In the Darkest Night is a finalist for Best Paranormal in the National Readers Choice Awards!!! Woot!

I was so excited when I got the call, I kind of shrieked into the phone. And then I babbled. I hope the poor coordinator recovered from the experience quickly. Normally, I’m much more low-key when I hear one of my books finaled, but not this time.

Some authors talk about the book of their heart, singular, but I have the books of my heart. Plural. Maybe I fall in love too easily, but of my eight full-length novels, I’d call three of them the books of my heart. In the Darkest Night is one of them.

The story is Kel’s (the hero) and it’s about how he changes and reaches a point where he can accept help. You see, he has Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and instead of getting help, he’s stonewalled everyone, including his twin brother who has always been his best friend. Kel was held captive and tortured (before the book opens) and he’s trying to lock that away, pretend it never happened, but he can’t suppress the memories or his guilt.

His heroine is Farran. She has her own issues, and in the months she’s been on the run, has developed new ones. She grows over the course of the book, too, of course, but it’s Kel’s story and he’s got the bigger changes to make.

I loved these two. They’re both emotionally wounded, and in each other, they find a kindred spirit, someone who can accept them as they are, baggage and all. This book wasn’t easy to write, not when the characters had such big issues, but I knew from the minute I met Kel that his story had to be told.

Of course, there aren’t only issues. There’s magic, action, adventure, and two people falling in love with each other even though neither one of them want that. I love adventure and romance, so those have to be there.

It means a lot to me that this book is a National Readers Choice Finalist. Thank you!

There are a lot of awards out there, but being mentioned for a Hughie Award is really cool because it comes from readers. When I say it’s an honor just to be nominated, I mean it. Truly, it is an honor to be nominated especially when I look at the other two authors in my category. Talk about a whoa moment. So thank you to the ReBeLs!

I’ve been lucky to be able to write more than one book of my heart. In the Darkest Night is the third that falls into this category for me. Kel, the hero, was broken and he’s withdrawn from the world and that includes his family. I knew as soon as he showed up while I was writing his brother’s story that Kel would have a book. He fascinated me, and while I knew pretty early on that he’d been tortured, I didn’t know why or what, exactly, had happened. I wanted to find out.

I saw comments online from a couple of readers who said matching Kel up with Farran was predictable, but I guess I’m slow because I didn’t know who his heroine was. I think I still have the email I sent to one of my writing buddies telling her that I’d just learned it was Kel and Farran and expressing my shock.

In every book, one character changes more than the other and I call it their book. This one belonged to Kel. Yes, Farran changed and grew, too, but Kel did the heavy duty changing. He needed to.

There were actually a lot of surprises for me with Darkest Night. First surprise was who his heroine was. The other big shock was what–specifically–about his time held captive caused him the biggest problem. I think I learned this big secret a couple of scenes before I had to write the part where he reveals it to Farran. The rest of the surprises were smaller, things like Kel being afraid of the dark or being branded, but they interested me nearly as much as the big ones.

Anyway, I loved this h/h and writing their story was an intense experience for me. Receiving this nomination means a lot. Thanks!

I’ve talked before about how different books are born in different ways. Darkest Night was all Kel, the hero. When I was writing Edge of Dawn, the first scene I saw for that book (which isn’t in the book at all, but that’s another story) was Logan (EOD’s hero) with his brother. Logan was worried about Kel standing off by himself at a family barbeque and brought a can of pop over to him. Kel was suspicious and taciturn. Hmm.

Boom! Right then and there I knew something bad had happened to Kel and I knew he had a story. I didn’t know much more than that, but as EOD progressed and Kel had more scenes with Logan and Logan thought or talked about Kel, I learned more. There was a lot I still didn’t know, like who had captured him and why he’d closed himself off from his family. And his heroine? I had no clue who she was either.

And then I reached the end of EOD and I learned who is heroine was and I was like, no, really? Farran? Call me dense, but I hadn’t seen that match up coming.

So what did I know going into Darkest Night besides who the hero and heroine were? Not all that much. I knew Seth was going to return because the Gineal are most definitely not done with him yet. But I couldn’t figure out why he cared about Kel or Farran when he had bigger issues to deal with like being pursued by Horus and reclaiming the power he’d lost. I also knew that Farran had a scar on her face from the end of EOD and that it was significant in some way.

You can see there was a lot I didn’t know. This is pretty typical. But I put together a synopsis and figured out the framework of the story, then it was a matter of writing it, of getting to know my hero and heroine through their thoughts and actions.

The theme song for this book is Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls and it’s because one line in that song fits Kel and Farran completely. “I don’t want the world to see me.” This ended up being a driving force for me as I wrote the book. It helped form the beginning of the story and it stayed a theme pretty much to the end.

I love all my books and all my heroes and heroines, but In the Darkest Night ended up being a little bit extra special to me. I hope you love it as much as I do.

In the Darkest Night releases today! Woot!

Kel Andrews has spent the last year living with nightmares and flashbacks. Unwilling to share what happened, he’s withdrawn from his family and the Gineal council has removed him from his position as a troubleshooter. But when a woman shows up asking for protection from a demon, Kel reluctantly agrees to help–and finds himself facing an unexpected adversary, one he doesn’t know how to fight.

I love all my books, but Kel’s story is one of the extra special books that come along once in a while. I hope you’ll buy it, read it, and enjoy it. I also hope you’ll love it as much as I do and tell your friends–online and offline–that they should pick up their own copy of this book.

To find out more, visit the DARKEST NIGHT page of my website.

Tor
ISBN: 9780765361707

1. Follow me on Twitter @Patti_OShea (Twitter is a FREE social networking site).
2. There will be 4 posts throughout the day that start “PLZ RT” All you need to do to enter is retweet one or all of those posts. If you retweet 3 posts, you have 3 entries in the contest. If you retweet 1 post, you have 1 entry.
3. The first post goes up around 8am US Central Daylight Time. The last post around 5pm US CDT. You have until 10pm US CDT to retweet. At that time, the contest will close.
4. The contest is today, March 30th, only.

Prizes are autographed books. Two (2) people will receive an autographed book and one (1) grand prize winner will receive the first 3 Light Warrior books (In the Midnight Hour, In Twilight’s Shadow, and Edge of Dawn).

Please help me spread the word about the release of In the Darkest Night—your support will be much appreciated!

March 30th

The Raven Happy Hour Blog

Mandy Roth’s Nocturnal Journal

March 31st

Sia McKye’s Thoughts…OVER COFFEE

And please comment and say hi, so I don’t feel lonely.

Today, the council removed Kellan Andrews from troubleshooter duties. The frantic expression that crossed his face concerns me, but I’m more fearful of what would happen if he remained active. We’d hoped that since he’d refused help, he’d work his way through this on his own, however, that didn’t happen. Worse, he’s taken dangerous risks with his life on many of his assignments. We can no longer enable his death wish.

As council leader, I’ve access to information that most do not and I’ve read and re-read the decision of the ceannards that placed Kel as a troubleshooter. It wasn’t an easy choice for them. With his high scores on empathy and healing talent, he could have been a formidable healer.

The difficulty was that not only is he magically strong, he also scored high in the talents required to be a troubleshooter, and the Gineal have plenty of healers. I’ve perused the transcripts of the debate, understood the arguments for each side in the discussion, but at the end of the day, it came down to numbers. We needed troubleshooters. We still need troubleshooters. I can’t help but wonder, though, how different Kel’s life might have been had the earlier council decided he should be a healer.

It might not have mattered at all.

What happened had nothing to do with his job, with any assignment, and might easily have occurred anyway. The only thing that would have been different was Kellan wouldn’t have been able to dare fate. But still, would it have affected him as strongly if he was a healer?

Now, all I can do is wait. And hope he can come around. If the council has read the portents right, we’ll need him at full strength. We’ll need all our troubleshooters at full strength. I pray we’re wrong.

* * *

In the Darkest Night releases March 30th! To find out more, visit the Darkest Night Page.

Age: 25

Identifying Information: Tàireil; Weak magical powers (per troubleshooters who encountered her).

Appearance: Height – estimated at 5′ 6″; hair color – chestnut; eyes – blue; possible facial scar (If power is as weak as suspected).

Last Known Location: Seattle, WA

Last Seen by the Gineal: June 2009

Notes: Monroe actively worked to steal the dracontias from the Gineal dragon mage. Supposition is that she was coerced by her family, all of whom were deemed to be strong magically. Further evidence suggests that Monroe took action on more than one occasion to protect our dragon mage, Shona Blackwood.

Incident One – Our Seattle-based troubleshooter suggested that Monroe hired a human to steal the stone because she could control him and prevent him from hurting Shona. He speculated that it prevented Monroe’s stronger family from becoming directly involved. Opinion of the council: Possible, but reasoning is convoluted.

Incident Two – Farran Monroe revealed herself to our Seattle troubleshooter to warn him that her family was set to attack. Her action allowed the troubleshooter to prepare himself and shield our dragon mage before the assault occurred. Opinion of the council: Accurate based on two witnesses.

Incident Three – During the battle between our dragon mage, three of our troubleshooters, and the Tàireil conspirators, Farran Monroe put herself between her family and Shona Blackwood, taking the shots meant for our mage. This action left her injured and she would have died if one of our troubleshooters hadn’t healed her. Opinion of the council: Accurate based on four witnesses.

After interviewing all involved in the dragon stone incident and having retrocognitive monitors replay events during this time, the council has determined that Monroe is unlikely to be dangerous. Before final determination can be made, it will be necessary to talk to the Tàireil woman in person. To that end, monitors have been told to watch for her energy signature and trackers have been assigned at various intervals to search Seattle for her. She has yet to be located.

The search will continue.

* * *

In the Darkest Night releases March 30th! To find out more, visit the Darkest Night Page.

I love the Light Warriors series. In a market saturated with vampires and were-beasties, Ms. O’Shea’s world of magic-users who eat solid food and don’t turn furry is a wonderful breath of fresh air.

I loved everything about this book. The action was fast-paced, the plotting intricate and well-written, and the characterization and dialogue spot-on. Their chemistry , both sexual and emotional, absolutely sizzles off the pages.

How cool is this? (The “their” in the last sentence refers to Kel and Farran, BTW.)

Seeing positive reactions is one of the fun things about release date drawing closer–In the Darkest Night comes out March 30th. I love it when people love my books.

BTW, tomorrow it will be 25 days until In the Darkest Night releases. Not that I’m counting or anything.