Contest : The Dragonfire Series: KISS OF FIRE by Spotlight Author Deborah Cooke

Product Details
ISBN-13: 9780451223272
Publisher: Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
Publication date: 2/5/2008
Format: Mass Market Paperback
Pages: 352
Sales rank: 117,036
Age range: 18 years
Series: Dragonfire Series, #1
Product dimensions: 4.46 (w) x 6.80 (h) x 0.95 (d)
Order: Barnes & Noble


Overview
For millennia, the shape-shifting dragon warriors known as the Pyr have commanded the four elements and guarded the earth's treasures. But now the final reckoning between the Pyr, who count humans among the earth's treasures, and the Slayers, who would eradicate both humans and the Pyr who protect them, is about to begin...

When Sara Keegan decides to settle down and run her quirky aunt's New Age bookstore, she's not looking for adventure. She doesn't believe in fate or the magic of the tarot-but when she's saved from a vicious attack by a man who has the ability to turn into a fire-breathing dragon, she questions whether she's losing her mind-or about to lose her heart...

Quinn Tyrrell has long been distrustful of his fellow Pyr and a self-reliant loner. So when he feels the firestorm that signals his destined mate, he's determined to protect and possess Sara, regardless of the cost to himself. Then Sara's true destiny is revealed-and Quinn realizes he must risk everything- even Sara's love-to fulfill their entwined fates...

 

Meet the Author

Deborah Cooke has written more than thirty romance novels. When she isn't writing, she can be found knitting, sewing, or hunting for vintage patterns.www.deborahcooke.com 

Excerpt from KISS OF FIRE

©2006 Claire Delacroix, Inc.

The reckoning had begun.


All around the world, gazes turned skyward for the total lunar eclipse. Not everyone realized that it was the first eclipse of a new cycle, that it was the beginning of an age of reconcilation and reckoning.


There were thirteen who knew. 

No sooner had the shadow of the earth passed over the full moon than the first six met in the quiet reaches of southern Libya. The moon glowed red and unnatural, as unnatural as many might have found the sight of the dragons circling out of the darkened sky. The dragons gathered silently, as prearranged, honoring custom. They landed unobserved beneath the path of the eclipse.


There was no need for conversation: the process of ordination had taught them their responsibility, though none had known whether they would be summoned until now. Dread and anticipation mingled in one of the eldest, Donovan, as he watched his fellows arrive. He didn’t like foretold events, didn’t like the sense they always gave him that there was more controlling his future than his own will. Heat rose from the sand underfoot and the sky appeared to be stained with blood.


Erik arrived last, his onyx and pewter figure casting an erie shadow as he wheeled with confidence out of the sky. He carried a black velvet sack, moving as if it weighed nothing. Donovan knew that sack’s contents and the weight of the burden Erik carried.     

The blessing was murmured in old-speak by all of them, even skeptical Donovan. The bag’s cord was loosed to reveal the treasure of their kind, still nestled in the shadowed interior. The Dragon’s Egg was as dark as night, as fathomless as obsidian, and the surface of the stone gleamed as if wet. 


The sight of it gave Donovan the creeps. 


“It’s not working,” Niall said with alarm. He was young, and more inclined to panic.


“Nonsense. It must taste the moon’s light,” Erik said, impatient with doubt. “Give it room.” The others withdrew slightly and Donovan restrained the urge to destroy the sacred relic. It was older than any of them, mysterious and potent, and to his thinking, it brought more trouble than it solved.


Erik spun the Dragon’s Egg three times, requested an augury of the Great Wyvern, and released it. The stone spun like a top across the hot sand. When it came to a halt, the six clustered closer, as close as Erik would permit. 


For a long moment, only the reflection of the moon’s red glow was visible in the orb. The eclipse was already progressing - if Erik felt the press of time passing, he gave no outward sign. Their leader was as cool and composed as always, as confident as Donovan had always known him to be.

Donovan was impatient and inclined to prod the stone. Before he could move, though, the orb sparkled, as if lit from the inside. Lines of gold appeared in the darkness, running across and around its surface.


“First it traces the planet,” Rafferty said, for those who had not witnessed the marvel before. The outline of continents appeared, as if drawn in gold by a frantic mapsmith. 


“North America,” said Donovan, recognizing the shape of the continent displayed on the top. He sighed. “It figures. Why can’t we ever be dispatched to Italy, where the women are gorgeous, or some South Sea island where they’re naked?”


“Silence!” Erik commanded. 


Nothing happened after the continents were drawn although the shadow of the earth moved relentlessly across the full moon. 

Then suddenly finer hairlines appeared on the Dragon’s Egg, straight lines of force, and the six exhaled in relief. The leylines could have been lines of longitude and latitude, because they triangulated a precise location. What they really marked was lines of energy, earth energy, energy that might as well have been Roman roads for the readiness with which Donovan and his kind could follow them. 


The lines targeted the nexus where the next firestorm would begin. The leylines glowed briefly as they made a conjunction and the six leaned closer, anxious to read the location before the gleaming lines faded to darkness.


“Ann Arbor,” Erik murmured, his old-speak echoing in the thoughts of his fellows with authority. “I will go.”


“I will be your second, if you wish it,” Donovan said, speaking out of some impulse he could not name. 

“You will all second me,” Erik declared and Donovan felt a frisson of alarm pass through the group. He exchanged a glance of understanding with Rafferty, knowing that the old prophecy must be correct for Erik to make such a demand.


The final battle had come.


And the world would ever be the same again.





©2006 Claire Delacroix, Inc.

~CONTEST~

All week long OTER spotlighted award-winning author Deborah Cooke.  Today is our final installment and what better way to end  this fantastic week than with Spotlight Author Deborah Cooke's first release KISS OF FIRE from her phenomenal Dragonfire series

THE PRIZE: Two lucky reader will have the chance to win the either first two titles, FLYING BLIND and WINGING IT from Cooke's The Dragon Diaries or FLASHFIRE and KISS OF FIRE book seven (7) and one (1). 

To enter contest you will need to stop back each day, read the excerpt posted and answer the question or questions of the day.

Monday Question: Dragons by nature are what?

Tuesday Question: Who is the Keeper of the Covenant?

Wednesday Question: Who is  Megan (Zoe's best friend) massively crushing on?

Thursday Question: Do you like reading stories about dragons? Have you ever imagined being a dragon - or a dragon shape shifter? What do you think would be the best thing about being a dragon?

Friday Question:  What is a Firestorm?

Saturday Questions:  What has begun?  What is in the black velvet sack that Erik is carrying?

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*Connect with RCJR eZine at:

Contest is open to ALL readers.

Contest runs until January 22, 2011.

I will contact winners directly on January 23, 2011.