{Book Tour} Guest Post and Review--The Hallowed Ones by Laura Bickle

Warnings

By Laura Bickle

There are warnings about danger all around us. Some are obvious, and some are subtle. 

Many such warnings come from the natural world. We’ve all heard anecdotes about dogs and cats who can sense earthquakes before we can, howling warnings and fleeing before disaster comes. There are tales of earthworms crawling out of ground that is soon to be flooded, and studies showing that sharks will leave areas of the ocean soon to be struck by hurricanes. Animals know things that we don’t, serving as warnings for us.

There are myths about ravens, especially. There’s one story about the Tower of London that always sticks in my mind. There are always ravens in residence – some even have their wings clipped to keep them there. There’s a legend that if the ravens ever abandon the Tower of London, the kingdom will fall. 

When I was creating the world of THE HALLOWED ONES, ravens were on my mind. The heroine, Katie, is an Amish girl who is very in tune with the natural world. Ravens are part of her landscape, picking through fields for grain and standing on her clothesline, gossiping with each other. When the end of the world comes, the humans are not sure what’s happened. The people in Katie’s settlement only know that there are no cars on the road, that a curfew has been ordered. There are no lights on the horizon. 

But the birds know. 

One morning, Katie awakens to a great cacophony. Thousands of ravens are calling to each other, taking wing in a massive swarm. The swarm is so dense that it blackens the sky, and the sound is deafening. The birds are leaving, flying south in vast multitudes. 

The evacuation of the birds tells Katie that something is very wrong with her world, something truly horrific. She can only guess at what it is…but the ravens already know, and are shrieking to anything that will listen.

My thoughts on THE HALLOWED ONES:

Simply put, this book is amazing! As a true lover of horror and the like, I think I love the end of the world, dystopian zombie/vampire tales the most.  It has been done many times...probably not much better than Matheson's I AM LEGEND, but let me tell you...THE HALLOWED ONES ranks pretty high, in my opinion.  What made it so good was introducing the phenomenon from the Amish community's point of view.  Bickle has done a terrific job introducing the reader to the Amish world and then illustrating how they might react if something terrible did happen in the English (what they call us) world.  And then she goes one better by creating some of the most creepy and frightening creatures I've read in awhile.  As I was reading, I kept trying to visualize what they would look like.  Every horrifying image I've ever seen in movies or read in books came to mind, but I still couldn't quite settle on the terrifying image my mind was seeing.  Not only do we get all of this from the book, but we get a well-written book to boot.  No cliche or run of the mill stereotyping.  Also, the characters, namely Katie, are wonderful.  When Katie goes against the Elders to help a young English man who is injured or ventures into town--alone--to get medicine and supplies, it's not hard to believe.  Early on we learn that Katie is head strong and of her own mind.  A girl on the verge of Rumspringa (a time when Amish teens get to go off and experience life in the English world), she is ready to explore and set out on her own.  She just didn't intend for it to occur in quite the way it did.

I am so pleased with this book.  It's not often that I come across a book in this genre (meaning horror/dystopian, although it is classified as YA) that is so well constructed and exciting and engaging as well.  I highly recommend it.

About the book:

If your home was the last safe place on earth, would you let a stranger in?

In this captivating thriller, an Amish settlement is the last safe haven in a world plagued by an unspeakable horror…

Katie is on the verge of her Rumspringa, the time in Amish life when teenagers are free to experience non-Amish culture before officially joining the church. But before Rumspringa arrives, Katie’s safe world starts to crumble.  It begins with a fiery helicopter crash in the cornfields, followed by rumors
of massive unrest and the disappearance of huge numbers of people all over the world. Something is out there...and it is making a killing.

Unsure why they haven’t yet been attacked, the Amish Elders make a decree: No one goes outside their community, and no one is allowed in. But when Katie finds a gravely injured young man lying just outside the boundary of their land, she can’t leave him to die. She refuses to submit to the Elder’s rule and secretly brings the stranger into her community—but what else is she bringing in with him?

Advance Praise for THE HALLOWED ONES

"This is a book to make you fear the shadows--a horrifying and gruesome tale of faith, and things that blink red eyes in the night. I began reading in the daylight, and read on into the

late hours, leaning close, biting my lip. I could not look away; I was ob-
sessed. Katie is an unbreakable soul."  --Lauren DeStefano, New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author of the Chemical Garden Trilogy

THE HALLOWED ONES

Laura Bickle

Reading level: Ages 12 and up

Paperback: 320 pages

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Graphia

(September 25, 2012)

ISBN-10: 0547859260

ISBN-13: 978-0547859262

Laura Bickle is represented by Becca Stumpf at

Prospect Agency:

becca@prospectagency.com

Publicity Contact:

Karen Walsh, 617-351-3647

Karen.Walsh@hmhpub.com

www.hmhbooks.com

About the author:

Laura Bickle's professional background is in criminal justice and library science. When she's not patrolling the stacks at the public library, she can be found reaming up stories about the monsters under the stairs. She has written several contemporary fantasy novels for adults, and THE HALLOWED ONES is her first young adult novel. Laura lives in Ohio with her husband and five mostly-reformed feral cats. For more about Laura, please visit her website at: www.laurabickle.com.

Thank you to Bewitching Book Tours for including me on this tour.

Book Tours: Guest Post--Georgia Cates, author of Blood of Anteros

When an author writes, they have visions and they choose their words carefully to portray images to their readers. Success depends on many variables, but adjectives eliciting the five senses are most important and I have chosen to share some of the images I used when visualizing my characters and setting.

Photo 1: An excerpt describing the house facing the beach in Blood of Anteros:
I stopped to study the house, a white, two-story Greek Revival with a raised basement. The three dormers and windows were adorned with black shutters and a double staircase descended from the center of the raised porch. The pair of staircases curved toward one other, resembling two open arms, welcoming me home.
The landscaping was different; it was better, and great care had been taken in the tending of the yard. The Live Oaks I had planted along the drive and property had matured and they stood over one hundred feet tall, providing the house with the much needed shield from the hot, coastal sun.
The house had diligently stood strong and proud against the anger of the sea and defiantly survived the hurricanes and storms that attempted to erase it’s existence. I knew this well because I had once called this home. I lived here more than one hundred and sixty years ago and while cruel circumstances had forced my unplanned departure, destiny had commanded my return.

Photo 2: An excerpt describing the appearance of Curry Brennan:
I looked at the stranger in the mirror staring back at me and wondered who he was. His image stood just under six feet tall and his hair was dark, nearly black, like his heart. I leaned closer to the reflection, attempting to see a glimpse of myself within the monster standing in front of me and searched his eyes, the so-called windows to the soul. I looked beyond the flecks of light blue and gold of his irises, but found no trace of the soul I was told no longer existed and wondered, “Who is this demon mocking my every move?”

Photo 3: An excerpt describing the eyes of Chansey Leclaire:
I studied her flawless ivory skin and rosy glow. Her lips were full and stained a shade of deep scarlet and I was surprised when I didn’t find Anna’s crystal blue eyes or Grady’s deep brown. Her eyes were her own, a beautiful hazel with greens, browns, and golds fighting for dominance in each iris. She wore a fuchsia shirt, so green was winning today.

Georgia Cates Links:  Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads

Purchase Blood of Anteros:
Amazon
Barnes&Noble
Smashwords
iBooks

Book Trailer:
http://youtu.be/_LbJpi3vEOA

Book Tour: Blood of Anteros by Georgia Cates--Review and Give@way

First, I would like to apologize to Bewitching Book Tours, and to the author, for my late posting of this review.  I've had some personal issues in the past week and was only able to finish reading the book today.

My thoughts:
Even after finishing this book, I'm really not quite sure how I feel about it.  It is a good story and the premise is really something different.  However, there are certain elements that I can't help but compare to the Twilight series and True Blood (the television series, since I still have not read the books) series.  Curry Brennan, like Edward Cullen and Bill Compton, is a tormented vampire who can't quite reconcile his vampire existence.  He continues to see himself as a monster, even if he has changed and become a 'good' vampire.  So, as can be expected, he is not keen on turning anyone into a vampire, including the woman he loves.  And, of course, since there is a love interest, he is fiercely protective of her and will stop at nothing to protect her, even if it means leaving her.  Sound familiar?  With all this said, I still can't say that I didn't enjoy Blood of Anteros.  As I mentioned, the concept behind the Vampire Agape series is very interesting.  It's actually a new idea behind a vampire being drawn to a human, which is somewhat refreshing.  It's not like a past life thing, which has been done.  It's totally different.  I won't go into details because I don't want to spoil the book for other readers.  Another complaint I have with the book is that it could have used some editing to correct some missing words and some extraneous words.  Also, there were points when the dialogue was very stiff.  An overuse of 'are not' instead of 'aren't', and other similar usage contributed to that effect.  Overall though, Blood of Anteros is an interesting read and I am intrigued to read the next book to see what happens.

Blood of Anteros 
By Georgia Cates

Book Description-
Cruel circumstances turned Curry Brennan into the wretched monster he hates and refuses to accept, but when an expected turn of events releases him from the bond of his obsessive maker, he returns to the home he knew 161 years earlier and finds the return of happiness and joy in something he didn’t know existed. 

Puzzled by his growing attraction to Chansey Leclaire, a human, he is unable to resist the captivating relationship that threatens to reveal his existence as a vampire. He eventually discovers the reason he was destined to find what he didn’t know he searched for and is faced with the cruel realization that the living and the immortal undead will always be separated by one thing. Eternity.

Brief Excerpt-
I was tantalized by mystery of her. The leech inside me came out to find prey, but found none in this enigmatic girl. The close proximity of her essence didn’t entice the monster within, so what did that make her? I had more questions than answers, but one thing was unmistakable; although she released me from her embrace, her hold on me remained.

Amazon Smashwords

Book Trailer: http://youtu.be/_LbJpi3vEOA

About the Author:

In addition to being an author Georgia is a wife, mother of two daughters and a labor and delivery nurse. 

She recently added Paranormal Romance Writer to her list of things that keep her busy, but she is ecstatic to release her debut novel, Blood of Anteros, the first book in The Vampire Agápe Series. 

Like others that enjoy a great story of paranormal romance, she is easily bored by the tale of an obtainable, ordinary romance and was inspired to create The Vampire Agápe Series. When not tied up with family or delivering babies, she is working feverishly on the second book in The Vampire Agápe Series.

Links-

http://georgiacates.com/
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Georgia-Cates/213130102082500
http://twitter.com/#!/GeorgiaCates

Giveaway:
One entrant will win an eBook copy (format of your choice) of Blood of Anteros.  Open to everyone.  Please leave a comment and include your email address.  You do not have to be a follower, but followers will receive an extra entry.  Giveaway will end on Monday, January 16 at 11:59pm CST.  Good luck!