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Friday, November 4, 2022

Hollie Smurthwaite's Top Ten Paranormal Book Boyfriends #ParanormalRomance #Suspense


TOP 10 PARANORMAL BOOK BOYFRIENDS

1. Bones from the Night Huntress series by Jeaniene Frost. Bones is a vampire, deadly, clever, grew up a male prostitute so sexually talented, and so devoted to Kat that he is positively swoony. He’s particularly delicious on audiobook. 

2. Curran from Ilona Andrews's Kate Daniel's series. Lion shifter and Lord of the Beasts. He's vicious and dangerous and growly, and I love the way he and Kate challenge and compete with each other. 

3. Valek from the Poison Study series by Maria V. Snyder. Valek starts the series as almost an antagonist. He is vicious, exacting, and cold. His treatment of Yelena is always upfront, though, even early on in the novel, and he's never cruel. A lot of integrity there. As the novel continues, however, he thaws to Yelena and really looks out for her. 

4. Logan from Dannika Dark's Mageri series. Logan doesn't show up until book two, Twist, but when he does, he makes an immediate impact. He spends the series in pursuit of winning over Silver. And he purrs. You gotta love that. 

5. Kieran from the Demigod of San Francisco series by KF Breene. Kieran, Kieran, Kieran. An Irish demigod from Poseidon's line, powerful, sexy, and determined, and yet sensitive and caring. He looks out for everyone around him, and he surrounds himself with some awesome friends. 

6. Adam Hauptman from Patricia Brigg's Mercy Thompson series. This series is still going strong. I just finished Soul Taken in October. Alpha werewolf Adam is all about being a protector and thoughtful leader. And he's got the skills and power to make everyone fall in line. 

7. Simon from The Other's series by Anne Bishop. Okay this is one that may not make sense to most of you readers. Simon is a wolf shape-shifter, but not the usual sexy, mostly human kind. In the world of the Other's, the Others are really distinctly different from humans. Simon doesn't like humans (except perhaps as a snack), and yet, there's something about someone so cranky and irritated who can't stop caring about one human (Meg). Earning his respect and love is really a feat. 

8. Ox from the Green Creek series by TJ Klune. This one is for any gay readers out there. Ox is introduced as a teenager just as he and his mother are abandoned by his father. His dad's parting words are none too comforting. And yet Ox is a steady, reliable, caring presence despite how life has treated him. He brings Joe out of a funk that has had his family worried sick. Ox never falters or fails those he loves. 

9. Samael in the Deals with Demons series by Stacia Stark. Samael crosses into alphahole a time or two, but never so far that he loses his sexiness or charm. He plays a patient game rather than overpowering Danica. They are a good match, and it’s fun to watch them come together. 

10. Zeylas from The Guild Codex: Demonized series by Annette Marie. Slow burn relationship, so by the end, of the series, Zeylas is the strong, mostly silent (demon) protector who somehow manages to keep his scorn and derision but still be heartwarmingly protective.
Hope you find a new book boyfriend from this list!


The Color of Betrayal
The Psychic Colors Series
Book Two
Hollie Smurthwaite

Genre: Paranormal Romance, Suspense
Publisher: Hollie Smurthwaite
Date of Publication: 10-31-2022
ISBN: 978-1-7371189-6-1
ASIN: B0BD2NYV8W
Number of pages: 344
Word Count: 98,000
Cover Artist: Sarah Hansen at Okay Creations

Tagline: No Secret is Safe . . . 

Book Description:

As a memory surgeon, Jolene can slip into other people’s memories. She can see them, experience them, even steal them. To atone for her past, she’s been using her gift to help the Agency, a secret government entity, taking out drug lords across the US. After a screw-up on an assignment, she’s back in Chicago, where her own worst memories live.

The last thing she needs while trying to make up for her mistake is a sexy distraction.  Cass is a little sweet and a lot gorgeous.  The only problem: she can’t have him and the job.  But when he offers his friendship, she can’t resist. 

While Jolene and Cass try to pretend there is nothing beneath their friendship, her mission spins out of control. Now, both their lives are on the line. Will her growing powers be enough to save her? Or will secrets send her right back to the darkest depths of her past?

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Excerpt:

After only three weeks of dating, Jolene and Colton had fallen into a routine: dinner (both) and drinks (him), binge-watching various flavors of CSI at his downtown Boston condo (him), and a few hours of surreptitiously delving into Colton's memories (her). Jolene's practice run as a spy in the field was going well.

The late August night was cool enough for Colton to crack open the sliding glass door to the balcony to let the night air clear his lingering cigarette smoke. Jolene kicked off the stiletto heels and inwardly sighed. After some complex maneuvering, she managed to tuck her aching toes under her too-bright skirt.

The next part of the evening promised to be worth the discomfort of a thong up her ass crack to avoid panty lines.

Without asking Jolene what she would like, Colton switched on the obscenely large TV and pulled up Hulu, lounging like a czar on his pristine white couch, which was a stupid color for anyone but particularly ludicrous for a smoker who drank too much and worked with dangerous people.

In another life, he would have been regal with golden hair, long limbs, straight nose, and a boyish, charming smile. But this wasn’t another life.

As a midlevel lackey in the Red Flames criminal organization, he was not proper boyfriend material, even if he made enough cash to buy a downtown place on a high floor and have it professionally, if foolishly, decorated all in white.

Jolene wiggled her toes into the plush cushion and ignored the stale-smoke smell mixed with Colton’s spicy cologne. Any moment, Colton would slip into a CSI coma, and she would slip into his memories.

“This looks like a good one,” she said. What she always said, because why mess with what worked?

“Yeah,” Colton agreed, as he always did. He lit a cigarette and “politely” blew the smoke toward the balcony doors, tapping the ash into an antique crystal ashtray on the glass coffee table already holding three butts.

The first week, she'd been terrified he'd somehow feel her inside his mind, though she'd never had that happen before or heard of anyone sensing the process. Not that Jolene still had contacts in the memory-surgeon community, small as it was, but that sort of revelation would put memory surgery back in the 24/7 news cycle, like when they’d first been legitimized. Semi-legitimized.

This first assignment was nothing more than an exploration of what she could do on a real mission. Since Colton was a gangster and she had no close backup, fear nibbled, but confidence had outpaced her worry.

Jolene rested her head on his shoulder, slipped her arm through his, and slid her hand down his button-down shirt to rest on his hand. As soon as skin-to-skin contact was made, she mentally reached out to him. Colton's mind rose up inside her own. To boost her concentration, Jolene closed her eyes.

Within the blackness, bubbles sharpened. The different shapes and colors bobbed and slid around one another. In her mind's eye, she moved into the middle, staring at them as if in an aquarium. The memories never touched her, but she could reach out and sink into any of them. If she did, she experienced the memory in its entirety, exactly as Colton had lived through the event at the time. If she wanted, she could remove memories, but that was a level of violation she resisted unless absolutely necessary. Besides, if she took something, she had to keep it, and she didn't want to keep anything of Colton's.

Jolene already had an entire dossier in her head of all things Colton. She’d cataloged his fears: multilegged insects like millipedes terrified him, as did his brother when his eyes went icy, and his jaw shifted to the right.

Shame occupied its own section: bed-wetting for a month when he was twelve. The time he'd slapped his girlfriend after she'd gotten pregnant and decided she didn't want it. Red Flames passing him over for job after job.

Still, inside, people were infinite, and she had more to learn. She avoided the pink bubbles, as they were filled with his worst memories, and her reactions to living them were difficult to hide. Reds gave her the best intel so far. Angers, suspicions, smackdowns.

Truthfully, she should have wrapped up the mission a week ago since she wasn’t finding anything new. But playing spy and the unfettered access to Colton's recollections had been too enlightening to quit quite yet. Her skills had grown, and she didn’t feel guilty about messing in his brain because of his criminal history. She was three weeks into her two- to three-week mission, so she needed to skip out soon.

Jolene decided to make a game to test her memory-reading skills. She had recently learned how to peek and not immediately experience a memory. It allowed her to see more since she didn’t need any emotional recovery time, and she processed what she encountered more quickly.

Tonight, she wanted to test how many memories she could scan during commercial breaks, since Colton was too cheap to pay for the commercial-free version of Hulu. She’d hop through his memories like jumping into puddles.

Commercial.

A mahogany memory: his brother, Walther, stood over him, watching over his shoulder as Colton did algebra homework. Whenever Colton squirmed in his chair, Walther flicked his ear. It didn’t hurt much, but Colton’s face burned every time, and his muscles shook with the stress of not moving to avoid Walther’s attention. “Knock it off,” he grumbled, earning another sting. Colton tensed—

A buttercup-colored memory: “Mama, Mama, Mama,” Colton said, running around his mama as she walked in the park. If he ran fast enough, he would fly, his head already lightening. He stumbled and giggled, his mama laughing. Something shiny glinted in the sun. What was it? His mama scooped him into her arms before he grabbed it. She smelled of flowers and oranges.

About the Author: 

Hollie Smurthwaite is a paranormal romantic suspense author of The Color of Trauma and The Color of Betrayal. The Color of Trauma was the winner of the 2020 Soon to Be Famous Illinois Author Project in adult fiction. She lives in Chicago with her husband, son, and too few pets. In past lives, she's been a checkout clerk, massage therapist, office manager, recruiter, magazine staff writer, pepper spray hawker, and belly dancer.













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