VBT: Giveaway and Reviews ~ Blood Fugue and Witch's Nocturne by E.J. Wesley

About Blood Fugue:

“Some folks treated the past like an old friend. The memories warmed them with fondness for what was, and hope for what was to come. Not me. When I thought of long ago, my insides curdled, and I was left feeling sour and wasted.”

Jenny Schmidt is a young woman with old heartaches. A small town Texas girl with big city attitude, she just doesn’t fit in. Not that she has ever tried.

Life has pummeled her heart into one big, lonely callus. She has no siblings, both parents were dead by sixteen, and her last grandparent—and caretaker—was in the ground before she turned twenty-one. She’s the last living member of her immediate family. Or so she thinks…

“We found my ‘grandfather’ sitting at his dining room table. An entire scorched pot of coffee dangled from his shaky hand. His skin was the ashen gray shade of thunderclouds, not the rich mocha from the photo I’d seen. There were dark blue circles under each swollen red eye. A halo of white hair skirted his bald head, a crown of tangles and mats. Corpses had more life in them.”

Suddenly, instead of burying it with the dead, Jenny is forced to confront the past. Armed only with an ancient family journal, her rifle, and an Apache tomahawk, she must save her grandfather’s life and embrace her dangerous heritage. Or be devoured by it.

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About Witch's Nocturne:

After receiving an ancient tribal journal from her grandfather, Jenny is sent on a mission of discovery in an attempt to unravel clues to her family's monster hunting past. The journey becomes more than academic when she is asked to confront a coven of dangerous witches who plan to cast an insidious spell on the plains of West Texas.

Witch's Nocturne is the second of the Moonsongs Books, a series of paranormal-horror-action novelettes by author E.J. Wesley. These stories contain language and content better suited for mature readers.

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Here's an excerpt:

My fingers tapped out an excited, tuneless rhythm on the steering wheel as I drove Beauty, my licorice black 4x4 truck, across town. Maybe the sudden change in the weather and the influx of warm, November sunshine brightened the gorgeous day and my spirits in equal measure. Or maybe, God help me, I was happy to be on my way to see Marshal again. Regardless, I couldn’t recall the last time a day held so much hope, like I’d been given a cheat code for infinite possibilities.

“How’s life?” Marshal asked, foisting himself into the cab of the truck.

He placed a brown, leather satchel between his feet on the floorboard. Marshal stared at me over the top of a pair of oversized, mirrored sunglasses. Combined with the plaid shorts, flip-flops and pink polo shirt with a crocodile on it, he appeared to be beach ready. Or headed to a photo shoot for a store I wouldn’t be caught dead in.

“Fast.” I grinned and revved the engine.

He gave me a worried look, rushing to buckle his seatbelt. “You can’t afford another ticket.”

“Relax, Mr. Public Safety. I was kidding. Mostly. Where we headed?”

He patted the saddlebag between his legs. “I’ve gone through everything in here fifty times and have more questions than when I started. I wanted to go to the college library, try to learn more about your grandfather’s tribe. Find some language books.”

“So, we go to the library and learn about the tribe and the journal. Shouldn’t be too hard. Texas is chock full of Native American history. I imagine there’ll be lots of stuff on the Apache at a big university.”

Marshal shook his head, his spiky blond hair staying perfectly still.

“It won’t be that easy. Apache was a catchall term given to several tribes. They were nomads. Historians had a devil of a time trying to keep track of any one group—not to mention they weren’t exactly friendly to outsiders. The name Apache was given to most of the warring, wandering tribes in the area.”

“Knew my cuddly personality couldn’t be all my own doing. How’ll we know which specific tribe Gramps belonged to?”

I turned onto the state highway that would lead us to Lubbock. It’d take us about an hour to get there, assuming there was no traffic. By traffic I meant some old farmer taking up both lanes of the highway with his tractor.

Marshal pulled the journal from the bag and flipped open the front cover. He held the book up, pointing to the inside corner.

“I think it’s this.”

The word Navezgane had been branded into the leather.

“Cool. Wonder what it means?”

I started to make a joke about the word hopefully not translating to Squats-in-Woods or something. One glance at Marshal’s troubled face told me I was going to like the real name a lot less.

“I looked it up online. The word means killer of monsters.”

 About the author:

Born and raised in Oklahoma, E.J. grew up in a land of good earth and better people. He holds degrees in psychology and counseling, but prefers to spend his time in the heads of imaginary people to real ones. He writes and lives in South Texas, and loves to chat about movies, books, music, food, and family.

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My Thoughts:

I read both Blood Fugue and Witch's Nocturne in one afternoon. Blood Fugue only had 47 pages and Witch's Nocturne had 73 pages.

I am always amazed when authors manage to give us a whole story in a small amount of pages. That is the case with these books. Both books are whole stories complete with an ending that doesn't feel rushed. :D

The plot has supernatural beings, suspense, and lots of action.

Jenny, the main character is a really kick a** heroine. She is stubborn, strong and one of a kind.

In the first book, Blood Fugue, she meets her grandfather who she thought was dead. He needs her help to fight a creature. She thinks he is off his rocker until she sees the mutilated horse that the creature went after. She agrees to help him and she does. We see a werewolf in this book but it is not the sexy kind.

In the second book, Witch's Nocturne we follow along as Jenny accepts her fate and gets into new trouble. Jenny is trying to find out more about her Grandfather's tribe and decipher the journal he gave her. She gets a call from a women claiming to have trouble with her coven of witches. We meet new characters in this book and I really liked Sarah especially.

Both books have a touch of horror. You all know that I don't do horror. So to say that I was entertained and kept reading, tells you that they weren't too scary.

I would recommend these short stories to those who like dark paranormal books, quick reads, or just a different less romantic type of urban fantasy.

I received copies of both books from Candace's Book Blog Promotions in exchange for my honest opinion. I honestly thought both books were entertaining.

Do you like books with a touch of horror?

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