Space Rep: Looks like a kick ass angel to me. I think I'm in love...
Liza: Before you go there, let's check out the book.
How far would you fall
for love?
Centuries ago, guardian angel Lucien committed a terrible sin. He gave into his own desires and revealed himself to the mortal woman he'd been charged to protect. By kissing her, he condemned himself. Torn of his wings and his angelic powers, thrown down into the City Below, Lucien now serves Satan as an incubus who claims souls for his master from the City Above, and who feeds on the energy stolen from his mortal lovers. Dark, sexy and charming, he's been top of his league for decades uncounted.
Until His Infernal Highness decides to send Lucien looking for a lost angel. Lucien has no idea what he did to deserve such a punishment, and the touch of an angel could destroy him. Yet the challenge and the potential kudos of seducing one of his former heavenly kin leads him on.
But when he finds the angel, he learns he still has more to lose than his already forsaken soul.
A new burning consumed his body. He wanted to reach
out and hold her. Wrap his arms around her, and drown in her kiss. But even as
he took one shaky step toward her, the light and goodness within her scorched
him and he staggered back a step, one arm thrown up to shield himself.
"Lucien." Her voice washed over him like a
sweetly scented summer breeze. He dared to drop his arm and look at her again.
"Miranda." Her name came out as a growl, and
he cursed himself for it.
Her frown deepened. "Lucien, what's happened to
you?" She took a step closer and he shied away. No matter how she'd come
to him, welcomed him, her angelic powers could still be deadly. "Oh, my
love, what have you become?"
My love. The words cut him as deeply
as the priest's forgiveness. The pain stirred his resentment. She had been the
cause of his fall. The reason for his torment. And now she was scolding him for
it?
"What I am is what you helped turn me in to."
He raised his head, glared at her. "What I am is because of you."
She shook her head. "Is that really what you
think? That it's all my fault?" Tears glimmered in her eyes. "I've
watched you for a long time now. Waiting for the right time to come to you.
I've seen how your existence has come to trouble you more in the last decades.
How the tasks set to you have crushed what remains of your soul."
Lucien snorted. "My soul? I lost that with my
heart. And my wings."
"No. You didn't. You hate what you do. You sealed
your heart in stone to protect yourself, but you can't bring yourself to fully
give into the darkness, no matter what."
Lucien shuddered. "You're wrong."
"You know I'm not." She took another step
toward him, and though he tried to back away he found himself trapped against
the brick wall. She put up her hand, palm outward, as if to touch him. His
breath stalled in his chest and his whole body might just as well have become
stone. He couldn't move.
Lucien,
the fallen angel, now works for devil himself, a rather frightening boss, to
say the least. He’s given the task of locating a ‘lost angel’ and taking her to
hell.
Miranda was the human who cost
Lucien his wings long ago when he kissed her while he was her protector. Now, she’s no longer human; she’s a powerful angel. She’s watched him
for a long time and concludes he hates his new job. Miranda wants to save Lucien,
so he can be happy again.
This
is a short story, a romance between two entities who could not be more opposite:
an incubus working for Satan and an angel who wants to make him good again. To
make a romance even harder, the touch of an angel causes Lucien extreme pain.
But even more painful is the act forgiveness.
Superficially,
this is a funny, quirky story, but as always Pippa Jay’s stories have more
depth that will keep you thinking about them long after the story ends. Since I
have loved some of her stories more than this one, (but it is very clever) I’ll
give this a 4.8 rounding up to 5.0. (Her standard of writing is very high,
forcing me to rank her books against her best.)
However
the cover gets a solid 5.0. IMO her best cover yet.
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After spending twelve years
working as an Analytical Chemist in a Metals and Minerals laboratory, Pippa Jay
is now a stay-at-home mum who writes scifi and the supernatural. Somewhere
along the way a touch of romance crept into her work and refused to leave. In
between torturing her plethora of characters, she spends the odd free moment
playing guitar very badly, punishing herself with freestyle street dance, and
studying the Dark Side of the Force. Although happily settled in the historical
town of Colchester in the UK with her husband of 21 years and three little
monsters, she continues to roam the rest of the Universe in her head.
Pippa
Jay is a dedicated member of the Science Fiction Romance Brigade, blogging at Spacefreighters Lounge, Adventures in Scifi, and Romancing the Genres. Her works
include YA and adult stories crossing a multitude of subgenres from scifi to
the paranormal, often with romance, and she’s one of eight authors included in
a science fiction romance anthology—Tales from the SFR Brigade. She’s also a double SFR Galaxy
Award winner, been a finalist in the Heart of Denver RWA Aspen Gold Contest (3rd place), and the GCC RWA Silken Sands
Star Awards (2nd place).
You can stalk her at her website, or at her blog, but without doubt her
favorite place to hang around and chat is on Twitter as @pippajaygreen.
Website – http://www.pippajay.co.uk
Blogs –
Adventures in Scifi - http://www.pippajay.blogspot.co.uk
Spacefreighters Lounge - http://www.spacefreighters.blogspot.com
Romancing the Genres - http://www.romancingthegenres.blogspot.co.uk/
SFR Brigade - http://www.sfrcontests.blogspot.co.uk/
Twitter - https://twitter.com/pippajaygreen
Pinterest - http://www.pinterest.com/pippajaygreen/
Wattpad - http://www.wattpad.com/user/PippaJay
Thanks for hosting me!
ReplyDeleteFabulous cover. Great excerpt. I adore sci-fi. Tweeted.
ReplyDeletelmao - I adore your spammer line, Liza - shot with plasma gun - gotta get me one of those!!!!
ReplyDeleteIt seems to work.
DeleteThen definitely try Pippa. She writes such thought provoking stories.
DeleteI agree about the cover but the story sounds pretty amazing too. I like that her touch can hurt him, physically... already she's hurt him emotionally. That's a twist on the fallen angel stories.
ReplyDeletePippa always adds more meaning in her stories, so the longer you thing about them, the better they get.
DeleteThank you!
Delete