Blood-borne

LET’S FACE IT. THERE’S NO CONTINGENCY FOR
EVERY EMERGENCY

Ever have one of those days when you wished you’d never gotten up in the morning. Where the adage “no good deed goes unpunished” gets thrust in your face like a rotten tomato in a vaudeville act. Where only the good die young would actually be a blessing if it was only true.

Paul Dominick stops to assist at an accident on a desolate road, only to have one person bite him and another try to bash his brains in. Narrowly escaping with his life, he soon discovers that he isn’t able to shake the victims of this accident from hounding him for his heroics. Changes develop from an infection passed on through an inadvertent transfusion of blood, which leaves him remarkably and irreversibly altered at the cellular level. As a paramedic, Dom has a difficult time adjusting to this change and thinks it’s only his twenty-four-hour shift that will suffer. It isn’t long before he learns that no one wants to leave him alive in the condition he is.

Jamie Wittenheim writes a gritty story that takes vampire romances to a frightening level—out of en vogue literature and back into the realm of horror. The traditional concept of a swashbuckling hero of the night withers under the pall of reality. Romance turns into hard-hitting sexual relations and power struggles, where the hopeful and desperate are manipulated into selling their souls to a power-monger already holding all the cards. In the midst of this is the luckless innocent Good Samaritan who simply intended to lend a hand, only to have it bitten in return. As innocence is perverted through a rape by fate, allegiances are realigned, insanity blossoms, and heroics come from the most unlikely characters. Wittenheim isn’t afraid to bring an eye-popping, heart-pounding, blood-racing story to mature readers who like a lot of tension between characters, complexity in an intricately woven conflict, and libidinous scenes.

Blood-borne is a complex story of three couples who start out with distinct views and endeavors, only to have them warped by betrayals, misconceptions, and the tricky intercession of fate. This is the reality of any relationship, and more so when other parties are brought into the mix. Take a step outside the norm with a writer who knows how to get the blood pumping in oh-so-many ways. This is not a book for the kiddies or the gushing romantic.

Blood-borne (529 pgs; $17.00) will be available only as a review copy for interested readers. Contact this web site for a copy.