The Demon’s Fire
Blood Coven, #2
by T. M. Smith
Date of Publication: May 26th 2023
Publisher: Evernight Publishing
Cover Artist: Jay Aheer
Genre: Paranormal Romance
ISBN: 978-0-3695-0823-2
ASIN: B0C5S5RCS3
Number of pages: 437
Word Count: 117,584
Tagline: When fire meets ice, romance sizzles.
BLURB
He’s not her type at all…
The commander is a barbarian. Despite a sexy smile and hot body, nothing can smooth the brute’s ragged edges. Besides, demons need a daily dose of sex. Skyler Maxwell has no intention of becoming a food source.
She’s not his type at all…
The chief legal officer of the Alliance is a buttoned-up, prissy human with frost in her veins. But Kole is stuck playing tour guide for her while she’s on his realm. He was ordered to “play nice.”
Together, Skyler and Kole are fire and ice…
She has a bullseye on her back, and the animus demon is her best chance to stay out of the line of fire. Trapped in a hostile environment, they survive mystical monsters and treacherous attacks. Despite the perils and their differences, their romance ignites, proving fire and ice sizzle.
Excerpt
Kole sheathed his blade, turned, and offered Skyler his hand. When she placed her pale, trembling fingers in his palm, he drew her close to his body. She raised her chin to stare into his fire-gold eyes.
Kole bent toward her, his lips drawing nearer. When his mouth brushed hers, rather than push him away, she opened to him. Kole’s lips pressed hard against hers, his tongue thrusting inside, his exploration wild, hungry.
Skyler gasped, shocked by either the kiss or her response. Her knees weakened, her hands resting on Kole’s warm chest for support. Short bursts of electricity flowed into her, eliciting soft moans as he pulled her tighter against him, his arousal a hard prod at her belly.
When he withdrew, he met her gaze with confusion. He cleared his throat.
“Choose, Chief Maxwell. Dermott or me?”
Author Info
After retiring from my career as a teacher and principal, I settled in to write something more creative than lesson plans on split infinitives and inner-school memos on noise in the hallway.
Vampires, demons, elves, mages, and other magical beings keep me awake at night with their tales of love and adventure. Taking great interest in their lives, I began a paranormal romance series with alpha males who aren't always nice and females who have no problem keeping them in line. The Firebrand is the first book in the Blood Coven Series.
Here are more orts, scraps, and fragments from my life. (Thank you, Virginia Wolf and Shakespeare.) I moved from sunny Las Vegas to the less-than-sunny Pacific Northwest. Here I have adventures with my daughter, son-in-law, and two granddaughters who also moved to the area. I also enjoy my membership at Bainbridge Artisan Resource Network (BARN), a local organization that supports the arts and offers classes and events in eleven different studios. It was at BARN where my critique group began. With equal time given to in-depth comments on each other's works, snarky remarks, and laughter, we have now been together over five years.
The Book Junkie Reads . . . Interview with . . . T. M. Smith . . .
How would you describe your style of writing to someone that has never read your work?
My writing style is an extension of the action and the characters. When the action heats up, so do my sentences, becoming one word or a clipped series of words. Likewise, when my characters express their thoughts, I try to mimic what happens in their heads. A disjointed phrase. A fleeting idea. A moment of self-talk. And warning. Since many of my characters are battle-hardened warriors in another realm, their vocabulary is liberally sprinkled with four-letter words. I also try not to over-explain how my characters feel or their tone of voice when they are speaking, preferring the dialogue and actions to speak for themselves.
Do you feel that writing is an ingrained process or just something that flows naturally for you?
For me, writing is both an ingrained process and something that flows naturally.
Some ideas, particularly in the early stages of the writing process—the development of a premise, the outlining of events that will move the story along, the setup of the story and the rising action–flow easily, like water over a steep fall.
After that point in the process, writing becomes more labored. It is an awkward dance, a movement back and forth, to and fro. I move forward by writing the next scene. I go backward to edit. I advance again. Something in the current scene requires I return to a previous chapter and fill in missing parts. As you can see, this process can take months of work. It can be tedious and frustrating.
But writing is a joy, passion, tedious labor, and necessity for my well-being.
Do you have a character that you have been working on for a long time that still isn't quite ready, but fills you with excitement to work on the story?
Once I finished the Blood Coven Series, I was excited to begin another, shorter series. I like my chosen MMC and MFC. When they are apart. When they are together, however, I’m having trouble hearing their voices clearly. So, I keep writing and re-writing their dialogue, trying to uncover how they interact, how they balance each other, how they attract each other, the tension between them. You get the drift.
They still aren’t where I want them. And this is a new experience for me. Usually, once I define and describe my characters, I hear and see them with a sharp clarity. I remain determined to help Dom and Mysty find their way.
Have you found yourself bonding with any particular character(s)? If so, which one(s)?
I did bond with a particular character—Indigo, a witch who is Rein’s aunt and Alarik’s half-sister. She is a character who appears in all five books of the Blood Coven Series. Think of her as a hippie with serious skills. The Aeternals in her realm, Scath, see her as quirky, though powerful. As the only mage who can read the River Am, studying in it the past, present, and possible future, she bears a heavy burden. But she has borne heavier. (Hush. It’s a secret.) No one would know, however, because she hides behind a mask. To those who aren’t close, she is flighty, frivolous, and fanciful. But they should watch out.
If you could have dinner/dinner party with 7 fictional characters, who would they be?
1. Ari Ben Canaan from Leon Uris’s Exodus because he is the perfect hero—handsome, brave, and on a mission. I would sit him next to me.
2. Scarlett O’Hara from Gone With the Wind because maybe she’s back together with Rhett Butler and he’d escort her to dinner.
3. Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird because I think he’d be a great conversationalist.
4. J. D. Salinger’s Seymour Glass because every dinner party needs an intellectual outsider who will renounce society with sardonic comments.
5. Harry Potter who’d be asked to bring his wand and keep everyone at the table safe.
6. Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Along with Atticus Finch, she’d keep the conversation going and add some humor.
7. The invisible man from Ralph Ellison’s book by the same name because I want to know his name. Surely, he would introduce himself. Though, I suppose, such would ruin the idea of the novel.
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Thanks for posting my interview.
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