Wednesday, October 15, 2014

*Christina Henry's Black Spring Blog Tour* Giveaway, Excerpt, and Review


My apologies to Let's Talk! Promotions and Christina Henry for not posting this 
on my actual date. My brain took an unnecessary vacation from reality and totally
forgot to schedule this post! Better a little late, than not at all!

Today, I am featuring a snippet of Black Spring, a full review, and a tour wide
giveaway that you can't miss out on! Make sure you travel all the way to the bottom
of this post to get the 411 on the giveaway!

Thank you, as always, for stopping by and checking out my post!

BLACK SPRING (Black Wings #7)
Publication date: October 28, 2014
ISBN: 9780425266786

BLACK SPRING blurb:

A former Agent of death, Madeline Black now has everything to live for, most importantly, her unborn child. But Chicago has become ground zero in a struggle between ancient creatures, and only Maddy can stop the carnage…

The mayor of Chicago has announced a plan to round up the city’s supernatural beings and put them in camps. With her due date looming, Maddy’s best move would be to lay low for a while. But not everyone is willing to respect her privacy. Hounded by tentacled monsters, a rogue shapeshifter, and a tenacious blogger, Maddy turns to her most powerful ally, her uncle Daharan, only to find him missing.

Just when it seems like things can’t get any worse, Maddy gets an invitation in the mail—to Lucifer’s wedding. Turns out everyone has been invited, friends and enemies alike. And with that kind of guest list, it’s highly unlikely there will be a happily ever after.

*~*REVIEW*~*

**I received this book for free from Let's Talk! Promotions/Ace in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!! This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.**

*Genre* Urban Fantasy
*Rating* 3.5

*My Thoughts*

Black Spring is the apparent finale to the Black Wings series that has seen the rise of Madeline (Maddy) Black from poor food critique, to being an Agent of Death like her mother, to saving Chicago from Vampires, and soon she will be a mother to a baby with unknown abilities and power thanks to her relationship with Gabriel. With this being the series finale, Maddy once again faces some interesting challenges with her friends Nathaniel, Beezle, Samiel, Jude, and J.B alongside.

Jack Debrowski, supernatural blogger, won't go away and wants Maddy to become the intermediary between humans and Chicago's supernaturals. An unknown shifter focuses all his attention on destroying Maddy & her gang. The mayor of Chicago wants to register, IE, put all the supernaturals of Chicago into a gulag and the number one person at the top of that list, might be Maddy herself since she's the most visible. If that weren't enough, Maddy and gang are mandated to attend Lucifer's wedding where anyone who has ever had a beef with Maddy will be in attendance. What could possibly go wrong?

Maddy never, ever takes things the easy way out. She's more like the Hulk, smashing, and burning down things in order to save not only herself, but her rag tag gang of supernatural misfits. She's been forced to face some of the most powerful group of supernatural villains ever created in one series. The one thing that she knows for sure, however, is that Lucifer's machinations would finally reveal themselves in all their glory. Nobody who has followed this series should be surprised by anything that happens right up until the very last page.

It is that time for me to admit that I was bored with Beezle this time out. For the past 7 novels, he has been the comic relief in times of great distress and times where Maddy questioned her abilities and whether or she was actually a good person. Often times, however, I roll my eyes, and shout SHUT UP! at the book because it's a little over the top. Thankfully, there are some good things about him, and probably outweighs the strange commentary.

I have found myself struggling with Maddy's relationship with Nathaniel for several books now. I have a long memory of things he's done in the past and just the mention of Gabriel's time with Maddy brings mist to my eyes. I guess it is time to expect that nothing will ever bring Gabriel back, and Maddy seems attached to the hip with Nathaniel now. He is extremely protective of her, and really does try to make her understand that she doesn't have to fight the good fight alone any longer, nor does she necessarily have to destroy everything in her path to defeat her enemies. If you've read this series, then you know about J.B. He's a good guy, but perhaps not what Maddy needs to protect her baby. I was truly hoping for a happy ending for J.B. who definitely deserves it for all the trouble Maddy has caused over the course of this series.

In the end, Black Spring ties up most of the loose ends, including Jude's past, and Lucifer's end game. It is a bit on the predictable side. I did like that Daharan was exactly as Maddy had hoped; someone who can ensure that Lucifer and his brothers don't gain an advantage over her, and protects her baby from being used as a pawn. Obviously, if you have made it to this point in the series, you definitely must read Black Spring right to the final page to see how Christina Henry ends her series.

Expected publication: October 28th 2014 by Ace
“I told you to leave me alone,” I said to Jack.
“And I told you that I wasn’t going to stop,” Jack said, his feet dangling above the ground. “Hey, can you get your goon to let me down? It’s kind of hard to breathe when I’m in this position.” 
“It’s kind of hard to breathe when angry supernatural creatures decide to punish you for not leaving well enough alone,” I said, but I nodded at Nathaniel to release Jack. 
He did so, but made sure to stand close by and loom over the blogger. Nathaniel looms well. His height—well over six feet—helps with that. 
Jude gave Jack a pointed look and growled. Jack gave Jude a nervous glance and backed away a few inches, which  naturally caused him to bump into Nathaniel. He glanced up at Nathaniel’s cold, hard face, muttered, “Sorry,” and tried to find a position far from both Jude and Nathaniel. 
Since we were all crowded around him in our best menacing fashion, this necessitated a lot of uncertain shuffling on his part. I watched him with a mixture of amusement and frustration. He was so far out of his depth, but he refused to be scared away. 



CHRISTINA HENRY is the author of the BLACK WINGS series (Ace/Roc) featuring Madeline Black, an Agent of Death, and her popcorn-loving gargoyle sidekick Beezle: BLACK WINGS, BLACK NIGHT, BLACK HOWL, BLACK LAMENT, BLACK CITY, BLACK HEART and BLACK SPRING. She is also the author of the forthcoming dark fantasy ALICE (summer 2015).

Christina was born in New York and now lives on the North Side of Chicago with her husband and son. She sees no conflict in rooting for both the Yankees and the Cubs.
She also enjoys running long distances, eating large quantities of cinnamon rolls, reading anything she can get her hands on and watching movies with zombies, samurai and/or subtitles. 

Giveaway info:

We are running a HUGE giveaway hop! Feel free to share the widget below with your tour post. The details!
- 1 winner will receive a tote from Penguin with all 7 books in the series
- 1 winner will receive a signed SET of all 7 books from Christina Henry PLUS a $25 gift card to Barnes & Noble
- 2 winners will receive a signed SET of all 7 books from Christina Henry
- Giveaway hop will run Oct. 6 to Nov. 7, and we will pick the lucky winners. You don’t have to do anything but share! And if you do share, let me know what your twitter handle and/or Facebook page links are and I will add to the widget entry options.

a Rafflecopter giveaway


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