Book Review
of Blood Jewel
Blood Jewel
by Georgia Cates
With the mystery of Chansey Leclaire and Curry
Brennan’s connection solved, they are free to explore their newfound love for
one another. Or so they thought...
When Marsala uses a witch and black magic to discover
Curry’s whereabouts, he and Chansey are left with no choice. The newly engaged
couple is forced to relocate away from their families at the new compound in
Savannah, which causes some major changes in the plans for their upcoming
wedding.
Relocating to Savannah might have saved Curry and
Chansey from being discovered by Marsala, but it doesn’t stop her attempts to
reach Curry or her efforts to harm Chansey through the use of black magic. As
Marsala closes in, Curry faces the decision he never wanted to make. Will he
keep Chansey human or condemn her to eternity as the thing he hates most?
As Curry waits for his hand to be forced, a newly
turned vampire arrives at the Savannah compound in need of help. Not only is
she a fledgeling in transition, she brings reports of escaping from a vampire
cult still in possession of her sister, a human. Any attempt to save the
captive human from a cult of vampires puts everyone in jeopardy. Can they risk
entering a large cult to save one human being? And is so, how could they
possibly do it successfully?
Love will grow. New mysteries will arise. A battle
will ensue. A Blood Jewel will be found.
Blood Jewel Excerpt-
I waited until she was
asleep to leave her side, slipping away as quietly as a thief in the night. My
family was no longer gathered in the dining room and I walked outside to find
Gia and Lairah in the pool taking a late night swim.
“Tell me you didn’t leave
your bride in the bed alone,” Gia huffed.
“She’s not my bride. She’s
my fiancé and I need your help with something big. Tomorrow is Chansey’s
birthday and I need some ideas. I want to take her into the city and do
something special, but I have no idea what.”
“Well, you made the right
decision by coming to us instead of that buffoon you call your best friend.
Really? What is his deal?” Lairah said.
“I think he’s jealous,” Gia
answered. “And yes, Solomon...I know you can hear me inside the house.”
“Take it easy, girls,” I
urged.
“Alright, we’ll forget the
buffoon and get back to the task at hand. You’ve already given her the most
precious piece of jewelry she’ll ever wear. Any type of bling-bling you come up
with will only pale in comparison, so you shot yourself in the foot when it
comes to jewelry,” Lairah told me.
“She loves your art, so
paint her something. You can have it ready by tomorrow because you’re so awesome,”
Gia suggested.
I blew that one, too.
“That’s not going to work. I did a soft pastel of her on the day I met her, so
anything I did would pale in comparison to that. Now, I’ve shot myself in the
foot when it comes to art.”
Solomon walked out of the
house and added, “Nice going, one trick pony.”
“In my own defense, she was
never suppose to see it. It was supposed to be for my own private collection.”
Sol jumped into the pool
with the girls and then came up. He ran his hands back over his slick dark
hair. “I’m not jealous. If anyone is jealous it’s the two of you with your
crazy ideas and dreams of romance that’s never going to happen for you. Both of
you are living vicariously through this poor human girl and she’s probably scared
to death to tell either of you ‘no.’Shame on both of you.”
“You’ve become such an ass
since Curry found Chansey. There’s no way you’re not jealous. I just haven’t
figured out if it’s because Chansey is taking Curry away from you or because
you want an Agápe too,” Gia accused, then bumped fists with Lairah.
A smug look crossed Sol’s
face. “Well, this ass has a perfect idea for Chansey’s birthday, so do you want
to know what it is or not?”
I threw my hands up. “Hey, I
didn’t accuse you of anything. You’ve always been an ass in my book and that
hasn’t changed since Chansey came along,” I joked.
He nodded in recognition and
said, “You damn skippy.”
I was anxious to hear his
suggestion. “So, what’s your idea, Skippy?”
“If I’m right, Chansey is so
going to dig this and you’ll score some major fiancé/husband/Agápe points with
her. Do you remember when you went back to Pascagoula about twelve years ago
and went by your house?”
I was puzzled by where this
was going. “Yeah , I remember.”
“If I recall correctly, you
had just become very interested in photography and you took a lot of pictures
of the house. You made me look through like five thousand pictures I cared
nothing about, but I remember the owners were in some of them and they were
having a birthday party for a kid out in the yard. Is it possible for that to
have been Chansey and her family? If it was her, then you saw her for the first
time when she was a kid and you captured it on film.
He was right. I went crazy
taking pictures that day and used every roll of film I had with me. “You are
absolutely brilliant, Sol. Girls, you can’t call him a buffoon anymore.”
Gia splashed water at Sol
and said, “You don’t know if that was Chansey and her family, so we reserve the
right to call him a buffoon until we have proof otherwise.”
Sol dunked Gia and when she
came up, he said, “You are both going to eat your words on this one, girls.
There’s no doubt in my mind that those negatives are full of Chansey Leclaire
and her family because he was like a madman with all of the pictures he took of
that girl and her family. At the time, I wondered if he was some kind of weird
vampire pedophile, but it all makes sense now. It didn’t matter that she was a
child. Even then, he was drawn to her because she was his Agápe.”
“I think you’re right and
what makes this even more awesome is that Chansey told me today that she has no
pictures of her family together because she lost all of them in Hurricane
Katrina.” I started walking toward the house. “I’ve got to find those negatives
before Chansey wakes up. Thank you, Sol. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“Yeah, I know. I’m pretty
awesome,” he boasted.
I went to my old darkroom
where I kept my negatives filed away and began my search. Ugh! I should have
filed these by date or something because I had years and years of negatives to
search through. My heart pounded as I searched and I prayed Sol was right.
Please let it be Chansey and her family.
After twenty minutes of
searching, I found the negatives from that day. I held them up to the light and
saw the outline of a family but even my vampire vision couldn’t make out if it
was Chansey and her family or not.
I stopped using film when
digital photography became popular, so it had been years since I printed
photographs from negatives, but I didn’t need any of those supplies because I
could scan the negative and upload it to my computer. Got to love technology.
I silently went to my
bedroom and moved all of my necessary equipment to another bedroom so I
wouldn’t wake Chansey and ruin the surprise. I scanned the negatives and waited
to see the images on my computer screen. And there she was...a young Chansey
with her family. I was ecstatic because I was going to be able to give her the
one thing no one else could...an intact photograph of her family together.
I printed the best one on
canvas and chose a few others for an album before I went back out to the pool
to tell the others my good news.
I held up one of the photos
and said, “Well, ladies, here’s the proof. I’m afraid you better come up with
another name for Sol besides buffoon because he was right. It was Chansey and
her family.”
“Dammit!” Gia swore as she
slapped the water. “I’m sorry, Curry. I didn’t mean that. I’m happy for you.”
Sol got out of the pool and
reached for one of the two towels on the table. “I think Mr. Fabulous has a
nice ring to it.”
Lairah was fuming. “Well, I
think jerk off sounds more like it. You didn’t bring a towel with you, so that
means you just stole one of ours.”
“Sorry ladies, it’s one of
the perks of being Mr. Fabulous,” he said as he used one of their towels to dry
off.
“You make me want to throw
up,” Gia gritted through her teeth.
Sol enjoyed the aggravation
he was causing and said, “Darling, you haven’t thrown up since you were human.”
“Whatever, jerk off.”
Lairah attempted to cool Gia
saying, “Calm down, girl. You’re giving him way too much satisfaction by
getting all riled up.” She turned to me and continued, “I was thinking while
you were inside. I know of a cool band playing tomorrow night at a club on
Bourbon. My friend, Jett, plays bass. Chansey is musically inclined, so I know
she will love to hear them. Why don’t we all meet at the club after you take
her to dinner and we’ll celebrate her birthday together with a night out on the
town? We’ll show her how to party vampire style.”
“I think she would love that
and your suggestion gave me an idea. Do you think I could get your cool band to
do a special song request?”
“Jett will do anything for
me,” Lairah promised.
“And is your friend, Jett, a
human or a vampire?” I questioned.
“He’s human, but he’s so
cool. I wish he was vampire because I could so dig him if he was. What do I
need to tell him to play?”
“Van Morrison’s ‘Steal My
Heart Away.’It was playing during our first dance.”
“Nice one,” Lairah
complimented.
“It was such a bittersweet
first dance because I thought it was our first and last. I loved her so much
and I thought I was about to leave her forever.”
“It was your choice to
leave, you ignoramus. Nobody forced you. Maybe you’re the buffoon instead of
Solomon,” Lairah laughed.
“That’s what I’m talking
about...someone else being the buffoon,” Solomon interjected.
“I realized my mistake and
it won’t happen again. That I can promise you.”
About the Author:
I reside in rural Mississippi with my wonderful
husband, Jeff, and our two beautiful daughters.
I spent thirteen years as a labor and delivery nurse
before I decided to pursue my dream of becoming an author.
Blood of Anteros, Book One in The Vampire Agápe Series, was my first novel and it was released in September
2011.
I decided to step away from the paranormal genre to
try my hand at a young adult romance and I loved it. It was so much fun, I plan
to do it again in the near future.
Author Georgia Cates gives us
this little tidbit:
Top 6 Words to
describe Blood Jewel and why:
Unique-
Blood Jewel is about the
love affair between a vampire and his destined mate, Chansey, which is mostly
human. The story is Curry’s, so it is written from a male vampire’s POV. In
your tradition vampire/human romance, you read the story from the female
character’s POV and the reader completely misses the emotions felt by the male
vampire. Blood of Anteros and Blood Jewel both take the reader into the mind of
the lead male’s vampire character.
Romantic-
Back to the male POV...my
gosh, who wouldn’t want to hear the romantic thoughts of the man in your life?
Curry’s love for Chansey is so sweet and tender, but that in no way makes him a
sap. He is an alpha male so we see his possessive, protective side as well.
(Sigh)
Sexy-
What can I say? This couple
is hot and their chemistry is on FIRE! Someone get an extinguisher. In Blood of
Anteros, we saw Chansey pushing Curry for an intimate relationship and he shows
a lot of restraint, but his desire for Chansey becomes uninhibited in Blood
Jewel. No more holding back. That’s all I’m saying about that. (Fanning myself)
Fulfilling-
The details and outcome of
Curry and Chansey’s romantic adventure and love affair is fulfilling for the
reader, while leaving room for potential future drama. In other words, you will
get that ending we all know you want for them.
Insightful-
Blood Jewel is a fresh twist
on the vampire world. Let’s face it...vampires have been done well and not so
well, but I approached Blood Jewel with emphasis on the Agápe. To me, it is
more about the Agape than it is about vampires.
Exciting-
Love never comes easy for a
vampire and his Agápe and it never will. Their relationship will always include
danger and struggle, although they were chosen for one another by the god,
Anteros. What kind of story would we have it Love ever came easily?
Links
This
product or book may have been distributed for review; this in no way affects my
opinions or reviews.
Title: Bookended by Beauty Queens
