And let me say, the picture here does not do justice to the beautiful cover...)

It’s 1939. The Nazis have supermen, the British have demons, and one perfectly normal man gets caught in between

Raybould Marsh is a British secret agent in the early days of the Second World War, haunted by something strange he saw on a mission during the Spanish Civil War: a German woman with wires going into her head who looked at him as if she knew him.

When the Nazis start running missions with people who have unnatural abilities—a woman who can turn invisible, a man who can walk through walls, and the woman Marsh saw in Spain who can use her knowledge of the future to twist the present—Marsh is the man who has to face them. He rallies the secret warlocks of Britain to hold the impending invasion at bay. But magic always exacts a price. Eventually, the sacrifice necessary to defeat the enemy will be as terrible as outright loss would be.

Alan Furst meets Alan Moore in the opening of an epic of supernatural alternate history, the tale of a twentieth century like ours and also profoundly different.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest is over) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday May 11th. No multiple entries please--all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners!

2010-04-19T09:16:00.000-07:00

I have randomly selected the winners for a few giveaways that have ended and the winners are...

For the Short Story Contest featuring "A Girl's Guide to Guns and Monsters," "Timeshares" and "Cthulhu's Reign," the winner is:

TJ Hutzol; Davis, Ca

************************************

The winner of a copy of "Directive 51" by John Barnes is:

Laura Armstrong; Ontario, Canada

******************************

The winner of a copy of "Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded" by John Scalzi is:

Debra Frazier; Houlton, ME

******************************

And lastly, the winner of the contest featuring "The Blood King" and "Dark Lady's Chosen" by Gail Z. Martin is:

Matt Paulen; Boynton Beach, Fl

Congrats everyone!

Giveaway! "Jayne Slayre" (3 copies!) by Sherri Browning Erwin and Charlotte Bronte

2010-04-12T23:25:00.000-07:00

I am getting such a kick out of the newest trend of classic novel/horror mash-ups ("Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" anyone?). So when Simon & Schuster offered me a chance to giveaway 3 copies of Jane Slayre, I couldn't resist.

A timeless tale of love, devotion . . . and the undead.

Jane Slayre, our plucky demon-slaying heroine, a courageous orphan who spurns the detestable vampyre kin who raised her, sets out on the advice of her ghostly uncle to hone her skills as the fearless slayer she’s meant to be. When she takes a job as a governess at a country estate, she falls head-over-heels for her new master, Mr. Rochester, only to discover he’s hiding a violent werewolf in the attic—in the form of his first wife. Can a menagerie of bloodthirsty, flesh-eating, savage creatures-of-the-night keep a swashbuckling nineteenth-century lady from the gentleman she intends to marry? Vampyres, zombies, and werewolves transform Charlotte Brontë’s unforgettable masterpiece into an eerie paranormal adventure that will delight and terrify.

I can't wait to read this.

Just add your information to the form below for a chance to win one of THREE copies (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick THREE winners by Tuesday May 4th. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

**Contest Closed**

Debut Giveaway!

2010-04-11T00:43:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Penguin Books I am building up a nice collection of fantasy debuts. Even better, I have some extras to pass on to one lucky winner.

And Falling, Fly by Skyler White

In a dark and seedy underground of burned-out rock stars and angels-turned- vampires, a revolutionary neuroscientist and a fallen angel must put medicine against mythology in an attempt to erase their tortured pasts...but at what price?
Olivia, vampire and fallen angel of desire, is hopeless...and damned. Since the fall from Eden, she has hungered for love, but fed only on desire. Dominic O'Shaughnessy is a neuroscientist plagued by impossible visions. When his research and her despair collide at L'Otel Mathillide-a subterranean hell of beauty, demons, and dreams-rationalist and angel unite in a clash of desire and damnation that threatens to destroy them both.
In this fractures Hotel of the Damned, Olivia and Dominic discover the only force consistent in their opposing realities is the deep, erotic gravity between them. Bound to each other finally in a knot of interwoven freedoms, Dominic and Olivia-the vision-touched scientist and the earth-bound angel, reborn and undead-encounter the mystery of love and find it is both fall...and flight.

Deadtown by Nancy Holzner

Publishers Weekly
In Holzner’s fast-paced urban fantasy debut, shape-shifter Victory Vaughn fights demons in an alternate present-day Boston, where a few thousand people have been mysteriously zombified and are now confined to the neighborhood of Deadtown along with vampires, werewolves, and other “Paranormal Americans.” Vicky’s sometime boyfriend, Kane, a werewolf, lawyer, and PA rights advocate, gets some competition from human detective Daniel; teen zombie sidekick Tina occasionally wreaks unintentional havoc; and Vicky’s sister, Gwen, an inactive shape-shifter and suburban wife and mother, argues with Vicky over their life choices and attitudes toward shape-shifting in the most fully realized and emotionally compelling parts of the book. By comparison, the reveal of the big villain comes off as both predictable and a little cardboardy. This fun and facile tale would be a great beach read if it weren’t coming out in the middle of the winter.

Touched by an Alien by Gini Koch

How can a sexy marketing manager join forces with an Alpha Centauri male in Armani to save the planet-using hairspray, a Mont Blanc pen, and rock n' roll?

Easy...

She's Touched by an Alien

Marketing manager Katherine "Kitty" Katt steps into the middle of what appears to be a domestic dispute turned ugly. And it only gets uglier when the man turns into a winged monster, straight out of a grade-Z horror movie, and goes on a killing spree. Though Kitty should probably run away, she springs into action to take the monster down.

In the middle of the chaos a handsome hunk named Jeff Martini appears, sent by the "agency" to perform crowd control. He's Kitty's kind of guy, no matter what planet he's from. And from now on, for Kitty, things are going to be sexy, dangerous, wild, and out of this world.

The rules are the same as always. For a chance to win all three books featured here just add your information to the form below and I will randomly pick a winner by Sunday May 2nd. No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

(I have a couple of contests past their entry date still up--since I can't mail anything off until Monday, I'll leave them open one more day. Make sure you check the page for all open contests.)

**Contest Closed**

Guest Post & Giveaway Featuring James Knapp

2010-04-01T11:09:00.001-07:00

When I reviewed "State of Decay" by James Knapp, I said it was a "cool" book-- and I meant it. So I was really excited when Knapp contacted me and offered to sponsor a giveaway for THREE signed copies of the book. And he let me talk him into a guest post too! It doesn't get much better than that...

Love for the Editor
by James Knapp

When I was younger, I read a short story I loved that involved an editor (I think I would love it more now, but have never been able to track it down). In the story, a writer makes a pact with the Devil, who makes him successful. The only catch is that the writer must, before the appointed time, convince an editor to publish a ‘Pact with the Devil’ story. It is told entirely in the form of proposal and rejection letters, as the editor politely (and continuously) explains to the author that ‘Pact with the Devil’ stories are played out, and will not be published. When the writer finally fails, he is whisked off to Hell, doomed to eternally try and sell ‘Pact with the Editor’ stories to the Devil, who eternally rejects them.

That was my first exposure to the concept of an editor. Other than reject stories, I had no idea still what they really did. I had on occasion, before getting published myself, read books that left me thinking "I liked it, but that guy/gal could use a good editor". When I said that, I would mean that I thought the book had indulged in too many irrelevant (though maybe interesting) tangents. When I said that, I also still had no real idea what an editor actually did. My first novel STATE OF DECAY has now been published, and as I wrap up the first round of edits on the second book in the trilogy THE SILENT ARMY, I understand more the true role, and value, of an editor.

My current editor's name is Jessica Wade, and she works over at ACE/ROC. She juggles a stable of other authors (that's where they keep us) and it's actually amazing to me that she provides the same services she provides me to a bunch of others. I use the word 'amazing' because I realized something this go around, and I'll try and explain it as best I can:

I'm sure every author is different, but for me the process involves writing, sketching out story arcs, walking around talking to myself, and rewriting. As I do this, I decide to change things, get new ideas, scrap other things, until the pieces fall into place and click. I've yet to write a book that didn't leave me with 30K words or so of scenes I cut out, and I've never done less than three rewrites, but still...there's always some little nagging items, some little nagging details that didn't *quite* click. I'm usually pretty whipped by the end of that last draft, and if the test readers didn't identify them as problems, I tuck them away thinking 'maybe this is just some sort of writer's neuroses' after all, I could always find *something* to change if I stare long enough. I tuck them away, but I don't forget them.

Jessica then reads the manuscript, and immediately zeros in on those things. She spots them (along with other things), calls them out, and then having had some time away from the book, I suddenly am able to see the answer that I couldn't see before.

That's not all she does, of course. You'll note I used the phrase 'first round' of edits back there; there are multiple rounds. The first round she makes both small suggestions (this is the part where she finds the things that bothered me, the things that I missed, and the things that need further (or less) explaining, etc), and big suggestions. The 'big' suggestions are what I think of as 'shaping the story'. Not in a 'could Chapter Three be Chapter Six?' kind of way, but in more of a broad sense...she understands books and story structure very well, and knows when a story arc has drifted or doesn't land as well as it could. She doesn't micromanage; I never feel like she's trying to turn the book into something I didn't intend, we have a common goal - we both want the book to be the best it can be. Therefore she is very honest...very nice (her tone sometimes suggests to me that editors might be used to authors freaking out) but very honest, and an honest opinion from a professional who is also nice is a good thing.

After the first round, there's a second round, and then copy edits (although someone else does those)...the process takes months and months, but in the end, the book is better than it started.

The point is, behind every writer is an editor, and that editor contributes a lot to the books you and I read. Their name doesn't go on the cover, and most readers have no idea who they even are, but the editor (and copy editor, and cover artist, and publicist, etc) are the team in the author's corner who give them the best shot at succeeding in an arena where success is not guaranteed. They're in the sometimes (I imagine) unenviable position of crushing dreams, stepping on raw nerves, and basically banging on an artist's finely assembled contraption with a rubber mallet to shake out the loose pieces, but they do it, usually with a smile, and no one ever writes a wiki about them.

So, it used to be when I thought 'editor' I imagined that cigar-chomping guy that always yells at Peter Parker. I don't *think* my editor chomps cigars, but I don't actually know that for a fact. I do know she doesn't yell at Peter Parker because she works for Penguin and he works for The Daily Bugle. Also, he is fictional.

I will now get back to editing, though, as not to provoke her into channeling her inner Jonah Jameson – editors keep an eye on deadlines, too.

Thanks James! There are a lot of writers, who aspire to be published, that frequent the review blogs (myself included) so it's always interesting to get a glimpse at real-world publishing and I know I appreciate the insight.

For everyone else, if you haven't yet gotten your hands on a copy of State of Decay, now you have a chance to win one of THREE SIGNED COPIES that James has graciously offered to giveaway. Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest ends) and I will randomly pick THREE winners by Friday April 23rd. No multiple entries-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open in the U.S. and Canada.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winner! "Shadow Prowler" by Alexey Pehov Giveaway

2010-03-31T23:44:00.000-07:00

I have randomly picked a winner for the "Shadow Prowler" giveaway I had up and the winner is...

Joe Scanlon: Ripon, WI

Congrats Joe!

Winners! "Numbers" by Rachel Ward Giveaway

2010-03-31T23:35:00.000-07:00

I have randomly picked THREE winners to receive a copy of "Numbers" by Rachel Ward and the winners are--

Chuck Graham: Madison, AL

Dave Wyatt: Fulton, MD

and

Sue Rojo: Bronx, NY

Congrats everyone!

Giveaway! ARC of "The Blood King" and "Dark Lady's Chosen" by Gail Z. Martin

2010-03-25T23:57:00.001-07:00

Just as I promised at the end of yesterday's post, I have a giveaway featuring TWO books from Chronicles of the Necromancer by Gail Z. Martin to offer to one lucky winner.

The first book is a limited edition ARC copy of The Blood King

The hugely anticipated second book in the Chronicles of the Necromancer series, following The Summoner, one of the most successful fantasy debuts of the year.

Outcast Prince Martris Drayke continues his quest to seek retribution and restore his father's honour. He must gather his allies and make a direct challenge to the armies of his brother, Jared. Meanwhile, Jared's mage seeks to raise the spirit of the Obsidian King, and creates an imbalance in the natural currents of magic. Tris must learn to use his powers as a Summoner to fight the forces of evil plaguing the Winter Kingdoms.

"Attractive characters and an imaginative setting."
- David Drake, author of the Lord of the Isles series.

And the second book that will go to the winner is latest book in "The Chronicles of the Necromancer" series, Dark Lady's Chosen.

Treachery and blood magic threaten King Martris Drayke’s hold on the throne he risked everything to win. As the battle against a traitor lord comes to its final days, war, plague and betrayal bring Margolan to the brink of destruction.

Civil war looms in Isencroft.

Finally, in Dark Haven, Lord Jonmarc Vahanian has bargained his soul for vengeance as he leads the vayash moru against a dangerous rogue who would usher in a future drenched in blood.

"Just when you think you know where things are heading, Martin pulls another ace from her sleeve... believable characters move through a beautifully realized world with all the quirks, depths and levels of a real place." - A.J. Hartley, author of The Mask of Atreus

The books are being offered courtesy of Gail Z. Martin herself and she has graciously offered to ship worldwide! Just add your information to the form below to enter and I will randomly pick a winner by Friday April 15th. (All information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest is over). No multiple entries please-- all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded" by John Scalzi

2010-03-23T23:08:00.000-07:00

I am a huuuge John Scalzi fan. Old Man's War is easily one the best books I've ever read. Scalzi's accessibility also extends to the blogoshpere where he has been writing and conversing with his fans for over 10 years. The most popular of those posts have been put together in a compilation that, courtesy of Tor Books, I am able to offer one copy for giveaway today.

On September 13, 1998, John Scalzi sat down in front of his computer to write the first entry in his blog Whatever--and changed the history of the Internet as we know it today.

What, you're not swallowing that one? Okay, fine: He started writing Whatever and amused about 15 people that first day. If that many. But he kept at it, for ten years and running. Now 40,000 people drop by on a daily basis to see what he's got to say.

About what? Well, about whatever: Politics, writing, family, war, popular culture and cats (especially with bacon on them). Sometimes he's funny. Sometimes he's serious (mostly he's sarcastic). Sometimes people agree with him. Sometimes they send him hate mail, which he grades on originality and sends back. Along the way, Scalzi's become a best-selling, award-winning author, a father, and a geek celebrity. But no matter what, there's always another Whatever post to amuse and/or enrage his readers.

Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded collects some of the best and most popular Whatever entries from the first ten years of the blog – a decade of Whatever, presented in delightfully random form, just as it should be.

The rules are the same as always. Just add your information to the form below to enter and I will randomly pick a winner by Wednesday April 14th. (All information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest is over.) No multiple entries please. All multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck.

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Directive 51" by John Barnes

2010-03-17T22:31:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of Directive 51 by John Barnes to offer for giveaway.

Heather O'Grainne is the Assistant Secretary in the Office of Future Threat Assessment, investigating rumors surrounding something called "Daybreak." The group is diverse and radical, and its members have only one thing in common-their hatred for the "Big System" and their desire to take it down.

Now, seemingly random events simultaneously occurring around the world are in fact connected as part of Daybreak's plan to destroy modern civilization-a plan that will eliminate America's top government personnel, leaving the nation no choice but to implement its emergency contingency program...Directive 51.

Doesn't this sound good? (I was psyched to get an extra copy to pass on) Just add your information to the form below to enter and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday April 8th. (All information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends). No multiple entries please. All multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck.

**Contest Closed**

Short Story Giveaway!

2010-03-15T22:31:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have another fun group of short stories to offer for giveaway.

A Girl's Guide to Guns and Monsters: Edited by Kerrie Hughes and Martin H. Greenberg

Brilliant, original sci-fi and fantasy stories featuring brave and bold heroines. Thirteen urban and paranormal tales of strong women, armed with weapons they are not afraid to use, as well as fists and feet of fury, who face monsters and bad guys-and are not above rescuing men in the process.

Timeshares: Edited by Jean Rabe and Martin H. Greenberg

Sixteen original stories about taking your dream vacation-in any era you desire.

Take a vacation through time with the help of a Time Travel Agency offering excursions into the past and future. Readers will find themselves in exotic, adventurous locales-and in all manner of trouble and mysteries. And figures from the past will be able to squeak by the other way.

Picture Cleopatra in modern-day New York City, or Hannibal searching for elephants at Wisconsin's Circus World. And that's just the beginning of the thrills and danger...

Cthulhu's Reign: Edited by Darrell Schweitzer

All original stories about the return of Cthulhu and the Old Ones to Earth.

Some of the darkest hints in all of H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos relate to what will happen after the Old Ones return and take over the earth. What happens when Cthulhu is unleashed upon the world? What happens when the other Old Ones, long since banished from our universe, break through and descend from the stars? What would the reign of Cthulhu be like on a totally transformed planet where mankind is no longer the master? Find out in these exciting, brand-new stories.

Just add your information to the form below to enter and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday April 6th. (All information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once contest ends). No multiple entries please. All multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winner! "The Adamantine Palace" by Stephen Deas

2010-03-15T22:18:00.000-07:00

I have randomly selected a winner of the contest I had featuring "The Adamantine Palace" Stephen Deas.

And the winner is:

Melissa McClure; Olathe, Kansas

Congrats Melissa!

Giveaway! "Shadow Prowler" by Alexey Pehov

2010-03-10T22:46:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Tor Books I have a copy of Shadow Prowler by Alexey Pehov to offer for giveaway. There's some nice buzz on this book so I'm really happy to have an extra copy to offer for giveaway...

After centuries of calm, the Nameless One is stirring.

An army is gathering; thousands of giants, ogres, and other creatures are joining forces from all across the Desolate Lands, united, for the first time in history, under one, black banner. By the spring, or perhaps sooner, the Nameless One and his forces will be at the walls of the great city of Avendoom.

Unless Shadow Harold, master thief, can find some way to stop them.

Epic fantasy at its best, Shadow Prowler is the first in a trilogy that follows Shadow Harold on his quest for a magic Horn that will restore peace to the Kingdom of Siala. Harold will be accompanied on his quest by an Elfin princess, Miralissa, her elfin escort, and ten Wild Hearts, the most experienced and dangerous fighters in their world…and by the king’s court jester (who may be more than he seems…or less).

Reminiscent of Moorcock's Elric series, Shadow Prowler is the first work to be published in English by the bestselling Russian fantasy author Alexey Pehov. The book was translated by Andrew Bromfield, best known for his work on the highly successful Night Watch series.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday April 1st. No multiple entries please. All multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Numbers" by Rachel Ward (3 Copies!)

2010-03-04T22:42:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Scholastic Books I have the opportunity to offer 3 COPIES of Numbers by Rachel Ward for giveaway. (U.S. residents only)

Ever since she was child, Jem has kept a secret: Whenever she meets someone new, no matter who, as soon as she looks into their eyes, a number pops into her head. That number is a date: the date they will die. Burdened with such awful awareness, Jem avoids relationships. Until she meets Spider, another outsider, and takes a chance. The two plan a trip to the city. But while waiting to ride the Eye ferris wheel, Jem is terrified to see that all the other tourists in line flash the same number. Today's number. Today's date. Terrorists are going to attack London. Jem’s world is about to explode!

Doesn't that sound good? Just add your information to the form below to enter (all entries guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest ends) and I will randomly pick 3 winners by Friday March 26th. No multiple entries please. All multiple entries will be discarded. Open to U.S. entries only.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners!

2010-03-02T12:54:00.001-08:00

I am sooo overdue on some of my contests. I may have to go to three weeks on the contests because two weeks goes by too fast for me. At least I eventually get to them....right?

Anyway. Three contests have come to an end and I need to announce the winners and get the prizes mailed off!

Contest #1-- "Peacekeeper" and "Vigilante" by Laura E. Reeve

The winner is: Leland Eaves; Texas

Contest #2-- ARC copy of "Finch" by Jeff Vandermeer

The winner is: Lucía Ceballos; Uruguay

Contest #3-- "The Auralia Thread" by Jeffrey Overstreet

The TWO winners are:

Kirk Jordan; Arkansas

and

Beth Lutz; Wisconsin

Congrats to all the winners!

Giveaway! "The Adamantine Palace" by Stephen Deas

2010-02-23T22:56:00.001-08:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of The Adamantine Palace by Stephen Deas to offer for giveaway.

The power of the Realms depends on its dragons. With their terrifying natures, they are ridden by the aristocracy and bred for hunting and war. But as dangerous political maneuverings threaten the complacency of the empire, a single dragon has gone missing. And even that one dragon-returned to its full intelligence and fury-could spell disaster for the Realms...

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Wednesday March 9th. No multiple entries please. All multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "The Auralia Thread" by Jeffrey Overstreet

2010-02-11T22:41:00.000-08:00

Many of you might not be familiar with author Jeffrey Overstreet. I first became aware of him when I read the review of "Auralia's Colors" written by Robert over at The Fantasy Book Critic. Since that review Overstreet has written two more books in his "Auralia Thread" series and the third book is due to be released on February 16th; and I am reminded how much I want to set aside the time to finally get to what I hear is a wonderful series.

Thanks to WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group you won't have to wait. I have TWO sets of the first three books in "The Auralia Thread" series to offer for giveaway. (U.S. entries only)

Auralia's Colors

When thieves find an abandoned child lying in a monster’s footprint, they have no idea that their wilderness discovery will change the course of history. Cloaked in mystery, Auralia grows up among criminals outside the walls of House Abascar, where vicious beastmen lurk in shadow. There, she discovers an unsettling–and forbidden–talent for crafting colors that enchant all who behold them, including Abascar’s hard-hearted king, an exiled wizard, and a prince who keeps dangerous secrets. Auralia’s gift opens doors from the palace to the dungeons, setting the stage for violent and miraculous change in the great houses of the Expanse. Auralia’s Colors weaves literary fantasy together with poetic prose, a suspenseful plot, adrenaline-rush action, and unpredictable characters sure to enthrall ambitious imaginations.

Cyndere's Midnight

“Cyndere walked down to the water to make her daily decision — whether to turn and go back into House Bel Amica, or to climb old Stairway Rock and throw herself into the sea…” In Cyndere’s Midnight, the power of Auralia’s colors brings together a bloodthirsty beastman and a grieving widow in a most unlikely relationship… one that not only will change their lives, but could also impact the four kingdoms of The Expanse forever. Jordam is one of four ferocious brothers from the clan of cursed beastmen. But he is unique: The glory of Auralia’s colors has enchanted him, awakening a noble conscience that clashes with his vicious appetites. Cyndere, heiress to a great ruling house, and her husband Deuneroi share a dream of helping the beastmen. But when Deuneroi is killed by the very people he sought to help, Cyndere risks her life and reputation to reach out to Jordam. Beside a mysterious well–an apparent source of Auralia’s colors–a beauty and a beast form a cautious bond. Will Jordam be overcome by the dark impulse of his curse, or stand against his brothers to defend House Abascar’s survivors from a deadly assault? Critics hailed Jeffrey Overstreet’s first fantasy novel, Auralia’s Colors, as “exceptionally well crafted,” “beautiful,” and “masterfully told.” Now he continues weaving thisfantastic tapestry with an enchanting fairy tale for ambitious imaginations of all ages.

Raven's Ladder

Following the beacon of Auralia’s colors and the footsteps of a mysterious dream-creature, King Cal-raven has discovered a destination for his weary crowd of refugees. It’s a city only imagined in legendary tales. And it gives him hope to establish New Abascar. But when Cal-raven is waylaid by fortune hunters, his people become vulnerable to a danger more powerful than the prowling beastmen––House Bel Amica. In this oceanside kingdom of wealth, enchantment, and beauty, deceitful Seers are all too eager to ensnare House Abascar’s wandering throng. Even worse, the Bel Amicans have discovered Auralia’s colors, and are twisting a language of faith into a lie of corruption and control. If there is any hope for the people of Abascar, it lies in the courage of Cyndere, daughter of Bel Amica’s queen; the strength of Jordam the beastman; and the fiery gifts of the ale boy, who is devising a rescue for prisoners of the savage Cent Regus beastmen. As his faith suffers one devastating blow after another, Cal-raven’s journey is a perilous climb from despair to a faint gleam of hope––the vision he sees in Auralia’s colors.

To enter to win one of TWO sets of "The Auralia Thread" by Jeffrey Overstreet, just add your information to the form below and I will randomly pick TWO winners by Friday February 26th. No multiple entries please. Multiple entries will be discarded. U.S. entries only. (All information is guaranteed confidential and will not be used for any purpose other than this contest. All entries will be discarded once the contest has ended)

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! ARC copy of "Finch" by Jeff VanderMeer

2010-02-10T22:18:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Underland Press I have an extra ARC copy of Finch by Jeff VanderMeer to offer for giveaway.

In Finch, mysterious underground inhabitants known as the gray caps have reconquered the failed fantasy state Ambergris and put it under martial law. They have disbanded House Hoegbotton and are controlling the human inhabitants with strange addictive drugs, internment in camps, and random acts of terror. The rebel resistance is scattered, and the gray caps are using human labor to build two strange towers. Against this backdrop, John Finch, who lives alone with a cat and a lizard, must solve an impossible double murder for his gray cap masters while trying to make contact with the rebels. Nothing is as it seems as Finch and his disintegrating partner Wyte negotiate their way through a landscape of spies, rebels, and deception. Trapped by his job and the city, Finch is about to come face to face with a series of mysteries that will change him and Ambergris forever.

To enter, just add your information to the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the giveaway ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday February 25th. No multiple entries please. All multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

**Contest Closed**

Winners! "Unknown" by Rachel Caine and "Flirt" by Laurell K. Hamilton

2010-02-09T22:08:00.000-08:00

I'm way late on announcing the winners for "Unknown"-- for which I apologize. I have family visiting from Virginia and their flight has been delayed for over a week due to the snowstorms blowing through the East Coast! Granted, I could have announced the winners, but this sort of thing makes me even flakier than usual. :0

Anyway, I have selected two people to receive ARC copies of "Unknown" by Rachel Caine and the winner of a copy of "Flirt" by Laurell K. Hamilton.

The winners of "Unknown" are:

Angela MacRae: Scotland

and

Jonathan Shoemaker: Hagerstown, MD

And the winner of "Flirt" is:

Esther Shchory: Israel

Congrats to the winners! I hope everyone enjoys the books.

Giveaway! "Peacekeeper" and "Vigilante" by Laura E. Reeve

2010-02-02T21:21:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have the first two books in the Ariane Kedros series by Laura E. Reeve to offer for giveaway.

Peacekeeper

First in a brand new action-packed military science fiction series. Meet major ariane kedros—daring pilot, decorated soldier, war criminal.
Fifteen years ago, Ariane Kedros piloted a ship on a mission that obliterated an entire solar system. Branded a war criminal, she was given a new identity and a new life in order to protect her from retribution. But now, twelve of Ariane’s wartime colleagues are dead— assassinated by someone who has uncovered their true identities. And her superiors in the Autonomist army have placed her directly in the assassin’s line of fire on a peacekeeping mission that will decide the fate of all humanity…

Vigilante

Amidst an uneasy peace between the Autonomists and the Terrans, Major Ariane Kedros and her partner, Matthew Journey, have discovered alien ruins on a remote planet-ruins that bear evidence to an ancient and highly advanced technology. But their discovery has drawn the interest of high stakes players from every corner of the universe-including that of the rogue leader of a fringe Terran sect. Ari must find a way to stop him, before they all become ancient history...

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all information is guaranteed confidential, will not be used for any other purpose other than this contest and will be discarded once contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Wednesday February 17th. No multiple entries please--all multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck.

**Contest Closed**

Winners! & New Giveaway (New Anita Blake!)

2010-01-20T23:30:00.000-08:00

First order of business! I have randomly selected the winners of two of the contests I had running on my giveaway page.

The first contest was for a copy of "The Good, The Bad and The Uncanny" by Simon R. Green and the winner is:

Steve Steinbach: Lizella, GA

and the second contest was for 5 copies of "Veracity" by Laura Bynum and the winners are:

Jesse Conrad: Alexandria, Va

Amanda Makepeace: Watkinsville, GA

Debbie Lester: Morehead, Ky

Crystal Broyles: Williamsburg, KY

and

Cliff Jones: El Paso, TX

Congrats everyone!

In addition to announcing the contest winners, I also have a copy, courtesy of Penguin Books of Flirt, the new Anita Blake novel by Laurell K. Hamilton to offer for giveaway.

When Anita Blake meets with prospective client Tony Bennington, who is desperate to have her reanimate his recently deceased wife, she is full of sympathy for his loss. Anita knows something about love, and she knows everything there is to know about loss. But what she also knows, though Tony Bennington seems unwilling to be convinced, is that the thing she can do as a necromancer isn't the miracle he thinks he needs. The creature that Anita could coerce to step out of the late Mrs. Bennington's grave would not be the lovely Mrs. Bennington. Not really. And not for long.

To enter, just add your information to the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest is over) and I will randomly pick a winner by Thursday February 4th. Multiple entries will be discarded. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

ARC Giveaway--"Unknown: Outcast Season Book Two" by Rachel Caine

2010-01-14T23:52:00.000-08:00

Somehow I have found myself in possession of two ARC copies of Unknown by Rachel Caine that I am going to offer for giveaway. For those unfamiliar with ARCs (advanced reading copies), they are the uncorrected proofs sent out to reviewers prior to a book's publication date. They are generally paperback copies without the cover art (my copies do not have the pretty picture shown here). But they're also free...

Second in the new series from the New York Times bestselling author

Living among mortals, the djinn Cassiel has developed a reluctant affection for them-especially for Warden Luis Rocha. As the mystery deepens around the kidnapping of innocent Warden children, Cassiel and Luis are the only ones who can investigate both the human and djinn realms. But the trail will lead them to a traitor who may be more powerful than they can handle...

To enter, just add your information to the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will not be used for any purpose other than this contest. I will also discard all entries once the contest has ended) and I will randomly pick TWO winners by Friday January 29th. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Veracity" by Laura Bynum (5 Copies!)

2010-01-07T09:19:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Simon & Schuster Books I have 5 COPIES of Veracity by Laura Bynum to offer for giveaway (U.S. entries only).

Harper Adams was six years old in 2012 when an act of viral terrorism wiped out one-half of the country's population. Out of the ashes rose a new government, the Confederation of the Willing, dedicated to maintaining order at any cost. The populace is controlled via government-sanctioned sex and drugs, a brutal police force known as the Blue Coats, and a device called the slate, a mandatory implant that monitors every word a person speaks. To utter a Red-Listed, forbidden word is to risk physical punishment or even death.

But there are those who resist. Guided by the fabled "Book of Noah," they are determined to shake the people from their apathy and ignorance, and are prepared to start a war in the name of freedom. The newest member of this resistance is Harper -- a woman driven by memories of a daughter lost, a daughter whose very name was erased by the Red List. And she possesses a power that could make her the underground warriors' ultimate weapon -- or the instrument of their destruction.

In the tradition of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, Laura Bynum has written an astonishing debut novel about a chilling, all-too-plausible future in which speech is a weapon and security comes at the highest price of all.

Sounds good doesn't it?

To enter, just add your information to the form below (all information is confidential and will not be used for any purpose other than this contest. All entries will be discarded once contest is over) and I will randomly pick 5 winners by Thursday January 21st. No multiple entries please. Open in the United States only).

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Contest Winners & Giveaway of Simon R. Green's Newest "Nightside" Book

2010-01-03T22:38:00.001-08:00

The holidays are over and I no longer have any excuses for not getting my contests wrapped up on time. So, to get things back on track, I have the winners of the short story contest I had up featuring Spells of the City and Changing the World, but I'm also putting up the newest Nightside book by Simon R. Green up for giveaway. How's that for a welcome back?

First things first. The winner of the "Spells of the City" & "Changing the World" contest is:

Sullivan McPig, the Netherlands

Congrats Sullivan!

And my first giveaway of the new year, sponsored by Penguin Books is:

The Good, The Bad and the Uncanny by Simon R. Green

Things were going so well for P.I. John Taylor, that it was only a matter of time before everything hit the fan. Walker, the powerful, ever-present, never to-be-trusted agent who runs the Nightside on behalf of The Authorities, is dying. And he wants John to be his successor-a job that comes with more baggage, and more enemies, than anyone can possibly imagine.

Just add your information to the form below to enter (all info is guaranteed confidential, will not be used for anything other than this contest, and will be discarded once contest is over) and I will randomly pick a winner by Monday January 18th. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

**Contest Closed**

Winners! "View From the Bridge" and "Incarceron"

2009-12-21T23:03:00.001-08:00

I am sooo sorry I am sooo late on picking a winner for "View From the Bridge." I am busier, and therefore flakier, than usual. But I've got a winner! And I've also selected the winner of the "Incarceron" giveaway as well.

The winner of a copy of The View From the Bridge by Nicholas Meyer is:

Jonnie Hartling, Edmonton, AB: Canada

and the winner of an ARC copy of Incarceron by Catherine Fisher is:

Wanda Bergman, Winnipeg, Manitoba: Canada

Yaaa Canada!

Short Story Giveaway!

2009-12-13T23:47:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Penguin Books I have the following short story collections to offer to one lucky winner.

Spells of the City Edited by Jean Rabe and Martin H. Greenberg
Venture into Spells of the City, where a troll may be your toll collector on the George Washington Bridge...Harry the Book will be happy to place your best in a spellbinding alternative New York...a gargoyle finds himself left to a lonely rooftop existence when he's forced to live by his creator's rules...and leprechauns must become bank robbers to keep up with the demand for their gold.

Changing the World by Mercedes Lackey
In March 1987, a young author from Oklahoma published her first novel, Arrows of the Queen. This modest book about a magical land called Vademar was the beginning of a fantasy masterpiece that would span decades and include more than two dozen titles. Now sixteen of today's hottest fantasy authors-including Tanya Huff, Mickey Zucker Reichert, Fiona Patton, and Judith Tarr-visit the world of Valdemar, adding their own special touches.

To enter, just add your information into the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will not be used for any purpose other than this contest. All entries will be discarded once a winner has been selected) and I will randomly pick a winner by Monday December 28th. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Incarceron" by Catherine Fisher

2009-12-08T08:24:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have an extra ARC copy of Incarceron by Catherine Fisher to offer for giveaway.

Product Description
A thrilling, high-concept fantasy for fans of Garth Nix and Nancy Farmer.

Incarceron is a prison so vast that it contains not only cells, but also metal forests, dilapidated cities, and vast wilderness. Finn, a seventeen-year-old prisoner, has no memory of his childhood and is sure that he came from Outside Incarceron. Very few prisoners believe that there is an Outside, however, which makes escape seems impossible.

And then Finn finds a crystal key that allows him to communicate with a girl named Claudia. She claims to live Outside- she is the daughter of the Warden of Incarceron, and doomed to an arranged marriage. Finn is determined to escape the prison, and Claudia believes she can help him. But they don't realize that there is more to Incarceron than meets the eye. Escape will take their greatest courage and cost more than they know.

Reviews
'One of this year's most striking fantasy novels' -- Amanda Craig, The Times '... imaginatively drawn and vividly described. ... an exciting adventure story.' -- School Librarian '... stands out above all others ... It's imaginative scale and gobsmacking finale make it one of the best fantasy novels written for a long time.' -- Times, Amanda Craig 'a deliciously dark and scary ride.' -- Nicholas Tucker, The Independent 'one of today's best fantasy writers ... a deliciously dark and scary ride.' -- Independent '... imaginative, rich in texture and vividly realised. Catherine Fisher writes with consummate skill and depth of feeling.' -- The Bookseller 'a smart, complex, engrossing and emotionally involving read.' -- Bookshelves of Doom 'a deep and sophisticated adventure story' -- Write Away '... a riveting book that keeps you turning pages. There are plenty of plot twists, mysteries, excitement, and secrets to hold your attention from the beginning to the very end. Even things that seem obvious may not be as they seem; there's enough ambiguity to keep you guessing.' -- Wands and Worlds PRAISE FOR THE ORACLE SEQUENCE:'... a rich, resonant conclusion to the series.' -- Booklist - May 06 'Vivid, complicated, and thoroughly engrossing, this fast paced adventure keeps readers avidly turning pages until the majestic conclusion.' -- Horn Book Review May/June 06 '... an intoxicating world reminiscent of the Arabian Nights. Highly recommended.' -- The Bookseller 'suspense is constantly built ... rattles along at a dizzying pace ... next volume please.' -- School Librarian 'A crisp, quick-moving narrative and fully fleshed out characters will keep readers hooked' -- Publisher's Weekly 'A powerful and very exciting adventure story.' -- School Library Journal '... one of the most skilled and original writers currently working in young adult fantasy' -- New Welsh Review 'Beautifully imagined and realised, this novel of future regression is rich with strong characters, big issues and a compelling plot. It is a barnstorming piece of serious fantasy that doesn't put a foot wrong.' -- The Bookbag 'Catherine Fisher is an artist with words ... An engrossing, intricate story of an extraordinary journey undertaken by richly imaginative characters' -- Carousel '... wholly engaging and rushes along as a breathless and nail-biting pace ... a gripping read that should enthral both young and old fans' -- Buzz

Just add your information in the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded immediately following contest) to enter and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday December 22nd. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

**Contest Closed**

Winner! "Dr. Who" & "Torchwood" Giveaway

2009-12-07T21:50:00.001-08:00

I have randomly picked a winner for my giveaway featuring DVD copies of "Dr. Who" and "Torchwood," as well as a Union Jack ornament. And the winner is:

Beth Melito: San Amboy, NJ

Congrats Beth!!

Giveaway! "The View From the Bridge" by Nicholas Meyer

2009-11-29T23:21:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Penguin Books I have a copy of the Star Trek memoir The View From the Bridge by Nicholas Meyer to offer for giveaway.

Product Description
The critically acclaimed director and writer shares his account of the making of the three classic Star Trek films.

The View from the Bridge is Nicholas Meyer's enormously entertaining account of his involvement with the Star Trek films: STII: The Wrath of Khan, STIV: The Voyage Home, and STVI: The Undiscovered Country, as well as his illustrious career in the movie business. The man best known for bringing together Sherlock Holmes and Sigmund Freud in The Seven Per-Cent Solution had ironically never been interested in Star Trek until he was brought on board to save the film series.

Meyer shares how he created the script for The Wrath of Khan, the most revered Star Trek film of all, in twelve days-only to have William Shatner proclaim he hated it. He reveals the death threats he received when word got out that Spock would be killed, and finally answers the long-pondered question of whether Khan's chiseled chest is truly that of Ricardo Montalban. Meyer's reminiscences on everyone from Gene Roddenberry to Laurence Olivier will appeal not only to the countless legions of Trekkies, but to anyone fascinated by the inner workings of Hollywood.

For a chance to win, simply enter your information in the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Monday December 14th. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners! "Mirrorscape" & "Sappire Sirens"

2009-11-25T00:06:00.001-08:00

I'm going to be busy over the next couple of days. (Yaaa! Thanksgiving!) So I may be delayed until Friday in getting these shipped off, but I have the winners of two of my current contests.

The winner of an ARC of Mirrorscape by Mike Wilks is..

Stacey Dempsey (Canada)

and

The winner of a copy of Sapphire Sirens by John Zakour is..

Sandro Pergameno (Italy)

Congrats to both winners!

I am in the process of picking the winners of the "Dark Void" contest I had up as well, I'm just confirming registration at the Dark Void site and when I have that I'll announce the winners.

"Dr. Who" & "Torchwood" Giveaway!

2009-11-23T18:00:00.000-08:00

BBC America has a great holiday sweepstakes going on right now and they've given me two DVDs and a Christmas ornament for giveaway to get you revved up for the really big prizes offered on their site. If you haven't been to the BBC America Shop, now's the time to check it out since the grand prize winner of the contest will win $500 to spend at the shop AND another $500 to give to a friend or relative -- just in time for Christmas.

~From the BBC America Contest

“Sci Fi Fans!!!! Enter for a chance to win a $1,000 shopping spree in the BBC America Shop.com Holiday Sweepstakes. Find the biggest hits in BBC film and TV on DVD (including Sci Fi shows like Dr. Who and Torchwood) for friends and family, apparel and books on tape for the special man in your life; and jewelry and holiday decorations from the UK for her.

To sweeten the deal, enjoy free shipping on all orders over $100, enter today at BBC America Shop

To give you a taste of some of the great stuff you could get your hands on, BBC America has given me a copy of Dr. Who: The Next Doctor, Torchwood: Children of Earth and a Union Jack Christmas ornament to giveaway to one lucky winner.

To enter MY contest, simply enter your information into the form below and I will randomly select a winner by Tuesday December 8th. (All information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded when the contest has ended) Please no multiple entries. Open everywhere.

To enter to win up to $1000 in prizes from the BBC America Shop, click on any of the BBC America links above to see the contest rules and entry forms. There's a lot more than just DVDs over there, so be sure to head on over and check it out for a great opportunity to win some stuff for yourself and give a great gift to a friend or relative.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winner! "ArchEnemy" by Frank Bedor

2009-11-16T22:49:00.001-08:00

Where does the time go? I am so late on finishing this contest. But I gotta get around to it sometimes, right? Luckily, I'm much more punctual when it comes to shipping off the prizes.

I have randomly selected a winner to receive a copy of "ArchEnemy" by Frank Bedor and the winner is...

Hailey Miller of East Stroudsburg, Pa

Congrats Hailey!

Contest Glitch--- Dark Void & Mirrorscape

2009-11-10T09:19:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure what happened, but the forms I used for my Dark Void and Mirrorscape contests had stopped working and they were deleted from the site I get my forms from. I think I may have logged in incorrectly somehow -- so the error is mine.

What that means is that I need anyone who had entered the contests to re-enter their information into the forms I have reposted on the contest posts. I have to go on the honor system regarding the Dark Void contest, so if you had answered the question on the page for an extra entry, please just put a +3 in the entry form so I know to add extra entries for you.

I'm so sorry for any inconvenience. I will not throw out any multiple entries for these contests (as longs as we're not talking many, many entries). I just want to make sure that everyone who entered has a chance to win their prizes.

Giveaway! "The Sapphire Sirens" by John Zakour

2009-11-09T23:07:00.000-08:00

Let's hear it for some of the best covers in sci-fi fiction!

Thanks to Penguin Books I have the latest in the Zach Johnson sci-fi/noir detective series by John Zakour up for grabs.

The Sapphire Sirens

Zach Johnson, the world's last freelance detective, has been man-napped by the beautiful sapphire-haired Amazon Kiana. She's brought him to her home island of Lantis-where the women dominate men with their words-to discover who killed her mother, the Queen. But to save the day this time, Zach and his holographic A.I. sidekick HARV have to tangle with not just one gorgeous superwoman, but four. Each of Kiana's three sisters could have the motive and the means to pull off the crime-and now that you mention it, Kiana could too...

To enter, just add your information into the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded once the contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday November 24th. No multiple entries. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Dark Void Giveaway! (( Gamer Alert ))

2009-11-06T12:21:00.001-08:00

On January 12th, 2010, Capcom will be releasing Dark Void, its highly anticipated sci-fi action adventure game, and to electrify even more excitement, the developer has launched the new and improved Dark Void Community site Dark Void

I'm not a gamer-- as I've mentioned before. But I know a lot of fantasy/scifi lovers who like their games, so when the Dark Void community got in touch with me, asking if I would do a giveaway to help promote their new game, I thought it would be a great opportunity to offer something for all the video game fans out there. So, in the interest in being able to offer some cool prizes to all of you, I thought a little promotion for Dark Void was a small favor to ask.

At the Dark Void community site subscribers will have the opportunity to:

Complete missions to earn points for prizes including Capcom game packs, limited edition Will figurines and exclusive Dark Void swag you can’t get anywhere else

Recruit friends for a chance to win an Xbox 360 console

Provide direct feedback regarding swag, exclusive content, developer interaction, prizing, and more

To encourage you to register for the Dark Void Community, I have been allowed to offer three lucky winners (contest limited to the UNITED STATES only) their choice of a Capcom game or a limited edition Will figurine (pictured here).

The games up for grabs are:

PS3 - Resident Evil 5 and Street Fighter IV
Xbox 360 - Resident Evil 5, Street Fighter IV and Bionic Commando

To enter for a chance to win one of the games listed here or a limited edition Will figurine, you'll have to do two things. First, go the Dark Void Community and register to be a member. Then, return here and enter the email you used to register into the form below so that I can forward the emails of the winners to the sponsors of the contest, who will confirm the entrant registration before mailing off the prizes.

For an extra opportunity to win, enter the site, look around and answer the following questions in your entry (in the address form) and each correct answer will garner you one extra entry per question- for 3 extra chances to win.

1. Dark Void developer Airtight Games is best known for which high flying Xbox simulator?

2. Which of the following inventions was NOT patented by Nikola Tesla?

3. Which of the following is an example of the "Tesla Effect"?

I will randomly pick three winners by Saturday November 21st. Remember, this is open in the U.S. only. No multiple entries please.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! ARC of "Mirrorscape" by Mike Wilks

2009-11-05T22:24:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Egmont USA I have an ARC (advance reading copy) of Mirrorscape by Mike Wilks.

Prepare to enter the Mirrorscape–a world where the bizarre is commonplace and logic makes no sense.

Melkin Womper is thrilled to escape his dull future as a village weaver and develop his artistic talent when he’s apprenticed to Ambrosius Blenk, one of Vlam’s most famous masters. Mel is especially excited by the colors that he’ll be able to use, since color is a very expensive Pleasure, strictly controlled by the sinister Fifth Mystery.

Mel can’t wait to enjoy the wonders of the grand city and begin his important work for Blenk. Instead, his dreams are quickly crushed by the reality of days filled with unimportant tasks and bullying by the other apprentices whose wealthy families have purchased their positions. Still, the promise of working under the great Blenk and studying his legendary paintings makes the misery bearable.

But when Mel and his new friends, Ludo and Wren, inadvertently stumble into a battle between the Fifth Mystery and the Rainbow Rebellion, an underground band fighting to make Pleasures affordable for all, the trio must step through Blenk’s paintings into the Mirrorscape. In this alternative world, the friends encounter monsters, mazes, talking houses, angels, and more.

Hugely original and deeply compelling, Mirrorscape is a thrilling adventure filled with the beautiful and the bizarre, the fantastical and the frightening, and entry into an incredibly visual, secret world, where the ultimate weapons are pigment, a paintbrush, and the power of imagination.

If this sounds good to you, just enter your information in the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded when the contest is over) and I will randomly pick a winner by Friday November 20th. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winner! "Red Claw" by Philip Palmer

2009-11-05T22:14:00.001-08:00

I have randomly selected the winner of my "Red Claw" (by Philip Palmer) giveaway and the winner is--

Lindsay Frost, Portland OR

Congrats Lindsay!

I hope you enjoy the book.

Winners! Book Giveaway Contests

2009-11-01T18:08:00.000-08:00

I have a few contests that finished up this last week and I need to announce the winners.

"Bite Marks" by Jennifer Rardin -- Contest winner

Catarina Santos, Portugal

Short Story Collection (#7) -- Contest winner

Karen Witkowski, Pompano Beach, Fl

and

Traitor's Gate by Kate Elliott-- Contest winner

Cameron Wagner, Baraboo, WI

Congrats everyone. Hope you enjoy your books!

The "I'm Not Feeling Well" Giveaway

2009-10-25T21:37:00.001-07:00

Ugh. I feel like one big body ache. I want to put up some reviews or write about something entertaining, but I feel icky. You know how it is. So to buy myself some time to sleep, I'm going to put up a book that I've been meaning to give away.

Arch Enemy by Frank Beddor
Discover the fate of Wonderland- and imagination itself- in this riveting conclusion to the New York Times bestselling trilogy. The Heart Crystal’s power has been depleted, and Imagination along with it. The people of Wonderland have all lost their creative drive, and most alarmingly, even Queen Alyss is without her powers. There is some comfort in the fact that the vicious Redd Heart seems to be similarly disabled. Amazingly, she is attempting to team up with her enemy, Alyss, in order to reclaim Wonderland from King Arch. Alyss might have no choice but to accept Redd’s overtures, especially when she begins to receive alarming advice from the caterpillar oracles.

You know the drill. I have one copy of "Arch Enemy" by Frank Bedor to giveaway, and if you'd like to win, then just enter your information into the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded immediately after the contest is over) and I will randomly pick a winner by Monday November 9th. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners! "Fantasy Firsts" Giveaway

2009-10-23T08:07:00.001-07:00

Oh my goodness! Blogger is finally working again. I tried to put up a post yesterday and kept getting an error message. I hope everyone else had some better luck.

Let me get this Friday started by announcing the winners of the "Fantasy Firsts" contest featuring Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson-- with each of three winners receiving a copy of The Eye of the World and Mistborn.

And the winners are--

Linda George (Napa, Ca),

Manchu Ravi (Ontario, Canada)

and

Jake Lsewhere (Chittenango, NY)

Congrats!

Hope you enjoy your books.

Giveaway! "Red Claw" by Philip Palmer

2009-10-19T09:28:00.000-07:00

I have some more books I need to get up for giveaway, so let's get this week started with a new book, courtesy of Orbit Books.

Red Claw by Philip Palmer. Philip Palmer turns science fiction on its head in this breathtaking thrill ride through alien jungles filled with terrifying monsters and killer robots. Space marines and science heroes! Gryphons and Godzillas! It's all here in this gripping tale of man versus nature.

If this sounds good to you, just enter your information in the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded after the contest is over) and I will randomly pick a winner by Monday November 2nd. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Traitor's Gate" by Kate Elliott

2009-10-17T15:35:00.000-07:00

I am starting to get quite the collection of duplicates (ARC's and final copies) of various books and it's time to weed out my collection by sharing some books.

Thanks to Tor Books I have one copy "Traitor's Gate" by Kate Elliott to give away to one lucky winner.

Traitor's Gate by Kate Elliott
In Spirit Gate and Shadow Gate, Kate Elliott took readers to the fascinating world of the Hundred, a land teeming with an array of cultures, gods, and conflicts blighted by the shadow of chaos and destruction. Now, with the same intensity and dramatic sweep that has brought this epic to life, Elliott returns to the exquisitely crafted cities and landscapes of the Hundred, in a thunderous conclusion to the saga. In the darkness of war and destruction, forces gather to reclaim the peace: Those immortal Guardians who still serve justice seek a means to end the devastating reign of one of their own; a hired outlander army struggles to halt the advance of the horde that has despoiled vast lands and slaughtered countless people in its murderous wake, while still guarding against a burgeoning threat from an aggressively expansionist empire; and the eagle reeves who have long been the only law enforcers of the Hundred struggle to reorganize after a devastating massacre has decimated their numbers. But even as these forces give hope to those who would live in peace, a terrible danger looms: a traitor with Imperial ambitions, the most dreaded, least anticipated threat of all…

For a chance to win just enter your information into the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded after the contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Saturday October 31st. Multiple entries will be disqualified. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! Short Story Collection (#7)

2009-10-15T22:39:00.000-07:00

I'm going to come clean. This contest exists solely so I could feature "Zombie Raccoons and Killer Bunnies."

You look at that cover and tell me you could resist?

Thanks to Penguin Books I have the following collection of short stories to giveaway to one lucky winner (you know you want to read about killer bunnies...) To enter, just leave your information in the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will be discarded after the contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Friday October 30th. No multiple entries please. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

Zombie Raccoons and Killer Bunnies Edited by Martin H. Greenberg and Kerrie Hughes
From a farmer at war with Nature's creatures, to dangerous doings when the henhouse goes on-line, to the hazards of keeping company with a book wyrm, here are ingenious tales that will make readers laugh or cry-or double-check to make sure that their windows and doors are firmly locked against the things that prowl the night.

Intelligent Design by Denise Little (Editor)
These ten original stories explore one of the most heatedly debated topics today. From a tale that examines whether life on Earth is an out-of-control science project, to one which reveals which species will inherit the planet, to a portrait of a scientist determined to discover the truth about God, the stories in this anthology tackle the big questions in ways that range from startling to satirical—and are always entertaining.

The Trouble With Heroes Edited by Denise Little
These 22 all-new tales pay tribute to the true heroes-the people who enable and put up with heroes. From what it's like to be Hercules' wife (complete with an appearance by Hercules in drag) to the trials of H.P. Lovecraft's housekeeper, from the perils of being King Kong's girlfriend to the downside of dating a shapeshifter, this anthology turns heroism on its head, revealing the behind-the-scenes drama, as opposed to glorious rescues. From the Pied Piper's power trip to David acting like a giant you-know-what after slaying Goliath, these stories show heroes in all their ignominy and shine a light on the unsung faithful standing in their shadows.

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Bite Marks" by Jennifer Rardin

2009-10-13T08:27:00.001-07:00

Courtesy of Orbit Books I have one copy of Bite Marks (Jaz Parks) by Jennifer Rardin to offer for giveaway.

Jaz is possessed. After biting the neck of a domyter during a forced visit to his territory, she now has unwelcome voices in her head. While fighting for supremacy in her own mind, she finds herself confronted with a near-impossible task: perform perfectly on her next mission or face the unemployment line. This goal wouldn’t be unreasonable, except that her newest target, the leader of a security software firm, plans on transporting a boatload of gnome larvae into NASA’s deep space communication complex. Why gnomes? Let’s just say that their god is a little peeved with humanity and plans on the usual: total annihilation. Joining Jaz and Vayl are their old buddies Cole, Bergman, Cassandra and Jack the malamute, each of whom has his or her own agenda. Between Cassandra’s curse, Jaz’s literally mental personal demons, and a host of angry gnomes, this mission is definitely going to be more complicated than any that have come before

If you're a fan of the Jazz Parks series and would like to get your hands on this, then just enter your information into the form below (all information is guaranteed confidential and will only be used for the purpose of this contest. All entries will be discarded when the contest ends) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday October 27th. Multiple entries will be disqualified. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners! The 'Not Changing the Name' Contest

2009-10-08T22:46:00.000-07:00

I have deliberately let this contest run late (as opposed to just being flaky) so I could update the book selection for the winners.

I have randomly picked two winners to pick TWO titles from the post on my giveaway page.

The first place winner is --

Ricardo Perez, Scott AFB Illinois

and the second place winner is--

Wendy Erwin

Congrats! Check out the giveaway page and let me know what your book selections are (Ricardo gets first pick as the first place winner) and I'll get them right off to you.

Thanks to everyone who entered!

Continuing the "Fantasy Firsts" Contest...

2009-10-04T22:37:00.001-07:00

Not too long ago Tor Books hosted a "Fantasy Firsts" book giveaway featuring authors Brandon Sanderson and Robert Jordan. Due to the popularity of the giveaway, Tor has decided to expand the contest and now I can offer THREE sets of the first books in two great series'.

From the original Tor contest...

Enter for a chance to win a copy of Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson and The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan!

Remember the first time you discovered an amazing new fantasy series? Now give that gift to a friend!

This October 27th, 2009, Tor releases The Gathering Storm by Robert Jordan & Brandon Sanderson, the first of three novels to conclude the legendary Wheel of Time® series. In honor of that occasion, we’re offering the chance to introduce your friends and family to the book that began it all: The Eye of the World.

With that, you will also receive Mistborn, the first book in Brandon Sanderson’s wonderful Mistborn trilogy, for your own enjoyment. Keep Mistborn and give The Eye of the World to a friend. And if you’ve read both of them already, give them both to a well-deserving loved one!

If you'd like a chance to win one set of these two books, then enter your information into the form below (all information is guaranteed to remain confidential and not used for any purpose other than this contest. Entries will be discarded after contest ends) and I will randomly pick 3 winners on Monday October 19th. Entries will be limited to the U.S., Canada and the U.K. Multiple entries will be disqualified (I allowed multiple entries the last few times, and it has gotten out of control!)

And, as an added bit of background about how Brandon Sanderson came to be chosen to finish Robert Jordan's series, here's an interview with Robert's widow, Harriet McDougal, and Brandon Sanderson.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners!

2009-09-30T22:44:00.000-07:00

Okay... Got some contest winners to announce here.

I have randomly picked the winners of the following contests.

One copy of Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire-- and the winner is:

Rebecca Bradeen, Dorchester MA

One copy of The Bell at Sealey Head by Patricia McKillip-- and the winner is:

Lesley Cheah, Singapore

One Copy of Ice Land by Betsy Tobin-- and the winner is:

David Dempsey, Centennial, CO

Thanks to everyone who entered!

I will be updating my Not Changing the Name contest to include some new books that have just arrived, so be sure to get your entry into that one before Saturday.

The "I'm Not Changing My Blog Name" Contest..."

2009-09-19T00:49:00.000-07:00

For those of you who follow my main blog, you'll know that I toyed with changing the "Fantasy & SciFi Lovin'" name. But something happened to convince me to keep the original name-- an excerpt from a review I wrote was included in a new book! Now I'm afraid to change the name! But I like to keep my word when offering books for giveaway, so I'm putting the original list back up and and picking two winners. First place gets first pick of two books from the following list and second place gets to choose two books from the remaining choices.

Simply fill out the form to enter (all entries will be immediately discarded following the contest and all information will remain confidential) and I will randomly pick 2 winners by Saturday October 4th. Don't worry about picking your books now-- I'll have the winners pick after the contest ends! (I'm going to add to the list...) Open everywhere, multiple entries okay.

Good luck!

City of Fire by Lawrence Yep
Sure to appeal to fans of Rick Riordan and Eoin Colfer, this action-packed tale takes readers on an unforgettable journey through an alternate version of our world in 1941—a world filled with magical beings such as dragons in human form, tiny “lap griffins,” reincarnations of legendary Chinese warriors, Japanese folk creatures, and goddesses in disguise. When her older sister dies trying to prevent the theft of one of her people’s great treasures, twelve-year-old Scirye sets out to avenge her and recover the precious item. Helping her are Bayang, a dragon disguised as a Pinkerton agent; Leech, a boy with powers he has not yet discovered; and Leech’s loyal companion Koko, who has a secret of his own. All have a grudge against the thieves who stole the treasure: the evil dragon Badik and the mysterious Mr. Roland. Scirye and her companions pursue the thieves to Houlani, a new Hawaiian island being created by magic. There, they befriend Pele, the volatile and mercurial goddess of volcanoes. But even with Pele on their side, they may not be able to stop Mr. Roland from gaining what he seeks: the Five Lost Treasures of Emperor Yu. Together, the treasures will give him the power to alter the very fabric of the universe.

Red Claw by Philip Palmer
Philip Palmer turns science fiction on its head in this breathtaking thrill ride through alien jungles filled with terrifying monsters and killer robots. Space marines and science heroes! Gryphons and Godzillas! It's all here in this gripping tale of man versus nature.

Archenemy by Frank Beddor
Discover the fate of Wonderland- and imagination itself- in this riveting conclusion to the New York Times bestselling trilogy. The Heart Crystal’s power has been depleted, and Imagination along with it. The people of Wonderland have all lost their creative drive, and most alarmingly, even Queen Alyss is without her powers. There is some comfort in the fact that the vicious Redd Heart seems to be similarly disabled. Amazingly, she is attempting to team up with her enemy, Alyss, in order to reclaim Wonderland from King Arch. Alyss might have no choice but to accept Redd’s overtures, especially when she begins to receive alarming advice from the caterpillar oracles.

Xombies by Walter Greatshell
When the Agent X plague struck, it infected women first, turning them into mindless killers intent only on creating an army of "Xombies" by spreading their disease. Running for her life, seventeen-year-old Lulu is rescued by the father she has never known and taken aboard a refitted nuclear submarine that has one mission: to save a little bit of humanity.

The Faceless Ones by Derek Landy
Valkyrie screamed, sprinting toward Skulduggery.
He looked up and reached out to her, but it was too late.
If you've read the other Skulduggery books by Derek Landy (and you really should have read them by now), you've seen it all before: Some bad guy wants to bring about the end of the world, and Skulduggery and Valkyrie fight valiantly to stop it from happening. A few people get hurt, sure, but everything's all right in the end.
Well, not this time.

At Empire's Edge by William C. Dietz
In a far-distant future, the Uman Empire has spread to the stars and beyond, conquering and colonizing worlds, ruling with a benevolent-but iron-fist. The Pax Umana reigns, and all is well. But on one planet, the remnants of a violent, shape-shifting race called the Sagathis are confined, kept captive by xeno-cops, who have been bio-engineered to be able to see through their guises. Still, sometimes one manages to escape. Zak Cato is a xeno-cop. He's returning a fugitive Sagathi when things go horribly wrong. Cato- the only survivor after the rest of his men are slaughtered-must now figure out who betrayed them and bring the alien in, whatever the cost.

Doubleblind by Ann Aguirre
It’s not easy to tread lightly wearing steel-toed boots. Sirantha Jax isn’t known for diplomatic finesse. As a “Jumper” who navigates ships through grimspace, she’s used to kicking ass first and taking names later—much later. Not exactly the obvious choice to sell the Conglomerate to the Ithtorians, a people whose opinions of humans are as hard as their exoskeletons. And Ithiss-Tor council meetings aren’t the only place where Ambassador Jax needs to maneuver carefully. Her lover, March, is frozen in permanent “kill” mode, and his hair-trigger threatens to sabotage the talks—not to mention their relationship. But Jax won’t give up on the man or the mission. With the Outskirts beleaguered by raiders, pirates, and the flesh-eating Morgut, an alliance with Ithiss-Tor may be humanity’s only hope. Which has Jax wondering why a notorious troublemaker like her was given the job…

Vigilante by Laura E. Reeve
Amidst an uneasy peace between the Autonomists and the Terrans, Major Ariane Kedros and her partner, Matthew Journey, have discovered alien ruins on a remote planet-ruins that bear evidence to an ancient and highly advanced technology. But their discovery has drawn the interest of high stakes players from every corner of the universe-including that of the rogue leader of a fringe Terran sect. Ari must find a way to stop him, before they all become ancient history...

Blood Bargain by Maria Lima
Keira Kelly has settled in with handsome Adam Walker, but happy-ever-after is not so easy when your vampire lover seems determined to deny his true nature. With Adam starving himself of blood and growing weak, Keira needs to work out how to persuade him to take care of himself, something she's fi nding diffi cult to do -- even with the advice of her brother Tucker, a millennium-old ex-Viking shapeshifter. And people have started disappearing in the Rio Seco area, making Keira worry about what this could mean, both for her friends in Rio Seco and to the community she and Adam have been creating at the ranch. But her investigation only seems to bring more trouble, especially when a clue leads her to an abandoned cemetery that Keira knew well when she was younger...one that has always been extremely important to her magical family. Evil is defi nitely walking once again in the Texas Hill Country. Can Keira discover where the danger lies...before danger discovers her?

The Dame by R. A. Salvatore
The vast road network of Honce, completed a decade before, had brought great optimism to the people of the land. Commerce could travel more freely and so could armies, and those armies, it was hoped, would rid the land at long last of the vicious, bloody cap dwarfs and goblins. For the first time, the many individual kingdoms, the holdings of Honce, would be brought closer together, perhaps even united. For the last few years, those promises had become a nightmare to the folk, as two powerful lairds fought for supremacy of a hoped-for united kingdom. Bransen Garibond, the Highwayman, held little real interest in that fight. To him the warring lairds were two sides of the same coin. Whichever side won, the outcome for the people of Honce would be the same, Bransen believed. A journey north, however, taught Bransen that his views were simplistic at best, and that some things--like honor and true friendship-- might truly matter. In The Dame, Bransen’s road becomes a quest for the truth, of Honce and of himself, a quest to put right over wrong. That path is fraught with confusion and fraud, and a purposeful blurring of morality by those who would seek to use the Highwayman’s extraordinary battle skills and popularity among the commonfolk for their own nefarious ends.

Traitor's Gate by Kate Elliott
In Spirit Gate and Shadow Gate, Kate Elliott took readers to the fascinating world of the Hundred, a land teeming with an array of cultures, gods, and conflicts blighted by the shadow of chaos and destruction. Now, with the same intensity and dramatic sweep that has brought this epic to life, Elliott returns to the exquisitely crafted cities and landscapes of the Hundred, in a thunderous conclusion to the saga.
In the darkness of war and destruction, forces gather to reclaim the peace: Those immortal Guardians who still serve justice seek a means to end the devastating reign of one of their own; a hired outlander army struggles to halt the advance of the horde that has despoiled vast lands and slaughtered countless people in its murderous wake, while still guarding against a burgeoning threat from an aggressively expansionist empire; and the eagle reeves who have long been the only law enforcers of the Hundred struggle to reorganize after a devastating massacre has decimated their numbers. But even as these forces give hope to those who would live in peace, a terrible danger looms: a traitor with Imperial ambitions, the most dreaded, least anticipated threat of all…

The United States of Atlantis by Harry Turtledove
As England tightens its control over the Atlantean colonies, Victor Radcliff and his band of revolutionaries resolve to make the English pay for each and every piece of land they dare to occupy and will stop at nothing to preserve the liberty of their people as a new nation is born—a nation that will change the face of the world...

The Empress of Mars by Kage Baker
When the British Arean Company founded its Martian colony, it welcomed any settlers it could get. Outcasts, misfits and dreamers emigrated in droves to undertake the grueling task of terraforming the cold red planet--only to be abandoned when the BAC discovered it couldn't turn a profit on Mars. This is the story of Mary Griffith, a determined woman with three daughters, who opened the only place to buy a beer on the Tharsis Bulge. It's the story of Manco Inca, whose attempt to terraform Mars brought a new goddess vividly to life; of Stanford Crosley, con man extraordinaire; of Ottorino Vespucci, space cowboy and romantic hero; of the Clan Morrigan, of the denizens of the Martian Motel, and of the machinations of another Company entirely, all of whom contribute to the downfall of the BAC and the founding of a new world. But Mary and her struggles and triumphs is at the center of it all, in her bar, the Empress of Mars. Based on the Hugo-nominated novella of the same name, this is a rollicking novel of action, planetary romance, and high adventure.

Fish Out of Water by MaryJanice Davidson
Fred the Mermaid has taken the bait and chosen to date Artur, Prince of the Black Sea, over human marine biologist Thomas. And just in time. The existence of the Undersea Folk is no longer a secret, and someone needs to keep them from floundering in the media spotlight. Fred has all the right skills for that job, but has a hard time when her real father surfaces and tries to overthrow Artur’s regime.

Crystal Healer: A Stardoc Novel by S. L. Viehl
Genetically engineered interstellar surgeon Dr. Cherijo Torin, her husband Duncan Reever, and a handpicked crew journey to the planet oKia to locate a strange black mineral that is the source of an intergalactic epidemic. When one of the crew members becomes infected, his body slowly begins to crystallize. While Cherijo races to save the crew member, mercenaries arrive in the oKia system, wanting Cherijo's genes-and her near immortality. It will take all of her abilities to elude the mercenaries and discover the black crystal's secrets before it's too late.

Strange Angels by Lili St. Crow
Dru Anderson has what her grandmother called “the touch.” (Comes in handy when you’re traveling from town to town with your dad, hunting ghosts, suckers, wulfen, and the occasional zombie.) Then her dad turns up dead—but still walking—and Dru knows she’s next. Even worse, she’s got two guys hungry for her affections, and they’re not about to let the fiercely independent Dru go it alone. Will Dru discover just how special she really is before coming face-to-fang with whatever—or whoever— is hunting her?

Cape Storm by Rachel Caine
Weather Warden Joanne Baldwin and her new husband, the Djinn David, are running from a malevolent hurricane bent on destroying her. Joined by an army of fellow Wardens and Djinn onboard a hijacked luxury liner, Joanne has lured the storm into furious pursuit. But even their combined magic may not be enough to stop it—nor the power-mad ex-Weather Warden controlling it...

Demon Inside by Stacia Kane
Hanging out with demons can be hell....It's been three months since psychologist Megan Chase made the stunning discovery that the world is filled with demons, and once more the situation is too hot to handle. Ironically, Megan -- the only person in the world without a little personal demon sitting on her shoulder -- has become the leader of a demon "family," but now some unknown arcane power is offing her demons in a particularly unpleasant fashion. And while her demon lover Greyson Dante is still driving her wild with desire, he's also acting strangely evasive. Then there's the truth about Megan's past -- the truth she's never known. Caught between personal problems and personal demons, Megan is having one hell of a hard time. Will the help of her Cockney guard demons and her witch friend Tera be enough so that Megan can finally resolve the past, survive the present, and face the future?

Brimstone Kiss by Carole Nelson Douglas
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Filled with kisses and kick-ass action, the second installment of this campy series (after 2007's Dances with Werewolves) finds paranormal investigator Delilah Street taking on her first case in an alternate 2010 Las Vegas. When Delilah and her boyfriend, ex-FBI agent Ric Montoya, find the bodies of two teens killed in Sunset Park in 1946, the girl's ghost appears and claims the killer was her father, werewolf mobster Cesar Cicereau. Vampire mogul Howard Hughes hires Delilah to learn the identity of the girl's vampire companion, and she also comes under pressure from albino vampire rocker Snow; television producer Hector Nightwine; and the Invisible Man, a zombie merged with Claude Rains's black-and-white film character. Douglas's dishy style compliments the twisty plot, and she helpfully includes references for the numerous nods to the silver screen, Egyptology and cocktails.

Matters of the Blood
If you thought your family was strange...Try being Keira Kelly. A member of a powerful paranormal family, Keira elected to stay among humans in the Texas Hill Country when the rest of the clan moved (lock, stock, and grimoire) to Canada. But family duty means still having to keep an eye on cousin Marty — a genetic aberration who turned out 100% human, poor guy. And recently Keira's been having violent dreams — or are they visions? — featuring Marty as the victim of a vicious murder. Something sinister seems to be brewing in little Rio Seco. Can Keira get to the bottom of it all while avoiding entanglement with her former lover, Sheriff Carlton Larson? And what does she plan to do about the irresistible and enigmatic Adam Walker? When this old friend shows up as the new owner of a local ranc and wants to get better acquainted, Keira is more than happy to be welcoming...until she suspects that Adam could be intimately connected to the dangerous doings in Rio Seco.

The Stars Blue Yonder by Sandra McDonald
Chief Terry Myell died and became a god. Now he’s back to life, careening around space and time at the behest of a voice that told him to save all of mankind. Helping and hindering this quest are his elderly wife, his young wife, grandchildren who haven’t been born yet, romantic rivals he hasn’t even met, a descendant from two thousand years in the future, and an alien nemesis who calls itself the Flying Doctor. Life in the military has never been so complicated. Commander Jodenny Scott would agree. She’s seven months pregnant and trying to come to peace with her husband’s death. When Myell reappears with tales of time travel, she’s not sure what to believe. But with an invading army bearing down on Earth’s last fleet of spaceships, there’s not much time for debate. When the dust clears Jodenny is stranded in an Australia she never imagined, and Myell’s more desperate than ever to rescue her—from aliens, from treachery, and from history itself.

Intelligent Design by Denise Little (Editor)
These ten original stories explore one of the most heatedly debated topics today. From a tale that examines whether life on Earth is an out-of-control science project, to one which reveals which species will inherit the planet, to a portrait of a scientist determined to discover the truth about God, the stories in this anthology tackle the big questions in ways that range from startling to satirical—and are always entertaining.

The Sword of the Lady by S.M. Stirling
The New York Times bestselling author continues his "epic of survival and rebirth" (Library Journal), chronicling a modern world without technology. Rudi Mackenzie has journeyed far across the land that was once the United States of America, hoping to find the source of the world-altering event that has come to be known as The Change. His final destination is Nantucket, an island overrun with forest, inhabited by a mere two hundred people who claim to have been transported there from out of time. Only one odd stone house remains standing. Within it, Rudi finds a beautifully made sword waiting for him-and once he takes it up, nothing will ever be the same...

Land of the Dead by Thomas Harlan
It’s a small change in our history: imagine that the Japanese made contact with the Aztec Empire. Instead of small-pox and Christianity, they brought an Imperial alliance, samurai ethics, and technology. By the time of these books, the Emperor in Mexico City rules not just the entire planet Earth, but a growing interplanetary Empire. But the Galaxy is not a hospitable place, and there are other powers, both new and very very old, who would stop the spread of the power in Anuhuac. A weapon of the Old Ones, from the time of the First Sun, has been found in a region of space. It must be investigated, then tamed or destroyed to keep it from the hands of opposing powers. Gretchen Anderssen, freelance archeologist and specialist in First Sun artifacts, has been hired by her old mentor Green Hummingbird, agent of the Mirror Service, to join him in the study. They will be joined by old friends, and some old enemies as well.

The Storm Witch: A Novel of Dhulyn and Parno by Violette Malan
The new fantasy adventure featuring Dhulyn and Parno. Mercenary Partners Dhulyn Wolfshead and Parno Lionsmane have returned to their Mercenary House to clear themselves of accusations of kidnapping and murder. But before they can resolve these charges, old friends are taken hostage by the Long Ocean Nomads, and they are forced to come to the rescue. And as they set sail, Dhulyn is convinced they are journeying to Parno's death, which she has foreseen in numerous visions of a drowning at sea.

Flight of the Renshai by Mickey Zucker Reichert
Prejudice against the Renshai is growing rapidly, fueled by their old enemies in the Northlands, who have convinced a faction in Erythane that the Renshai lands were stolen from them, forcing the King to banish the Renshai from the Westlands. Shunned by Westerners and hunted by Northmen, the Renshai will face many trials before rallying together against a common enemy determined to destroy them once and for all.

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Ice Land" by Betsy Tobin

2009-09-15T23:49:00.000-07:00

Here's the next of this week's giveaways...

I have one copy, courtesy of Penguin Books, of Ice Land by Betsy Tobin to offer for giveaway.

From Publishers Weekly
Tobin's second novel (after Bone House) is set in Iceland, A.D. 1000, just as Christianity is taking a foothold and the volcano Hekla is growing restive. In this slick re-imagining of Norse myth, humans, dwarves, giants and gods differ superficially but suffer life's trials equally and are susceptible to love, loss, violence and even the weather. The central character, Freya, is an Aesir (a god), who is essentially human but for her ability to fly and her address: she notes that her kind occupy the space that men create for something larger than themselves. (In Freya's case, she occupies the tainted realm of love.) Among numerous subplots, Freya's story follows her quest for a powerful gold necklace, the Brisingamen, accompanied by a love-torn human teenager named Fulla. Tobin's rich understanding of the source material, backed up by deft historical touches—beds made of moss and skins, turf-roofed houses, earthenware cups—brings the narrative to life. Though women take center stage, Tobin sketches the thoughts of both male and female characters with skill. With an introspective dwarf, the god Odin and a fearsome band of giants, Tobin has this one aimed squarely at the Mists of Avalon audience, and she hits big.

Just enter your information in the form below to enter and I will randomly pick a winner by Wednesday September 30th. (All information entered will be discarded immediately following the contest and will not be distributed or used for any purpose other than this giveaway). The rules-- no rules. Enter as often as you like. Open everywhere.

Good luck.

**contest closed**

Discombobulated...

2009-09-13T23:44:00.000-07:00

You ever have those times when you feel like you're going 20 different directions but getting nothing done? That's where I'm at. I hate to neglect the blog, but I know we all have times when other things take priority-- and I know I have wonderful people who comment here who understand when those times pop up. Since I am feeling scattered right now I'm going to throw up a contest and I'll probably put up a few more this week since I have a lot of duplicates going on in my book collection. It's no substitute for decent blog content-- I know that. But I'm sure a week will be all I need to get myself back in gear.

To start the week...

The Bell at Sealey Head by Patricia McKillip

An "elegant" (Library Journal) fantasy from the World Fantasy Award- winning author of Solstice Wood

Sealey Head is a small town on the edge of the ocean, a sleepy place where everyone hears the ringing of a bell no one can see. On the outskirts of town is the one truly great house, Aislinn House, where the aged Lady Eglantyne lies dying, and where the doors sometimes open not to its own dusty rooms, but to the wild majesty of a castle full of knights and princesses...

To enter, just add your information into the form below and I will randomly pick a winner by Monday September 28th. (All information entered into the form will be discarded after the contest and I guarantee it will remain confidential). Go ahead and enter multiple times! What the heck. ;) Open everywhere!

Good luck!

**contest closed**

Winners! "9" Movie Prize Pack

2009-09-09T20:29:00.000-07:00

Now that 9-9-09 is here I can announce the winner of the 9 movie prize pack. I have randomly picked 5 winners and they are:

Elizabeth Murray -Suffern, NY

Ben Stanley -Raleigh, NC

Linda George -Napa, CA

Crystal Broyles -Williamsburg, KY

and

Jeremy Keplinger -Ogden, UT

Congrats everyone! I hope you enjoy your prizes.

Winners! Pick Your Sequel Contest

2009-09-07T23:38:00.001-07:00

Gosh, I'm late again! I'm such a flake these days. I hope everyone had a great holiday weekend. Now that I have to get the kids back in school, I can't lounge around eating barbecue. Darn!

So, to ease me back into the business of blogging, I have randomly picked the winners of my "Pick Your Sequel" contest and they are:

The winner of a copy of Vanished by Kat Richardson is

Dawn Miers, Hominy OK

and the winner of a copy of Enigma by C. F. Bentley is
Craig Scott, Auckland, New Zealand

Congrats to the winners!

Giveaway! "Rosemary and Rue" by Seanan McGuire

2009-08-31T09:12:00.001-07:00

I love it when I get extra copies of books by new authors to pass on. This new title, Rosemary and Rue, (Penguin group) by Seanan McGuire seems particularly promising.

Singer-songwriter McGuire adeptly infuses her debut with hardboiled sensibilities and a wide array of mythological influences, set against a moody San Francisco backdrop. October Toby Daye is half-human, half-faerie, a changeling PI with a foot in both worlds. After spending 14 years as a fish following a botched assignment, she's desperate to avoid magic, but the dying curse of a murdered elven lady forces her to investigate the killing, with the price of failure being Toby's own painful death. Toby struggles with court intrigue, magical mayhem, would-be assassins and her own past, always driven by the need to succeed and survive. Well researched, sharply told, highly atmospheric and as brutal as any pulp detective tale, this promising start to a new urban fantasy series is sure to appeal to fans of Jim Butcher or Kim Harrison.

To enter, just add your information to the form below (this form is for use in this contest only and is guaranteed to be confidential. All entries will be discarded after the contest is over) and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday September 15th. Multiple entries will be disqualified. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**contest closed**

Winners! "Winds of Dune" String Bag & Book Contest

2009-08-28T09:03:00.001-07:00

I'm soooo overdue on ending this contest-- so I apologize for that. But I did take entries right up until the very end, so more people did get a chance to win.

Anyway, I have randomly chosen the 5 winners of this contest. The two grand prize winners will receive signed copies of "Winds of Dune" by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson as well as the string bags, and three second place winners will receive just the strings bags.

The two first place winners of the signed books and string bags are:

Nancy Sharpe of Lakeland, FL

and

Robert Williams of Cincinnati, OH

And the three winners of the string bags are:

Bruce Golden of San Diego, CA 92124

Mishel Zabala of Virginia Beach, VA 23452

Amanda Makepeace of Watkinsville, Georgia

Thanks to everyone who entered. I'll be more timely with future contests-- I promise!

"9" Movie Prize Pack

2009-08-17T13:52:00.001-07:00

In anticipation of the release of the new movie 9, produced by Tim Burton, I have been given the opportunity to offer some "9" prize packs.

Movie Synopsis
An action-packed adventure, director Shane Acker’s animated fantasy epic 9 is the feature-length expansion of his Academy Award-nominated 2004 short film of the same name. The screenplay for the feature is by Pamela Pettler (Monster House); directors Tim Burton (Beetlejuice) and Timur Bekmambetov (Wanted) are among the feature version’s producers.

The time is the too-near future. Powered and enabled by the invention known as the Great Machine, the world’s machines have turned on mankind and sparked social unrest, decimating the human population before being largely shut down.

But as our world fell to pieces, a mission began to salvage the legacy of civilization; a group of small creations was given the spark of life by a scientist in the final days of humanity, and they continue to exist post-apocalypse. Another of their own, #9 (voiced by Elijah Wood), emerges and displays leadership qualities that may help them survive and possibly even thrive. The conflicted but resilient tribe already includes #1 (Christopher Plummer), a domineering war veteran and the group’s longtime leader; #2 (Martin Landau), a kindly but now-frail inventor; #3 and #4, scholarly twins who communicate nonverbally and mostly with each other; #5 (John C. Reilly), a stalwart and nurturing engineer; #6 (Crispin Glover), an erratic artist beset by visions; #7 (Jennifer Connelly), a brave and self-sufficient warrior; and #8 (Fred Tatasciore), the none-too-bright muscle and enforcer for #1.

With their group so few, these “stitchpunk” creations must summon individual strengths well beyond their own proportions in order to outwit and fight against still-functioning machines, one of which is a marauding mechanized beast. In the darkness just before the dawn, #9 rallies everyone of his number to band together.

While showcasing a stunning “steampunk”-styled visual brilliance, 9 dynamically explores the will to live, the power of community, and how one soul can change the world.

Watch the trailer and other clips HERE.

To get you revved-up for the release of "9" I have 5 prize packs to offer, including:

· Official Soundtrack

· Book (covering the "backstory" of "9"-- similar to version distributed at
Comic-Con)

· Mini-Poster

· Trading Cards (features all characters)

If this sounds like something you'd be interested in, just leave your information in the form below (all information will be discarded after contest and will not be used for any other purpose than this contest-- absolute confidentiality guaranteed) and I will pick 5 winners by Tuesday September 8th-- just in time for the movie. This contest is open in the U.S. only and P.O. Boxes will not be accepted. Multiple entries will be disqualified.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Pick Your Sequel Giveaway!

2009-08-16T23:18:00.001-07:00

Ahhh! So busy. Had a birthday party for my husband today and the kids are starting school tomorrow-- so getting a real post up right now is pretty much out of the question for my frazzled mind.

Luckily, I have books to offer.

I have two sequels sitting on my shelf that are vastly different from each other-- one sci-fi and the other paranormal. Since I know that not everyone is into both, I'm going to give you a chance to pick your preference-- though you are welcome to enter twice for a chance to win both books.

Book #1 Vanished by Kat Richardson (Greywalker Series #4)

Harper Blaine was your average small-time P.I. until she died—for two minutes. Now Harper is a Greywalker—walking the line between the living world and the paranormal realm. And she's discovering that her new abilities are landing her in all sorts of "strange cases."

But for Harper, her own case may prove the most difficult to solve. Why did she—as opposed to others with near-death experiences—become a Greywalker? When Harper digs into her own past, she unearths some unpleasant truths about her father's early death as well as a mysterious puzzle. Forced by some very demanding vampires to take on an investigation in London, she soon discovers her present troubles in England are entangled with her dark past back in Seattle—and her ultimate destiny as a Greywalker.

Book #2 Enigma by C. F. Bentley (sequel to Harmony)

The world of Harmony, along with its close-knit colony planets, has been isolated from the rest of the universe for many generations. Now, Harmony's High Priestess Sissy and Confederated Star System Agent Jake have traveled to space station Labyrinthe VII, otherwise known as The First Contact Café, where they hope to establish diplomatic relations between the Harmonic Empire and the wider universe. But when an alien ship crashes into the Harmony Diplomatic Wing of Labyrinthe VII, the precarious balance Sissy and Jake have established begins to dissolve.

Simply fill out the form below to enter-- just be sure to specify which book you want in the space provided-- and I will pick two winners by Monday August 31st. (Entries will be discarded after the contest is up and will not be used for any other purpose than to make sure the books get to the winners) Two entries are also allowed if you'd like a chance to win both books. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Quick note** I'm overdue on picking a winner for my Janny Wurts contest. I will accept entries until the end of the day Monday August 17, and will post a winner Tuesday.

Giveaway! "The Winds of Dune" by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson ->->5 String Backpacks & Two Autographed Copies of the Book!<-<-

2009-08-05T11:47:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Tor Books I have a unique giveaway to offer as part of their promotion of the new book in the "Dune" universe, The Winds of Dune. Not only do I have TWO signed copies of "The Winds of Dune" by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson, but I also have FIVE string backpacks to pass on to some lucky winners.

So the breakdown is--TWO grand prize winners will get autographed copies of "The Winds of Dune" and a string backpack, and THREE winners will receive only the backpacks.

Book Description
With their usual skill, Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson have taken ideas left behind by Frank Herbert and filled them with living characters and a true sense of wonder. Where Paul of Dune picked up the saga directly after the events of Dune, The Winds of Dune begins after the events of Dune Messiah.

Paul has walked off into the sand, blind, and is presumed dead. Jessica and Gurney are on Caladan; Alia is trying to hold the Imperial government together with Duncan; Mohiam dead at the hands of Stilgar; Irulan imprisoned. Paul’s former friend, Bronso of Ix, now seems to be leading opposition to the House of Atreides. Herbert and Anderson’s newest book in this landmark series will concentrate on these characters as well the growing battle between Jessica, and her daughter, Alia.

If you'd like a chance to win a backpack and a signed copy of "The Winds of Dune" just enter the form below (all information will ONLY be used for the purposes of this contest and will be discarded immediately after) and I will randomly pick five winners by Thursday August 20th. The first and second place winners will receive both the string backpack and autographed copies of "The Winds of Dune." The third, fourth and fifth place winners will receive a string backpack. Multiple entries will be disqualified. Contest is open in the U.S. and Canada only.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Winners! "Wireless" by Charles Stross and "Harry and the Pirates" by Brian Lumley

2009-08-04T23:05:00.001-07:00

I have randomly picked the winners of two of the contests currently running--

The winner of a copy of "Wireless" by Charles Stross is Karen Bovenmyer of Ames, Iowa

and

the winner of a copy of "Necroscope: Harry and the Pirates" by Brian Lumley is Greg Lincoln of Sausalito, California.

Congratulations to the winners!
I have another contest I'll be posting Wednesday--I'm just trying to nail down the specifics with the publishers-- so check back everyone. And thanks to everyone who entered.

Giveaway! First 3 Books of Janny Wurts' "The Wars of Light and Shadow" Series!

2009-07-28T23:38:00.001-07:00

Years ago I became acquainted with author Janny Wurts when I read the fantastic series she wrote with Raymond Feist (my favorite of the Riftwar Saga), so when Voyager Books contacted me and offered to let me giveaway a few of her books-- I jumped at the chance. And now, I have the first three books of "The Wars of Light and Shadow" series by Janny Wurts to giveaway to one lucky winner.

The Curse of the Mistwraith

The world of Athera lives in eternal fog, its skies obscured by the malevolent Mistwraith. Only the combined powers of two half-brothers can challenge the Mistwraith's stranglehold: Arithon, Master of Shadow, and Lysaer, Lord of Light. Arithon and Lysaer soon find that they are inescapably bound to a series of events dictated by their own deepest convictions. Yet as the sorcerers of the Fellowship of Seven know well, there is more at stake than one battle with the Mistwraith: between them the half-brothers hold the balance of the world—its harmony and its future—in their hands.

The Ships of Merior

The half-brothers Arithon, Master of Shadow, and Lysaer, Lord of Light, have defeated the Mistwraith and dispersed the fogs that smothered Athera's skies. But their victory comes at a high price: the Mistwraith has set them at odds under a powerful curse of vengeance. The two princes are locked in deadly enmity, with the fates of nations and the balance of the world's mystical powers entangled in their feud. Arithon, forced out of hiding, finds himself hounded by Lysaer and his mighty army. He must take to his natural element—the seas—in order to evade pursuit and steal the initiative. However, his efforts are impeded by outside magical factions, not to mention a drunken prophet sent to safeguard his life, but who seems determined to wreck his cause by misadventure.

The Warhost of Vastmark

Tricked once more by his wily half-brother, Lysaer, Lord of Light, arrives at the tiny harbor town of Merior to find that Arithon's ship yards have been abandoned and meticulously destroyed, and that the Master of Shadow has disappeared as if into thin air. Meanwhile Arithon and the Mad Prophet Dakar are traveling on foot through the treacherous Kelhorn Mountains towards the Vastmark clans, there to raise further support for his cause. But raising a warhost is a costly business. Is it mere coincidence that Princess Talith—Lysaer's beautiful, headstrong wife—is taken captive and held for a vast ransom by a master brigand? The forces of light and shadow circle and feint, drawing ever closer to a huge conflict. And in the background the Fellowship of Seven Sorcerers and the Koriani Enchantresses watch and plan, and wait.

Sounds like some great summer reading doesn't it? If you'd like to get your hands on all THREE of these books, simply enter your information into the form provided on the page and I will pick a winner by Wednesday August 12th. Please include your address-- I promise I will delete all entries after the contest has ended and will not use your personal information for any purpose other than making sure the prizes get to the winner. Multiple entries will be disqualified. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Giveaway! "Necroscope: Harry and the Pirates" by Brian Lumley

2009-07-20T18:27:00.000-07:00

I'm baaaack! And I bring gifts! Thanks to Tor Books I have a copy of Necroscope: Harry and the Pirates: and Other Tales From the Lost Years.

Harry Keogh, the first Necroscope, is arguably Brian Lumley’s greatest creation. In the Necroscope series, readers saw Harry learn to use his powers to talk with the dead and travel instantaneously to any point in space and time. They saw him take arms against the evil, twisted, metamorphic alien vampires who sought to feed off humans and enslave mankind. They saw him suffer a great personal loss and then recover his family, and later his humanity, through a new love. And they saw Harry wage the grimmest battle of his life—against the vampire he himself was becoming!

Even after Harry’s story was done, Brian Lumley continued to write books about Harry’s legacy—the other Necroscopes who inherited his weird talents. But Harry himself would not go quietly into that darkness that lies beyond an author’s imagination . . . and now Brian Lumley has written three new novellas about Harry and his supernatural adventures, which are published for the first time in the United States in Harry and the Pirates.

Doesn't that sound great? To enter, just enter the field below and I will randomly pick a winner by Tuesday August 4th. Make sure you fill out all the fields or I cannot accept the entry. Please no multiple entries at the same address-- I will disqualify those entrants as well. Open everywhere.

Good luck!

**Contest Closed**

Fantasy/Sci-Fi Lovin' Giveaways!

Short Story Giveaway!

Giveaway! "The Silent Army" by James Knapp

Winners!

Ann Aguirre Giveaway!

Giveaway! "Lord of the Rings" Trilogy Blu-Ray Prize Pack

Winners!

Giveaway! 6 Sci-Fi Titles Now Available on Blu-Ray

Giveaway! "The Reapers Are the Angels" by Alden Bell (3 copies-- U.S. entires only)

Giveaway! "Lady Lazarus" by Michelle Lang

Winners!

Giveaway! 5 Copies of "Dust" by Joan Frances Turner (U.S. entries only)

Giveaway! "The Truth of Valor" by Tanya Huff

Giveaway! "The Last Page" by Anthony Huso

Giveaway! "Shades of Milk and Honey" by Mary Robinette Kowal

Winners!

Giveaway! "The Hypnotist" by M.J. Rose

Giveaway! The Circle Series by Linda Robertson

Giveaway! "Labyrinth" by Kat Richardson

Giveaway! "Omnitopia Dawn" by Diane Duane

Giveaway! "Tracking the Tempest" by Nicole Peeler

Contest Winners!

Giveaway! "The King's Bastard" by Rowena Cory Daniells

Giveaway! "Countdown" and "Final Crisis" by Greg Cox!

Giveaway! "Undead and Unfinished" by MaryJanice Davidson

Guest Post & Giveaway! Kelly Link--Author of "Pretty Monsters"

Winners!

Giveaway! "Distant Thunders" by Taylor Anderson

**Updated** (Form Fixed) Giveaway! "Terminal World" by Alastair Reynolds

Giveaway! "Procession of the Dead" by Darren Shan

Winners! "Pinon" by Jay Lake and Dark Void Swag Packs

Giveaway! "Black Blade Blues" by J. A. Pitts

Book Review and Giveaway! "Roadkill" by Rob Thurman

Winners! "Jane Slayer" and "Bitter Seeds"

Giveaway! "Bullet" by Laurell K. Hamilton

Winner!- Debut Giveaway

John Sandford Book Tour--Extra Giveaway!

John Sandford Book Tour: Review and Giveaway Featuring "Secret Prey"

Exclusive Look at "Lost Planet 2" and Swag Pack G

Giveaway! "A Taint in the Blood" by S. M. Stirling

Giveaway! "Pinion" by Jay Lake

Giveaway! "Bitter Seeds" by Ian Tregillis

Winners!

Giveaway! "Jayne Slayre" (3 copies!) by Sherri Browning Erwin and Charlotte Bronte

Debut Giveaway!

Guest Post & Giveaway Featuring James Knapp

Winner! "Shadow Prowler" by Alexey Pehov Giveaway

Winners! "Numbers" by Rachel Ward Giveaway

Giveaway! ARC of "The Blood King" and "Dark Lady's Chosen" by Gail Z. Martin

Giveaway! "Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded" by John Scalzi

Giveaway! "Directive 51" by John Barnes

Short Story Giveaway!

Winner! "The Adamantine Palace" by Stephen Deas

Giveaway! "Shadow Prowler" by Alexey Pehov

Giveaway! "Numbers" by Rachel Ward (3 Copies!)

Winners!

Giveaway! "The Adamantine Palace" by Stephen Deas

Giveaway! "The Auralia Thread" by Jeffrey Overstreet

Giveaway! ARC copy of "Finch" by Jeff VanderMeer

Winners! "Unknown" by Rachel Caine and "Flirt" by Laurell K. Hamilton

Giveaway! "Peacekeeper" and "Vigilante" by Laura E. Reeve

Winners! & New Giveaway (New Anita Blake!)

ARC Giveaway--"Unknown: Outcast Season Book Two" by Rachel Caine

Giveaway! "Veracity" by Laura Bynum (5 Copies!)

Contest Winners & Giveaway of Simon R. Green's Newest "Nightside" Book

Winners! "View From the Bridge" and "Incarceron"

Short Story Giveaway!

Giveaway! "Incarceron" by Catherine Fisher

Winner! "Dr. Who" & "Torchwood" Giveaway

Giveaway! "The View From the Bridge" by Nicholas Meyer

Winners! "Mirrorscape" & "Sappire Sirens"

"Dr. Who" & "Torchwood" Giveaway!

Winner! "ArchEnemy" by Frank Bedor

Contest Glitch--- Dark Void & Mirrorscape

Giveaway! "The Sapphire Sirens" by John Zakour

Dark Void Giveaway! (( Gamer Alert ))

Giveaway! ARC of "Mirrorscape" by Mike Wilks

Winner! "Red Claw" by Philip Palmer

Winners! Book Giveaway Contests

The "I'm Not Feeling Well" Giveaway

Updated (Form Fixed) Giveaway! "Terminal World" by Alastair Reynolds