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Monday, February 16, 2015

A maze of hate, personal grudges, and mortal danger - Infected: Prey (Infected #1) by Andrea Speed

He cracked open the gun and made sure he had some shells loaded in it before snapping it shut again with a sharp flick of his wrist. Man that felt good. This was a real man’s weapon, made him feel a foot taller and made of pure muscle, and he knew why that meth fuckhead was carrying it around with him. A weapon like this was a real god-killer; it made you feel invincible.

Description:

Cover Artist: Anne Cain

In a world where a werecat virus has changed society, Roan McKichan, a born infected and ex-cop, works as a private detective trying to solve crimes involving other infecteds.

The murder of a former cop draws Roan into an odd case where an unidentifiable species of cat appears to be showing an unusual level of intelligence. He juggles that with trying to find a missing teenage boy, who, unbeknownst to his parents, was “cat” obsessed. And when someone is brutally murdering infecteds, Eli Winters, leader of the Church of the Divine Transformation, hires Roan to find the killer before he closes in on Eli.

Working the crimes will lead Roan through a maze of hate, personal grudges, and mortal danger. With help from his tiger-strain infected partner, Paris Lehane, he does his best to survive in a world that hates and fears their kind… and occasionally worships them.

GUEST POST

Can I be frank right up front, and admit that I hate sub-genre categorization? Not the genre themselves, mind you, just the strange need to put things in ever dwindling categories. 

Yes, I know everyone has different tastes, and a person who wants to read a romance featuring a woman, a robot bull, and a peglegged pirate is going to be put out if the romance they end up with features two women in a steampunk hellscape. But there's this part of me that just insists “hell with it”. Label it all romance and throw caution to the wind. Make them read the blurb before deciding to buy a book. 

It's not just romance that I have this issue with. Science-fiction has sub-genres to sub-genres (don't want to mix up your military sci-fi with your hard sci-fi with your space-opera or science fantasy), and I feel like throwing them all into the same pile and making the readers either read the back cover or take a chance. But I guess I'm what you call an adventurous reader, in that I will pull anything off the shelf that interests me, and I don't care what the sub-genre is. I've discovered a lot of good writers simply by picking up books I wouldn't necessarily have read under other circumstances. 

Which brings me to the question if it's difficult writing M/M as opposed to “normal” romance. No. Not at all. Because characters are characters. They are who they are, regardless of their sexual persuasion (or lack thereof). That's kind of like asking “Is it difficult to write about a minimum wage earning character as opposed to a more comfortable middle class one?” It's such a weird question. Are they implying something in the question? Are they asking is it more difficult because this class of people have been historically disparaged, or are they asking because they think it's a bit like a performing elephant, with great gawking value? I don't know, and I don't want to offend anyone with my response. But characters are characters; they are who they are, just like you are who you are. Why should their be a complication in that? 

I suppose it's like those weirdly regressive things that inevitably surface in book/TV/movie discussions: women can't write men/men can't write women (although the accusation is thrown at women more often, while men often use the latter as an excuse for poor writing). Umm, yes they can. If they are a writer with any imagination and empathy, they can. Gender shouldn't be a huge stopping point, and I don't know why, in this day and age, it is. We're not a diffferent species; many things are universal to the Human (not man, not woman – Human) experience. We all have needs, fears, and desires. We all bleed if cut. Is it so difficult to start from that point? 

I feel like I've devolved into a rant, and I didn't mean to. But if you are a writer worth your salt, you can write anything. Even that robot bull I mentioned earlier. But keep in mind that bleeding rule doesn't apply to them. (If you cut them, they mght leak, but they may not. Depends on the type of robot, and where you cut. I don't know, it's your robot.)

About the author:
Andrea Speed was born looking for trouble in some hot month without an R in it. While succeeding in finding Trouble, she has also been found by its twin brother, Clean Up, and is now on the run, wanted for the murder of a mop and a really cute, innocent bucket that was only one day away from retirement. (I was framed, I tell you - framed!)

In her spare time, she arms lemurs in preparation for the upcoming war against the Mole Men. Viva la revolution!

Author's Giveaway a Rafflecopter giveaway

21 comments:

  1. Awesome,thanks for the chance!!!

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  2. I looking forward to reading the book and thank you for the great giveaway.

    ShirleyAnn(at)speakman40(dot)freeserve(dot)co(dot)uk

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  3. I would love to read this book. Story sounds like a keeper.

    Juana Esparza

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  4. I really enjoy the Infected series. AS writes intense and interesting characters.

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  5. thanx for the giveaway and good luck everyone

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  6. Looks very god thank you for the information will go look it up.

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  7. This sounds very intriguing. I need to read it.

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  8. Wow, prize kindle is fab. & splendid. 2 fingers snap. It is tight, fly & off the chain. Thank you for the awesomeness, the contest, and generosity. Pick me, pick me! Dear Santa: I’ve been nice. My X-Mas wish this year is to win this contest. Starving artist here desperately needs the kindle to read, work eat again.

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  9. I love the job that she assigns to her main character! I feel like werecats are probably well suited to detective work. You'd think that a society well aware of the virus would put those into job positions they're uniquely qualified for. But it's not surprising that there's a divide between those with and without the virus - it's how our own society is. People tend to fear what they don't know.

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  10. Sound very intense. Will add this to my want to read list.

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  11. sounds like a great book and I want to read it. thanks for the chance

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  12. Sounds intriguing I can never get enough of sci fi

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  13. Sounds like a great book!

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  14. Werecats...that's a new twist on the werewolf cliche. This sounds like breathing new life into a genre! I like the plot line.

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  15. sounds wonderful, thanks for the chance!

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  16. Sounds like a great book! Thanks for the giveaway.

    rounder9834 @yahoo.com

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