Covenant of Thorns Series
Carina Press
July 16, 2012
Blurb
This is no fairy tale…
Haunted by nightmares of a black dog, sick to death of my mind-numbing career and heart-numbing fiancé, I impulsively walked out of my life—and fell into Faerie. Terrified, fascinated, I discover I possess a power I can’t control: my wishes come true. After an all-too-real attack by the animal from my dreams, I wake to find myself the captive of the seductive and ruthless fae lord Rogue. In return for my rescue, he demands an extravagant price—my firstborn child, which he intends to sire himself…
With no hope of escaping this world, I must learn to harness my magic and build a new life despite the perils—including my own inexplicable and debilitating desire for Rogue. I swear I will never submit to his demands, no matter what erotic torment he subjects me to…
Excerpt
“Enough,” a male voice said.
As if I’d ceased to exist, Tinker Bell blinked her eyes and regained her lovely self, face smoothing, shining once again in sunny elegance. Reboot and resume program. She gracefully stood and glided to the tray, set the bowl precisely in the center, lifted the tray and left the room without hesitation.
Booted footsteps crossed the room toward me. Act II, scene ii. Exit Nasty Tinker Bell, Enter God-Only-Knows-What-Now. My face was sticky with whatever the brothy stuff had been, my hair wet and fouled. I stank. I hurt. I was chained to a bed in a place so completely unknown I couldn’t begin to understand it. I tried to squeeze my legs closer together, but the chains seemed at the limit of their reach. The energy of my brief triumph evaporated, allowing tears to well up again.
Oh, please, please, please, do not cry. The threatening sting worsened. I closed my eyes and one tear leaked out. He stopped next to me, surveying me.
“You’re certainly a mess.” His wry voice was rich and smooth.
My eyes snapped open to glare at him through the blur. Fifty different smart remarks flew across my tongue, most along the lines that any failures of appearance on my part could be laid on the doorstep of someone besides myself. But even the buzz of the first word on my vocal chords brought searing agony. Relieved to have a legitimate reason for the tears, I almost welcomed the searing sensation.
“No, don’t try to talk—no one needs to hear what you have to say, anyway. Not that we can help it, since you think so loudly. And you have a decision to make. We have a quandary.” He began pacing, boots echoing against stone. “No one can heal you while you’re bound in silver and we can’t release you from the silver until you have yourself under control. Which will take a considerably long time—perhaps years of training—if you’re even able to accomplish it at all.”
I thought of the birds crashing in increasing cacophony with a small shudder.
“Exactly,” he confirmed. “And yes,” he said from the window behind my head where he seemed to be gazing out, “I can hear most of your thoughts—another reason to save trying to speak aloud.”
My stomach congealed in panic. Had he heard my secret thoughts? Don’t think of them, bury them deep, deep. Think of other things…like what? Think of home, think of Isabel. Isabel, my cat—Clive hated her. What would happen to her now? How could I not have thought of her until this moment? Abandoned, wondering why I never came home for her… And my mother—she’d be frantic. How long had I been gone? They could be all dead and buried, lost to me forever. The anguish racked me.
“Shh.” The man sat on the side of my bed now, heavier than Nasty Tinker Bell. He brushed the hair back from my forehead, then placed his long fingers over my brow and, with his thumbs, rhythmically smoothed along my cheekbones, wiping away the tears that now flowed freely.
I stifled a sob. I had cried more in the past day than I had in years. The sweeping along my cheekbones soothed me, melting warmth through my skull. The rhythm became part of my breathing. Deep breaths. Smooth, easy. The awful tightness in my chest gave a little sigh and released.
“Let’s try again, shall we?” The man pulled his hands away. I could hear him brush them against his thighs. Soup, tears and blood. Yuck.
My eyes cleared enough for me to see him. Ebony-blue climbed over half his face. The winding pattern of angular spirals and toothy spikes swirled out of his black hair on the left side of his face, placing sharp fingers along his cheekbone, jaw and brow. For a moment, the tattoo-like pattern dominated everything about him. Ferocious and alien.
Once I adjusted, I could see past the lines. His face echoed Tinker Bell’s golden coloring. He could be her fraternal twin, with those same arched cheekbones. But where she was golden dawn, he was darkest night. Midnight-blue eyes, that deep blue just before all light was gone from the sky, when the stars have emerged, but you could see the black shadows of trees against the night. He shared Tinker Bell’s rose-petal mouth, but with a curious edge to it. I suppose a man’s mouth shouldn’t remind one of a flower, and there was nothing feminine about this man. Where she wore the pink sugar roses of debutantes and bridal showers, his lips made me think of the blooms of late summer, the sharp-ruffled dianthus, edges darkening to blood in the heat. His bone structure was broader than hers but still seemed somehow differently proportioned, his arms hanging a bit too long from shoulders not quite balanced to his height. Inky hair pulled back from his face fell in a tail down his back. One strand had escaped to fall over his shoulder and I could see a blue shimmer in its silk sheen.
He arched his left eyebrow, blueness in the elegant arch, repeating the deep shades of the fanged lines around it.
“Shall we?” he repeated.
I stared at him. What was the question?
/ Barnes & Noble
Jeffe: Heh – Neil Gaiman. I would probably go all fangirl over him if we ever met – and hopefully Amanda Palmer wouldn’t kick my ass for it.
If you could co-write with another author who would it be and why?
Jeffe: I’m not sure I *could* co-write with another author. My process is so internal and not plotted – I don’t see how I could possibly work with another person. Though a couple of my writer friends have suggested it.
The world is under attack and you are forced to run for your life. You only have room for one book in your survival kit, what book do you take?
Jeffe: Definitely the guide that tells me which mushrooms are poisonous and which I can eat!
Who are your favorite literary characters? (Yours or someone else's)
Jeffe: Hmm. Elizabeth Bennett, Eve Dallas, Phèdre no Delaunay de Montrève, Lessa of Benden Weyr.
If you friends were asked to describe you in one word what would it be?
Jeffe: Dynamo. I’m not sure this is a compliment. ;-)
Where do you do your best work?
Jeffe: At my desk, with no one home and everything completely silent. Or under the grape arbor – same conditions.
Do you find it harder to write a full-length novel or novellas?
Jeffe: A full length novel. I tend to be a pretty concise writer, so I prefer to write short. But there are rewards to writing the novel that novellas don’t offer.
When did you fall in love...with writing?
Jeffe: When I was in grad school for neuroscience, I took a class for fun on writing stories, just to work the other side of my brain. It was instant love.
If you only had five words to describe Rogue’s Pawn, what would they be?
Jeffe: Magic. Passion. Faerie. Negotiation. Desire.
In Rogue’s Pawn, your heroine has the power of making her wishes come true. If you could have one wish come true, what would it be?
Jeffe: It might be trite, but right now my wish is that readers will love this book. It’s a story that means a great deal to me and I’d love to see this series fly!
Favorite food brownies
Boots or heels both!
eReader or Print eReader
Social Media: Love it or Hate it? Lurv
Beer, Liquor or Wine Wine
Favorite place to get it on besides the bedroom I have a thing for balconies…
Favorite TV Show don’t watch TV, alas
Favorite Book series (besides your own) Kushiel’s Legacy, for one that’s done. JD Robb’s In Death books, for ongoing..
Pj’s or Lingerie neither ;-)
Vampires vs. Shifters Vampires
Favorite Genre anything with a little sex and romance!
Jeffe Kennedy took the crooked road to writing, stopping off at neurobiology, religious studies and environmental consulting before her creative writing began appearing in places like Redbook, Puerto del Sol, Wyoming Wildlife, Under the Sun and Aeon. An erotic novella, Petals and Thorns, came out under her pen name of Jennifer Paris in 2010, heralding yet another branch of her path, into erotica and romantic fantasy fiction. Since then, an erotic short, Feeding the Vampire, and another erotic novella, Sapphire, have hit the shelves.
Her contemporary fantasy novel, Rogue’s Pawn, book one in A Covenant of Thorns, will be published in July, 2012. Jeffe lives in Santa Fe, with two Maine coon cats, a border collie, plentiful free-range lizards and frequently serves as a guinea pig for an acupuncturist-in-training. Find her on Facebook and Twitter or visit her at her Website.
7 comments:
Fun interview! I really enjoyed the excerpt from Rogue's Pawn - thanks for sharing that with us. It definitely sounds like a book I would enjoy reading:)
Looks like a great book. Added it to my TBR list.
Thanks for hosting me, Ali! and thanks Maria and Kaylyn for the interest!
I like the sound of Rogue's Pawn!
ROGUE'S PAWN looks amazing. I love Neil Gaiman's work too.
Happy Release Day, Jeffe! Another one to add to my TBR pile. Great interview and blurb! :)
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks Timitra and Tina! Marybelle - Neil Gaiman totally rocks!
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