Welcome to the Halloween Blog Hop!

Halloween is almost upon us, time to party hearty!  To that end, I'm having a contest! Want to win a PDF of my brand new release? My Fair Vampire? My first novel written with co-author SL Danielson.

You have until Midnight of October 31st, Halloween night, to enter - all you have to do is comment on a post between now and then, and follow this blog! Simple, right?

Then go for it! And click on the picture to see what Drea Becraft and the other writers on the blog tour are doing for their own Halloween pleasure!

Let me give you a little taste of what you'll get!

My Fair Vampire
by S.L. Danielson and Julie Lynn Hayes
now available from Silver Publishing 

Blurb:  

In 1904, the world's spotlight shone brightly on St. Louis, Missouri—gateway to the West and host of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Visitors came from all points of the globe to wonder, to gape, to taste, to explore and to enjoy the marvels which the World's Fair had to offer. An ambitious young reporter from Utah, William Deming, sees his chance to not only visit the fair, but make a name for himself by reporting on its goings on. He takes a room in a boarding house, close to the Fair itself. What he doesn't count on is meeting Misha—a young and handsome Russian, whose aunt owns the boarding house.

Misha is something William has never encountered before—a vampire! As if that isn't enough to accept, when a man is discovered murdered at the Fair, William has to wonder if his Misha is involved. Especially as there seems to have been a connection between the vampire and the victim. Will an old flame cause new problems for William and Misha? Will they find love at the World's Fair? Or will theirs be doomed to be a fatal attraction?

Excerpt:

May 6, 1904

The influx of new boarders was all due to the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, as St. Louisans opened their homes not only to friends and family who wished to visit the extravaganza, but to veritable strangers as well. Most had shortened it to World's Fair for the sake of brevity and lazy tongues. It was all anyone had spoken about for months, and Misha was sick to death of it already. He didn't find it wonderful at all. For him, it was a disruption in the quiet tenor of his life, and it was playing havoc with his nerves. Especially considering how close they lived to the hub of it all, to Forest Park itself—a mere short stroll away. The park had always been his haven, his place of quiet contemplation—and secret assignation. But for far too long now it had been the scene of noisy construction, and strange buildings with stranger purposes.

He would not admit, even to himself, to possessing a certain curiosity toward the whole thing. He tended to hold himself aloof from the people around him, and only associated with them on his own terms.

"Misha? Misha!"

He started, so lost in his own reverie he had failed to hear the voice of Mrs. Sims. He turned away from the window, the curtain falling back into place, obscuring the evening view, the strange glow of the unaccustomed electric lights which disrupted the night sky.

"I'm sorry," he murmured, although he had no real reason to apologize, the words falling automatically from his lips. His English was still flavored with his native Russian accent. Some of that had sloughed off as he had struggled to master this foreign tongue, but it remained thick. He would never be mistaken for a native, that much he knew.

The older woman gave him an astute look from behind her spectacles. She was fond of the young man, and protective of him. She thought he had a beautiful voice, and had persuaded him to read to her, on those evenings when he did not flit out the door in order to spread his wings. Where he went, she could only speculate, but she was not one to pry. She enjoyed hearing him read, and she knew that the practice was good for his language skills as well.

"Would you like tea?" he asked her politely, although he already knew the answer. They had fallen into a proscribed routine. He would prepare the tea for the two of them—the black Russian tea of his homeland, sweetened with lemon or sugar or jam—and they would sit together in the parlor, sipping the warm brew. Sometimes he would serve little biscuits with the tea, but he never indulged in these himself. He would read and she would listen. His attentiveness to the older woman was pleasing to his aunt, who was kept busy with the boarding house during the day, at times when Misha could not help her. She understood why that was, the necessity of his absence, and she appreciated that he did what he could, when he could.