Showing posts with label Prince Lestat. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Prince Lestat. Show all posts

Thursday, January 28, 2016

Top Five Reads of 2015

Hello out there historical fiction junkies! I did my post a little bit different this year and kept up with what I did last year for my top reads of the year. I made a video for you all and I hope that you all enjoy watching me in action. This year I picked out 5 of my favorites and not all of them are historical fiction there is a pretty good mix up of genre's. For more information on the novels I picked for my favorite 2015 reads be sure and scroll below for full descriptions and links to amazon.


In order of appearance:
An Heiress at Heart by Jennifer Delamere
"A youthful indiscretion has cost Lizzie Poole more than just her honor. After five years living in exile, she's finally returning home, but she's still living a secret life. Her best friend Ria's dying wish was for Lizzie to assume her identity, return to London, and make amends that Ria herself would never live to make. Bearing a striking resemblance to her friend, and harboring more secrets than ever before, Lizzie embarks on a journey that tempts her reckless heart once again . . .
A committed clergyman, Geoffrey Somerville's world is upended when he suddenly inherits the title of Lord Somerville. Now he's invited to every ball and sought after by the matchmaking mothers of London society. Yet the only woman to capture his heart is the one he cannot have: his brother's young widow, Ria. Duty demands he deny his feelings, but his heart longs for the mysterious beauty. With both their futures at stake, will Lizzie be able to keep up her façade? Or will she find the strength to share her secret and put her faith in true love"?


The Girl on the Golden Coin by Marci Jefferson
"Impoverished and exiled to the French countryside after the overthrow of the English Crown, Frances Stuart survives merely by her blood-relation to the Stuart Royals. But in 1660, the Restoration of the Stuart Monarchy in England returns her family to favor. Frances discards threadbare gowns and moves to gilded Fontainebleau Palace, where she soon catches the Sun King's eye. But Frances is no ordinary court beauty-she has Stuart secrets to keep and her family to protect. King Louis XIV turns vengeful when she rejects his offer to become his Official Mistress. He banishes her to England with orders to seduce King Charles II and secure an alliance.

Armed in pearls and silks, Frances maneuvers the political turbulence of Whitehall Palace, but still can't afford to stir a scandal. Her tactic to inspire King Charles to greatness captivates him. He believes her love can make him a better man, and even chooses Frances to pose as Britannia for England's coins. Frances survives the Great Fire, the Great Plague, and the debauchery of the Restoration Court, yet loses her heart to the very king she must control. The discovery of a dangerous plot will force her to choose between love for herself and war for her beloved country.
Debut author Marci Jefferson's Girl on the Golden Coin brings to life a captivating woman whose beauty, compassion, and intellect impacted a king and a nation".

Rebel Queen by Michelle Moran
"From the internationally bestselling author of Nefertiti and Cleopatra’s Daughter comes the breathtaking story of Queen Lakshmi—India’s Joan of Arc—who against all odds defied the mighty British invasion to defend her beloved kingdom.
When the British Empire sets its sights on India in the mid-nineteenth century, it expects a quick and easy conquest. India is fractured and divided into kingdoms, each independent and wary of one another, seemingly no match for the might of the English. But when they arrive in the Kingdom of Jhansi, the British army is met with a surprising challenge.

Instead of surrendering, Queen Lakshmi raises two armies—one male and one female—and rides into battle, determined to protect her country and her people. Although her soldiers may not appear at first to be formidable against superior British weaponry and training, Lakshmi refuses to back down from the empire determined to take away the land she loves.

Told from the unexpected perspective of Sita—Queen Lakshmi’s most favored companion and most trusted soldier in the all-female army—Rebel Queen shines a light on a time and place rarely explored in historical fiction. In the tradition of her bestselling novel, Nefertiti, and through her strong, independent heroines fighting to make their way in a male dominated world, Michelle Moran brings nineteenth-century India to rich, vibrant life".
The Sharp Hook of Love by Sherry Jones
"Among the young women of twelfth-century Paris, Heloise d’Argenteuil stands apart. Extraordinarily educated and quick-witted, she is being groomed by her uncle to become an abbess in the service of God.
But with one encounter, her destiny changes forever. Pierre Abelard, headmaster at the Notre-Dame Cloister School, is acclaimed as one of the greatest philosophers in France. His controversial reputation only adds to his allure, yet despite the legions of women swooning over his poetry and dashing looks, he is captivated by the brilliant Heloise alone. As their relationship blossoms from a meeting of the minds to a forbidden love affair, both Heloise and Abelard must choose between love, duty, and ambition.

Sherry Jones weaves the lovers’ own words into an evocative account of desire and sacrifice. As intimate as it is erotic, as devastating as it is beautiful, The Sharp Hook of Love is a poignant, tender tribute to one of history’s greatest romances, and to love’s power to transform and endure".
Prince Lestat by Anne Rice
"Old vampires, roused from deep slumber in the earth, are doing the bidding of a Voice commanding that they indiscriminately burn their kin in cities across the globe, from Paris to Mumbai, Hong Kong to San Francisco. Left with little time to spare, a host of familiar characters including Louis de Pointe du Lac, Armand, and even the vampire Lestat, must embark on a journey to discover who—or what—is driving this mysterious being".

Sunday, January 18, 2015

Book Review: PRINCE LESTAT by Anne Rice

The vampire Lestat is finally back. This time he has a purpose he just does not know it yet. Picking up in modern times Lestat is still the pitiful self-made outcast.  Loathing himself he has refused to intergrade himself back into his vampire family. In his self-imposed exile Lestat roams the world haunted by the past that he cannot change. While wandering he does a few miraculous things, first he saves a little girl named Rose from utter destruction and becomes her uncle “Lestan”. Second he meets two unique vampires one of very ancient lineage named Seth that is the human son of the dead queen of the damned Akasha. Seth’s newly made vampire partner Dr. Fareed is a genius doctor that has quickly become a valuable asset to the “vampire tribe”. In his medical experiments Fareed has discovered a way to stop the vampire blood in the body long enough to give Margaret new eyes and Flavious a new leg.  With these medical break troughs whirling around the vampire community is on the cusp of a new era not just medically but also socially. The vampire dj Benji has taken notice of this and on his nightly broadcasts he tells all the vampires that  “we are a tribe of one” and every night he begs Lestat to come home and help the tribe. Lestat refuses to do so but Benji’s pleas do not go unheard.

The whole vampire community is still recovering in the wake of the terrible events that Queen Akasha dealt them. At the time no one knew that when she awoke she also woke up many super ancient vampires that had been sleeping for centuries and even some millenniums. As they have been coming to many have found that this mysterious “voice” has been talking to them demanding the destruction of the young vampires all across the world. Some of the ancient ones had fallen victim to incessant demands of the Voice nearly driving them to madness. Lestat has become a great vampire of interest to the Voice and loved to torment him.  The torment of the Voice had been harassing Lestat for quite some time until the burnings of the young ones began. That was Benji’s reason in vigilantly calling Lestat home to the tribe. There is only one way the vampire tribe was going to figure out what this mysterious Voice wants. They would all have to come together to and use all of their strength to find out where this voice is coming from. Only then will they discover its reasons for wanting to destroy the young ones.  The Voice must be stopped at all costs before it kills them all.

5/5 I loved this wonderful addition to the Vampire Chronicles because it almost brings every single one of the vampire characters together. The only part of this novel that I did not like was that Anne left out Tarquin Blackwood and Mona Mayfair.  The only reason it upset me that there was no mention of them was because the last two previous novels in the series were completely devoted to Lestat’s adventures with Mona and Quinn in New Orleans. I was disappointed because I felt that if everyone was coming together to be a tribe then that would include Mona and Quinn. On a really positive note there was a new feature I really found useful that none of the previous novels had and at the very end of the novel there is a full character index and an “informal” guide to the whole series. I found both of these features really helpful in jogging my memory on the previous novels events and it really helped in keeping track of all the newly awaken vampires. I would not recommend this novel as a stand-alone novel because it literally pulls the previous twelve novels together. If you really want to read this novel with out reading all twelve other novels I would recommend at least reading “The Queen of the Damned” because then you will at least get the major points in the back history.

R ~ Rating for sexual references and graphic violence

FTC ~ this novel is from my personal collection. I received no compensation for this review and it is reflective of my honest opinion of this novel.

A M A Z O N

STAY CONNECTED WITH ME: 
~L I Z Z I E~

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

New Release, In Stores Today! Prince Lestat by Anne Rice

"Prince Lestat by" Anne Rice
Released 10.28.2014
"The novel opens with the vampire world in crisis...vampires have been proliferating out of control; burnings have commenced all over the world, huge massacres similar to those carried out by Akasha in The Queen of the Damned... Old vampires, roused from slumber in the earth are doing the bidding of a Voice commanding that they indiscriminately burn vampire-mavericks in cities from Paris and Mumbai to Hong Kong, Kyoto, and San Francisco. As the novel moves from present-day New York and the West Coast to ancient Egypt, fourth century Carthage, 14th-century Rome, the Venice of the Renaissance, the worlds and beings of all the Vampire Chronicles—Louis de Pointe du Lac; the eternally young Armand, whose face is that of a Boticelli angel; Mekare and Maharet, Pandora and Flavius; David Talbot, vampire and ultimate fixer from the secret Talamasca; and Marius, the true Child of the Millennia; along with all the other new seductive, supernatural creatures—come together in this large, luxuriant, fiercely ambitious novel to ultimately rise up and seek out who—or what—the Voice is, and to discover the secret of what it desires and why...
And, at the book's center, the seemingly absent, curiously missing hero-wanderer, the dazzling, dangerous rebel-outlaw—the great hope of the Undead, the dazzling Prince Lestat..."
Amazon: Prince Lestat by Anne Rice
~Lizzie~

Tuesday, July 22, 2014

Up Coming Release "PRINCE LESTAT" by Anne Rice

I know what your thinking what does "The Vampire Chronicles" have to do with historical fiction? For me it has everything to do with historical fiction. My love for historical fiction started with this series by Anne Rice because Anne's vampires have something that "Twilight" and any other vampire series never had... history. The best part of this series is that you live and breath a vampires life from the beginning to present time. Anne has set her characters in my favorite time periods ancient Egypt, Renaissance Italy, Revolutionary France, Revolutionary America, and so many more. After retiring her series "The Vampire Chronicles" Anne Rice has decided to break out with a brand new second part to the series starting with this new release "Prince Lestat". The title itself is very suggestive of what may come to be for the handsome vampire Lestat.

The series includes Interview with the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat, The Queen of the Damned, Tail of the Body Thief, Memnoch the Devil, The Vampire Armand, Merrick, Blood and Gold, Blackwood Farm, Blood Canticle and if you want to go in another branch of the vampire's you can pick up The New Vampire Tales duo: Pandora and Vittorio the Vampire. Farther yet you can also check out The Vampire Companion by Katherine Ramsland.

 I would highly recommend this series to history lovers because this whole series focuses on the history of the era and if you can handle a bit of vampire gore then this is for you but keep in mind there are NO sparkly vampires here. The only thing that sparkles in Lestat is his personality. I can  not wait to read this novel but I am very disappointed to hear that Barnes and Noble had autographed pre-ordered copies up for sale for less than a few hours before they were all gone. Sadly I could not get a copy but I will wait in high anticipation for the 11th book in the series. I can not wait to see where Anne takes Lestat this time.

Releasing 10.28.14
"A stunning departure, a surprising and compelling return…From Anne Rice, perennial best seller, single-handed reinventor of the vampire cosmology-a new, exhilarating novel, a deepening of her vampire mythology, and a chillingly hypnotic mystery-thriller.
"What can we do but reach for the embrace that must now
contain both heaven and hell: our doom again and again and
again…" -from The Vampire Lestat

Rice once again summons up the irresistible spirit-world of the oldest and most powerful forces of the night, invisible beings unleashed on an unsuspecting world able to take blood from humans, in a long-awaited return to the extraordinary world of the Vampire Chronicles and the uniquely seductive Queen of the Damned("mesmerizing" -SF Chronicle), a long-awaited novel that picks up where The Vampire Lestat ("brilliant…its undead characters are utterly alive" -New York Times) left off more than a quarter of a century ago to create an extraordinary new world of spirits and forces-the characters, legend, and lore of all the Vampire Chronicles.

The novel opens with the vampire world in crisis…vampires have been proliferating out of control; burnings have commenced all over the world, huge massacres similar to those carried out by Akasha in The Queen of the Damned…Old vampires, roused from slumber in the earth are doing the bidding of a Voice commanding that they indiscriminately burn vampire-mavericks in cities from Paris and Mumbai to Hong Kong, Kyoto, and San Francisco.

As the novel moves from present-day New York and the West Coast to ancient Egypt, fourth century Carthage, 14th-century Rome, the Venice of the Renaissance, the worlds and beings of all the Vampire Chronicles-Louis de Pointe du Lac; the eternally young Armand, whose face is that of a Boticelli angel; Mekare and Maharet, Pandora and Flavius; David Talbot, vampire and ultimate fixer from the secret Talamasca; and Marius, the true Child of the Millennia; along with all the other new seductive, supernatural creatures-come together in this large, luxuriant, fiercely ambitious novel to ultimately rise up and seek out who-or what-the Voice is, and to discover the secret of what it desires and why…

And, at the book's center, the seemingly absent, curiously missing hero-wanderer, the dazzling, dangerous rebel-outlaw-the great hope of the Undead, the dazzling Prince Lestat…"
Amazon: "PRINCE LESTAT" by Anne Rice , The Vampire Chronicles
~Lizzie~