Blog Tour: Character Interview, Excerpt & Giveaway — SJ Himes – The Necromancer’s Reckoning

A warm welcome to author SJ Himes joining us today to talk about her new release “The Necromancer’s Reckoning part of the succesfull Beacon Hill Sorcerers series.
SJ brought the cast of characters to talk to them , shares an excerpt and there is a giveaway to participate in!
Welcome SJ 🙂

THE NECROMANCER’S RECKONING

THE BEACON HILL SORCERER, BOOK 3

S.J. HIMES

GAY URBAN FANTASY ROMANCE

RELEASE DATE: 05.27.18

AMAZON US

AMAZON UK

COVER DESIGN: Kellie Dennis of Book Cover by Design

BLURB

Every action has consequences.

For a decade, Angel Salvatore has been the most powerful sorcerer and only necromancer in all the Northeast. Never one to ask permission nor apologies, he has acted with near impunity for years.

Until now.

The High Council of Sorcery has come to Boston, and Angel is their target. Charged with numerous violations of practitioner laws, his freedom and family are placed in jeopardy.

If found guilty, Angel’s apprentice Daniel will be imprisoned to serve out the remaining years of his apprenticeship. Isaac, his brother, is too vulnerable to be left unguarded, and Angel fears for his sanity and health. And Simeon, Elder vampire and Angel’s mate refuses to see Angel convicted under the laws of the Council and his actions to keep Angel free threaten to start a war that could destroy their world. And Angel faces the severest of punishments—the castration of his gifts.

The Council has never cared for the people of Boston, and Angel doubts their motives. They have come for some insidious reason, and it has nothing to do with upholding the law and everything to do with Angel.

Dealing with an impending trial, a wayward ghost, and a grave robbing ring of thieves leaves Angel on the edge. He thinks he may have a handle on things until violence erupts across the city, and a stranger comes to town…a stranger with his own dark powers of necromancy.

This is book 3 of a series, and the previous books should be read first for full enjoyment. Trigger Warnings are on the Copyright Page and can be seen using the Look Inside feature or by downloading a sample of this book.

Character Interview with the Cast of The Beacon Hill Sorcerer with SJ Himes

 

Hello everyone! My name is SJ Himes, I’m the author of The Necromancer’s Reckoning, Book #3 of The Beacon Hill Sorcerer series. Thank you for having me today, and I’ve brought with me the cast of the novel and series’ favorites! With me are Angel Salvatore, Boston’s only necromancer; Simeon, Elder vampire and Angel’s mate; Isaac Salvatore, fire mage and Angel’s brother; Daniel Macavoy, sorcerer and apprentice to Angel; Dame Milly Fontaine, sorceress and Angel’s teaching partner; and Eroch, the mightiest tiny dragon in the world.

SJ: We’re here to celebrate the release of the third book in BHS, The Necromancer’s Reckoning. Angel before we begin the interview, is there anything you want to say about this book?

Angel: In this book, I’ve drawn the attention of the High Council of Sorcery, the de facto ruling world government for practitioners. I have my suspicions about why they’ve come, and the reasons behind the charges levied against me, and the book explores how I react to that. My family is put in danger even while we’re dealing with trouble and difficult situations on the home front. Each of us has a trial of our own to face in this book.

SJ: This is the last book from your perspective?

Angel: <nods> Reckoning is the last book with myself and Simeon as the main characters. Isaac and Daniel get a chance to shine in Books 4 and 5. They’ve been more than patient, and it is now their turns.

SJ: I have some questions from fans of the series. Everyone ready?

<everyone nods and looks nervous>

Let’s start with Dame Fontaine! Milly, this question is from Heather Leonard. Can you tell us about any teaching sessions with Angel that went hilariously wrong?

Milly: <sighs> Angel and I teach the more advanced and specialized magics not taught at the high sorcery schools for young practitioners. Between us, we likely know more spells and adaptive spellwork than the combined staff of a few of the top schools. This is not bragging—I point this out to illustrate that we’re experienced, and parents send us their children to learn more than what they could learn in a school setting. That often means dangerous, deadly magics. We are careful and take precautions, but many times things go wrong. Accidents with injuries and some near misses. I’ve never met a student that was perfect on their first try—

Angel: <coughs>

Milly: <rolls eyes> –except for one precocious young man a long time ago, of course. But one funny incident involved Angel dealing with a young air elementalist who had the misfortune to cast a hex instead a spell, and Angel, whenever he spoke, ended up flattened on the floor by a gust of wind. It took us far too long to figure out how to undo the hex, as it was instinctive magic and not something structured. The young man was most embarrassed, and we had to convince him Angel wasn’t mad at him before he would return for the next session.

Angel: Hard to convince the kid since I was seething mad after the tenth time I got knocked on my ass.

Milly: <pats Angel’s shoulder>You talk too much, dear. It did you good.

Angel: <sighs>

SJ: This question is from Rochelle O’Rourke for both Angel and Isaac: If things hadn’t happened as they did with the Salvatore Massacre, would you two be closer to each other or farther apart than you are now?

Isaac: <grows pale> I’m not going to answer that. Excuse me. <leaves the room>

SJ: That’s hard topic for him to talk about. Angel, can you share?

Angel: That’s something we’ve never thought about, or at least I haven’t. I raised Isaac after our family’s death. Whatever we were going to be to each other as only brothers, that’s a possibility forever lost after the massacre. Isaac was wounded deeply and carries those wounds still. It’s something he must confront in this book.

SJ: Let’s lighten the mood a bit. This is a question for Simeon from Remus Sanders: What were you thinking just before you saw Angel for the first time and just After? Given the circumstances it must have been a major shift in gears.

Simeon: I knew of Angel before we ever met in person. As First Elder of the Bloodclan, my master, Constantine Batiste, charged me with investigating the top supernatural beings and strongest practitioners in Boston before we moved the clan. The Wars had just ended, and Angel and Isaac were hard to find. The information we gathered was focused on Angel, since our sources told us Isaac was a mundane mortal. Videos of Angel fighting in the streets were easy to find in this era of the internet, and news reports and pictures were publicly accessible. I never saw Angel in person, up close, until that night in the club when he came to bring his brother home. He was different and yet the same from the young man in those videos. I don’t recall what I had been thinking before I saw him, scented him, felt the heat of his body in the air around me, but I know afterwards that his leaving wounded me, a sharp ache that I’d not felt for centuries. Sharp tongue and wit, a wry smile, and power that shook the world around him, he was everything I’d ever wanted.

<Milly sniffles. Angel stares at Simeon, who takes Angel’s hand and squeezes it, smiling softly.>

SJ: <smiles> From Remus Sanders, again, Angel: What flavor of ice cream do you like the most?

Angel: <blinks and comes out his daze, a dopey smile on his lips> I adore cookie dough ice cream.

SJ: Me too! And this next question was for Isaac, also from Remus, but I can ask y’all: Has anyone tried to use Isaac like a microwave or oven?

Daniel: <raises hand> We once got in a stupid argument in the kitchen and we exploded a kettle full of boiling water. Almost lost my hand.

SJ: <grimaces> Yikes! Anything less deadly?

Daniel: Isaac really doesn’t use his magic. I think it hurts him. Not physically, but emotionally. He carries a lot of guilt.

Angel: No more questions about Isaac. He has enough going on in this book. Let’s change it up, please.

SJ: Of course. Angel, from Mary Myers-Huff Barger: Do you ever feel like just letting loose and going to the dark side of being a Necromancer?

Angel: <slow grin> Who says I’m not there already? I’m not a hero. I swear too much, don’t give a fuck about the rules, I flip the bird to laws, and will do anything to keep my family, friends, and city safe. I don’t care all that much about people when they’ve been stupid and brought their misery upon themselves. I’ve got no tolerance for bullshit, authority without earning respect can suck it, and I want to be left alone with my family.

<Daniel giggles>

Angel: What?

Daniel: You’re so full of it. You care too much, not too little. Why else would you save me and make me your apprentice? <Daniel laughs> Angel cares too much and has little patience. He’ll fix the problem as soon as he can and will run roughshod over anyone in his way. No apologies from Angel, but he’s the one to have in your corner when the world goes to hell.

Simeon: He has you there, mo ghra.

Angel: <grumbles> I’m not a hero.

Simeon: You are a hero, but not the usual kind, I’ll grant you that. Everyone is going to have to read the book to see exactly what I mean.

Angel: <perks up> By Hecate, that’s right! Read the book, stop asking me these things!

Milly: And he’s done with the interview, looks like!

SJ: Thank you everyone for coming. Angel convey my apologies to Isaac, and I look forward to seeing you all in Necromancer’s Reckoning!

<everyone escapes>

The Necromancer’s reckoning is the third book in The Beacon Hill Sorcerer series, available now from all Amazon markets. It is enrolled in Kindle Unlimited.

 

“What do you mean, I got a letter?” Angel held his smartphone between his ear and shoulder, fumbling with the keys to his office. It was still dark, and he huffed with impatience, blinking a small orb of hellfire into existence over his hands so he could find the right key. Inserting it into the lock, he opened the door and dismissed the orb, flicking the light switch by the door.

“It was delivered by courier about ten minutes ago,” Daniel replied, his apprentice talking past food. “I had to sign for it. The courier almost didn’t leave it with me until I told him I was your apprentice.”

Angel grumbled to himself, tossing his keys on his desk and grabbing his phone, rubbing the back of his neck. He left his apartment not even ten minutes before, which was only a couple blocks away, so the courier must have shown up right as he was leaving. He frowned, thinking back to the pre-dawn street, and he didn’t recall seeing anyone—not even a car or taxi.

“Well, go ahead and open it,” Angel said, tapping his phone to put it on speaker. Daniel made a happy sound past whatever he was chewing, and Angel snorted out a laugh. He booted up his laptop, looking for the appointment he had that morning at the ass-crack of dawn. Why in the world he thought it would be a good idea to have a private consultation so damn early on a Monday was beyond him. Which was why he decided on waking up everyone he lived with so he could share the misery. Though it was only Daniel since Isaac was at Nevermore and Simeon was at the Tower.

A sharp yelp and swearing came out from the speakers, and Angel laughed. “Papercut?”

“No! It shocked me!” Daniel gasped out, cussing under his breath. “I can’t open it!”

“What do you mean you can’t open it? Just rip it open.”

“I’m trying! Ouch!” Daniel yelped again, and the sounds coming from over the phone were parts hilarious and alarming. “I’m not risking my fingers. You can open it.”

“Who is it from? It might be warded if a courier brought it.”

“Now you tell me,” Daniel muttered, and Angel grinned as he found the appointment time. Daniel was finding his courage and picking up sass lessons from Isaac. His shy apprentice was learning all about sarcasm in the Salvatore household. His appointment was in about five minutes. No time to run back home and get the letter that was singeing his apprentice’s fingers. Daniel recited the address on the letter, “It says, ‘To Angelus Raine Salvatore, Necromancer of Beacon Hill, Boston, Massachusetts. From’…Oh, wow.”

“Who’s it from?”

“The High Council of Sorcery, Bucharest, Romania.”

Angel stood up straight, hands falling away from his laptop. He stared at the phone, the quiet in his office somehow loud, heart pounding in his ears. He looked up at the door as if any second one of the Council enforcers would blast through the doorway, ready to take him into custody for crimes sundry against international sorcery laws. He breathed in, breath shaky, and flexed his fingers. He reached out with his mind, cautiously testing the wards around his office, and there was nothing.

“Angel? Angel!” Daniel squawked over the phone, and Angel snapped free of the tension that held him frozen and snatched up the phone.

“Daniel, my appointment is any minute. Can you bring the letter here? Just hang out in the main room until I’m done if we’ve started when you get here. Wake up Eroch and have him come with you.”

“Um, okay…wake up the fire-breathing lizard, he says.”

“Just pick him up and carry him with you if he doesn’t wake up. He was sleeping on my pillow when I left. Don’t walk over here alone. I’d say hold on to it until I get home, but I have a feeling I need to read that letter as soon as possible.”

“Okay. Can I take a shower first?”

“You better,” Angel chuckled and hung up. Twenty-year-old men needed showers for the sake of everyone.

A knock sounded from the front of the office, and Angel took a deep breath, calming his off-center nerves before heading to answer the door. He was still cautious, sending out his awareness, his wards humming in the recesses of his mind, unmolested. There were two people on the small landing outside his door, their auras muffled by the panel, but they were both practitioners.

Angel opened the door, a polite smile on his face.

“Angelus Salvatore?” asked a tall, bulky man in a dark coat, his face set to glower. Angel lifted a brow, unable to see the person behind the big man. He could see a flash of red hair and a small bit of alabaster skin before the big guy shifted.

“I am,” Angel replied, opening the door wider, stepping back and gesturing them inside. His wards were set to allow strangers inside, but they would dampen any magic cast in this space by strangers or those he blocked. Came in handy when dealing with young sorcerers and unexpected guests. They could still cast, but his magic permeated the space, claiming even the ambient magical energies and stifling spells cast by interlopers. Not much use against a practitioner who used their own reserves, but the more dangerous, higher-ranked practitioners tended to reach outside themselves first before casting.

A tall woman was behind the big guy, slim and covered head to toe in black, from her leather high-heeled boots and ankle-length black pea coat to her black silk scarf and a jaunty, tiny pillbox hat atop titian curls. She was familiar, but the shadows were still dark enough Angel was having difficulty determining her identity. He led them back to his office, gesturing at the chairs in front of his desk. The woman sat, unwinding her scarf, her escort taking a stance beside the office door. Angel turned on the lamps as dawn was taking its time arriving and the room had shadows in inconvenient places.

The woman removed her scarf, putting it on her lap before shrugging from her coat. Her escort stepped forward, taking it from her before returning to his spot by the door. The woman, dressed in a thin black wraparound dress that hugged every slim curve and long line of her body, smiled at Angel. She was pretty, in a very human way, nothing of the fae about her in face or form. Dark green eyes, nothing at all like the brilliant emerald of Simeon’s eyes but arresting enough in their own merits, gazed back at him, glistening with wry humor.

“Lady Kensington,” Angel acknowledged after a moment’s pause, surprised. The recent widow was a wizard and a skilled apothecary who owned and ran Nightshade Apothecary not far from where they sat in Beacon Hill. Angel would see her occasionally in the neighborhood or when he needed supplies between scheduled deliveries. Her husband, Lord Greyson Kensington, died of a heart attack three months ago while shoveling snow off the front stoop of their shop one chilly winter morning.

“Call me Heather, please,” she said, voice melodic and rich, smooth as hot chocolate with a shot of whiskey. Her chin rose as if she was expecting argument. What Angel could remember of her husband, the man was a stickler for propriety and demanded to be addressed by his title, even to friends.

Angel never liked the man.

“Heather,” Angel agreed with a grin, surprising her into smiling back at him. “What can I do for you? And why so early? I would’ve come to the shop.”

“I’m afraid this matter requires a measure of discretion,” Lady Heather replied, twisting her scarf in her fingers. “It’s regarding my late husband.”

Angel paused, thinking. Usually when the recently bereaved came to his door, they wanted either the impossible, like a resurrection, or more commonly, a summoning of the departed spirit. He rarely acquiesced as nothing good could come from repeatedly dialing in to the Other Side. It kept the living from moving on and tormented the souls he would be recalling to this plane.

She must have seen some of these thoughts on his face, as she held up a dainty hand, forestalling his coming denial. “I don’t want you to summon him from the Other Side,” she said, tears gathering on her lashes. Angel waited, curious despite himself. “I want you to find him for me.”

“I’m sorry, I’m not following,” Angel said warily, hoping she didn’t cry. Isaac or Daniel breaking down he hated but knew what to do, a near stranger crying left him awkward.

“The shop was broken into three nights ago,” Lady Heather said quickly, words tumbling over themselves as she hurried to explain. “I heard the commotion from my apartment upstairs, but by the time the police arrived, it was too late.”

“What did they steal?” Angel was trying to follow along, he really was, but he had no idea what a burglary would have to do with her deceased husband.

“They stole him,” Lady Heather said, digging out a handkerchief from her tiny black purse. She dabbed at her eyes, miraculously not smearing her mascara.

Angel frowned. “I’m going to need you to spell this out for me.”

“The thieves stole Greyson’s ghost. I need you to find him.”

AMAZON US – THE BEACON HILL SORCERER SERIES

AMAZON UK – THE BEACON HILL SORCERER SERIES

I’m a self-employed writer who stresses out about the silliest things, like whether or not I got my dog the best kind of snack and the fact my kindle battery tends to die when I’m at the best part in a book. I write mainly gay romance, erotica, and urban fantasy, with occasional forays into contemporary and paranormal. I love a book heavy on plot and character evolution, and throw in some magic, and that’s perfection. My current series are: The Beacon Hill Sorcerer, Bred For Love (as Revella Hawthorne), The Wolfkin Saga, and the epic fantasy romance series Realms of Love. My last two novels in the Beacon Hill Sorcerer won 3rd Place in the Gay Fantasy category for the 2016 Rainbow Awards.

I live in New Orleans, where the personalities are big and loud and so are the bugs! New Orleans is rich in cultural history, and the flavor and music of the City is impossible to hide. Before that, I lived all over the United States: Tampa, Western Massachusetts, Indianapolis, and on and on…. I’m a nomad, and I’ve yet to find a place that calls to me strongly enough to become home. My faithful travel companions are my dog Micah, the numerous voices in my head who insist they all get put on paper, and the wind at my back.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SJHimes/

Website: https://www.sjhimes.com/en

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