Halloween Author Invasion Day #4 — All Steamed up with Jacquelyn Frank

Welcome back for day #4 of the Author Invasion. Come back every day this week for another great author and a chance to win.

October 27 — Paranormal Romance Author Jacquelyn Frank
October 28 — Young Adult Author Simone Elkeles
October 29 — Paranormal Romance Author Maggie Shayne
October 30 — Young Adult Author Ednah Walters
October 31 — Urban Fantasy Author Jeanne Stein

Are you a winner? We put up the winners of Zoe Archer’s SCOUNDREL, Tera Lynn Child’s FORGIVE MY FINS and the $10 Amazon GC from Charlene Sands.

Today we welcome Paranormal Romance Author Jacquelyn Frank. Her latest release DRINK OF ME came out yesterday! She’s the NYT bestselling author of several paranormal romance series including The Nightwalkers, the Shadowellers, and The Gathers.

I’m all STEAMED! up!
by Jacquelyn Frank

Ask anyone who knows me and they will tell you this is my ultimate favorite holiday of the year. Not just because I am a Wiccan. I was a Halloween phreak long before I was a legitimate witch.  (BTW I brought my altar out into the public areas of the house and it really looks cool…albeit far cleaner than it normally looks when it is more privately located in my bedroom. I’ll bet my housekeeper never thought she’d have a job dusting a crystal ball…) This is me in costume this year! Guess who I am? Elizabeth Bennet! Of course! This was taken at the Authors After Dark convention this year in New Jersey. I know, EB doesn’t wear glasses…but otherwise I was all authentic!

So it makes me very happy to have a ‘Halloween’ release. DRINK OF ME comes out October 26^th and I am really excited about this story.

It’s set in an alternate world, something very like steampunk but without the steam and less Victorian more Edwardian. The Sánge (SAHN-jeh) people have limited electricity and rudimentary gadgets, sort of pre-industrial…perhaps right on the cusp. They are more concerned with survival than they are making things easier on themselves, and after all that is what any sort of industrialization is all about. The story’s main focus is about the ruler of the Sánge people who must make his way in a world where his people are reviled and shunned for what they consider barbaric practices…oh, you know…little things…like the drinking of blood…muhhahahaha!

The story is actually very sweet and sexy, about two unlikely people crossing paths in unlikely ways…and somehow it all makes sense in the end. But it puts me in mind of the way so many things in this world that people do are not tolerated…or weren’t at one time, but now they are. That includes my Wiccan religion…or any religion if you think about it. After all, those Christians did get fed to those lions. Tolerance is a word we hear a lot of, throw about trying to make ourselves sound wise, or are trying to get ourselves elected to office (eye roll). But how many of us can say we truly practice tolerance in all areas of our lives? The Sánge are reviled…oh, except when other cultures want to buy that grain they grow so well…or want to sell them things. Money forces acceptance in their case, but as we see the world from the Sánge perspective, we find they are in some ways far better than we are when it comes to loyalty, family, and honorable behavior.

Anyway, thanks Suzanne for letting me visit here at STEAMED! Come visit me over at my website. Feel free to write. Meanwhile, I’ll give a free copy of DRINK OF ME to someone who comments on this blog post today 🙂 Suz gets to pick!

~Jacki
http://www.jacquelynfrank.com