Review and Giveaway with Wynne Channing

Good Morning everyone. I am thrilled to have Journalist turned author, Wynne Channing stopping my to chat today. So, without further ado, I hand over the blog to her! Welcome Wynne!

Thanks so much to Picked By Poison for hosting me today! My name is Wynne and I wanted to take this opportunity to chat with you a little bit about characters who come alive.

I know a character has life when I wake up in the morning and wonder what they're up to. Or when I see something and say, "Oh, man, that's something [character] would totally do!" Then I realize, "Whoa. [Character] is a fictional person from a book. I'm a dork."

Guilty as charged...LOL

But though I feel like a loser for a second, it's really a win for the author. He or she has created someone very real for me. And what an incredible feat.

So when I was writing my debut adventure novel What Kills Me, I wanted readers to know Zee. I wanted them to hear her funny and warm voice in their heads. But how do you achieve this?

While I think you will like Zee, you don't have to adore a character for them to be real. (Who likes Hannibal Lector?) The characters just have to be true to themselves. So questioned my heroine’s actions and motivations at every turn.

For example, why would Zee venture out at night with a young man whom she just met? (That's dangerous!) When we meet her, she is a little naive, trusting, and desperate for adventure. So she makes a mistake. The mistake of course, costs her her life. But she is braver than she thinks she is, so she is able to face the horror that comes.

She's funny. Her little sister was sick growing up, so Zee became a clown to make her laugh. She’s also incredibly loyal and kind. She was bullied when she was younger, so she tries to treat everyone with respect. She's also honest and blunt. Unfortunately, this means that she blurts out whatever is in her head.

Whatever happens to her, this is her core. After she falls into an ancient well and emerges a vampire, she is told that she is the monster of monsters. Dangerous. Vicious. And Zee has to figure out for herself, who she is now and who she wants to be.

I hope one day that you wake up one morning and wonder what Zee is up to. Spoiler: chances are, she's either running for her life or kicking someone's butt.

what Kills Me
Wynne Channing

An ancient prophecy warns of a girl destined to cause the extinction of the vampire race.

So when 17-year-old Axelia falls into a sacred well filled with blood and emerges a vampire, the immortal empire believes she is this legendary destroyer. Hunted by soldiers and mercenaries, Axelia and her reluctant ally, the vampire bladesmith Lucas, must battle to survive.

How will she convince the empire that she is just an innocent teenager-turned bloodsucker and not a creature of destruction? And if she cannot, can a vampire who is afraid of bugs summon the courage to fight a nation of immortals?

What Kills Me Links:
Goodreads | Wynne's Website

Where to buy What Kills Me

Amazon US | Amazon UK | Smaskwords | Barned & Noble | Kobo

Excerpt

A human girl will be re-born a vampire. She will shed the blood of all who walk in darkness and bring about the death of the entire vampire race.
—Ancient vampire prophecy

Chapter 1

The sun’s down. I am so dead.

I walked out of the bakery with a box of cannoli balanced in my hands and when I saw the dark sky, my smile faded. I shouldered my way through the crowds and rushed into a piazza. The clock on the church tower read 9:25 p.m. I rounded the fountain in the center of the square, my flip flops slapping at my heels. I shifted my box of pastries so that it was under my arm like a football and quickened my pace.

Sofia is going to kill me. When I left the house at 7:30 p.m., I had told her that I’d be only twenty minutes. But I’d lost track of time wandering the narrow cobblestone streets, snapping pictures. So far, I wasn’t being a good guest in her home. Two days ago, I had accidentally used dishwasher soap in her laundry machine, producing a titanic bubble bath. This was not the way to redeem myself.

A few people sat on the stone stairs around the fountain. A bearded man plucked at a guitar and nodded his head. A woman reclined against her boyfriend, her hands on his knees as if they were the arms of a chair.

One young man stood alone on the top of the stairs. His hands were in the pockets of a charcoal coat with an asymmetrical zipper that cut across his chest. His face was backlit against the street lamps, but I knew that he was staring at me. He had such rigid posture that nothing but his head moved as he watched me cross the square.

I dropped my gaze. The straps of my backpack dug into my shoulders and shifted my T-shirt. I tugged at the hem so that the Canadian flag was centered in the middle of my chest. He probably wants to rob me. My father had warned me about pickpockets in Rome. A few days before my trip, he had come into my room with a bulgy blue fanny pack: “To keep your valuables safe.”

From the corner of my eye I could still see the man’s face pointed in my direction, and I heard my best friend’s voice in my head. Zee, he’s checking you out. See if he’s hot. Ryka had encouraged me to have a summer fling. The only fling I’d ever had with a guy was when Felix Lewis flung me in the air during cheerleading tryouts. “Find someone and have fun,” but avoid the bad guys, she had said. She wanted me to keep my other valuables safe.

Pretending to look back at the clock, I glanced at the fountain. The guy was gone. I searched the piazza but didn’t see him. Too bad. He might have been cute.Would his trying to pick my back pocket count as second base?

I turned down a lane sandwiched between two square buildings and wove through a group of men in soccer jerseys. An old man in an undershirt and house slippers stood in the street with a dusty poodle, and I returned his sullen glare with a smile and a nod.

After walking several minutes, something seemed wrong. Okay, I remember passing this restaurant with the row of people eating on white linen tablecloths under white umbrellas. I remember this tight street with the parked cars on my left. But I don’t remember the street opening into a parking lot and this giant purple bush.

A mass of fuchsia flowers cascaded down the side of a building, like a purple monster arm, reaching for the ground with its branchy fingers. I would have remembered this. I doubled back through the dim streets but then couldn’t find my way to the piazza. Don’t panic.

I took a mental inventory of the contents of my bag: a journal, my wallet, my passport, my digital camera, a bottle of water. Of course, I didn’t take the note card with Sofia’s address and phone number on it. It’s on my dresser. Of course, I didn’t take a map. I could see Sofia’s round face, scrunched with disapproval, the creases on her frowning forehead. I performed a frustrated pirouette.

“Come on,” I said, exasperated with myself.

“Excuse me?” A voice said behind me.

I spun around, and there he was in the middle of the road. The guy from the fountain. I recognized his jacket and his tall, stiff stance.

“Sorry. I was talking to myself,” I said.

He took a step toward me and his face shocked me. He had high cheek bones and clean-shaven, pale skin. His deep-set blue eyes were in shadow under thick, dark eyebrows, but they were luminous.

I realized then that I was staring with my mouth ajar.

“You’re American?” he asked in his Italian accent.

“No, I’m from Winnipeg. It’s in Canada,” I said, pointing to my T-shirt. I glanced away, feeling weird that I had just directed his attention to my chest.

He nodded. “You are on vacation?”

“I’m living here for two months studying Italian.”

“Well then, welcome to Italia,” he said, and his pale pink lips smiled. “Do you like it here?”

“I’ve only been here for about a week and I love it.”

“What do you love most?” The word, “lah-ve,” filled his mouth thickly.

“I love the architecture, the food,” I said. “If I could eat gelato every day for the rest of my life, I would.”

“Then you must be sweet.”

His smile widened and I felt embarrassed. To quash my anxiety, I thrust my hand at him. “I’m Zee,” I said.

He seemed startled, tucking in his dimpled chin to gaze at my hand. “Zee?"

“My name is Axelia but everybody calls me Zee.”

“Paolo,” he said.

He slipped his smooth, cool hand into mine. I gripped his palm and shook it vigorously.

“Eggs-ee-lee-ah?” he said, pronouncing every syllable of my name. “I like it.”

“Thanks. I like it too.  It’s spelled A-X-E-L-I-A; but the X is soft. Though I hated it when I was young. In kindergarten, someone spread a totally untrue rumor that ‘Zee likes pee,’ and then, you know, at recess, it was always ‘Zee likes pee, Zee likes pee.’”

I laughed and when he didn’t join me, I cleared my throat to silence myself. “And I have no clue why I told you that story, since we just met.”

Oh, Zee. Always babbling when you’re nervous.

He cocked his head and studied my face. “Zee, would you like to go with me for a gelato?” he asked.

Whoa. Is this beautiful guy asking me out? Ryka would be celebrating with corniness: “He doesn’t want to steal your wallet. He wants to steal your heart.”

“Uh, thank you, Paolo,” I said, relishing the opportunity to use his name. “But I actually need to get home.”

“Where do you live?”

“Good question. I mean, I’m not sure. I’m a bit lost,” I said with a shrug and something in between a grin and a grimace. “It’s on a narrow street around here. There’s a café on the street. There’s a pizzeria. I know—every narrow street has a café and a pizzeria. And I don’t have a map or an address. I might just have to live on the streets, survive on cannoli, and sing for coins.”

“You sing?”

“Yes but I’m sure people will pay me to stop.”

“Don’t worry,” he said. “I will help you.”

“Oh, I remember!” I exclaimed. “There’s a white church on my street.”

“Via della Scala has a white church,” he said. “And a café and a pizzeria.”

“Via della Scala, that’s it!” I said.

He put his hand over his heart and bowed slightly. “May I have the honor of walking you there, Zee?”

“That would be lovely.”

As we walked back to Sofia’s apartment, I chattered to fill the silence. I told him about the laundry fiasco and about my Japanese housemate, Miyuki. At one point, I realized that I was nervously swinging the box of cannoli while I walked. Paolo kept his eyes on me while I looked everywhere else. His suede coat sleeve would brush my bare arm, giving me goose bumps.

“How old are you?” I said.

“How old are you?”

“Seventeen.”

“Me too,” he replied.

“I start university in the fall. I’m going to take general arts courses for now because I’m not sure what field I’d like to get into. My father’s an aerospace engineer and my big sister is studying mechanical engineering. But I almost failed physics and math in high school. So for the safety of mankind, I don’t think I should get a job building anything. I love taking pictures so maybe I could be a photographer. What do you do?”

“I’m a student.”

“What are you studying?”

“I’m a student of life,” he said. He pursed his lips when he smiled.

Was that code for unemployed?

“I see,” I said, instead. “And what have you learned so far?”

“I’ve learned that treasures present themselves when you least expect them,” he said. “And you? What has your life taught you?”

“That I shouldn’t walk around without a map,” I said. “And that dish soap doesn’t go in washers. Actually, I’m here because I want more life experience. I feel like I’ve been pretty sheltered in Winnipeg.”

“I’ve never been there. Is it nice?”

“Yes, but it gets cold.”

“Cold doesn’t bother me.”

“This cold would. Our winters are brutal. It’s so cold sometimes that my eyes water and then my wet eyelashes freeze together.”

He chuckled. His teeth were small and perfect. For a moment, I imagined walking with him through these streets, laughing and holding hands. I imagined him teaching me Italian. I imagined him kissing me. Then I could add “kissed a hot guy” to my experiences, right after “traveled outside of Winnipeg.”

Suddenly I recognized the square planters in front of Sofia’s apartment farther down the street.

“Thank God, we’ve found it!” I blurted. Then I turned to Paolo. “I didn’t mean thank God because I don’t like your company. You’re wonderful company in fact.”

“I also enjoyed your company.”

“Thank you so much. I owe you my life for helping me get back to Sofia’s.”

One side of his lips curled up. “Then repay me,” he said.

“Okay.” I channeled Ryka’s boldness. “I could buy you a gelato?”

“Yes. Let’s meet tomorrow at nine fifteen.”

“Where?” I asked. I could feel my cheeks flushing.

“Right here,” he said, pointing to the pizzeria to his left.

“Done,” I said. “It was nice meeting you.”

“Goodnight, Zee.”

“Goodnight, Paolo.”

About Wynne Channing

ynne Channing is an award-winning national newspaper reporter and young adult novelist. She loves telling stories and as a journalist, she has interviewed everyone from Daniel Radcliffe and Hugh Jackman to the president of the Maldives and Duchess Sarah Ferguson. The closest she has come to interviewing a vampire is sitting down with True Blood's Alexander Skarsgard (he didn’t bite). She briefly considered calling her debut novel "Well" so then everyone would say: "Well written by Wynne Channing." 

Where to find Wynne Channing

Her Website | Her Blog | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads

Review

Axelia (Zee) is studying Italian in the center of the culture in Italy. when she meets Paola things seem to be perfect, but things quickly go from good to bad, to worse. Paola is NOT what he seems to be and he leads Zee to the sacred grounds of the Ancients. When Zee finds herself drowning in a pool of blood and somehow manages to get out, things go from normal to creepy in a matter of minutes. Once she emerges she's taken to face the Queen and faces punishment for her intrusion on sacred ground. She soon finds out she's not like others of her kind.

Once she escapes, she heads into the woods and simply runs to find a way be free. Its there she finds the cottage, Lucas and his family who are rebels of the queen. Lucas is a skilled swordsman and fighter. Soon the queens warriors catch up with Zee and Lucas' family fight to save her and all but Lucas survive. On the run they seek out an old friend of Lucas' who can help them seek out Lucas' maker, who has knowledge about the prophecy surrounding Zee.

<>Their journey is seemingly full of peril as the monarchy is still hot on their trail and Zee and Lucas have to fight to stay alive. Once they reach their destination they think they have sanctuary for a while. However, things aren't what they seem as their lookout is found killed, turned to ash, and others are missing. Soon the army of the queen is right there. Zee and Lucas are shocked to find out how they were found. Things are getting getting tense, but the tables will turn.

I can't spoil the ending as it was a truly shocking revelation which leads to what will be the next story in the trilogy, or so I'm told... Wynne has a great way of storytelling and descritptive details which make Zee and Lucas jump off the pages. The cliff hanger near the end was intense and had me turning pages well into the early morning hours. I loved Zee and Lucas and I can't wait to see how things turn out next! A 5 star read for sure!

Giveaway

Wynne is offering an eCopy of what Kills Me with a signed bookmark with a butterfly charm to one lucky commenter (please leave your E-mail and format preference) on the blog all you have to do is fill out the rafflecopter form below and post a quick comment. The Giveaway here is open to US and Canada residents.

Dark Minds Book Tours is also hosting a giveaway over on their blog, so stop by there to see the special giveaway they have.

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