Interview + Giveaway: Jennifer Estep and Dark Frost

Today I have the pleasure of welcoming author Jennifer Estep back to the blog to answer a few questions about the newest release in her young adult Mythos Academy series, Dark Frost (releases today! YAY!). I'm an enormous fan of Jennifer's and pretty much devour everything she writes in a single sitting while ignoring work demands in favor reading, and I have to say her books are always worth it!

Let’s say Vic manages to make his way into the Elemental Assassin world and into Gin’s hands specifically. What do you think he would like most about fighting with her?

Oh, I think Vic would like a lot of things about Gin, and I think they would get along quite well together. But what he’d probably enjoy most is how many bad guys the two of them could take down together. It always seems like Gin is up to her neck in trouble, something Vic would be happy to help her with, since he’s always ready to do battle.

If you had the choice of any of the gifts/abilities the students at Mythos possess, which would you most like to try out for yourself? What’s the first thing you would do?

Any of the abilities would be interesting to have, but I think it would be really fun to be superquick like the Amazons are. I’d probably use my newfound speed to help in my writing and see how many words I could type a minute and how much work I could get done in a day. That would definitely be a useful power to have.

Gwen often seeks out her grandmother in times of need, comforted not only by her presence but by her baking as well. What’s your number one comfort food when you’re feeling down?

I love comfort food, although I don’t think I could pick just one. Mac and cheese, mashed potatoes, fresh-baked bread, strawberry cheesecake ice cream, brownies fresh from the oven – I like just about anything that’s warm, hearty, filling, or sweet.

If Gwen could ask her mother a single question now that she knows all about being Nike’s Champion and the challenges she faces as such, what do you think she would most like to ask?

I think Gwen would ask her mom how she found to courage to be Nike’s Champion and keep on fighting, despite the fact that the Reapers just keep coming up with new ways to hurt Gwen and the people that she cares about. I think Gwen would want to know how her mom felt about being part of this epic struggle and how she managed to keep fighting the good fight.

You’re walking down the street and suddenly find yourself surrounded by Reapers. You know you have to stand and fight and you can choose either Logan or a Fenrir wolf to fight beside you. Which do you choose and why?

Hmm. That’s a tough one, but I think I’ll go with Logan, since the Spartan has the ability to pick up any thing and automatically know how to fight with it. That’s one skill that would definitely be handy in a battle against Reapers.

Some huge events take place in Dark Frost. If Gwen had to choose three words to describe her feelings when she thinks about everything that’s happened and everything still yet to come, what would those three words be?

Hurt. Heartbreaking. Hope.

Thanks so much for taking the time to answer my questions Jennifer! You can read my review of Dark Frost here, and you can find more information on Jennifer and her books below.

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GIVEAWAY

Jennifer is generously offering up one copy of both Kiss of Frost and Dark Frost to one lucky winner today! To enter, please just leave a comment on this post and include a valid email address so I can contact you if you win. This giveaway is open to US residents only and will run through midnight EST on Sunday, June 3rd after which time a winner will be chosen and announced on the blog. Good luck everyone!

DARK FROST (from Goodreads)

I’ve seen so many freaky things since I started attending Mythos Academy last fall. I know I’m supposed to be a fearless warrior, but most of the time, I feel like I’m just waiting for the next Bad, Bad Thing to happen. Like someone trying to kill me—again.

Everyone at Mythos Academy knows me as Gwen Frost, the Gypsy girl who uses her psychometry magic to find lost objects—and who just may be dating Logan Quinn, the hottest guy in school. But I’m also the girl the Reapers of Chaos want dead in the worst way. The Reapers are the baddest of the bad, the people who murdered my mom. So why do they have it in for me?

It turns out my mom hid a powerful artifact called the Helheim Dagger before she died. Now, the Reapers will do anything to get it back. They think I know where the dagger is hidden, but this is one thing I can’t use my magic to find. All I do know is that the Reapers are coming for me—and I’m in for the fight of my life.

Review: Dark Frost

DARK FROST
(Mythos Academy #3)

Jennifer Estep
Paranormal Young Adult
336 pages
Kensington
Available May 29th
Received from author for review

THE STORY (from Goodreads)

I’ve seen so many freaky things since I started attending Mythos Academy last fall. I know I’m supposed to be a fearless warrior, but most of the time, I feel like I’m just waiting for the next Bad, Bad Thing to happen. Like someone trying to kill me—again.

Everyone at Mythos Academy knows me as Gwen Frost, the Gypsy girl who uses her psychometry magic to find lost objects—and who just may be dating Logan Quinn, the hottest guy in school. But I’m also the girl the Reapers of Chaos want dead in the worst way. The Reapers are the baddest of the bad, the people who murdered my mom. So why do they have it in for me?

It turns out my mom hid a powerful artifact called the Helheim Dagger before she died. Now, the Reapers will do anything to get it back. They think I know where the dagger is hidden, but this is one thing I can’t use my magic to find. All I do know is that the Reapers are coming for me—and I’m in for the fight of my life.

MY THOUGHTS

The Mythos Academy series is one where the road traveled by its characters gets progressively rougher with each installment, the tests Gwen faces increasing in emotional and physical intensity to ensure that what started out as a lighter connection to characters and story darkens and solidifies into something we feel with every beat of our hearts. One of Ms. Estep’s strengths lies in her ability to pair humor with pain, life with loss, and romance with heartbreak, always adding a little grit to an otherwise smooth story, our skin abrading when we come in contact with it to act as a sharp reminder that in Gwen’s world, as in reality, suffering is a part of life. Though the burden Gwen carries as Nike’s Champion weighs more heavily from one book to the next, Ms. Estep never allows the darkness hovering on the fringes of her tale to fully infect and consume the story itself, crafting characters who repeatedly rise battle-ready with weapons drawn, prepared to be the first line of defense against any evil threatening their lives, their loved ones, and their world.

Gwen is a young woman whose growth continues to impress us the more time she spends at Mythos, starting out a true outcast who often lamented her status but did relatively little to ingratiate herself fully with the other students, to someone with a drive and determination to strengthen herself physically while striving to more thoroughly understand the scope of her pyschometry. She handles the constant emotional turmoil with Logan (and at times with best friend Daphne) remarkably well, never allowing her backbone to bend under the onslaught and instead keeping her head held high as she continues to wish for an outcome she’s not sure will ever truly be possible. While she does crumble a bit under the guilt stemming from certain events that take place in the last several chapters, her feelings of failure and inadequacy are more than understandable, and she only wallows in them briefly before drawing her spine straight once more and soldiering on.

Dark Frost is a pivotal book in the series in terms of the main story arc with Loki and the Reapers of Chaos, the minor developments of the previous two installments culminating in a conclusion that has us quivering in anticipation of the next book. There’s no jaw-dropping cliffhanger thankfully, but our need for more time in this world as the characters struggle to deal with the aftermath of all that’s happened is at an all time high as we close the back cover. While the identities of the Reapers are fairly easy to deduce, that knowledge doesn’t detract from our overall enjoyment as we’re easily wrapped up in Gwen, Logan and an epic battle of good versus evil, knowing all the while Ms. Estep will never make things easy for our heroes and heroines and loving her all the more for it.

Rating: 4/5