by Terrance Mc Arthur

This week we have a review of Blood of Earth by Faith Hunter, which comes out in August. We are also a part of her blog tour and have an excerpt from a story by Faith below our review. Details at the end of this post on how to win a copy of the book and links to purchase it. You can also enter the blog tour giveaway-Faith is giving away a $25 Amazon or Barnes & Noble gift card (winner’s choice), and 5 custom key chains. Open to US residents only. You can find the rest of the blog tour stops here: www.ltpromos.com/2016/07/12/faith-hunters-blood-of-the-earth-blog-tour.

Blood of the Earth By Faith Hunter
Review by Terrance McArthur

I am a Faith Hunter fan, crazy about her Jane Yellowrock books. A Jane short story introduced Nell, a down-to-earth woman who is really connected to her land…really connected, like, she can put her fingers and toes into the ground and encourage plants to grow. If someone bleeds on her ground, she can drag their life-force into the land…like, you know, kill them. Nell now gets her own series of books, “Soulwood,” kicked off with Blood of the Earth.

Nell was raised in a religious cult in Tennessee, where girls were married off into harems at twelve years old and women were “punished” if they didn’t do what the churchmen said, and Nell was constantly threatened with being burned at the stake for being different. Her husband and another wife had helped her escape the cult but stay in the area—in case her mama or sisters wanted to break away. Yellowrock recognized the young woman’s special qualities, and connected her with PsyLED—a paranormal arm of Homeland Security.

The PsyLED team is led by Rick LaFleur, who was Jane’s boyfriend until he was mated with another werepanther to keep from spreading his weretaint to others. (Many Yellowrock fans are very anti-Rick because “he done her wrong”; some will not read this series because he’s in it. Come on, people! This is urban fantasy, not real life.)

Rick recruits Nell to find out if God’s Cloud of Glory Church (her former cult) is connected with a terrorist group kidnapping girls for ransom. She surprises the investigators with her deductive reasoning—she may sound like someone out of Deliverance at times, a backwoods hick, but she has library-learning, and her home is off the grid with solar power. As the stakes are raised on the case, more and more paranormal elements enter the story.

Blood of the Earth, as the lead-off book, is packed with world-and-character-building: Nell, Rick’s young crew with their talents (from shapeshifting to witchcraft to empathic communication to computer savvy), the people and ways of God’s Cloud, and Soulwood, Nell’s farm, which has its own identity and powers, possibly fueled by contact with Nell. Don’t be put off by all the backstories and explanations. Faith Hunter delivers. Just like Nell’s plants that bloom when and where they shouldn’t—it’ll grow on you.

Terrance V. Mc Arthur is a Community Librarian for the WoW! (WithOut Walls) Division of the Fresno County Public Library, roaming the Valley to meet the public’s information needs.

Off the Grid Excerpt

By Faith Hunter

This story takes place just before Broken Soul. In it, you’ll meet Nell, who will be getting her own series! The first book, Blood of the Earth will be published in August 2016.

Let’s try not to kill anyone, and the idea of eating humans and vamps is not appealing in the least.

Hunt deer. Soon.

Yeah. Deal, I thought at her, spotting sprinting human-shaped forms just ahead.

The race through the woods revealed no barricades, no downed trees, and no booby traps. The colonel hadn’t expected attack from this direction, and the topo maps had shown why—a long vertical drop of nearly fifty feet into the compound. No human law enforcement agency would have been able to manage the descent with any kind of order or speed. And the little slip of a girl who looked like something you could break her in two with one hand tied behind your back was clearly no menace, not with a spy in the trees.

We ducked beneath the rock ledge that hid the old road from the eyes-in-the-sky and sprinted through the deeper dark, around the heart of the ancient mountain, and out the far side. The trees were smaller on this side of the mountain. The underbrush was thick and dense. The land smelled different from Nell’s property. Stressed and sleeping and unhappy. Weird thoughts for another time.

We crested the hill and the compound appeared below us. The hill fell away, a sheer drop seen on the topo maps, but not realized until now. Nearly fifty feet of vertical fall. There was no fence. No barrier. Just the drop. My heart stuttered and sped. The terrain must have seemed like the perfect protection to the church’s security crew.

The vamps didn’t even slow. They raced out and leaped. Down. The humans hardly slowed, slapping lines around tree trunks and leaping off for a fast rappel. At the back of the crew, I was undecided, but still moving fast. Beast slammed into me, the pain so sudden and intense that I tripped over my own feet and rolled off the ledge. The world tumbled around me.

To enter to win a copy of Blood of the Earth, simply email KRL at krlcontests@gmail[dot]com by replacing the [dot] with a period, and with the subject line “earth,” or comment on this article. A winner will be chosen August 6, 2016. U.S. residents only. If entering via email please include your mailing address.

Check out more fantasy book reviews in our fantasy and fangs section.

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Tour Wide Giveaway:
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Other purchase links:
Barnes & Noble: www.barnesandnoble.com/w/blood-of-the-earth-faith-hunter/1123638785?ean=9780451473301
Books-A-Million: www.booksamillion.com/p/Blood-Earth/Faith-Hunter/9780451473301?id=5383851536305
Google Play: play.google.com/store/books/details/Faith_Hunter_Blood_of_the_Earth?id=4mspBgAAQBAJ
iTunes: itunes.apple.com/us/book/blood-of-the-earth/id957958080?mt=11
Kobo: store.kobobooks.com/en-us/ebook/blood-of-the-earth-2

About Faith Hunter:

Faith Hunter, fantasy writer, was born in Louisiana and raised all over the south. She writes three Urban Fantasy series: the Skinwalker series, featuring Jane Yellowrock, a Cherokee skinwalker who hunts rogue vampires. The Soulwood series, featuring earth magic user Nell Ingram. And the Rogue Mage novels, a dark, urban, post-apocalyptic, fantasy series featuring Thorn St. Croix, a stone mage. (There is a role playing game based on the series, ROGUE MAGE.)

Faith Hunter

Under the pen name Gwen Hunter, she writes action-adventure, mysteries, and thrillers. As Faith and Gwen, she has 30+ books in print in 29 countries.

Hunter writes full-time, tries to keep house, and is a workaholic with a passion for travel, jewelry making, white-water kayaking, and writing. She and her husband love to RV, traveling with their rescued Pomeranians to whitewater rivers all over the Southeast.

Find Faith online at her website FaithHunter.net, her blog, on Twitter, Facebook, and Goodreads.