Take Home Tuesday Hosted by Chris Marie Green

UPDATE: THE winner of A DROP OF RED and THE PATH OF RAZORS by Chris Marie Green is Karin! Congrats! Please email your physical addy to contests(AT)knightagency.net.

Win Two Signed Trade Copies from Chris Marie Green’s Vampire Babylon series!

Below the streets, the vampires gather. Erotic, beautiful, secretive…dangerous. Dawn Madison, an ex-stunt woman, takes up the hunt for these enthralling creatures, first in Hollywood, then in London. As the Undergrounds’ secrets spill into her own life, shaping it, illuminating her own muddled past, she must face these underground Vampire Babylons.

Or die trying.

The Vampire Babylon series uses trilogy arcs to tell one basic story, much like the way JK Rowling used seven books that didn’t solve every plot thread book-by-book to tell Harry Potter’s story. While each individual novel focuses on a central mystery that’s solved by the end, the three books together build character and mythology arcs/mysteries until everything culminates in the third books of the trilogies.

The first trilogy is known as the “Hollywood trilogy.” It contains these books:

NIGHT RISING
MIDNIGHT REIGN
BREAK OF DAWN

The second trilogy continues the adventures of Dawn Madison and the vampire hunting team, and this three-book arc is known as the “London trilogy.” It consists of:

A DROP OF RED
THE PATH OF RAZORS
DEEP IN THE WOODS

On March 2, DEEP IN THE WOODS, Book Six, is being released in trade format, and it completes the second trilogy of the Vampire Babylon series. To learn more, you can go a number of places—www.vampirebabylon.com, my blog (http://crystal-green.blogspot.com/) , Facebook (at http://www.facebook.com/people/Chris-Marie-Green/1051327765 ) or Twitter (at http://twitter.com/ChrisMarieGreen ).

To gear up for reading DEEP IN THE WOODS, you now have the chance to win the first two books in the London trilogy! By commenting below, one person will win signed trade copies of A DROP OF RED, Book Four, and THE PATH OF RAZORS, Book Five.

Question of the day: In urban fantasies, setting plays a huge part. What have some of your favorite UF settings been? Why? Where would you like to see more stories set?

The winner will be announced tomorrow afternoon.

LOVERS ROCK WEEK (Day 3): Hosted by Chris Marie Green

UPDATE: The winner of THE PATH OF RAZORS by Chris Marie Green is Mariska. Please email your physical addy to contests(AT)knightagency.net.

How many of you out there wanted to be Princess Leia?

Was it because of her butt-kickin’ attitude? Because she got to swashbuckle-swing across a Death Star chasm with Luke Skywalker? Or perhaps you spent hours in front of the mirror trying to get your hair in those buns?

Nah. It was totally because she ended up with Han Solo, wasn’t it?

And that’s why I’m dedicating this Valentine’s Blog to a couple whom I consider to be one of the most romantic in existence—Han Solo and the Princess.

They had a rough start. She yelled at him a lot. She called his co-pilot a walking carpet. She even insulted Han’s spaceship (and you just don’t do that to a man). She blew a hole in the Death Star cellblock corridor just inches away from his goodies and told him to hop into the garbage chute.

And he damn if he didn’t like every minute of it.

Yeah, she shared a gross little kiss with Luke before she knew he was her brother. (Thank you, Star Wars, for warping my childhood with this and Luke’s sliced-off, castrated hand. But that would be a different blog entry.) Heck, I even started off adoring Luke Skywalker, too, with his non-threatening surfer dude amble and golly-willickers outlook, before The Empire Strikes Back came out and something went “twing” in my body. We all go from boys to more dangerous men at some point in our lives, and although I suspect Leia never did hold any lust for the Skywalker, she’s no different.

Like us, she couldn’t say no to the sparks—the scoundrel grin and low-riding holster.

I guess I love Han and Leia because, when she dished it out to him, it was because she didn’t know how the heck to deal with her feelings. When he gave it right back, it was because he wanted to get her to admit to her emotions. It was a game to him at first, and he didn’t even know what to do when he was confronted with how he felt about her. When she blurted out her love to him while he sank into the carbonite pit in Cloud City, all he could do was be a smart ass. (Oh, those immortal words of affection: “I love you.” “I know.”)


But no matter how many barbs were traded, you always knew that they had unflinching respect for each other, and that only grew scene by scene. Why else would Leia have been so disappointed in Han when he left the rebel base to take his bounty money to Jabba the Hutt just before the big Death Star attack? She knew he’d be an asset. (She also thought he was unbearably hot, but that’s beside the point I’m trying to make here.)

Their relationship is certainly a model for a lot of stories that we read, watch, and love today—especially in paranormals and action-adventure. Look at how Buffy and Angel worked together, wiping floors with vamp blood. Vaughn and Sydney put the bad guys away on ALIAS as they spied their way around the globe. These characters weren’t just in love—they were partners in every way, solving problems, saving the world, knowing that when the chips are down, both were capable of taking up each others’ backs.

Also, the heroes always seem to depend upon the heroines in a way that goes beyond warming the bed or heart. The heroes will send the heroines on the most dangerous of missions because they’re as good as any man, although the heroines always give the heroes more than any mere war buddy. My own urban fantasies definitely have that “Han and the Princess” dynamic, too. From Camille and Sarg in my first vampire book, The Huntress, to Dawn and The Voice in my Vampire Babylon series, there are many I-love-you-I-know beats.

May the Force be with you on this Valentine’s Day! Oh, and if you’d also like to spend some time with a giveaway, I’ll send a signed copy of THE PATH OF RAZORS, Vampire Babylon, Book Five, to one person who leaves a comment here. The winner will be randomly drawn and announced tomorrow afternoon.

Chris writes urban fantasy as Chris Marie Green and romance as Crystal Green.

BREAK OF DAWN, Book Three in her Vampire Babylon series, has just been reissued in mass market format and book six, DEEP IN THE WOODS, is hitting shelves March 2. To learn more, you can go a number of places—www.crystal-green.com, www.vampirebabylon.com, Chris’s blog, Facebook or Twitter at http://twitter.com/ChrisMarieGreen.