Monday, March 5, 2007

Burning Bright US Publication This Week


By Janine Ashbless

Burning Bright is released in America this week, so I thought I'd let you poor unsuspecting people know what you're in for, via the medium of British reviewers. I've never had Reviews before, so forgive me if I'm a bit giddy! This one is from Forum, (Vol. 41 no.2) and I'll quote it in full:

"Veraine was a commander in the Imperial army and Myrna was the high priestess he stole away from her temple. As they attempt to make a new life together they are attacked by reivers: Myrna is taken to be a slave of the evil Tiger Lords, while Veraine is beaten and left for dead. Piecing together fragments of memory, Veraine begins to search for his lost love, but there are many erotic temptations on his way, while life with the Tiger Lords is so brutal and short he may not arrive in time...

Black Lace is branching out heavily into paranormal erotica this year, attempting to emulate the success of authors such as Laurell K. Hamilton and Sherrilyn Kenyon (but with better writing standards...), so expect lots of novels involving vampires, shape-shifters and general spookiness. If they're all up to the standard of Burning Bright then it's a gamble which should pay off. There's an art to making you believe in characters who are part-human, part-animal and Ashbless clearly possesses it.

Personally I don't particularly like lots of death and dollops of gore with my erotica, but the fight scenes are carried off well, and the Eastern tinges of mysticism which are woven into the plot and the characters' belief systems hold everything together nicely. And the sex never takes second place to the plot twists, which is always the danger with this type of erotica genre.
Careful, this one burns..."

No offence to LKH, but ... heeheehee!

However, my real favourite is from the journal of the Erotic Trade Organisation:

"Practically snuff"

I laughed till I fell off my chair...

xxx

Janine Ashbless

http://www.amazon.com/Burning-Bright-Janine-Ashbless/dp/0352340851/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/102-9199407-3344131?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1173093264&sr=1-1/

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

Practically snuff? Good god, what do they read as their fantasy or their erotica?

Nice Forum piece though, and a nice story too.

Janine Ashbless said...

Thanks Nikki for posting this - I don't know what's up with Blogger.

I don't have the foggiest what "practically snuff" means either, since by definition snuff isn't fiction. I swear no real people got hurt during the writng of Burning Bright!

Megan Kerr said...

Can you also vouch that no animals were harmed during its reading?

You know what they say: "Every time you masturbate, God kills a kitten. Please - think of the kittens."

Fabulous review, well done!

Alison Tyler said...

Awesome review, Janine!
Go pop the champagne!!

XXX,
Alison

Nikki Magennis said...

Congratulations, Janine! You evil Snuff Mistress, you!

Anonymous said...

Great review! Well done.

Vincent Copsey said...

Great reviews, Janine! Hope you don't mind that I tweaked the picture.

Anonymous said...

Yay. Great reviews. I am glad the paranormals are already causing such a stir.

I've told the werewolves and they're all really pleased

Vincent Copsey said...

Hmm, Tilly... Is there something you're not telling us? Or you in fact harbouring dangerous oversexed beasties in your cellar?

Anonymous said...

Depends how deluded I am when you ask me, really.

Right now, with the deadline for werebook one (aka The Silver Collar) on the 12th March, they are very, very real.

Anonymous said...

Oh, that sounds like a lovely story. Makes me want to to add it (done) to my wishlist. Great review though, wish I had that great of a review of my novel.

Janine Ashbless said...

I hope you're treating those werewolves right, Tilly. They need plenty of exercise and fresh food, you know. A werewolf is not just for xmas...

Megan Kerr said...

Hey Tilly - I'm in your area - if you need some help walking them, taking them out, whatever - you just say the word. I'll be right round with a leash in my hand and a glint in my eye.

Unknown said...

Great review Janine! I love the cover of this book as well. Here's hoping the U.S. market sits up and takes notice!

Anonymous said...

I have to say, there really should be more responsible werewolf owners, to really point out how lovely they are.

... yummy.

Anonymous said...

Well they do keep running away, going off at tangents, deciding to have sex in the middle of plot arcs, refusing to have sex in the middle of sex arcs (that's rather more common), fighting, running the dialogue to pages and pages, inventing new backstory and generally making me fall in love with them, but, really, me and the werwolves - getting along fine.

They're wagging their tails right now.

(!)

Megan Kerr said...

"running the dialogue to pages and pages"

Thank God! Tell me I'm not the only one who wonders if she's missed her calling as a screen or playwrite? I get so captivated by the dialogue I have to slap myself and say NO - NO, Olivia, REPORT - DESCRIBE. Maybe I should write a novel about two talking heads just to get it out of my system? (And yes, they would talk about sex. A lot. It would be practically autobiographical.)

Anonymous said...

Ha ha, yeah, but isn't Vox like that?

*coughmumble*neverreadit*mumble*

I cut 50-75% of my dialogue. And it breaks my heart because I write such great pointless witty dialogue

Madeline Moore said...

The book sounds fabulous. Congrats! I agree - the 'practically snuff' review is practically priceless!
As for writing tons of dialogue and missing your calling as a screenwrite - I also write for the big and little screen and let me tell you, what you write is not what ends up on the screen. That can really hurt - until you look at your paycheque. Talk about laughing all the way to the bank.
Finally - MM - are you breeding werewolves? Wouldn't that be a great source of extra income? I know if I ever wanted one, I'd ask you for guidelines. Just think what a purebred WW - WITH PAPERS - would go for!

Anonymous said...

In my nonpseudonymous writing life, I turned to playwrighting in part because I liked writing dialogue much more than writing narrative. But I've noticed that my erotic fiction tends actually to be light on dialogue sometimes. Go figure. Maybe I used up all the dialogue writing those plays?

Vox . . . yay!!

Anonymous said...

We so need to have 'practically snuff' underneath BB in the side bar!