Angela Spencer
Paranormal Romance Author
Art by Wendi Strang-Frost
Angela Spencer has written science fiction, fantasy, nonfiction, and now paranormal romance. She lives in Seattle with five cats and her partner, Danny.
Angela was a semi-finalist in All Romance eBook's "Just One Bite" contest.
Review of Sins and Shadows by Lyn Benedict
(Originally published at Associated Content. You can read it here or there.)
Lyn Benedict’s Sins and Shadows is a tense romp full of unexpected twists and turns. She also approaches the subject matter in ways that I didn’t expect, which can be both good and bad depending on your point of view. Her protagonist, Sylvie Lightner, is not the sort of person who would be universally liked. There is also a lot of background to Sylvie that could warrant multiple prequel books,to the point where I felt at times like I was entering the story in the middle of the series instead of at the beginning. Despite this, or perhaps because of this, Benedict manages to write a gripping tale that manages to take seeming disparate elements and weave them into a magnificent reveal.
Sylvie Lightner, owner of Shadows Inquiries, deals with threats from the magical world. But when one of her employees is murdered in front of her, she decides to hang up her hat and close the shop. A man claiming to be the God of Justice pressgangs her into working for him to find his missing lover. She leaves her native city of Miami to visit Chicago to begin the search. Along the way, she runs afoul of Greek gods, Lilith, her ex-lover (who runs the government agency that handles the occult) and an occult catastrophe that threatens to destroy Chicago.
Tags: associated content, Lyn Benedict, Shadows Inquiries
Review of Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris
(Originally published at Associated Content. You can read it here or there.)
After loving the first Sookie Stackhouse novel, I had to delve deeper into Charlaine Harris’s marvelous vampire novels. The second installment in the series, Living Dead in Dallas, explores the secret world of the supernatural in greater detail. But while the writing is still engaging and the new revelations are compelling, the plot itself is not as tightly woven as the Dead Until Dark.
Tags: associated content, charlaine harris, review, sookie stackhouse
Scarecrow Video: This Local Video Store is an Excellent Resource for Those Looking for the Obscure
(Originally published at Associated Content. You can read it here or there.)
Scarecrow Video is a shining beacon in the gloomy Seattle weather.
One of the largest video stores in the country and a landmark in north Seattle, Scarecrow Video specializes in carrying movies and formats you can’t find other places. Though their primary business is video and machine rental, they also have great selection of new and used movies for sale in the same range of formats.
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Tags: associated content
As Far from Home as I Can Get
(Originally published on Associated Content. You can view it here or there.)
There are few things more frustrating than missing a flight and trying to figure out what you can do to try and fix things. The first time this happened to me, it was a flight home from Detroit to Seattle, with a layover in Salt Lake City. My husband at the time had misremembered the time of the flight and only realized his mistake at the last minute. We caught a ride from a friend who drove like a crazywoman through Detroit traffic, but due to new post-9/11 regulations, we had to be checked in 30 minutes before our flight. And we arrived 25 minutes before departure.
Tags: associated content, travel
McKinley’s Vampires Are Scary and Alien, but Get Lost in Exposition
(Originally published at Associated Content as part of their Halloween flash fiction contest. You can read it here or there.)
When Neil Gaiman, author of many things that I love, proclaims a book to be, “Pretty much perfect,” it sets an expectation that is hard to live up to. And based off of reviews on Amazon, Neil Gaiman’s opinion is shared shared by many. Yet I find myself among the minority that had some frustrations with Sunshine, by Robin McKinley.
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Tags: associated content, robin mckinley
Lordy, lordy, where does the time go?
I’ve been focused most of November on NaNoWriMo and a convention I was attending, so the blog has been neglected. Toss into this the fact that I had a delightful medical emergency has not helped.Now I’m running a malware killer on my laptop, and so I’m taking some time to update here. (Note to self: back up your novel!)
I got a good chunk of writing done on the way up from Portland, but I’m still behind the curve for NaNo progress. My main hope had been to squeeze out the full novel in 30 days, some 60-80K instead of 50K. I’m feeling less optimistic about that. Hopefully I can get more cranked out tonight and have a good stretch tomorrow.
I am doing much better with my outline this year than last year. Many props go to Kij Johnson, whose novel workshoppers this last summer were kind enough to give me the 411 on her advice.
My other quasi news is that I may be writing reviews for another site besides AC. This new site, called Rise Reviews, will focus on books put out by companies that do not pay pro rates. Those publications get short shrift in other review sites, so this site hopes to provide more support for the smaller markets. I’ll post links when there are links to post.
Tags: associated content, fish tales, nanowrimo
An Ounce of Prevention
(Originally published at Associated Content as part of their Halloween flash fiction contest. You can read it here or there.)
The cool night air felt comforting against Peter’s skin as he walked up the door. He savored that sensation, knowing it could be the last day of his so-called life. He paused at the threshold, fighting down the terror. His hands should be sweating, his breath coming short, his heart pounding in his chest. But none of those things happened to him. He just felt the tight knot of unease in the pit of his belly.
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Tags: associated content, contest, flash fiction
Steampunk and Vampires and Werewolves, Oh My!
(Originally published at Associated Content. You can read it here or there.)
With steampunk and vampires at the forefront of hip, I imagine it was only a matter of time before I read a novel featuring both. Gail Carriger’s Soulless is the first book in her Parasol Protectorate series, which details an alternate Victorian world where the supernatural has been known to exist for several centuries and many historical events, particularly Henry VIII’s split from the Catholic Church, are now based around this knowledge (and acceptance) of vampires and werewolves in their midst.
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Tags: associated content, Gail Carriger, review, the parasol protectorate
Sookie Stackhouse Takes on the Vampire World in This Wonderful Alternative to Leading Vampire Novels
(Originally published at Associated Content. You can read it here or there.)
Whether you are looking for a new fix after running out of Twilight books or want to read the inspiration for HBO’s True Blood series, you will find something worth enjoying in Charlaine Harris’s Dead Until Dark, the first of the Sookie Stackhouse series of novels.
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Tags: associated content, charlaine harris, review, sookie stackhouse
Just keep on swimming, swimming
Still trailing in the first round of the Just One Bite contest. Feeling less and less hopeful. Still, five days remaining for the voting. Things could turn around.
Submitted my first article to Associated Content and it is pending approval. It and future articles will be available here. For now I’ll also be cross posting articles to this blog as well.
Today I also signed up for NaNoWriMo, and my profile can be found here. I’ve done it before under a different name, but this will be my first year doing it as me. My goal is to write the first novel of the series that my short story kicks off.
Tags: all romance ebooks, associated content, contest, fish tales, nanowrimo