When Jennifer asked me if I wanted to participate in this tour. I of course jumped at the chance. I absolutely adore and love Jennifer and her books are EPIC and this one is no different. So let's get started and learn more about Jennifer and her book.
Jennifer Malone Wright is best known for her short story
series, The Vampire Hunter’s Daughter. Other works include the follow up to The
Vampire Hunter’s Daughter series called The Arcadia Falls Chronicles and her
vampire novel called The Birth of Jaiden. Jennifer also co-authors a series
called Once Upon A Zombie Apocalypse as well as another project which hasn’t
been announced yet.
She resides in the beautiful mountains of northern Idaho
with her husband and five children where she practices preparing for the zombie
apocalypse. Just kidding!
But seriously, between the craziness of taking care of her
children, Jennifer has little time left for herself. The time she does have
left, usually leading far into the night, is spent working on her beloved
fiction or chatting with her equally crazy friends.
Jennifer also loves coffee, has a passionate affair with red
bull, wishes the sushi were better where she lives and dances while she cleans.
Stalker Links:
A war is brewing between the hunters and the
vampires and Chloe is determined to strike against the vampires before they
have a chance to attack the hunter community.
While Chloe tries to convince the hunter community, and most especially tries
to convince Drew, that they should move against the vampires first instead of
waiting for an attack, the group of new friends—Oscar, Alice, Drew, Chloe and
Christina—are distracted by news reports of a vigilante who is saving innocent
humans against what can only be vampire attacks. Fearing this vigilante will
cause unwanted attention that will expose the vampire-hunter community with
each person he rescues, the group attempts to discover who this mysterious
potential vampire hunter is.
When they catch up with him, the group learns a shocking revelation that might
just change everything for everyone in Arcadia Falls, but will have the most
profound impact on Chloe herself.
The Arcadia Falls Chronicles is the continuation of The Vampire Hunter’s
Daughter. Following the format of The Vampire Hunter’s Daughter, The Arcadia
Falls Chronicles is serialized into several novella-length stories.
Excerpt:
Prologue—Chloe's Diary
~~~***~~
January 15:
Sometimes, when the sun goes down, I stare
out the window of our house and wonder how much of the city beyond our
community is being ravaged by vampires. How many people will die? How many will
become newborn vampires?
I know I am not strong enough to kill them
all… but that won’t stop me from trying.
The next chapter in my life has begun.
I received this journal as a gift from Oscar
for Christmas this year and decided it would be a good place to chronicle the
events of my life. Who knows what will happen to the hunters after this is all
over? If it ever is all over. I feel like there should be some documentation of
how things went down.
So here you have it: The life of Chloe
Kallistrate, in my own words.
I never thought there was anything special
about me. Actually, I still
don’t, but apparently, because I'm the distant offspring of angels and
demigods, there is something in my DNA that creates what I truly am: a vampire
hunter.
Yeah, a vampire hunter. From angels and
demigods. Un-freaking-believable.
It seems, a long time ago, there was a
warrior angel sent to rid the world of vampires. This warrior angel, during his
time on earth, found love with a warrior woman. The warrior woman was a killer,
too. She was a hunter, the daughter of Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt.
Yes, I know. Artemis. Like… from mythology.
It’s true; I'm a distant descendent of
Artemis, and more directly, her daughter, Sostrate. I know this because I’ve
met Sostrate. She has visited me on more than one occasion. I can’t say I look
forward to her visits all that much. The last time she appeared, she told me a
war loomed between the hunters and the vampires, that the hunters needed to
train even harder.
Sheesh.
Oh, it gets better. Not only am I carrying on
the bloodlines of angels and demigods, but I just happen to be a dhampir, too!
What is a dhampir? Oh, that is the best
tidbit of all. Remember when I said I was a vampire hunter? Well, that part of
me is from my mother’s side. She fell in love with one of those we are supposed
to hate the most: a vampire.
Out of that lovely relationship, I was born.
My father’s name was Trevor. My mother
apparently loved him more than she loved killing vampires, because they had me.
That is where the story gets really strange.
Right, like it wasn't strange enough.
My mother was born in an exclusive and
unique gated community, properly named Arcadia Falls. The community is unlike
any other of which I have ever heard. It's a vampire-hunter community. There,
vampire hunters are born, and they train to kill, pretty much from the day they
learn to walk. Only in Arcadia Falls can one find people strolling down the
street with loaded guns and crossbows strapped to their backs.
This community is a peaceful, mountainous
place. It is our safety from the demons on the outside.
I love Arcadia Falls. I love our house,
where I live with my grandfather, my mother's father, who I didn't meet for the
first time until after my mother was killed. I love sleeping in my mother’s
childhood room, and I love that I am surrounded by others who cannot claim to
be normal.
On the inside of the protective wall that
surrounds us is our little town, just like any other town one might come
across. We have a grocery store, a video store, even a bakery and coffee shop.
Hunters’ homes cover the expanse of forested hills that make up Arcadia Falls,
and the hunters rarely need to leave unless they are on missions.
I know my mother loved this place. She was
one of the most renowned hunters among them. Trevor claimed, even after he met
his final death, that he loved my mother, but that love did not guarantee he
would love me. I only know this story as it passed Trevor’s lips, but I can see
how it would be true. He fell in love with my mother, who left the community to
live with him. She soon became pregnant with me. Apparently, he was ecstatic
over the announcement of my birth. My mother must have been relieved, but she
ran from him before I was born, for reasons I didn’t know until I was fifteen.
Why would a woman leave a man with whom she
was having a child? If he was that bad, why not kill him? Who knows? All I know
is that she found out his original reason for choosing her as his mate. Love,
it seemed, ended up being a bonus in his case.
He bred me.
It was his plan from the very beginning, for
years and years before he met her. Apparently, I was some kind of main
ingredient in his make-the-vampire-become-a-day-walker recipe. Allegedly, if a
vampire drinks the blood of a dhampir, who also carries the bloodlines of a
vampire hunter, on the day of the dhampir’s sixteenth birthday, the vampire
will forever be able to walk in the sunlight. Typically, vampires can't be in
sunlight, because it kills them.
Okay.
I had no idea, initially. None of us did.
My mother knew. She found out his plan and
ran from him with me in her womb. That wasn’t as simple as it sounded. She hid
me away for years and years. I never knew any family, I never had many friends
because we moved so much, and I never knew the truth… until that horrible day.
The day Trevor had her murdered, right in
front of me.
But he wasn't trying to get to her. He was
trying to get to me.
That day is branded into my memory like a
hot iron burning into my skin. Trevor’s goons broke in and murdered her. They
tried to take me away, but I was rescued by the vampire hunters. My grandfather
sensed the pain his daughter was going through and sent the rescue team. If it
weren’t for them, I would have been taken and would have never known who I
truly was. I would probably be dead already.
Drew had led the hunters. I remember him
lifting me into his arms and telling me he was taking me someplace safe. They
had brought me home, to Arcadia Falls. It was there I found out about my hunter
heritage. It was also there I found my true supernatural gifts.
Yes, I have supernatural gifts, abilities,
you might say. My element is fire. I can make flames appear in my hand whenever
I want. Although, it wasn’t always as easy as it is now to control. It took me
a long time to learn to control the flames. Though I'm much improved at
wielding the power of the flame, I am still learning to control the fire within
me.
Moving on with my story, my father attacked
the hunters, and I decided I didn’t want to lose anyone else to his vampires. I
willingly went with him, ignorant to his true plans. I lived with him for
nearly a year, and shortly before my sixteenth birthday, I found out exactly
why he had wanted me so badly, why he had killed my mother to obtain me: He had
wanted to be a day-walker.
I tried to run but ended up a prisoner.
We escaped only because of Alice, the
housekeeper who had lived with Trevor for a long time, serving him. But while I
was there, she had been my friend. She betrayed her precious Trevor and helped
me get out. Drew was a prisoner with me, and when we escaped, we found Oscar,
who had been my tutor, and who just happens to be a siren. Oscar had been
bitten almost to the point of death. We grabbed him and managed to escape, only
to fight a vicious battle in the end.
In the heat of the battle, we were saved by
Gavin—who was once my almost-boyfriend—who happened to be Drew’s half-brother.
And Christina—Drew’s ex-girlfriend and probably one of the meanest girls I
know.
It was a nasty fight, but we are all alive.
The question remains: What happens now?
What it comes down to is this:
On the day of my sixteenth birthday,
Sostrate came to us and told us all to prepare for war. She said we all needed
to train hard because we were on the brink of war with the vampires, a big war.
It was in that moment I realized
this—whatever it was—was never going to be over. Just like my angel grandfather
was sent down to rid the world of vampires, I vowed to do the same.
I am Chloe Kallistrate. I am the
vampire-killing angel of death.
Buy Links:
If you want to learn more about Chloe check out part 1 of The Vampire Hunter's Daughter which is always FREE!!
I want to say Thank You to Jennifer for letting me participate in her blog tour. Make sure you enter the giveaway.
~Sabrina
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