Welcome to my stop on the Winter's Demon Blog Tour hosted by Girls Heart Books Tours. Click here to follow along with the full tour schedule. My review of Winter's Demon will be coming next week!
Title: Winter's Demon
Series: Vesik, #3
Author: Eric R. Asher
Release date: June 12th 2014
Genre: Adult Urban Fantasy
Some things can never be undone. The horrors I've defeated - or even caused - with my own hands...they are nothing compared to what's coming. Philip Pinkerton has brought his madness upon my family, my own blood. His army of necromancers is on the move, harbingers of a great darkness. I fear the war has begun...and damn, I don't get paid enough for this.
Excerpt 1:
"Hey, Demon. Wake up!"
I cracked my eye and was ready to reduce my sister to a sparking mass of rubble, the most common fate for irritating alarm clocks in my life.
"How did you get in here?" I mumbled.
"Don't know. The door opened up for me. Cool, huh?"
"Super," I said as I buried my head in my pillow. "I love you Sam, but I have to kill you now."
"That's cute, are you wearing clothes?"
"Yes, why?" The why trailed off into a yelp as Sam picked me up under my arms and stood me beside the bed. She held on until I managed to get my legs halfway stable. I groaned as the room spun and stars swam in my vision. "I hate you."
"The innkeeper made breakfast. Let's get some food before we take our shift."
Excerpt 2:
I finally caught a glimpse of Sam in the snow-obscured scene. She was back-to-back with Cara as they fought off four of the vampiric zombies in a constant, dizzying motion. They were losing ground. Cara winced as one of the zombies reached past her flickering blade and tore into her left wing. It cost the zombie an arm, but the bastard didn't care. Sam lunged and punched through his head, but it left her back open. One of the others got an arm around her neck and started to bend her backwards. The vampiric zombie was damaged, and its aura was exposed. I'd seen enough.
I raised my arm and my necromancy flared out. It enveloped the zombie on Sam's back and I flinched as the flash of knowing began.
Ancient, he'd died in the black plague, or at least he should have. So many years past, lost, alone, a rogue vampire for almost three hundred years. So many dead lay in his wake, and he reveled in the destruction. He laughed as he stood on the rubble of a fallen castle. Years passed before a man found him. A man with a sandy complexion, round features, and dark, kind eyes. A demon in everything but body. He tore the vampire's soul away and replaced it with a demon's aura, birthing a vampiric zombie. Conscious of his surroundings, but unable to act, he just wanted to die.
I shuddered as the flash faded and my mind became my own again.
Ezekiel.
I'd been looking into the eyes of Ezekiel. I inhaled and tore the zombie's head off with a flick of my wrist and a blade of necromancy.
Book One
Title: Days Gone Bad
Series: Vesik #1
Author: Eric R. Asher
Publication date: August 18th 2013
Genre: Adult Urban Fantasy
Audiobook format: Audible | Audible UK
* Click here for my review! *
My name is Damian Valdis Vesik. I am a necromancer, an ability feared and hated as much as the powers my master and I set ourselves against. We've vanquished many evils, but now something is releasing an old darkness, forcing us to hunt an enemy beyond anything I've faced before. I was already busy enough with vampires, fairies, witches, Watchers, weddings, and...damn, I need a vacation.
Excerpt 1:
Foster's howl shattered the night. It grew into a scream as his body began to glow. Swirls of orange and red flickered into being around him, spinning faster and growing thicker as he called on the wild fae. A swirling sphere of color like the storm clouds of Jupiter swallowed the van and Foster with it. The entire scene burst into a nova of flame and I closed my eyes against the light, the blast of heat hitting me like a desert wind. Foster's scream fell silent. I heard his sword slide out of its sheath as he stepped from the smoke and flame. His body and wings were covered in soot, but no burns marred his flesh.
The smell hit me as the wards were dissolved by the fae-powered flames. The stench of burning skin and hair was overwhelming. I stepped away from the inferno, blinked a few times, and followed Foster into the garage.
"What will the authorities find?" I said.
"Nothing but a burned out van." Foster's voice was dead, his knuckles stark white with the pressure he put on the hilt of his sword.
Excerpt 2:
I was standing outside the birdcage in the dead of night with a tiny ghost holding my hand and a seven-foot fairy watching our backs. I closed my eyes and focused, gathering up a glowing ball of fae before sending it out in a pulse of power across the park. It wasn't aimed at just any dead; it was aimed at attracting the attention of one particular ghost. It didn't take long.
The little girl at my side squealed as Happy came bounding through the bars of the birdcage, much to the chagrin of the scattering birds.
Happy pulled up about six inches in front of us. I held up another ball of energy and the spirit quaffed it down before I started scratching his ears. "Hey buddy, still terrorizing the birds, huh?" He leaned into the ear scratching and grunted.
"That is so wrong," Foster said.
I turned to the little girl. She clung tightly to the back of my leg. Happy pushed his head between my legs and I heard another squeal. So, there I was, with a fairy laughing at me, a ghost panda between my legs, and a little girl unwilling to relinquish her death grip on me while she tried to get away from Happy.
Book Two
Title: Wolves and the River of Stone
Series: Vesik #2
Author: Eric R. Asher
Publication date: October 22nd 2013
Genre: Adult Urban Fantasy
* Click here for my review! *
Philip, Zola's boyfriend from one hundred and fifty years ago, is not nearly as dead as we thought. I really wish he was. Not only has he kidnapped Zola, but he's raising an army to scour humanity from the earth. Hopefully the local werewolf pack will help. What could possibly go wrong?
Excerpt 1:
I eased the bullets into my six-barreled pepperbox one at a time, forgoing the speed loader in the name of intimidation. Lewis's eyes went wide and locked onto the gun.
"Where is she?" I said. I took a deep breath, the Missouri River beside us masking every other scent aside from the decay of the blasted zombies. The shadowed tree lines hid us from the nearby population of Saint Charles.
Lewis shook his head.
Two days ago we learned Philip was still alive. Yesterday his servants kidnapped Zola. I didn't know why they took her, but she didn't go quietly. The Watchers would be using a spatula to clean out the alley where she was taken.
"You sicced your zombies on us?" I said. "A fairy and a necromancer?" I glared at Lewis. "I find myself...irritated."
Lewis held up his hand and started to speak.
I holstered the pepperbox under my arm and wrapped my hand around the shield rune on my staff. A flowing glass surface sprang to life as a thread of power wound into the wood and metal.
"Don't even think about it," I said.
Despair washed over Lewis's face. He was breaking, and I could see it.
Excerpt 2:
Edgar's face soured and he turned away from Zola. He looked nauseous. "Someone has to be held responsible for this mess. I'd rather prefer it be Vesik."
"What?" I said. "What'd I ever do to you?"
Edgar leveled a glare at me.
"Ah, fair enough," I said.
"Edgar, Ah, don't have time for this right now." Zola gently pushed him aside with her scorched cane. Zola bent down and started digging beside the vampires and Hugh. Vik handed her a spade and she nodded her thanks.
"You may cite me if you wish," Hugh said. He didn't look up from the furrow he was digging in the dirt. "I have no issues with the Watchers' duty."
"That is kind, wolf," Zola said. She glanced at Edgar. "Ah think we should play a game, Edgar. If you can spell this wolf's name, you can issue him a citation."
Edgar blew out a breath. "You haven't changed a bit, Adannaya." He actually cracked a tiny smile and I thought my world was ending. "What is your name, wolf?"
"Hohnihohkaiyohos," Hugh said.
Edgar glared at Zola for almost a minute. His mouth was open and his eyebrows were raised. I was waiting for him to break down crying or laughing. Instead he just shook his head.
"You get used to it Eddie," I said as Foster snickered.
Eric is a former bookseller, guitarist, and comic seller currently living in Saint Louis, Missouri. A lifelong enthusiast of books, music, toys, and games, he discovered a love for the written word after being dragged to the library by his parents at a young age. When he is not writing, you can usually find him reading, gaming, or buried beneath a small avalanche of Transformers.
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I like the excerpts! Thanks for sharing them. :)
ReplyDeleteThis series is top notch - I adore it and can't wait to read the third book. The first two satisfied my thirst for urban fantasy! Thanks for stopping by, Henrietta! :)
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