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"Each
time I read another book by Ms. Danann, I always say it's my favorite of
hers, but really, this one is! I simply love these characters and
each of their intertwining stories. A Summoner's Tale hooked me
from page one.Another
hit out of the park for Ms. Danann. A Summoner's Tale is a
beautiful romantic story that remains honest with its laugh-out-loud
humor and anxiety-ridden action scenes. I simply could not put this book
down."
-
Jenna,
Between the Bind
"When I started reading the book I was absolutely
thrilled. If you have read my review of The
Witch's Dream, you will know I have a soft spot
for Baka. I was so happy to see that he had a
larger role in this story. The reader got a huge
glimpse into the man he was, the vampire he became,
and the man he is today. I don't want to spoil
anything for readers, but I will say that I found
many touching moments in his story. It isn't only
Baka that I got to revisit; all of my favorites were
back." - Vampire Romance. com
"I'm not sure that I can really describe Danann's
writing style and give it justice. Most series are
set up in such a way that you meet all of the
characters in the first book, and then each
subsequent book is dedicated mostly to one main
character. In Danann's books a character or two may
have a bit more of the spotlight, but the reader is
able to follow the stories of all the characters.
The books unfold like a good T.V. series or soap
opera. I love this about her storytelling, because I
don't feel like I lose the connection with any of
the characters that I have grown so fond of. I also
enjoy her descriptiveness and her way with words. I
am always drawn in right from the start, and I am
fully into the story until the very last word.
The Order of the Black Swan is quickly becoming one
of those series that I wait with anticipation for
the next novel to release.
A Summoner's Tale did not disappoint, in fact
it could very well be my favorite so far. Danann is
really onto something with this spicy, entertaining
and exciting series!"
- Vampire Romance Books.com
"Just when
you think things can't get any better a new twist forms and you're
eagerly awaiting the team's newest adventure."
-
Carole Dee, Bitten by Paranormal Romance
"Victoria did a great job in crafting Baka’s unique
history throughout the book, and weaving it
alongside the unique happenstances that occur
throughout the book with the other members of the
Order.
A titillating and quite heart-warming ride,
we get to see the man Baka truly is." -
Lisette Manning, Simplistik.Org
"She does a great job of creating a world that we
will never see but where anything may seem possible."
-
Lynn, UrbanGirlReader
"Victoria does it again. I'm
always amazed at the strong character development
throughout each book, her descriptions of places and
what is going on... she makes you feel you are right
there.
Highly recommended for all paranormal, supernatural,
and vampire lovers. I give it a 5 star rating." -
My Cozie Corner Book Reviews
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A Summoner's Tale:
the vampire's confessor
READING THIS SERIAL SAGA IN ORDER HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
DESCRIPTION:
A secret society, a witch, a psychic, vampires, modern day knights,
heroes, elves, fae, assassins from another dimension, and fairytales
come together where emotions intersect. Two souls, joined by a mystical
bond, separated by distance, must simultaneously struggle through pain and darkness in
an ultimate confrontation with character and an ultimate struggle for
life proving that true love waits patiently through lifetimes and finds
courage to survive. Even in the strangest places. Even when you're least
expecting it. Even when you're far, far from home.
Erotic quotient: A little steam. No menage. No BDSM.
CHAPTER_1
BLACK SWAN FIELD TRAINING MANUAL Section
I: Chapter 1, #1
The plural of vampire is vampire.
When the initial rush of activity
subsided, he had found himself all too often alone with his own
thoughts; a condition that was tediously familiar since he had spent
hundreds of years that way. Without the distraction of his friends'
banter, since his proposed staff had left Edinburgh, he had begun to see
his task not just as a job, but as a mission, one immersed in the
duality of joy and gravity. Though, lately it seemed gravity was
winning.
He had never considered himself to be impatient. Quite the contrary.
Everything he
had ever pursued in earnest, from painting to music to writing, had
depended upon patience. But, his
awareness of
the enormity of the burden he had accepted had grown over the past
months and he had turned to brooding about the time that was passing.
Every day that nothing was accomplished was a day when more people had
their humanity taken from them, another day when vampire remained
imprisoned in bodies infected with the foulest disease imaginable, and,
also, another day when people died.
The project was moving painfully slowly. Everyone who had originally
been assigned to work with Baka was gone: married, retired, whatever.
Everyone except Heaven - who had turned out to be anything but. If he
was to be brutally honest with himself, he would have to admit that one
of the main reasons for the slow progress was his distraction with his
appointed assistant.
The large work space, intended for several people, held two people most
of the time. He worked from early in the morning till late at night,
challenging both the hours in the day and the fact that he was one
excruciatingly short-handed task,
force leader.
When Heaven was present, her moods ran the range of a shallow bell curve
from disagreeable to surly to sullen. He admitted that he had provoked
her on their first meeting, for reasons that were a mystery to him.
Something about her had instantly put him on edge, made him feel
anxious, and inclined to strike out.
Even though that feeling persisted, he had attempted to make amends so
that they could work together amicably,
but his attempts at accord had failed. Miserably so. She was prickly all
the way to her luscious
core, spurning every effort on his part to develop a rudimentary
standard of civility. No matter how many times he tried.
He not only had to work with a person who detested his very presence,
but, adding insult to injury, it seemed he couldn't shake an
inexplicably strong attraction to her. He found himself staring at the
curve of her cheek when
her head bowed over work. Or the shine of her chestnut hair when she
walked in front of a window, right through a bank of sunrays. Or the way
her lips pursed
in silent protest and disdain
whenever he
gave her something to do.
It was damned aggravating to be held captive, figuratively, by a woman
who detested him. To
make matters worse, he seemed to have lost interest in pursuing other women,
which really wasn't like him at all. After being freed of the vampire
virus, he found himself in a world where sex was king. Women dressed
provocatively. Women were provocative. And they were free to
share sex if it suited them to do so without needing permission outside
their own conscience.
He had made the most of that window of sexual opportunity between the
cure and the day Heaven walked into his war room.
For over five months, she had behaved as if simple courtesy was more
than she could manage.
That meant
that "nice" was a goal way too distant. Baka knew it wasn't an
expression of her nature in general because he'd often watched her from
across the dining hall laughing and interacting with
other associates and employees.
No. With others her manner was
open and unguarded.
A thousand times a day his eyes sought her out while he surreptitiously
pretended to be doing something else. He found himself imagining having
her lift her head and turn the sunshine of that smile his way or, even
better, to angle her face up at him with invitation on her features
while she pressed her
beautifully packed curves
against his
body. The
thought of that made him hard. Painfully so. Again.
He was
staring at the
clock on the wall as he did that time every day, waiting
for the separation ritual to begin. At exactly fifteen after five,
Heaven checked her wristwatch,
closed an open folder, pushed her chair back, stood up, shoved
her arms into her
sweater jacket, put her purse on her shoulder and, like every other day,
started to walk out of the office without so much as
a passing glance angled
his way. Much less
a wish for
goodnight. But, that
night was going to be different. That night his voice stopped her when
she put her hand on the door pull.
"Heaven."
"Yes?" she asked over her shoulder without looking at him directly.
"Why do you hate me so much?"
She didn't hesitate for
an instant before answering,
"I don't hate
you. Whatever gave you such an idea?"
Before he could frame an answer to that question, she was gone. He
heaved a big sigh. Fuck me.
Life had become a conflict without prospect of resolution. He
perpetually struggled to concentrate when she was there because the
space seemed to vibrate with a low level, but annoying irritation. When
she wasn't there, he hated it even more.
Baka had been a person with a well-developed
sense of morality
and a well-functioning conscience before he became a vampire. During the
last hundred years of life as a vampire, having survived long enough to
blessedly recover his understanding of right and
wrong, he had voluntarily allowed
himself
to be taken into custody by
The Order
hoping that they would put an end to him. But they devised a far worse
punishment. They decided to keep him alive on artificial sustenance so
that, on occasion, he could serve as "consultant". Of course that also
entailed imprisonment and many decades of a solitary life.
He could have committed suicide, but submitted to the ongoing torment
because he knew he deserved whatever crucible they might devise.
No. He had never been short on conscience. And that conscience was
rubbing a hole in his brain telling him that it would be wrong to simply
sit at a desk and plan a strategy on paper while, at the same time,
doing nothing. So, keeping his own counsel, for better or worse, he
determined that he would continue to work as a bureaucrat during the
day, but would spend his nights - at least part of them - looking for
others he might coax back to the light with the help of a very special
serum.
He had worked with Monq at Jefferson Unit labs to develop a delivery
solution. Taking a page from the methodology of the late Gautier
Nibelung, they had decided that the safest and most effective approach
would be dart gun. Each dart was outfitted with a tiny canister that
would puncture on impact releasing a formula that was part stun and part
cure. The proper dose of stun solution had been determined by tests on
Baka himself. So he knew it worked. First hand.
Obviously vampire must be incapacitated while the viral antidote works.
As medicinal remedies go, it is fast working, but not instant. There is
a delay of two to four hours between introduction to the system and
complete reversal of the disease, depending upon the age and
constitution of the individual.
His plan wasn't perfect. It depended on encountering one - no more than
two - vampire at a time and extracting them, while paralyzed, without
engaging other vampire. Further, all that had to be accomplished by him.
Alone.
Tricky, but the alternative was waiting for a task force to be vetted,
assembled, and trained. And waiting was the one thing he couldn't
manage. Maybe it wasn't the smartest thing he'd ever done, but, hell,
he'd had a long life.
To his advantage, he still had certain attributes that were extra
human. Not like comic book heroes. More like human plus. No one knew if
these benefits would fade away over time, but, for now, he was a little
stronger, a little faster, and could see in the dark a little better
than most people. All traits very useful for vampire hunting.
It just so happened that he found his assigned base of operations in
prime territory that qualified as a vampire magnet on all counts. In
Edinburgh's Old Town there was a large pedestrian population that came
out at night and it was built on top of an underground system
that was not utilized to any extent that would interfere with the needs
of vampire. All this was literally in sight of his office - five
minutes' walk away.
In a darkly poetic way, it was fitting that vampire would thrive in
Edinburgh's underground city which consisted of a system of tunneled
streets with walls so close you could almost stand in the middle and
touch both sides. The caverns and cells that faced the streets cut into
the much softer sandstone under the rock that the above-ground Old Town
is built upon. It's a place with grisly history where thousands of
hapless poor lived in darkness, packed together without sanitation and
with the vilest of criminals. The legend is that plague victims were not
removed and buried or burned, but sealed in their cells.
Some of the underground "vaults" under the bridge were reportedly used
during World War II air raids, but, even if that was true, no one had
been back since.
Modern day Ghost Tours offer a shallow excursion into Mary King's Close
- shallow because individuals don't want to stay in the underground very
long. Words like "creepy" are frequently used even by hard-core
insensitives. That left a lot of maze for a vampire haven.
Baka had been a vampire long enough to know all about how they think
which was why he had been supremely valuable to The Order as
"consultant".
He knew that the days of the Samhuinn festival would be a gorge fest for
vampire. The Royal Mile, just over the heads of vampire living in the
Underground, would be crowded with visitors to the city, visitors intent
on celebration and revelry, danger being the last thing on their minds.
It would be a blessing to vampire in the original sense of the word's
older cousin - bloodletting.
He finished his day, went to dinner alone, and slowly savored every bite
of actual food. Afterward, driven by a heartfelt desire to do some good
in the world, he pulled on a pair of cargo pants and equipped the dozen
pockets with as many canisters as they would hold. He opened his
backpack and stuffed it with two not-for-sale-on-any-market, rapid-fire
dart pistols designed by The Order's own, genius inventor, Thelonius M.
Monq. To that he added five revolving canisters for reloads, a
thinsulate, a lighted helmet guaranteed to give fourteen hours of use in
exchange for three AAA batteries, and six pairs of handcuffs.
When he put the handcuffs in side zipper pockets he wondered if he was
being ambitious, prideful, or just plain stupid. It gave him pause, but,
when weighed against the burden on his heart, his second thoughts didn't
carry enough weight to stop him. Like many natural intuits, he ignored
the foreboding of his own instinct and proceeded with the plan, foolish
though it might be.
He descended the stairs to the main foyer wondering if, even partial
redemption for a long life of misdeeds, is possible. The fact that he
was not accountable for his infamous history should have given him some
peace of absolution. But didn't. He said good evening to the doorman,
threaded his arms into the backpack straps, and headed out into the
night. ***
A second excerpt
is available on the blog at
http://victoriadanann.me/2012/12/26/the-http://victoriadanann.me/2012/12/26/the-summoners-tale-excerpt-2
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"I love the world(s)
she has designed. The basic issues that all the different races are
facing and trying to overcome. Interesting scientific concepts
side by side with issues of age old prejudices; a great mixture of
science and humanity – much like reality."
-
Georgianna S., The Reading Cafe
"Let me just say ~ Squeeeee!"
- Reviewing in Chaos
"As
multiple stories are seemingly unrelated, each brings with it a new
dimension that begins to form a pattern that slowly leads all players to
one key game, one final showdown to succeed and emerge intact. It is the
chase to the end, the multiple and variant tensions, the characters that
have become your friends, your heroes and your entertainment keep you
reading long past bedtime and into the night
– for you
need to know how it all ends. A gripping read that will please fans of
the series, and is best enjoyed after reading books one and two.
Completely worth the time and sleepless nights – and now I am left to
wonder impatiently what will happen in the proposed book four." -
Gaele,
Booked and Loaded
"Once
again I found myself wrapped up by the storytelling ability of this
author. I love her characters and I was thrilled that we get to continue
to follow their lives. I am a huge fan of books that have multiple
stories going on all at once and Victoria Danann seems to have perfected
it.
Fast paced, action packed, amazing characters - do not miss this
series."
-
Beverly, The Wormyhole
"What
can I say, other than the series has it all. Men and women you can't
help but love, betrayals, romance and surprises, oh and a loyal black
dog, and a pack of wolves. I was so surprised by many of the things I
learned, my first instinct was to want to share it with everyone. But
that is something I will not do.
The series needs to be read in order and each time you read and finish a
new chapter you just yearn for the next one.
All the characters are amazing, strong, handsome, loyal, and married to
women who are their equals." -
Linda Tonis,
The Paranormal Romance Guild.
"This series is far more than the total sum of its words. This is a
breathtaking cannot-put-it-down even if it is 3:00 am epic adventure.
The characters are so well developed that the reader identifies with
them, cheers them on and can wholly empathize with their trials. This
parallel world takes our history, changing its defining moments by a
simple deed or decision. The author plays out these facts and their
affect on the current world known by these complex characters. I am
amazed at how the author does this logically, yet dramatically, with
realistic results in the universe where those choices or decisions play
out.
Ms. Danaan is a masterful writer who weaves a story that flows
seamlessly. She leads you down a path, then takes detours creating new
forks in every road. You will be kept guessing, you will be intrigued
and yes you will be surprised. My Familiar Stranger, The
Witch's Dream and now The Summoners Tale should be on your
must read list.
The Black Swan series is one that, through
its brilliant and detailed storytelling, will become the classics our
kids (when grown) will read about and love in generations to come.
This is not a story about fairies, vampires and witches. As I stated
above, this is an epic adventure that includes things we dream about and
what becomes possible in a world where we and they unwittingly co-exist.
" - Christine Merritt
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