A Dream Within A Dream: Bloodcraft Blog Tour: Review + Giveaway

Welcome to my stop on the Bloodcraft blog tour! I'll be sharing my review of the book with you today - and don't forget to enter the awesome giveaway! To follow the rest of the tour, check out the schedule at the bottom of the post.

Bloodcraft (Bloodspell #2)
Author: Amalie Howard

Genre: Upper YA/NA (mature content) Fantasy
Publication: December 15, 2015

Description:

All magic has its price, and no one knows that better than Victoria Warrick. Gifted with a centuries-old blood curse, Tori has finally learned to master her blood’s demands and has emerged triumphant with Christian Devereux, a vampire overlord, at her side.

But the worst is yet to come …

In the infamous City of Lights, home to both the Witch Clans and the Vampire Council, Tori enrolls at the exclusive Belles Fontaines school in Paris, where she is faced with a devastating choice: choose Christian and be an outcast, or choose the coven and secure her place with the witches.

When the fate of the supernatural world is targeted by a sinister new threat, Christian and Victoria must unite their two warring species to defeat it. Their bond will be tested, twisted, and sorely weakened, and Tori will find herself in uncharted territory—a dangerous place to be when her blood’s magic has its own dark agenda.

But to save them all, she may have no choice but to invoke its deadly power.

Bloodcraft is the thrilling second book in a New Adult paranormal series that will leave readers breathless and begging for more. The story continues to follow our heroine - Victoria "Tori" Warrick - a witch queen who's still trying to understand her family's blood curse, her powers, and all things related to witchcraft. She's a good main character for the series and we definitely see her grow and mature throughout the book. She becomes more comfortable with her powers and her role within the Covens, along with having to take on major responsibilities that could mean the end of the Covens forever if she makes a wrong move. Christian Devereux - a royal vampire overlord and now a member of the High Council - returns as Victoria's love interest. I really enjoyed watching them together - how their relationship grows even though so much is against them being together. They have to really fight for their love - and both are more than willing to do whatever it takes. It's really sweet and swoonworthy - and there are some scenes that are pretty steamy - which only made the book more captivating (in my opinion).

Threats from the first book are still an issue in this story - along with a whole new slew of problems that vary in their danger. The book description makes it sound like a run of the mill paranormal romance between a witch and a vampire - but it is SO much more than that! There's a lot of action and suspense in the plot - fighting within the Covens and the Vampire Council - and the impending war between the two races. Not to mention the new threat that Victoria and Christian encounter that wants to wipe out both the witches and the vampires. This book definitely kept me on my toes and reading as fast as I could to see what would happen next - not only with the romance woven into the story, but with the issues within each species and (in the bigger picture) between them as well. The writing is solid and well done with great attention to detail and vivid imagery that allows the reader to feel as though they are within the world the author created. I found myself easily slipping inside Victoria and Christian's world within the first couple of paragraphs - and I didn't come back out until I had finished the book in it's entirety (which wasn't hard due to the excellent writing and the intertwining subplots). I can't wait to see where the story will go from here and I hate that I have to wait until the next book releases. I want to read it now! Overall, I really enjoyed this book and definitely recommend it to fans of paranormal fiction as well as those who enjoy fantasy, romance, suspense, action, and magic. One word of advice: Since this is the second book in the series, I highly advise you to read the first book before attempting to read this one. There are a lot of references made to occurrences, places, people, etc. from the first book - and the only way to not be totally confused is to read the books in order.

Bloodspell (Book #1):

AVAILABLE ON
Amazon | B&N | Book Depository | Kobo
for 99¢!

AMALIE HOWARD grew up on a small Caribbean island (Trinidad & Tobago) where she spent most of her childhood with her nose buried in a book or running around barefoot, shimmying up mango trees and dreaming of adventure. 25 countries, surfing with sharks and several tattoos later, she has traded in bungee jumping in China for writing the adventures she imagines instead. She isn’t entirely convinced which takes more guts.

An aspiring writer from a young age, Amalie’s poem “The Candle,” written at age twelve, was published in a University of Warwick journal. At fifteen, she was a recipient of a Royal Commonwealth Society Essay Award (a global youth writing competition). A Colby College graduate, she completed simultaneous Honors Theses in both French and International Studies, and graduated Summa Cum Laude/Phi Beta Kappa. At Colby, she was cited for research and criticism in Raffael Scheck’s article, “German Conservatism and Female Political Activism in the Early Weimar Republic,” and his subsequent book, Mothers of the Nation. She also received a distinction in English Literature from the University of Cambridge (A-levels) as well as a certificate in French Literature from the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris, France. Traveling the globe, she has worked as a research assistant, marketing representative, teen speaker and global sales executive.

She is the author of several young adult novels critically acclaimed by Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, VOYA, and Booklist, including Waterfell, The Almost Girl, and Alpha Goddess, a Spring 2014 Kid’s INDIE NEXT title. Her debut novel, Bloodspell, was a #1 Amazon bestseller and a Seventeen Magazine Summer Read. As an author of color and a proud supporter of diversity in fiction, her articles on multicultural fiction have appeared in The Portland Book Review and on the popular Diversity in YA blog. She currently resides in Colorado with her husband and three children. She is represented by the Liza Royce Agency and is a member of SCBWI.