... into the fire... Phoenix Rising Series by Alexandra Christian

"Just when I think I can finally give up on romance, I find a book like this. [...] This book is so far beyond the current norm for action-adventure and sci-fi romance it's almost ridiculous. [...] There's world-building here that rivals most of the Nebula and Hugo winners I've read lately. [...] Not to be missed." -Lucy about #1, Goodreads

Description:

Naked 

Published: April 2017

OUT OF THE STACKS

Librarian Phoebe Addison has lived her entire life within a seventy-five mile radius of her small Louisiana town, but when she receives a strange medallion from her adventurous, off-world sister, reality tilts toward the bizarre. Everything Phoe thought she knew is…well, wrong. Dead wrong. But bone-numbing fear has no place in this brave new world—nor by the side of the dangerous, exquisite man who saves her life.

…AND INTO THE FIRE

Following the tragic slaughter of his family, operative Macijah “Cage” St. John understands evil in a way no man ever should. He traded happiness for a magnificent and terrible power, and fate isn’t done with him yet. He wasn’t looking for comfort. He didn’t need tenderness. But today he’ll play hero to a damsel in distress, and his quest will deliver him to the uncanny Martian colony of New London—and his heart to the demure Phoebe Addison. The bookish beauty’s hidden talents and deep abiding love just might save Cage from himself.

Neo-Geisha 

Published: October 26th, 2017 

Reluctant to become a spy again, Macijah "Cage" St. John's instincts prove correct when all hell breaks loose for him and his lady love, Phoebe Addison, who is also his new partner. 

BACK... 

Macijah "Cage" St. John' didn't want the spy life anymore. He would have been thrilled to spend every morning lying in the field behind Phoe's home in smalltown Louisiana watching the clouds roll by. But his Miss Addison wanted to spread her wings, literally. So Cage accepted a mission that teamed him up with his lady love. If only he had trusted her. 

TO THE FUTURE 

Everything about being a spy was a million times more exciting, and scarier, than the books she'd read in her former life as a librarian. When her first mission with Cage turned into a colossal clusterf*ck because he withheld information and kept secrets, Phoebe's world narrowed into a long tunnel of betrayal. Captured by space pirates and delivered to a horrible fate, she wished the last words between them had been of love, because she was certain she would never see Cage St. John again. 

GUEST POST

Genre Crushing: Mixing Sci-Fi and Paranormal 

I have a confession to make: I’ve always been a difficult reader. As in, difficult to please. I’m the girl that you’d see mumbling angrily to herself in the bookstore stacks. The one who reads the back of a book, rolls her eyes, and puts it back before moving on to another. Shopkeepers hate people like me. I move through the sci-fi/ fantasy and romance shelves like a tornado, leaving the wreckage of mis-shelved books in its wake. 

It isn’t because the books stink or that they’re cliched. I realize that I’m the one with the problem. The books I like to read are simply unshelvable. The perfect book for me has elements of horror, urban fantasy, science-fiction, and at the center of it all—a romance that’s tender, hot, and not too mushy. See? I’m a difficult reader. So I found myself writing stories that I would like to read. Then I had the thought—surely there are other “difficult readers” out there looking for an action-packed storyline with a romance in the center. Remember that movie, Romancing the Stone? I wanted to write a book like that. Except with monsters. But I couldn’t take one more shapeshifter romance where an unsuspecting woman is wooed by her fated mate that turns into a tiger or wolf or badger… 

And thus, the Phoenix Rising series was born. 

At the time that I wrote the first book in the series, Naked, shape-shifters were everywhere. Clans of people that were werewolves, or people that had been cursed to turn into rage-filled were-creatures. I didn’t want to write a book that would get lost in that shuffle, and I became interested in the idea of using science to create a shapeshifter. Why would they want to do such a thing? Well, to create soldiers that would fight some impending threat that was unaffected by regular means. What kinds of impending threats? Aliens? Well, aliens are interesting, but less sexy. What if what we think of as “monsters” (i.e.—vampires, werewolves, dragons) are actually alien species? And suddenly my story about a shapeshifting soldier became a science-fiction story. Whenever science experiments go wrong, there is always a governmental agency to blame. So maybe my shapeshifting soldier isn’t a soldier, but a government agent. A spy. BINGO! I’m a huge fan of James Bond, and that was the kind of feel I wanted to have: intrigue, sleek, futuristic settings, and a main character who was smarter and more physically adept than anyone else. Pair that with a heroine who is, at first, the polar opposite of the hero, and now we have a romance novel. 

I always get strange looks when I talk about crossing the genres of paranormal and sci-fi, but it really isn’t that difficult to imagine. Through writing the Phoenix Rising series, I’ve found that the two genres are quite similar. The world-building can be pretty extensive in both genres. The task of making unbelievable characters seem down-to-Earth and relatable is a challenge for both paranormal and sci-fi authors alike. 

I suppose the key is to realize that we’re writing about people, regardless of whether they live down the street or on a space colony. If your stories are true to the people, then the readers will come. 

TOUR SCHEDULE

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About the author: 

Alexandra Christian is an author of mostly romance with a speculative slant. Her love of Stephen King and sweet tea has flavored her fiction with a Southern Gothic sensibility that reeks of Spanish moss and deep fried eccentricity. Lexx likes to keep her fingers in lots of different pies having written everything from sci-fi and horror to Sherlock Holmes adventures. 

A self-proclaimed “Southern Belle from Hell,” Lexx is a native South Carolinian who lives with an epileptic wiener dog and her husband, author Tally Johnson. Her long-term aspirations are to one day be a best-selling authoress and part-time pinup girl. She’s a member of Romance Writers of America.

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