Monthly Archives: October 2014

Meet Storm from Forgotten Desire by @barbbradley #PNRblogfest

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Lyndi Lamont's Paranormal Blogfest

Barbara Donlon Bradley is here today with a character interview of Storm, hero of her erotic romance, Forgotten Desire.

BDB-ForgottenDesire_200-300Blurb:

Heather and Storm’s story continues…

When Storm leans against one of Bert’s machines and is sent back in time, without his memories, Heather has to go after him.

A simple retrieval won’t work. She has to make him remember before they can return to their own timeline.

Finding him is easy, getting him to regain his memories isn’t. Then she finds out Ialog is there, giving Storm something to keep his memories at bay.

Now she has to find a way to stop her old nemesis and bring her mate home.

Available at Phaze and Amazon.

Contains explicit scenes.

Character Interview of Storm, ambassador of Vespia:

BDB: Thanks for sitting down with me today. Tell us a little about yourself.

You humans always have so many questions, but my mate told me to be nice. There is not much to tell. I am Storm. You wouldn’t be able to pronounce my Vespian name. I am head of Vespian security, the ambassador to Earth and I am mated to Heather Drexel. She was part of your earth’s security.

BDB: I understand you have some kind of special power. Can you tell us about it?
How do you know about that? I will thrash the person who told you.
BDB: We have the clearance and will keep your secret. Tell us about it.

Sigh…We Vespians do not talk of such things with others, but I know my mate will be displeased with me if I refuse…I have the ability to shift. Although I can shift into any form I shift to wolf all the time. It is the easiest form for me.

BDB: When did you discover you were able to shift?

When my mate was kidnapped by Ialog, an ancient who created her. He held her at a compound on Earth and my wolf form allowed me to get close to Heather without being detected.

BDB: Did you have special education or training to hone your power?

No. Each Vespian who has the mix of blood that I have has different abilities. There is no one to prepare you for it or train you unless they happen to have the same power, which is unlikely. I have been lucky enough to meet someone with the same powers and she has helped me master it, but in the beginning I was alone.

BDB: Do you consider your power a gift or a curse? Why?

It is a gift. Not every Vespian has an ability like this, only those with at least thirty percent ancient blood in them and this ability allowed me to save my mate on more than one occasion. She has a tendency to get into trouble.

BDB: Does having this power complicate your life?

No. In the beginning it might have. Not being able to control the shift kept leaving me naked when I returned to humanoid form. I kept losing my clothes in the shift. But now I can control it and only use it when I need to.

BDB: If you could swap your power for another one, what would it be?

I quite like my power. I have a keener sense of smell, which allows me to pick up all the different levels of my mate’s arousal. That is quite beautiful and arousing for me.

BDB: What does your mate think of your abilities?

Heather has a few of her own so my abilities don’t bother her at all. In fact our intimacy is enhanced right after I shift which she enjoys very much. Of course so do I. Now, are we done? All this talk of my mate has me thinking of the way I like to spend my time with her.

Excerpt:

It didn’t take them long to get to Bert’s compound. Once the elders had a chance to question Bert they gave him permission to stay on some land in a remote area of Vespia so he could do his research on what happened to the rest of the ancients. They felt it was better not alerting the entire race that they had a living, breathing ancient among them. If the planet was aware of his presence they would never leave Bert alone.

Heather and Storm walked into his main computer room and found him working on assembling a large piece of equipment. He had parts floating in the air as he used a three dimensional image to move them around until they were ready to be put into place. There were small clamps on the pieces floating that allowed them to defy gravity.

“You have been busy.” Storm looked around at all the different components Bert now had up and running, not sure if he was happy with the elders’ decision. The only other ancient they had been involved with had a fixation on his mate and he feared the same thing would happen again over time, but Heather trusted the man so he kept his opinions to himself.

So far Bert had been the exact opposite of Ialog, but how long would that last? Would he develop that strange overpowering desire to have Heather that Ialog had? She was part of his visions. He had told them she was important to the future of their races. Would he try to take matters into his own hands like Ialog did? Storm knew he had to be leery or they could be caught unawares.

“A lot of the equipment I need for my search was already in my ship so it was easy to transfer it. Others I brought from my other compound, plus I have been working on a few more to make sure I have everything I need to begin my search.” He looked at Storm. “I know you have no reason to trust me. Ialog did ruin that, but I promise I have no ulterior motive. I just want to find my people. It is hard knowing I am alone.”

Did the man just read his mind?

Heather touched Storm’s arm. He could see that she understood. She had lived with being unique all her life. He placed his hand on top of hers. He trusted her. If she felt Bert was safe then he would too. For now.

The simple gesture had him wanting her again. She started smiling at him so he knew his eyes had started glowing once more. Good thing they had the ship with their favorite chair in it. He just might get a scream from her on their way back.

Storm walked around, looking at the different pieces of equipment. All types of machines covered the walls along with several large screens. “Fridon would love this place.”

“Then bring him next time.” Bert grinned as he worked on connecting a board to one of the screens. “I enjoy his sharp mind.”

Storm nodded as he rested his hip on one of the consoles.

“Oh, Storm don’t lean there–” Bert frowned as Storm winked out of sight. “Oh, dear.”

About the Author:

Writing for Barbara Donlon Bradley  started innocently enough, like most she kept diaries, journals, and wrote an occasional letter but she also had a vivid imagination and wrote scenes and short stories adding characters to her favorite shows and comic books. As time went on she found the passion for writing to be a strong drive for her. Humor is also very strong in her life. No matter how hard she tries to write something deep and dark, it will never happen. That humor bleeds into her writing. Since she can’t beat it she has learned to use it to her advantage. Now she lives in Tidewater Virginia with two cats, one mother in law – whose 87 now, her husband and son.

Barbara Donlon Bradley’s writing started innocently enough, she kept diaries, journals, and wrote an occasional letter but her vivid imagination had her writing scenes and short stories, adding characters to her favorite shows and comic books. As time went on the passion for writing became too strong to ignore. Humor dominates her life. Write something deep and dark, will never happen. That humor bleeds into her writing. Since she can’t beat it she’s learned to use it to her advantage. Now she lives in Tidewater Virginia with two cats, one mother in law – whose 87 now, her husband and son.

Connect with her online at:

Author Sites:

Website: http://www.barbaradonlonbradley.com/
Publisher: http://www.phaze.com/author.php?author=21
Blog: http://barbaradonlonbradley.blogspot.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Barbara-Donlon-Bradley/118673448173249
Twitter: https://twitter.com/barbbradley
Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/barbaradbradley/
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/7773192-barbara-bradley
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0072OTZJE
B&N: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/Barbara-donlon-bradley
ARe: http://www.allromanceebooks.com/storeSearch.html?searchBy=author&qString=Barbara+Donlon+Bradley
Kobo: http://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/Search?Query=Barbara%20Donlon%20Bradley
Shelfari: http://www.shelfari.com/search/books?Keywords=barbara%20donlon%20bradley

I hope you enjoyed the character interview and excerpt. Leave a comment for Barb if you’re so inclined. And there are only a couple more days to enter the giveaway. Use the Rafflecopter form below to enter the drawing for this month’s special giveaway, a Halloween basket with autographed books, candy, Halloween socks and assorted author swag.

Lyndi Lamont

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Inspiration for New Release: A Bit of the Dark World by Toni V. Sweeney #PNRblogfest

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Lyndi Lamont's Paranormal Blogfest
Today Toni V. Sweeney shares the inspiration for her new release, A Bit of the Dark World. But first, enjoy the video!

Godalmighty, what a night!

Daniel Walker, MD, was a big man though not a particularly clumsy one, but there was nothing graceful about the way he reeled through the door of his office after stubbing the toe of his Croc on the threshold. Wavering to catch his balance and prevent crashing into his desk, he staggered around it and fell into the big executive’s chair, then jerked open the center drawer, searching frantically for the pack of cigarettes he kept there.

…Gotta have that smoke…lemme at it before I have a nifit! He was acting like an true addict and admitted it. Found it. As if discovering water in the desert, he extracted one, snapped open the lighter lying inside the drawer, and flicked it into life. The tobacco flared, the tip of the cigarette glowed, wrapped paper curling blackly. Raking one hand through his coarse black hair, he leaned back, hungrily gulping in smoke. Ahhh… He closed his eyes, exhaling it out in a long, slow trickle. He’d been trying to quit, was doing pretty well too, what with that Nicorette CQ patch and all, but now? Hell, after tonight…he’d ripped that little piece of drug-soaked adhesive off his shoulder. The way I feel right now, I’d smoke a whole damned carton if I had it.

He’d never seen anything like it. As if God Himself had battered down the Gates of Hell and set free total calamity. Cracked ribs, broken arms, fractured legs…ambulances and police cars swarming and wailing…was there anyone left in Temple and surrounds in one piece?

A bit of an exaggeration perhaps. It was August and there was a full moon. Everyone knew those two things separately were bad news and together they spelled disaster. The heat and the moonlight made all the loonies—and they didn’t call them luna-tics for nothing—even crazier, while the sane ones bore the brunt of their madness.

ToniS_DarkWorld1…and this begins the story of a young man fighting his heritage while ambiguously relishing in its power…a foolish young woman revels in the attention she receives from him and his rival…while a doctor genetically embued with the truth about the island off the Georgia coast and the mysterious entity sleeping in its waters, fights to prevent disaster… my new horror novel A Bit of the Dark World, based on the “Cthulu Mythos” created by HP Lovecraft.

Who? you ask. HP Lovecraft? Never heard of him.

O-kaaay. Here we go.

Almost everyone is familiar with Edgar Allan Poe, right? Quoth the Raven…and etcetera… At one time or another, we’ve probably read one of his short stories, even if it was in tenth-grade English where “The Pit and the Pendulum” was required reading. How did HPL, as he’s affectionately known by his followers, get overlooked? He was a man who was influenced by Poe, AA Machen, and Algernon Blackwood. (Bet no one knows who they are, either!) In the early Twentieth Century, he became Poe’s equal in writing tales of mystery and imagination.

Lovecraft was a New Englander, a sickly child growing into an introspective man, not breathtakingly handsome, but fairly ordinary in appearance. He married, but eventually divorced, seeming to flourish in a more isolated and less social atmosphere. Other than his own writings, his second claim to fame is that he carried on a correspondence with several aspiring teenaged authors, most of whom, because of his mentoring, later became well-known themselves. (Do the names Robert Bloch (Psycho) and Robert E. Howard (Conan the Barbarian) ring bells?) Known as the “Lovecraft Circle,” they furthered the stories of Cthulu and the other amorphous, barely-describable Elder Gods by promoting Lovecraft’s stories and using the characters and places in their own writings

I was introduced to Lovecraft during my teenage years through a single story “The Dunwich Horror” in an anthology entitled Tales of Terror and the Supernatural, which I received as a gift for my twelfth birthday. This story was later made into a movie, but like the screen adaptations of most of Poe’s stories, Lovecraft’s tales don’t translate well, since they rely on a good bit of atmosphere and description of the characters’ mental states and internal conflicts rather than physical action.

Later in life, I had the privilege of living next door to a Lovecraft scholar. A fascinating man who was also a black belt instructor in karate and a professor of psychology at the local state college, he had a library consisting of hundreds of books on Lovecraft as well as translations of his stories, in German, French, even Japanese. He graciously allowed me to borrow some and read them. Initially, I didn’t know what an honor I was being given until his wife commented, “You really rate. He doesn’t let anyone touch those books.”

As expected, I, being who I am, immediately began to weave my own pseudo-Lovecraft tale, thinking along the lines of…why did the Great Old Ones center themselves only around New England in our part of the world, specifically Providence and Arkham? (Batman followers… recognize that name?) In other stories, they exist in Great Britain, the Middle and Far East, in abandoned cities, deep jungle valleys, or high, frozen mountain peaks. Why couldn’t some of them have traveled further South on our continent and found disciples among the southern population?

Answer: They could’ve… Why not?

…and thus I came up with the idea for A Bit of the Dark World…

Driftwood Sunrise

Copyright: pkphotography license by Bigstock.com

There are the Great Old Ones, not of this world but bound to it by their enemies…their faithful servants, willing to risk not only their lives but those of their descendants to free their masters…the native peoples of the Coast, aware of these creatures and using their own magic to protect themselves…and those aforementioned descendants, caught up in the struggle for power and possession whether they wish it or not.

Since the story’s set in Georgia, or on an island off the coast, rather, I had an opportunity to weave into it stories from my own Southern childhood, as well as the histories of the Yamacraw, a portion of the Creek Native American tribe, and descriptions of St. Simons and Jekyll Islands which I’ve had the opportunity to visit.

There’s sex in it (after all this is my version and not Lovecraft’s) so I doubt if HPL would wholeheartedly approve, but perhaps he might give me an agreeable nod for the general tone of the novel as well as the way I’ve portrayed the horror his creations invoke.

A Bit of the Dark World—the title is a quote from Rudyard Kipling’s The Phantom Rickshaw—was released by Class Act Books on October 15.

Other Links for Toni V. Sweeney:
Website: http://www.tonivsweeney.com/
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=Toni+V+Sweeney
MySpace: www.myspace.com/tvsweeney
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tvsweeney
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Toni-V.-Sweeney/e/B002BLQBB8/

Toni, thanks for the fascinating background on your inspiration for your book. I’ve heard of H. P. Lovecraft, but am ashamed to say I have never read his works. Let us know who your favorite horror authors are.

Use the Rafflecopter form below to enter the drawing for this month’s special giveaway, a Halloween basket with autographed books, candy, Halloween socks and assorted author swag.

Lyndi Lamont

Rafflecopter: A Rafflecopter giveaway