Vicious Vampyres: Red-Haired Stepchild

Sadly, I read these three books at least 4 months ago but never got a chance to start furiously typing away on them.

Let's get 'er done.....

This series by our new author type friend (at least in my mind, dear readers) Jaye Wells.  She introduces us to some of her dark and twisted world where the vampires are fighting with the sorcerers.  The vampire council (the Dominae) are three ancient vampires - like the Fates people - that rule the affairs.

Sabrina Kane is the fix it man, er, wo-man, who is there to police the vampire community.  She is then sent undercover by the Dominae to infiltrate a cult in SF where a sexy demi-demon is trying to have the races of Lilith unite.  After a demon comes to kill her (yes, really) she finds herself talking to a mage who seems to know more than he's letting on about Sabrina's past, and potentially, her future.

I think the best part of this series is really the compelling interplay between the characters and the (pardon the pun) human issues they have trying to deal with each other.

What are you going to do when your life turns upside down and what's right is now wrong and what's wrong now seems like the way to be?

Join me at the blood table and find out.

XX
RHW







Red-Headed Stepchild (Sabina Kane)
By: Jaye Wells
Published: April 1, 2009, Orbit
ISBN: 978-0316037761

Fancy Faeries: A Kiss of Shadows

I'm practically vibrating I'm so excited to start talking about one of my favorite authors, Laurell K. Hamilton.  I originally got into her via her first extended series, Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter, which I will speak about in due time in more depth but she was the first to break me out of my rather strict vampire outlook and move into the world of the Fae.
A Kiss of Shadows is a great first book, luring me in to the alternate reality of her world.  Her fae are different than many books' takes on the topic, as she posits that the Fae have been kicked out of every nation on Earth except for America and Thomas Jefferson let her people arrive and take the hills in Illinois as their home.  Her main character, Meredith Gentry, is a real life faerie princess, the first to be born on American soil.  The problem Meredith has is that she is not a pure blood Sidhe, but rather mixed heritage, including human, which has made her paternal Aunt, Andias, Queen of Air & Darkness of the Unseelie court try to drown her like a pure bred puppy, and her maternal Uncle, Taranis, King of Light & Illusion of the Seelie court nearly beat her to death.

Meredith's father took her out to grow up among the humans, and most of the Sidhe have not forgiven that.  This first book, A Kiss of Shadows, has Meredith hiding undercover as a private detective in LA and is found by the Slaugh the most un-human of the Fae and their sexy weird king, Sholto, King of the Slaugh and Lord of that which passes between.

I truly enjoy the research Laurell has put into her series, both keeping true to the mythology of the Fae and specifically the Sidhe, but she also weaves in subtleties that make this a most engaging faerie series.  That and it's also a gothic romantic element which I find always a great way to have some paranormal sex.

Meredith, who is hiding in LA as a private detective starts her return to faerie via her under cover work capturing a human who was using the Tears of Branwyn to enslave and capture energy from human descendants of the fae.  After she breaks the man's hold on the spell (and accidentally gets him killed) she is taken to the police where they reveal her as Princes Meredith NicEssus.

After her first hand of power blossoms, Meredith returns to the faerie sithen, and returns to her people's side.  But someone is always out to get her..... can Meredith survive returning home, and further be allowed to be crowned Queen?

Get into it!












A Kiss of Shadows (Meredith Gentry, Book 1)
Laurell K. Hamilton
October, 2000
Publisher: Ballantine Books
ISBN: 0345-42340-2

As I Lay Me Down to Sleep: Fairy Faith

Hello Dear Readers:

I hope you are all nestled in your coffins, aherm, beds, with cups of cocoa and reading your favourite book.

I am spending the weekend doing much the same.  It shames me but I got a "sugar moment" - I couldn't put down some books I bought and ended up reading them until late in the morning.  I will be blogging about them soon, dear readers, as I shouldn't leave you out of the loop.

The books are a trilogy from a new author (well, new to me) named Jaye Wells who features the ironic hero Sabrina Kane, a mage, a vampire and a demon..... I mean!  We could talk about that all day here (after all, it's in the title for fucks sake!).  But again, I digress.

I wanted to talk about the non-fiction essay I am reading called "The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries" written by W.Y. Evans-Wentz in 1912.  My dear friend, EffinFoodie (check her blog here), bought it for me after a delightful dinner at Bar Pitti downtown in the City.

It's a much slower read than many of my other books, mainly as it is multiple languages and is a thesis about the fairy faith in the Celtic lands.  It's actually very interesting.  I will be back to write more about it after I finish, but as I said, it has been hard reading and I'm only about a third of the way in.

I will keep you posted, readers mine.

XX
RHW

Fancy Faeries: Rosemary & Rue

Since they didn't get in the blog name thought I should kick off this here blog with a post about Faeries.  Specfically, the Fae found in Seanan McGuire's October Daye novels.

Some of my favorite history is bound up in the Tuatha De Danann - The Children of Danu.  Whether reading texts of the ancient Celts, or the modern day faerie romance, they are always sure to delight the drab manor on the hill.  While another day, dear readers, we can rundown the path into the realms of importance of the Fae in world history, or culture, today we should speak with the characters conjured from the Summerlands by Ms. McGuire in her first book in the series.

Rosemary & Rue is a great first book of a series:  taking us through the sometime legubious process of the Exposition of a series, all the while keeping some semblance of action.  In fact, this book is fast-paced and adventure packed, and provides the basics of the world in which October Daye, the protagonist lives.

A Kight of the Kingdom of Mists, Toby, ne October, is a halfling crime solver in the very real world of San Francisco.  After being turned into a koi for 14 years and 2 days, we start on our quest with Toby checking out shoppers at the local Safeway, hiding from the world of Fae she knew.

All that changes after Evening Winterrose Dutchess is killed in a manner most foul, and charges October to find her killer via a curse on her answering machine.

From narrowly escaping death while untangling the thorns of this sticky bleeding rose of a murder, October finally solves the mystery as she lies dying on the floor.

A crime proceedural with a metaphysical bent is almost a guarantee of the Red Haired Witch missing bedtime to see what happens next -- Rosemary & Rue was like that both on the first read and this one, many moons and page turns later.

I love how this realm of faerie stays just on the fringes of San Francisco's famous hills, woven into a complex tapestry of man made and faery realm tethered through knoews thoughout the world.

Another idea in Seanan's book is the Cait Saidhe, the cat faeries.  I love her King Tybalt, and his mercurial temperment and how well she makes him act like, well, a cat.  Having three cats, I've got some semblance of an idea of how they operate.  I'm looking forward to exploring the complex relationship between Tybalt and Toby Daye throughout the series (do you like that I'm foreshadowing as IF I haven't already read the second and third books multiple times.  Ha!).

The Fae are always reliable both in tall tale and current pulp, to be full of intrigue and politics.  I think it comes of living forever....I mean, what would you do to fill your eternal days but play with intruiges and fight your courtly battles, rather than just lay down and fade from boredom.  In Rosemary & Rue, we are left thinking about the Queen of so and so doesn't want x, but Duchess of such and such wants y, and how do we get out of being stuck in the middle, raging against the ridig structure of honor, debt favors and blood.

An interesting footnote to that is the world created in these novels, are that the Fae can lie.  It's a fairly common rule in modern faery writing that the Fae cannot lie;  they can certainly use very little actual truth and mislead left and right, but hte outright lie has been left behind.  Not so in this world.  Fae can lie easily, which makes for a better mystery novel, but im not sure I want to like a faery like that (or a fairy for that matter but I don't need to be going and telling on my personal life).

Love the spine of balancing between two worlds without feeling a part of either is woven into the tapestry of Toby's connundrum.

Go and buy the book, people!

Rosemary & Rue
Seanan McGuire
DAW Books, Sept 2009
ISBN 978-0-7564-0571-7

Next to publish in the series:  Late Eclipses (March 1, 2011)

Well, I'm off to dance in the sacred circle, chanting the chant and all that good stuff.  Blog later!

Fairy Kisses,
Red Haired Witch