Guest Bloggers: Kiki Howell and Emma Hillman Stop By!

Stories That Mix Paranormal Creatures

I am so drawn to paranormal stories. Witches! Sorcerers! Wizards! Vampires! Dragons! Shapeshifters! Fairies! Ghosts! Bears, Oh My, Okay, skip the last one! LOL Sorry, couldn’t resist.

I think I have become…well…slightly obsessed.  These days though, I have taken to mixing these paranormal creatures together in erotic romance stories, letting their mythologies play off of each other, letting their strengths and weaknesses be highlighted against each other, and best off all let them fall in love with all the complications that relationships between the different kinds brings about.

I want to thank Dakota for having me here today as part of my Looking Back and Looking Forward Book Tour.  Today I will be looking back on a story I co-authored with the wonderful, Emma Hillman called The Sum of All which mixes two witches with a vampire, a panther shapeshifter, a fey, and a sorcerer. Below you will find a great chat between Emma and I about writing this book that we had during a release party for the novella. After that, there will be a giveaway,  for my witch and vampire tale, A Strange Freedom: Blood & Fireworks .Last, I will giving you a little glimpse into my first ever series, A War In The Willows Series releasing in 2012 with Naughty Nights Press where witch, vampire and werewolf clans are battling each other given romances which go against their social laws.

How The Sum of All, a co-authored novella, Came To Be, A Chat with Emma Hillman and Kiki Howell

Kiki: Emma Hillman and I, Kiki Howell, met as fellow authors at eXcessica Publishing early on in my career. Somehow we got to talking. Will have to ask Emma if she remembers the very first instance, because, well I have a horrible memory, as she can well attest to. LOL

Emma: You were organizing reviews done by authors and I said I’d do one. In the end the author never responded so I didn’t do one, but we started talking. And then, you offered to review my first book, Location, Location, Location. And liked it.

Kiki: Cool, so happy to have her around as my memory. LOL I do remember that we became fast friends by email alone, as Emma lives in France and I live in the US. We started talking about writing and ended up critiquing many of each other’s works, but it soon moved past that, to sharing a lot about our lives, supporting each other in personal things, etc.. And, though we’ve never met in person, I consider Emma a very dear friend.

Emma: Right back at ya!.

Kiki: So, in all of this, especially in discussing each other’s stories, there was a point where I was considering spicing up my erotica like Emma did hers, and she was working her way into incorporating paranormal elements into her stories. There would also be conversations where I would praise her ability to create such real and gripping dialogue, whilst she would talk about my descriptions, etc.

Emma: I suck at descriptions, I really do. But I’m working on it.

Kiki: Yeah, well I’m still working on the dialogue too. LOL So, back to the creation of The Sum of All, over time, the idea was born to incorporate our strengths into one story. Of course it was going to be paranormal, but we hadn’t settled on what creatures to use. I did have the idea, as I am partial to witches, of having two best friend heroines and have each of us be one of their voices. In its simplest form, every other chapter has a different voice.

Emma: That didn’t last long!!

Kiki: No it didn’t. But, in theory, Emma became Es and I became Mae. This was the original idea. But as we wrote, both critiquing and editing each other’s chapters it really became hard to figure out who wrote exactly what.

Emma: Even when I reread it, I’m not sure what paragraphs I wrote. I take this as a good sign.

Kiki: I know! It is pretty amazing :) I do know that Emma came up with the idea for the contest

Emma: Because really, what’s better than four hotties competing in your bed?

Kiki: Exactly! Then, building upon my spell-gone-wrong idea. We ended up picking quite a few paranormal creatures as our alpha heroes: vampire, shifter, fae and sorcerer.

Emma: So everyone can have their favorite ;)

Kiki: I don’t know, I can’t chose *giggles*  Before I knew it, we were going past way past ménage and straight into foursomes.

Emma: Well, you know, you might as well make it hotter than hot!

Kiki: So true! I remember an email specifically which stated, “Don’t know how it happened, but they just ended up in this room together…LOL!”

Emma: Guilty as charged! You know there’s a good reason why I never plan my books. My characters always end up doing whatever the hell they want anyway.

Kiki: Emma has this wonderful voice and does snarky, hip, funny dialogue really well, so the verbal, testosterone-filled battles between our Alphas were a ton of fun to write too.

I think we were both really pleased with how it turned out in the end. And, if we could ever find the time now that our careers have taken on a new life all their own, I know there is a sequel in there.

Emma: So true! There’s so much we could do with a sequel. Now all we need is time!

Kiki: Someday! An amazing writing experience is what writing The Sum of All was, one I will always treasure.

Emma: I concur! And if anyone has questions on co-authoring, feel free to ask J

The Sum of All Blurb:

When a spell goes wrong and two witches find themselves stuck in a house with a plethora of paranormal creatures, tension rises and sparks ignite. A gauntlet is thrown down, a contest is born, rules are drawn up, and soon, the two women are living out the fantasies they’d never thought to have. 

Who will be the best? Will jealousy prevail? Or, will they get their hearts snared by one or two of those Alpha males?

Genres: Paranoramal (Witches, Shifter, Wizard, Fey, Vampire), Contemporary, Erotic Romance

Adult Content Warnings: Explicit Graphic language and Other Situations Some Readers May Find Objectionable: Anal Play, Exhibitionism, Ménage (m/f/m), Homoerotic Sex (female/female and some light male/male), Sex Magic and Bloodlust! 

from eXcessica Publishing

Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, All Romance Ebooks, Smashwords, and many other ebook retailers.

Giveaway!

Just comment below, on anything that catches your attention to win a PDF copy of my novella A Strange Freedom: Blood & Fireworks. I must mention that the fantastic cover for this story was made for me by Emma Hillman! Okay, back to it. Please leave your email address so I can contact you if you win. I will stop back on Dec 11^th to pick a winner :)

A Strange Freedom: Blood & Fireworks Blurb

Can a witch gain her freedom to live as she chooses between Memorial Day and the Fourth of July?  

A man was not exactly what Meranda was looking for when she went to her grandfather’s grave for a ritual of remembrance on Memorial Day.  However, what she thinks is a ghost in the heavy shadows of the night ends up a vampire. 

When Meranda’s grandfather lay dying on a bloody battlefield in WWII, Alexander promised the man he would take care of his family if he got out of the war alive.  Even though he returned to the states a night walker, he has done his best to honor that promise from a distance. 

When Meranda is hurt due to his negligence, Alexander valiantly fights his own desires for her blood to save her.  Only, once she is better, their lives clash.  But, using a little magic, she plans to win their war by the time the fireworks light up the sky on Independence Day.

Genres: Contemporary, Paranormal (Vampire & Witch), Erotic Romance

Adult Content Warnings: Explicit Graphic Language, Bloodlust, Brief Depictions of War

A Glimpse Ahead at At War In The Willows Series releasing with Naughty Nights Press

The Willows in Tennessee, is a resort, lake-front, community. Here, a clan of transient vampires set down new roots a few years back. As always, they’d soon learned of the others there, the ones like them who hid what they were. In this bright resort town full of sun and boating, these other creatures, shifters, vampires and werewolves run the nightlife, while living secret lives apart from the humans. Problem one with this is that these creatures don’t get along. For the most part, they chose to interact as little as they can. Of course problem number two happens when the temptation becomes too much: a vamp drinks from a tourist leaving town then wipes their memory, a werewolf runs under the moon with the intent of scaring a few townspeople, or a group of witches does a few spells just for the fun of messing with mere humans lives. They’re not all bad here in The Willows, but the troublemakers always make the most noise. Which leads to problem number three, when a vampire and a werewolf dare to fall in love. Now there is a war in the Willows.

When Book One, The Vampire’s Witch, starts, the Willows is at war already.  Isaac comes back to town after getting the call that his maker, Drake, has been killed by a werewolf in an incident after his Vampire sister, Amberlyn, reveals she’s in love with the werewolf, Kane. Amberlyn, who was being groomed by Drake to take over the clan now has to go into hiding. Isaac can’t take over the clan, although he is next in line, because he was made into a vampire in the Willows by Drake, and had to live in California letting his biological family believe him dead. Even coming back to the Willows, he will have to be careful not to be seen by anyone in his family who still lives here. The only on left to lead their clan in this time of war is Achim, Drake’s maker, and he has his own reasons and issues to not want the job back.

As if this all isn’t bad enough, a young witch, in the wrong place at the wrong time, was also killed along with Drake. And, rumor has it a group of witches are seeking revenge against both the vamp and were clans. Always one for kicking ass then asking questions later, Isaac goes and kidnaps a witch, locking her in Drake’s old place hoping to get answers as to what her clan is planning. Isaac’s plan backfires when he recognizes the witch’s magic. He believes himself under a spell when he finds himself easily attracted to her. It isn’t long before he finds out he has a history with this witch named Winter as things in the town go from bad to worse. As weres and vamps start to fight, spelled by witches, Isaac will have to fight his past, his present and for his future, if he has any chance of following the heart he mistrusts as it falls in love with Winter.

Book Two, The Vampire’s Wolf, begins right where Book One leaves off with Amberlyn learning of her vampire brother, Isaac’s love for a witch, Winter. Hurt, angry, among a million other emotions, she meets up with Kane out of town. Kane, the werewolf she loves who she hasn’t seen since her maker Drake was killed, tries to calm her the best ways he knows how. But, emotions are running high, and the vampire and werewolf ride along the edges of the rules, of being safe, of being together.

Their reunion, though, is short lived, when Amberlyn gets a call from her brother, Isaac. They have met with elders of all the clans to try to talk to the younger, more ambitious and dangerous, clan leaders in hopes of making them see that the old social, non-written, laws of no interaction between clans needs to be broken. The old prejudices need to be addressed in non-violent ways before they blow their cover with the humans and all have to leave the Willows.

Only the meeting turns deadly. The witches through manipulation and spells force Amberlyn and Isaac to have to face to have to face her own pasts. The war not only continues after their meeting, but gets uglier.

In Book Three, The Vampire’s Human, the war escalates when another of Drake’s vamps, Devin, saves and falls for a female human, Sarai. Stuck together in his home, the attraction between them becomes too much to resist. He needs the support of his sister and brother, Amberlyn and Isaac.

Only on his way to meet them, they stumble upon a coven of witches doing a ritual, something seasonal, summer, but after hear talk of their plans.

This leads to an all out war, one so bad that those who survive it may not have a resort town to live in any more. The tourists are leaving after just a few nights of violence, the boat house has been burned to the ground…when the war ends, the Willows may be a ghost town rather than a resort. But, will anyone be left to care enough to pick up the pieces?