Book Blogger Appreciation Week!

Hey Everyone!

I just wanted to do a quick (okay after I put the whole post together I realized it's not quite as brief as I thought it would be, I got excited and rambled a bit) post about Book Blogger Appreciation Week 2011 since nominations are now underway. For those of you who don't know, as the title suggests, Book Blogger Appreciation Week is a week long event with all sorts of fun guest posts, giveaways, and of course awards honoring book bloggers who have been nominated in different categories. I had just started the blog last year when nominations were taking place so I wasn't able to contribute to the voting process, but I'm really excited to be a part of it this year and nominate some of my very favorite blogs as a token of the deep, deep love I harbor for all of them :-)

If you're interested in nominating some of your favorites, you can click on the following links (nominations close August 13th)! They've changed the process a bit this year and you must have a Twitter or Google account in order to register and submit nominations, but basically you just sign in using one of those accounts and then fill out the form with the the name of the blog you're nominating, the URL address, and the blogger's email. You can find more information about the awards process HERE. They also have a FAQ page to answer any questions you may have!

There are a lot of different categories and you absolutely do not have to nominate a blog for each one, you can just fill out the ones you are most familiar with and submit them. All the different categories are listed below. There's also some new book-related categories this year in addition to the blogger categories like Favorite Character, Best Cover and Favorite Bookish Relationship or Romance, and I can't wait for those results!

BOOK BLOGGER CATEGORIES:

Best Written Book Blog
This blog is consistently well-written, clear, and engaging, no matter what the subject.

Best Author Interviews
This blogger does his or her research and asks the questions no one else does. These interviews are top-notch. Note that this award reflects the quality of the interviews, not the popularity of the person being interviewed.

Best New Book Blog
his blog was launched on or after September 1, 2010. The blogger has already made his or her mark in terms of the quality of the reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content on the blog; it’s hard to imagine the book blogging world without this blogger.

Best Book Blog Meme
This weekly or monthly meme is one that you never miss. You look forward to contributing on a regular basis and/or to reading the participants’ posts.

Best Book Blogging Event
This event, whether it focuses on blogging, reading, collecting reviews, or building community, inspires everyone to join in. It brings bloggers together for fun, learning, reading, or mutual support and help.

Best Book Blog Feature or Series of Posts
This weekly or monthly feature is something that an individual blogger does on a regular basis, but that does not include the community participation of a meme.

NICHE CATEGORIES:

Best Eclectic Book Blog

This blog doesn’t specialize in any one book genre. It is known for consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in a variety of genres.

Best Kidlit Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content for books written for young children through middle-grade readers.

Best Young Adult Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content for books written for a young adult audience.

Best Nonfiction Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in nonfiction. It may cover a variety of areas or focus on one particular field.

Best Speculative Fiction Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in fantasy, science fiction, horror, and/or paranormal books. The blog may cover several of these subgenres or just one.

Best Literary Fiction Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in literary fiction.

Best Classics Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in classics.

Best Romance Book Blog

This blog offers the best reviews and specialized content in romance books of any subgenre, from historical to contemporary.

Best Historical Fiction Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in historical novels. For the purposes of this award, consider historical anything from 1945 (World War II) and older.

Best Mystery/Suspense/Crime Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in mysteries, suspense, and/or crime. The blog may cover several of these subgenres or just one.

Best Horror/Thriller Book Blog

This blog offers the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in horror and/or thrillers. This blog may cover both of these subgenres or just one.

Best GLBT Lit Book Blog

This blog features the best reviews and specialized content in GLBT books. This blogger may or may not self-identify as a member of the GLBT community, but he or she focuses on GLBT literature on the blog

Best Cultural Book Blog

This blog features the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in books and/or authors of a *specific* cultural identity. This blogger may or may not self-identify with the culture featured on the blog but focuses on that culture’s literature.

Best Graphic Novel/Illustrated Nonfiction Book Blog

This blog features the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content in the graphic medium.

Best Publishing/Industry Blog

This blog features the best content on the publishing industry and is written by an industry professional.

Best Published Author Blog

This blog features the best content written by an author. This is an author who keeps an active blog that engages his or her readers.

Best Spiritual, Inspirational, or Religious Book Blog

This blog features the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content on books that address a life of faith. This blog is not necessarily associated with an organized religion and may discuss either fiction or nonfiction books.

Best Audiobook Blog

This blog features the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content on audiobooks.

Best Poetry Blog

This blog features the best consistently excellent reviews, recommendations, analyses, and other content content in poetry.

Best Bookstore Blog

This blog is associated with a retail bookstore, offering book news, staff recommendations, and other content of interest to people who love to shop for books.

Best Bookish Miscellaneous Blog

This blog has a specific focus that is related to books, but doesn’t include reviews of books. It might focus on book cover design, books in culture, trends in books, hidden treasures in books, etc.

Whew. That was a lot of categories, but again you don't have to nominate a blogger for each one, you can pick and choose. Much love to all my fellow bloggers, this first year of blogging has been way too much fun and I'm thrilled to be part of such a positive community of people:)

Cover Critique: The Goods

Let me preface this post by saying that my critiques of these covers are in no way, shape or form a reflection on the author, the content or the publisher. I know the authors have very little, if any, control over the design. These are strictly my thoughts meant simply to be humorous and not insulting.

Warning: This week's critique is probably not appropriate for workplace viewing and young eyes should be covered ;-)

Ungh. When I first came across this cover I blew snot all over my computer screen as a result of a decidedly unfeminine combination of a laugh/snort that had me thankful I work from home and therefore had no witnesses to the strangled noise and accompanying spittle that escaped me upon seeing Secret Santa. I'm actually having trouble typing I'm laughing so hard and I just can't bring myself to stop staring at his black-clad goods. LOOK AWAY JENNY! I've been trying to avert my gaze for the past five minutes, but his package calls to me. It clearly wants me to look at it and so I'm going to accommodate its desires.

I'll give you all a minute to fully absorb his tiny black panties and his bulbous assets before we move on.

....

Okay, there's really not a lot to move onto is there? This cover is just really all about his junk. There's no escaping it. It's all up in my face and the electric green "W" in Wadsworth just seems to be propping things up a bit doesn't it? And then there's the seam running down the middle of the microscopic piece of fabric covering his groin and I find myself continuously dissolving into fits of immature giggles the longer I look at this.

He seems to be pretty pleased with himself if that little smirk on his lips is any indication. He's got his hands (which seem a touch feminine to me) roaming his muscled torso, all "I'm a sexy hairless beast aren't I?", and I think it's safe to assume that if we could see his eyes they'd be glued south of the border just as ours are. I have to say the "secret" part of this title doesn't seem entirely fitting given there's not a whole lot left to the imagination and I'm extremely confident I know way more about this cover model than I ever wished to.

Seriously, I can't stop staring at it. Demon package release your hold on me!

Okay, sorry. Let's take a look at a different cover that is a touch sexier for all the things we can't see.


Ah, there we go. Sweet relief. I can look at this photo without having his manhood burned into my retinas forevermore. Aside from the strange skin condition he seems to have on his left shoulder (or does he have clouds floating past him?), this is a much more appealing cover I think. His junk is safely contained in underwear that will not haunt me for the rest of my days and we get teased just a little with the unzipped fly, but thankfully get to use the glory of our minds for the rest.

The smoke around his crotch is slightly problematic however, we seem to have moved on from a not-so-secret twig and berries to a flammable twig and berries. I'm beginning to rethink the mental safety of this cover. If he was a firefighter, the smoke might make sense but that very shiny, very photoshopped-in U.S. Marshal badge is irrefutable evidence of his profession, which means his crotch is emitting smoke without him being in the presence of actual flames and that is downright disturbing. Is there so much friction in his pants that at times he spontaneously combusts? Or maybe his one-eyed snake breathes fire? He's so talented! Perhaps if he covered his business in black satin like a certain nameless Santa, he wouldn't have this problem. Obviously his cotton/denim combination isn't doing him any favors much to my chagrin.

I still think I prefer a crotch that bursts into flames to a crotch that causes me to redecorate my computer screen with spit because I'm laughing uncontrollably though. What do you guys think?

Happy Friday Everyone!

Review: Sweet Venom

SWEET VENOM (Medusa Girls #1)
Tera Lynn Childs
Paranormal Young Adult
HarperTeen
345 pages
Available September 6th
Received from publisher for review

This review contains NO spoilers.

THE STORY
Grace is seriously hoping the move to San Francisco will give her the opportunity to start over she's desperate for. Always the girl who's never had the ability to stand up for herself or find the witty retort to a popular girl's jibe at just the right moment, she's willing herself the strength to make some personal changes when she starts at a new school. Unfortunately for her, her first day proves she's still the same Grace.

At least she thinks she is until she's carried bodily from a club by a young woman who looks exactly like her and claims to be a descendant of Medusa. Gretchen, Grace's apparent twin sister, has been fighting mythological creatures for four years while the human world remains completely oblivious. But things are changing, and she believes Grace's arrival is part of the reason.

Gretchen resolves to train Grace in the art of creature-slaying while Grace studies up on Gretchen's substantial texts detailing the girls' history and lineage. What she finds however, surprises them both. It seems they're not twins, but triplets. And there's one more sister out there completely unaware of the danger she's in.

MY THOUGHTS
Aptly named, Sweet Venom infects us from the first page, sending anticipatory tingles racing through our bloodstream as we prepare ourselves for mythological action and sisterly affection. Both Grace and Gretchen pierce our skin immediately, taking up residence far beneath it for the entire fun-filled ride and turning us into willing partners in their supernatural crime fighting. The story alternates between the first person point of view of both Grace and Gretchen (and eventually Greer) which in some books can be a distraction but in this one gives us full access to three exceptional young women. We get to learn with the characters as we go, starting off fairly in the dark with Grace and then slowly gleaning information from Gretchen as she attempts to familiarize Grace with her impossible history and potentially deadly new existence.

Though we get chapters with each of the three women, Grace is the character with whom we spend the most time, her lack of self-confidence causing us to feel instantly protective as she starts a new life in San Francisco. Though she considers herself fairly nondescript and a general doormat for the popular kids, she has a charming sense of humor about it all that prevents her from slipping down a spiral of self-deprecation into the world of whining. She's extremely intelligent, and when made shockingly aware of her family history, exhibits a determination and desire to succeed that has us cheering her on with every new display of inner fortitude.

Gretchen and Greer are as different from one another as they can get despite their identical appearances, and all three girls prove to be an interesting study in the nature vs. nurture debate. Adopted into separate families at birth, Gretchen, Grace, and Greer's personalities and attitudes are all drastically dissimilar, reflecting the environment in which they've grown up perfectly. However, running through each of them is a quick wit and a drive to excel, providing us readers the added entertainment of comparing and contrasting each character as we read, forming profiles in our heads that irrevocably bind us to each of them as well as to the war they're waging.

The only mild complaint with this story would be with regard to the romantic element. We meet Milo and Nick, objects of affection for Grace and Gretchen respectively, early on and their interactions are both so tense and humorous we find ourselves reverting back to our younger versions–giggling like schoolgirls at Grace's attempts to play it cool when faced with her crush, and smiling like idiots at Nick's admirable persistence despite Gretchen's repeated rejections. Though these moments are extremely well-executed, both Nick and Milo mysteriously disappear through the middle of the story only to make fleeting appearances at the end, leaving us to wonder exactly what their purpose is overall when the relationship between just the girls themselves is so very captivating. There's clearly more to Nick, and possibly Milo and Grace's brother Thane as well, than what we're shown in this first installment, and we can't help but hope their roles are a bit more clearly defined for us moving forward.

Ms. Childs enchants us with her twist of the Medusa myth, constantly keeping us on our toes as we pounce on both familiar and unfamiliar beasts with the girls and continually appealing to our endless curiosity by deftly leaving clues as to Gretchen, Grace, and Greer's destiny as descendants of the famous Gorgon sisters. Being the first book in a trilogy we are left with little resolution, but instead of frustration we feel only excitement at the prospect of spending more time in this world.

Rating: 4/5

Guest Post + Giveaway: Debra Anastasia and Crushed Seraphim

I'd like to extend a warm welcome to author Debra Anastasia who's taking over the blog a bit today to talk about her paranormal romance novel Crushed Seraphim. Thanks so much for taking the time to be here Debra!

Hi Guys! Jenny was kind enough to allow me to be a guest on her incredible blog. I decided to dare you to try something. I’m daring you to write.

To Hell with writing what you know.

If I had a nickel for every time I read that advice I would at least be able to buy an ice cream. Mmmm Ice cream. I would pick coffee and chocolate on a cone.

But this isn’t about ice cream, this is about words. Your words.

I say write what scares you to anyone that shows interest in telling a story. I’m not talking horror book stuff, though that can be your focus if you feel drawn to it. Write what flows. You might not know jack and a banana about mob bosses or angels or aliens or mid-century Ireland. But that story might be lying right under your fingertips, waiting to be told.

Not everyone is a writer, and that’s okay. I’m a reader first. Sometimes you see authors say, “Write the book you want to read.” Well, I’ve been reading for my whole damn life and I’ve never found a lack of amazing stuff on my library shelves. Ask the librarian for a good read and her eyes will sparkle. She’ll drag you off to a nondescript cover that holds a story that rocks your world. And I tried writing the book I wanted to read -- it fell flat.

I finally sat down and told myself, “No one has to see, you can always delete the word document.” And then when I wrote from that place? I had something I could work with.

So today’s post is for the people who lived a million lives in their head as a child. Did you grab bowls from the kitchen as a kid so you could turn them into pools for Barbie Dolls? Did the whole neighborhood become a lively town when you got on your bike?

My question for you is: Did you ever consider writing?

Since my book was released, I’ve found myself in conversations with readers and they would eventually get around to the story they knew lived inside them. As grown ups, responsibility really beats the ever-living piss out of imagination. That kid who was wearing a bonnet toting a toy gun to a tree house totally curled into a ball. She’s used to being ignored. Bills, laundry, making dinner numb our mind her pleas to explore again.

Now is the perfect time in the world to write. Your writing implement is right in front of you. If you have a computer, you can try, if you’d like. Doesn’t that feel like wings? A blank document can be anything.

You might surprise yourself. I wrote in third person before I even knew it had a name, a category. It flowed, so I let it have its head.

That’s the first step.

The second is alarming. What happens if you like what you wrote? What happens if you love it? There’s an answer for that too. The internet. There are giant blobs of places you can reveal your writing with out claiming it like an explorer in a new world. Readers can be found in amazing places. You might have a local forums that has a spot for a blog or pick your favorite interactive website and see if they have an off topic section. Starting a blog is free! Want more? Try a site that focuses on writing fiction.

Luckily for me I’m not a thinker. Maybe if I had some common sense I would have shied away from writing, but I’m just a happy cocker spaniel, rarely thinking through the mechanics of a process. But if you are a bit more foresighted, you might wonder, “Well I suck at grammar, and writing a whole book is such an endless seeming process.”

I say, “ppfffttt.” to those concerns. Because on that wonderful internet there are amazing people that will give you a helping hand. They will pre-read for you, help, suggest stuff. They will be kind about it and knowledgeable.

As for writing a book --well anything big starts small. Like elephants and whales, well those suckers are huge at the beginning. God bless those large mommas. But your idea? Your passion? That’s what has to be big. The words will inflate to accommodate them.

So maybe you’re reading this post for a reason today. Maybe I’m daring you to give writing a chance. You can put so much stuff in a story. Your emotions have a place in a book. If you come home screamingly mad from work, lucky you, paint that anger on a screen. It’s tremendously freeing. Are you looking at your kids and feeling such swelling pride you want to just hug them and hug them? Well, do that first, but then you can commemorate that emotion by giving your characters another layer of depth.

For me, I’m writing about angels and mobsters and killers and saviors. I rarely run into those types on the soccer field or at girl scouts. And having people know what goes on inside my head? That scared me. When someone sits down and says that the story was a good way to pass time? That feels amazing.

I’m writing the sequel to my debut novel, Crushed Seraphim at the moment. It’s a story about a foul-mouthed angel tasked with saving the world.

My short story, Shackled is included in the Summer Lovin’ Heat Wave, one of two charity compilations that my fantastic publisher produced. All the proceeds will go to Save the Tata’s. (The other anthology is YA themed called Summer Lovin’ Summer Breeze.)

This November my novel, Poughkeepsie, is being released as well. A simple smile, set on repeat, coming from a pretty train commuter has a deep effect on the homeless man sitting in the shade. When she dares to step between Blake and a bunch of bullies at the train station, her bravery and his kindness flames a love that neither can deny.

So tell me, have you ever thought of it? Have you ever flirted with a blank Word document? You might want to try it if you haven’t.

A thank you to Jenny for use of her Internet real estate!

You're very welcome! I'm one of those people who fears grammar. I'm piss poor at it. I admit it. So that "ppfffft" applies specifically to me ;-) For more information on Debra and Crushed Seraphim, you can find her here:

Website
Blog
Twitter
Watch the Trailer

GIVEAWAY

Debra has generously offered up a digital copy of Crushed Seraphim to give away on the blog today! To enter, please just leave a comment answering some of Debra's questions above along with a valid email address so I can contact you if you win. Since this is a digital copy, this giveaway is international and will run through midnight EST on Friday, August 5th after which time a winner will be chosen and announced on the blog. Good luck everyone!

CRUSHED SERAPHIM:

How does a foul-mouthed angel end up as the last hope for all of Heaven and Earth?

When Seraph Emma is maimed and tossed from Heaven by a rogue angel who's taken charge, she fears she'll never be allowed to return. Tasked with the impossible job of showing the self-loathing (and not even human!) Jason his worth, Emma is sure she's doomed to fail.

Meanwhile, having wormed his way into Heaven, the corrupt Everett has trapped God in Hell and has designs on unleashing evil everywhere. Fortunately, if there's one thing Emma can't do (in addition to minding her language), it's give up. Determined to save Jason and get back to Heaven-even if it means going to Hell-Emma's plan is simple yet impossible: trick the Devil to save God.

What she doesn't count on is the devotion and, well, humanity she finds in Jason; the spirit, hidden compassion, and raw sex appeal within the Devil; and the vulnerability of her own heart. With the help of two unlikely allies, she'll wage the battle for Heaven. But will Emma be sidetracked by a new sort of heaven along the way?

What's truly more dangerous? Falling from Heaven, or falling in love?

Review: Siren's Storm

SIREN'S STORM
Lisa Papademetriou
Paranormal Young Adult
260 pages
Random House
Available Now
Received for review through Teen Book Scene

THE STORY
Will's brother died exactly one year ago, knocked from his sailboat and presumably drowned while Will miraculously washed up on shore unharmed. Now, with his longtime friend Gretchen back in town along with all the other wealthy summer tourists, he's trying to put the accident behind him.

He finds it difficult to do, however, when strange things begin happening, things that all seem to take place in the presence of an attractive young woman with a striking green gaze. The more Will gets to know Asia, the more he realizes how different she is from everyone else. He even begins to think she might know something about how his brother died.

The more he presses Asia, the more he and Gretchen discover about the world they thought they knew, questioning their sanity as they learn the past has a nasty way of repeating itself and ancient myths aren't only a part of the history books as they assumed.

MY THOUGHTS
This paranormal adventure is one of those stories where we read the first several pages and immediately know we're entering the characters' world in the eye of a powerful storm. Events that changed their lives forever have clearly occurred a while before our arrival into the eerily calm aftermath, but we can feel the winds of change gearing up for another brutal lashing. Siren's Storm creeps along, showing us little by little how Will and Gretchen are coping with the loss of a brother and friend while also strategically creating chain links that begin to fit together and connect events of past and present. Once we follow the chain chapter after chapter we are rewarded with an interesting tie in between the sirens currently plaguing Will's home and those in Homer's epic Odyssey, the unique twist sparking our curiosity as we wait to see how Ms. Papademetriou will merge her mythology with that of the one we know so well.

Will and Gretchen are both perfectly likeable characters, the one-sided romantic current flowing between them wonderfully understated and at times painful to read as Gretchen cannot find her way around the barrier the word "friend" creates between her and the boy she's loved forever. Their general likeability however never grows into anything more, and we read on interested in them but not necessarily fascinated by their interactions nor overly frantic about learning everything we can about each of them. While some characters leap of the page with the strength of their personalities–the sight of their names in ink enough to call forth a detailed profile of them in our minds and cause a corresponding tug on their distinct connection to our hearts–Will and Gretchen remain simply words that never breach the paper separating us to burst into life before our eyes. The potential for an evolving relationship from friends to something more is intriguing though, and might just be the impetus that allows them to grow to be those characters we can see and hear clear as day in future books.

Additionally, sometimes the pacing feels just a touch off as several short scenes are included that don't seem altogether intrinsic to the furthering of the plot. We read close to twenty pages of an old captain's log that relates an encounter with the sirens, and though it's interesting to connect that isolated event with the current happenings, it could have perhaps been done in a more succinct manner in order to leave that extra page time available to answer a few of the rapid-fire questions launched in our direction at the end. For most of the story we're focused on Asia and her unusual abilities, but then suddenly in the last few pages we have the introduction of our true villain as well as the appearance of some inexplicable talents on Gretchen's part. These new revelations add complexity, but they arise quickly and seemingly out of nowhere, leaving us a bit disconcerted since we saw so little evidence of their arrival in the beginning or middle of the tale.

Overall though, the story has great promise moving forward into the next installment, we can only hope we are given some clarity on certain elements to provide us something solid to latch onto to ride out the brewing tempest.

Rating: 3/5

Guest Post + Giveaway: Robert Browne and The Paradise Prophecy

Today I have author Robert Browne joining me on the blog to talk a little bit about daydreaming and his new paranormal thriller The Paradise Prophecy. Take it away Robert!

THE IDLE SEASHORE OF THE MIND

There's a box in my garage that contains several mementos from my childhood. A literary magazine I wrote for in high school. Snippets of songs I wrote when I thought I was destined to be a rock star. Copies of two Playboy magazines that contain a serialized novel by Donald Westlake (yes, I actually read the articles). And an elementary school report card with a note from a teacher, "Robby is an intelligent young man, but spends far too much time daydreaming."

I really did spend a lot of time daydreaming. Still do. The only difference now is that I write those daydreams down and fashion them into full-fledged stories, the kind of stories that I loved to read as a child, a young adult, a man.

I think it's sad that a teacher would make such a notation. Yes, I understand that she had a job to do and wanted her students to pay attention—and that's as it should be. But to treat daydreaming as if it's something wrong or inappropriate is a shame. Because, let's face it, where would we be without men and women who daydream too much? Who get lost in their private thoughts and hopes and aspirations, or in worlds they've imagined and my someday share?

Fortunately, I had parents who understood this and ignored the note, and allowed my imagination to nurture and grow.

I've had daydreams about a man who has lost his daughter to a kidnapper and races desperately to save her, about a young doctor whose latest patient is a dead ringer for his murdered wife, about an FBI agent whose nightmares and visions of a little girl in danger become all too real, about a disgraced reporter whose only chance at salvation lies in a house of death in Juarez, Mexico.

And now there's the biggest daydream of all: The Paradise Prophecy. A big, bold thriller about angels and demons and two seriously screwed-up mortals—a government agent and a tortured survivor of the other side—who race around the globe trying to stop the destruction of mankind.

I can't tell you how much it means to me to be able to write these daydreams down and share them. To take readers on the roller coaster ride inside my head and hope that they have as much fun as I do.

And when our days get too crazy, it's a good idea to remember the words of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: "Sit in reverie and watch the changing color of the waves that break upon the idle seashore of the mind."

I can't think of better advice.

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by Mr. Browne! For more information on Robert and The Paradise Prophecy, you can find him here:

Website
Watch the Trailer
Listen to an Excerpt

GIVEAWAY

Thanks to Robert and the lovely people at AuthorsOnTheWeb I have one copy of The Paradise Prophecy to give away on the blog today! To enter, please just leave a comment with 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 Friday, August 5th after which time a winner will be chosen and announced on the blog. Good luck everyone!

THE PARADISE PROPHECY

A spectacular thriller inspired by John Milton's Paradise Lost in which the final chapter of the War in Heaven is about to play out on Earth, with the fate of humanity hanging in the balance.

The Myth

When God cast the archangel Satan into Hell, ending the War in Heaven, peace prevailed on Earth. Until the fallen angels took revenge in the Garden of Eden. Ever since, mankind has been in a struggle between good and evil, paradise and apocalypse: the fall of Rome, The Crusades, World Wars, nuclear proliferation, the Middle East Crisis... The War in Heaven never really ended-it just changed venues. For millennia, God's angels have been fighting Satan's demons on Earth, all in hopes of bringing about Satan's greatest ambition, the Apocalypse.

The Reality

Satan has never been closer to his goal than right now.

Agent Bernadette Callahan is a talented investigator at a shadowy government organization known only as Section, on the trail of a serial killer with nearly supernatural abilities. Sebastian "Batty" LaLaurie is a religious historian who knows far too much about the other side- and that hard-earned knowledge is exactly what Callahan needs. This unlikely duo pair up for a race across the globe, decoding clues left in ancient texts from the Bible to Paradise Lost and beyond. In the process they stumble upon a vast conspiracy-one beyond the scope of mankind's darkest imagination.