The New Vampires on the Block
Thank you, Vanessa, for letting me visit your blog! I’m here today to celebrate the upcoming release ofNight Reigns, the second book in my Immortal Guardians paranormal romance series.
One of the things that excites me about this book is that it gives readers greater insight into the plight of vampires. If you missed Darkness Dawns, the first book in the series (The Jeep Diva gave it 5 stars!) and are unfamiliar with my vampires, let me tell you a little bit about them. The vampires in my Immortal Guardians series aren’t dead. Or undead. They are very much a live. They also aren’t heroes. They are villains, but not by choice.
You see vampires and immortals are both infected with a rare symbiotic virus that first conquers, then replaces their immune system, lending those who transform incredible strength, speed, and longevity accompanied by extreme photosensitivity and a need for blood. Both the immortals and the vampires in Darkness Dawns andNight Reigns are infected with the virus and share these characteristics. But for vampires, there is another adverse side effect of the virus: Humans who are infected with it suffer brain damage that causes them to rapidly descend into madness. Even if a vampire was kind and honorable as a mortal, he is destined to become a ruthless killer as a vampire.
Immortals, fortunately, are spared this because they were something more than human before their transformation. Each was born with incredibly advance DNA that protects them from the more corrosive aspects of the virus and lends them special abilities vampires lack. So they have taken it upon themselves to protect humans by keeping the vampires in check. This task, however, has become more and more difficult of late as new enemies have arisen, challenging immortals in ways vampires never have in the past. Readers received a first taste of the vampire madness in Darkness Dawns. In Night Reigns readers will become much better acquainted with it, in all of its manifestations, as Marcus and Ami -- the hero and heroine -- work together to combat a new adversary who poses an even greater threat to them than they can imagine.
Night Reigns
Blurb
Ami isn't much for trusting strangers. She has a hard time trusting anyone. But she's no coward, and she's no pushover in the protection department either. So when she comes across a mysterious warrior taking on eight deranged vampires on his own, she doesn't hesitate to save his bacon. Of course, that was before she realized what one little rescue would get her into . . .
Marcus Grayden has been an immortal protector of humanity for eight hundred years, and at the moment he's not interested in backup. From the moment Ami arrives in his life, he can't deny that she's strong, smart, and extremely skilled at watching his back. But she's also destroying his protective solitude and stirring desires he can't bear to awaken. After all, whatever her secrets — how can she defeat death itself?
Brief Excerpt
Up ahead, small lights flickered like fireflies. Amber. Green. Blue. Silver. Sometimes individually. Sometimes in pairs. Moving and shifting. The length of time they remained visible varying.
Ami swallowed hard and questioned her sanity as she came to an area where the trees thinned and paused, concealed by the denser foliage on the perimeter.
Ahead, too small to be called a clearing, lay a patch of land the size of a two-car garage that just happened to be treeless. In its center, a fantastical scene unfolded that -- for many -- would defy belief.
The flickering lights she had spied swam in and out of focus as the faces that housed them moved so quickly to and fro that they blurred. Men, who were clearly more than mortal men, engaged in a surreal battle that resurrected her first description: a lion facing down a wolf pack.
The lion -- a dark, menacing figure in the center of the storm -- bore glowing amber eyes and long black hair that floated around his head like tendrils of smoke as he spun, fought, and slashed at his attackers with a speed that brought to mind the Tasmanian Devil in the Warner Brothers cartoons Darnell had shown her.
Immortal Guardian.
No other creature could move so swiftly.
The pack of wolves -- growling and snapping like their namesakes -- also bore glowing eyes, theirs green, blue and silver. Though they all, like the immortal, were garbed in midnight hues, their hair varied. Blond. Brunet. Auburn. Long. Short. Shaved. Spiked. Pulled back in a ponytail. They, too, moved faster than humans ever could, darting in and striking at the immortal with indistinct motions, then leaping back and pausing to gauge the damage and let their comrades have a shot, their blades dripping crimson liquid.
Vampires.
Though they couldn’t match their enemy’s speed and strength, the vampires outnumbered the immortal . . . eight to one as best as she could count. Ami could only make out individual features when the vampires paused between strikes.
She discerned none of the immortal’s features because he remained in continuous motion, his swords or sais or whatever blades he wielded defending him from assaults on all sides.
Ami reached into her left pocket, palm sweating, and pulled out a cylindrical aluminum silencer that was longer than the Glock itself. Keeping her gaze on the conflict before her, she screwed it onto the barrel. The top-of-the-line suppressor would reduce the explosive expulsion of each hollow-point bullet to a mere click that would not rouse residents slumbering in the houses and townhouses beyond the trees.
Raising the Glock with her right hand, she supported it with her left and waited.
Find Me on the Internet
Dianne's Website: http://www.dianneduvall.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/
The Immortal Guardians Website: http://www.
Dianne has been kind enough to offer winner's choice of either a signed copy of Night Reigns or a signed copy of Darkness Dawns. International is fine. I will announce the winner on Saturday December 10. To enter just comment below with your email address.
Be sure to stalk Dianne! In celebration of Night Reigns she is giving away 2 Kindles!
Be sure to stalk Dianne! In celebration of Night Reigns she is giving away 2 Kindles!
