Pre Pub Book Buzz -- Nocturne by Syrie James

Syrie James has been busy, busy this year! Dracula, My Love: The Secret Journals of Mina Harker is fresh off the presses (well, fresh this summer) and now her latest, Nocturne, is set to hit shelves in just a couple of weeks (Jan 4 to be exact).

Here's some info from the press release:

For [Syrie] James, story and character are the two most important elements in a novel. She says: “Without a great story, you’ve got nothing to hold onto or remember. And no matter the genre, I think the main characters must go through some kind of learning curve and come out on the other side transformed.”

In NOCTURNE James tells the story of Nicole Whitcomb, a young woman whose car runs off a Colorado mountain road during a blizzard, and who is snowbound for days with a handsome, fascinating, and enigmatic stranger, Michael Tyler. As Nicole spends more time with Michael, she can’t shake the feeling that he is hiding something from her—and as the romantic and sexual tension between them builds, Nicole soon learns the terrifying truth: that Michael is a vampire who’s torn between his love for her and his desire for her blood.

James captures the dilemma of the vampire in a compelling and devastating way in NOCTURNE. Even though Michael is a good man who has already spent an eternity struggling to repress the evil inside him, he cannot trust himself with Nicole, the one woman he yearns for more than anything in the world. For Nicole, there is nowhere to run but the blizzard raging outside, and yet Michael is the only one who can save her life.

Of our fascination with vampires, James recently wrote in a Huffington Post piece: “In an age with such rapid technological advances, it’s only through our dreams and nightmares that we can experience the thrill of fear and awe again. And vampires have everything we want. They’re good-looking, powerful, dangerous, immortal, eternally youthful, and not bound by any laws or morality except their conscience, if they have one. In a culture that’s youth and sex obsessed, what could be better than to be young and beautiful and able to indulge one’s dark desires and sexual urges without penalty ... forever?”

In NOCTURNE, James tells a beautiful and haunting tale about forbidden love, about second chances, about the hope for redemption—and about how incredible joy can be inextricably linked to infinite sadness…

I don't know about you, but with all this winter weather, I'm thinking this is going to be the perfect steamy read! I have to heartily thank Elena with Wunderkind for sending this one my way. Remember, mark your calendar for Jan 4! This would be a great one for those of you I know will have gift cards burning holes in your pockets!