Posts Tagged ‘Kenya Wright’

chameleon banner

Thanks for stopping by for the Chameleon Tour.

I have so much to share with you.

Please enjoy my review, read the first chapter, get to know Kenya Wright, and don’t forget to enter the giveaway!

chameleon cover

1771e-addtogoodreadsblack

Genre: New Adult Urban Fantasy

Cameo lives in a caged supernatural city where all species are tagged at birth with silver brands embedded in their foreheads. Her X brand identifies her as a Mixbreed, but she’s so much more. Like a chameleon, she can shift from one person’s image to another.

It’s a great way to make money for a habitat street kid, or Cage Punk as most people call them. Wiz, her street partner-in-crime, finds her jobs to use her abilities. Some jobs entail changing into people to take academic tests. Others require more skill and involve higher risk.

When Wiz asks Cameo to stand in for a Were-wolf teenager who doesn’t want to go to her debutante ball, it seems like just another job, until a corpse is discovered and an old friend of Wiz appears.

Buy Links

Amazon / Barnes and Noble

~~

My Review

I’ve read Kenya’s adult Santeria Habitat books and loved them, so I was excited to try her New Adult book Chameleon.

When the supernaturals lost the war against the humans, they were rounded up and forced to live in caged cities called Habitats.

Each supernatural had their own particular brand placed on their forehead and a choice of which walled city they wanted to live in.

Cameo lives in Santeria. She has glowing white skin and hair, and her body is covered in scales.

She’s lived on the streets for most of her 17 years, hiding from her abusive mother, other more powerful supernaturals, and mean cage punks. That’s what the kids are called.

Wiz saved her, fed her, helped her to get where she could fend for herself. Now they work together.

Cameo has a secret only Wiz knows about. She has the power to look like anybody she wants. Wiz becomes known as the go to guy when someone needs a stand in for an original. They never suspect it’s a real person. And it proves to be lucrative, keeping them both fed and sheltered.

When a job that should have been easy goes very wrong, Wiz senses a set up. Sure enough, the Bearded Dragon is coming and he wants Wiz to keep his blood promise. The one that will occur on Cameo’s eighteenth birthday.

Cameo knows something bad is coming and when Wiz won’t or can’t tell her what it is, she races from danger to danger, trying to make sense of it.

Time is running out. Cameo’s birthday is approaching, and someone will die soon.

After reading the adult Habitat series, I was surprised by how well the author wrote this in a teenagers point of view. She kept in a younger voice, helping you to feel their emotions. The characters acted as teens would, impulsive, reckless, and emotional.

Cameo has a few friends she can trust, and maybe a new one with a vampire with a surprising secret.

Wiz was the adult, the go to guy for all of the cage punks, giving them sanctuary at the Haven.

It was interesting to read about how these unwanted kids lived. They resided on the rooftops, perhaps so they could see danger coming. It was a harsh life but Wiz helped to feed them and gave them some sense of safety.

There were a few scenes with some sexual tension. A few had me chuckling. But they are just attraction and frustration. Nothing unsuitable for young adults and it was appropriate as teens are either talking about sex or thinking about it, a lot.

A couple of characters from Kenya’s other books make cameo appearances and I was thrilled to know they were still alive and kicking while I wait for the next book.

Chameleon does have an ending. It’s not a cliffhanger. I was actually shocked, thinking, “No, this can’t be happening.” But it actually worked very well and I was happy with it.

There is room for more, but I would be content with the ending as it is.

Kenya has built this amazing world of caged cities, with so many different mixbreeds and purebreds. Powers abound and something is always happening.  There’s never a dull moment.

4 Stars

~~~

Excerpt : Chapter 1

Police tape surrounded my mom’s studio apartment.

I stared at her feet as she hung, lifeless, from the mango tree. Sunlight hit her pale skin. She’d painted her toenails teal and used a marker to draw smiley faces on each one.

     It’s funny how people notice the craziest things in times of shock.

Each moment the wind blew, the branches swayed, and her dangling body twisted and turned. Death’s decaying fragrance hovered around her. Don’t cry. She didn’t love me anyway. Tears streamed down my cheeks. I rushed to wipe them away. So many emotions bogged down my brain. Grief suffocated me. I breathed in and out, but couldn’t calm down.

You’re an abomination!” My mom stumbled after me and held the worn-out leather belt in her hand. Her bushy chestnut hair bounced with the movement. “Lizard girl, I should have killed you when you were in my womb.”

I stood among the crowd in disguise as an earth witch, with almond skin instead of my pale, scaly complexion, curly black hair in place of my white bushy strands, and fuller breasts versus my nonexistent ones. Usually, the silver X brand embedded in my forehead identified me as a mixbreed and informed everyone that I had parents from different species. Human doctors had tagged me with the brand at birth, like all the other supernaturals. To help my disguise, I plastered an illegal brand cap with an illusionary spell over my X. When people saw my forehead, they spotted an upright triangle with a line going through it. It was a witch’s brand.

“That’s the crazy lady who talked to ghosts,” a woman whispered to a tall man.

“Too bad the ghosts never talked back.” The man covered his mouth with a folded newspaper to quiet his chuckle. “They would have told her to wash.”

     Even in your death, people make fun of you.

I tossed a pebbled candy in my mouth, sucked on the sweet cherry syrup, and struggled with not crying or showing pain on my face. Would Mom have cried for me if I died? I doubt it. I balled my hands into tight little fists. My nails dug in my skin. Instead of savoring the candy, I crunched it up into tiny pieces and then swallowed them.

“How long has she been up there?” someone asked another.

“Don’t know. They found her there this morning.”

I checked the two guys out from my peripheral view. Neither one looked familiar. They could have recently moved into the apartment complex. I’d run away from home three years ago, when I was fourteen. Every morning since I escaped, I walked by my mother’s house in another person’s image to make sure she was okay. I’d done my best to hide from Mom in this little caged city, and did a good job with avoiding her, until three months ago when she found me. It had been a big argument. I’d stood on the losing side, receiving her insults and abuse. It took a friend of mine to pull her away from me. As I raced away, she’d threatened to never leave me alone.

     But, I didn’t think you would kill yourself.

I edged away and bumped into the one person that I didn’t think I would meet on this end of Oya District. Wiz.

He towered over me. His short, sandy-blond hair brushed against the middle of his ears and blew in the wind, getting in the way of his unique eyes. The left one was emerald green, the right one sapphire blue. Although, only two years older than me, he looked more like a man than a teenager. He had a lightweight boxer’s frame, taut and curved but without all the bulk. Thousands of girls would’ve drooled at his feet if it weren’t for his trench coat. Patches of dried flesh formed the garment. Every time Wiz fought and won, he carved out a square of the loser’s skin and sewed it on. The coat hung below his knees. Were-lion fur bordered the hood.

“Excuse me.” I stepped around him and wondered if I could trick him this time. For some reason, he always knew it was me, regardless of what image I mimicked.

Wiz’s arm shot up and blocked my way. His citrus scent filled the air. Jagged scars covered every knuckle on his hands. Above each scar, black runes decorated his tan skin.

“Cameo, I have a job for you.” Sunlight shined over his X brand. “Let’s go to the playground over there.”

In all the years that I knew him, I never told Wiz where I came from or who my mother was.

    

     Maybe he knows why I walk by this way every day.

“How did you know it was me?” I asked.

“Does it matter?” He flashed me a crooked grin that displayed silver fangs. He’d had the fangs added by a guy that did black market enchantments. “Are you going to start hiding from me?”

“Nope.” I headed toward the playground. “I would never hide from you.”

I met Wiz the first month I ran away. It was during one of Santeria City’s notorious tropical storms. The whole supernatural city was encaged inside a large barred ceiling that shot up thousands of feet into the air and covered the city like a ceiling. Metal-bricked walls surrounded the whole place. We could never see the human cities that existed freely outside of ours. So, when it rained, Santeria flooded.

That night, the downpour had beat down on my head while I sat in a semi-flooded dumpster and shivered. I’d worn the image of a Hispanic boy. Out of nowhere, Wiz jumped into the dumpster, pulled me out, and carried me to one of the many small rooms he rented around Santeria. I figured he was going to hurt me, but I was too sick to put up a fight.

     But he never hurt me.

He wrapped me in a pile of fluffy blankets the rest of the week and declared I had a fever. And that was how he discovered my power. Because I was ill, it was difficult to maintain a disguised form. I passed out in Wiz’s arms and transformed from a little Hispanic boy to a pale teenage girl right before his eyes. We’ve been in business together ever since.

~~~

Kenya Wright – Author

Kenya

Kenya Wright always knew she would be famous since the ripe old age of six when she sang the Michael Jackson thriller song in her bathroom mirror. She has tried her hand at many things from enlisting in the Navy for six years as a Persian-Farsi linguist to being a nude model at an art university.

However, writing has been the only constant love in her life. Will she succeed? Of course.

For she has been coined The Urban Fantasy Queen, the Super Iconic Writer of this Age, The Lyrical Genius of Our Generation. Granted, these are all terms coined by her, within the private walls of her bathroom as she still sings the Michael Jackson thriller song.

Kenya Wright currently resides in Miami with her three amazing, overactive children, a supportive, gorgeous husband, and three cool black cats that refuse to stop sleeping on Kenya’s head at night.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads

~~~

giveaway photo: Giveaway Banner for 42nd giveaway.png

 A $10 Amazon Gift Card and 3 ebook copies from Kenya Wright’s backlist.

Click on the rafflecopter below to enter.

Raffle button

You can follow the tour for more fun posts by clicking on the button below.

literary nook buttom

~~~

Thanks so much for visiting fuonlyknew and Good Luck!

To see all of my giveaways click on the lucky horseshoe below!

horseshoe photo: Horseshoe horseshoe.jpg

WWW Wednesday

looking out a window photo: girl looking out the window girl-looking-out-the-window.jpg

Hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading

To play along, just answer the following three (3) questions…

• What are you currently reading?

• What did you recently finish reading?

• What do you think you’ll read next?

~~~~~

What are you currently reading?

Chameleon

by Kenya Wright

Chameleon 

1771e-addtogoodreadsblack
.
Cameo lives in a caged supernatural city where all species are tagged at birth with silver brands embedded in their foreheads. Her X brand identifies her as a Mixbreed, but she’s so much more. Like a chameleon, she can shift from one person’s image to another.It’s a great way to make money for a habitat street kid, or Cage Punk as most people call them. Wiz, her street partner-in-crime, finds her jobs to use her abilities. Some jobs entail changing into people to take academic tests. Others require more skill and involve higher risk.So when Wiz asks Cameo to stand in for a Were-wolf teenager who doesn’t want to go to her debutante ball, it seems like just another job, until a corpse is discovered and an old friend of Wiz appears.

~~~~~

What did you recently finish reading?

Christmas in Dogtown

by  Suzanne Johnson 

16095703

1771e-addtogoodreadsblack

A woman who spent years escaping her rural past learns that Dogtown, Louisiana, hides more family secrets than just the recipe for boudin blanc.

Resa Madere’s on the verge of losing it all. The boyfriend’s gone. The job’s history. Her beloved house is on the brink of foreclosure. She’ll do anything to save it–even spend a long Christmas holiday working in St. James Parish, Louisiana, helping her uncle run the family meat business. But the community of Dogtown, which has been home for seven generations of the Madere and Caillou families, has deep roots and deeper secrets. For Resa, going home is one thing. Getting out might not be so easy.

~~~~~

What do you think you’ll read next?

Braineater Jones

byStephen Kozeniewski 

18226374

goodreads-badge-add-plus
.
Braineater Jones wakes up face down in a swimming pool with no memory of his former life, how he died, or why he’s now a zombie. With a smart-aleck severed head as a partner, Jones descends into the undead ghetto to solve his own murder.But Jones’s investigation is complicated by his crippling addiction to human flesh. Like all walking corpses, he discovers that only a stiff drink can soothe his cravings. Unfortunately, finding liquor during Prohibition is costly and dangerous. From his Mason jar, the cantankerous Old Man rules the only speakeasy in the city that caters to the postmortem crowd.As the booze, blood, and clues coagulate, Jones gets closer to discovering the identity of his killer and the secrets behind the city’s stranglehold on liquid spirits. Death couldn’t stop him, but if the liquor dries up, the entire city will be plunged into an orgy of cannibalism.Cracking this case is a tall order. Braineater Jones won’t get out alive, but if he plays his cards right, he might manage to salvage the last scraps of his humanity.
.
~~~~~

So, whatcha readin?

question mark photo: Question Mark Question-1.jpg

Check out Chameleon!
I’ve read the first two books in the Santeria Habitat Series and loved them.
Chameleon looks to be a parallel story about a habitat street kid, a Cage Punk.
The synopsis has hooked my already and I’m looking forward to getting to know Cameo and her friend Wiz!
**
***Don’t forget to enter the giveaway!***
It’s definitely a great stocking stuffer!
**

Title: Chameleon

Genre: New Adult Urban Fantasy

Author: Kenya Wright

Blurb:

Cameo lives in a caged supernatural city where all species are tagged at birth with silver brands embedded in their foreheads. Her X brand identifies her as a Mixbreed, but she’s so much more. Like a chameleon, she can shift from one person’s image to another.

It’s a great way to make money for a habitat street kid, or Cage Punk as most people call them. Wiz, her street partner-in-crime, finds her jobs to use her abilities. Some jobs entail changing into people to take academic tests. Others require more skill and involve higher risk.

When Wiz asks Cameo to stand in for a Were-wolf teenager who doesn’t want to go to her debutante ball, it seems like just another job, until a corpse is discovered and an old friend of Wiz appears.

Kenya Wright always knew she would be famous since the ripe old age of six when she sang the Michael Jackson thriller song in her bathroom mirror. She has tried her hand at many things from enlisting in the Navy for six years as a Persian-Farsi linguist to being a nude model at an art university.

However, writing has been the only constant love in her life. Will she succeed? Of course.

For she has been coined The Urban Fantasy Queen, the Super Iconic Writer of this Age, The Lyrical Genius of Our Generation. Granted, these are all terms coined by her, within the private walls of her bathroom as she still sings the Michael Jackson thriller song.

Kenya Wright currently resides in Miami with her three amazing, overactive children, a supportive, gorgeous husband, and three cool black cats that refuse to stop sleeping on Kenya’s head at night.

~~~~

giveaway photo: Giveaway Banner for 42nd giveaway.png

Giveaway:

$25 Amazon Gift Card and Kenya Wright’s Paranormal Romance

ebook Bundle Giveaway (Eight Books: The first three Santeria Habitat

Books, Vampire King Series, Incubus Hunter, and Chameleon)

Click on the rafflecopter below to enter.

Raffle button

~~~~

Thanks so much for visiting fuonlyknew and Good Luck!

To see all of my giveaways click on the image below.

spellbound photo: Spellbound spellbound.jpg

It’s release day for Kenya Wright! The tour is upon us!

The Burning Bush (Book Two in the  Santeria Habitat Series) is available NOW!

The Burning Bush (Habitat, #2)

I love this cover! What do you think?

If you think it’s amazing, wait until you read the story. It starts out with a bang.

Let me tell you something about it. But before I forget, I should tell you that this is Book Two in the series and may contain some mild spoilers.

Now they’ve really stepped in it. Zulu and Lanore blew up Linderman‘s Blood Factory. It just happens to be owned by Dante, a very powerful vampire that wants them dead.

To complicate matters, the bumbling cop, Rivera, was tracking them with their brands and knows they did it. He uses that knowledge to blackmail Lanore into helping him with a case.

A burning bush has been left in front of the police station. Inside is a naked dead girl showing no signs of burnt flesh or decay. It has to be magic that keeps the bush burning. Hence, Rivera’s need for Lanore. He is inept and lazy, and plans on taking full credit when Lanore solves the mystery. The mystery deepens when she discovers that this is the second burning bush that was dropped off.

I really liked this part:

Rivera took off his blood spattered jacket and slung it over the chair in the corner. “This is the second burning bush with a girl tied to it.”

“Two bush victims.” I shook my head. “And why doesn’t the public know about this?”

“The first victim was just a female mixbreed. A poor one.”

The prejudice portrayed in this scene made the story very genuine.

Let me give you a little background. Lanore is a mixbreed, or mixie for short, the product of parents from different magical species. They are considered the lowest form of trash. Each species in the caged cities, or habitats, are given a brand on their forehead signifying what species they are.

Lanore has a secret, the power of fire. She also has white cords sewn into her arm, put there when her lover Zulu claimed her as his mate during lovemaking. He did this without her consent and she wants them gone.

Zulu has multi-colored cords sewn into his skin from his wrists to his shoulders. They are a spell that lets him shift into a lethal Fairy beast called Prime.

And then there is MeShack. He is a were-cheetah and he makes my blood start racing and my heart go pitter-patter.

Lanore has a lot on her plate. She has to solve the burning bush mystery and keep Zulu and Meshack from killing each other. They both claim her as their mate.

Meshack had his chance and he blew it. He cheated on Lanore. Of course he is in his season, his beast is beginning to mature and is quite randy. The season lasts for seven years and Lanore isn’t putting up with it for that long. But Meshack doesn’t give up that easily. I love his purring when he is aroused. How she resists him, I can’t figure.

She has hooked up with Zulu. A body from heaven with beautiful flowing dreadlocks and a sarcastic wit that adds to his charm. He is her lover and protector and is fiercely possessive. A real alpha male. He is called The Heart Ripper and not because of his sexual prowess.

Here are a couple of  scenes I really loved.

Meshack – “I have you alone in a cellar where no one can hear you call for help. You’re lucky I still have my pants on.”

Lanore – “You’re like a romantic serial killer.”

and this one:

Lanore – “Zulu said, and I quote,”Meshack can look but if he touches, I get to rip off the hand he used.” Then I explained that we weren’t committed and that he was acting like a possessive psycho.”

“His response?”

“Zulu just shrugged and said, “I am a possessive psycho.”

I don’t know who I want Lanore to end up with. I go back and forth, Meshack or Zulu, Zulu or Meshack? Either one warms my blood. The sexual tension just oozes from the pages.

There are also some very funny scenes all throughout the book. They add genuineness to the story, making it very believable.

I laughed out loud at this one! It takes place over the phone.

“So how would a fire witch cast a spell to create the burning bush?”

“The witch would attach their fire to the bush and then have the bush hold the girl in place like magical glue.”

Something banged and then crashed on her end of the line.

“Fox Jr.! I am on the phone!” Vee yelled and then cleared her throat. “Take your sister out of the toilet now! Partricia, get her out!”

The book is chock full of this stuff.  It’s like every page wrings some emotional response out of you. Anger, lust, disgust, glee and triumph. Sometimes more than one.

You would think keeping track of all of the species would be difficult and the explanations of their abilities a drag. But Kenya writes like a master, puts it in laymen terms you could say, making it easy to follow and understand. There is always something thrown into the scene to draw a reaction from you. Very powerful writing.

There is so much sexiness in this book, but not a lot of explicit sex scenes. The author’s innuendos are more than enough to heat up your blood.

The bad guys are really bad and the good guys are so darn likeable. These characters are the friends I would want  to hang with and have on my side if I lived in Santeria.

I could go on and on, but I can’t. I would be telling too much. You will just have to hurry over and get your own copy of The Burning Bush and enter the habitat at your own risk:)

  This book is on Fire!!

You can read my review of Fire Baptized (Book One) here.

About Kenya Wright  www.kenyawright.com
Join the mailing list to stay up-to-date with free books, giveaways, and new releases!Kenya Wright always knew she would be famous since the ripe old age of six when she sang the Michael Jackson thriller song in her bathroom mirror. She has tried her hand at many things from enlisting in the Navy for six years as a Persian-Farsi linguist to being a nude model at an art university.However, writing has been the only constant love in her life.Will she succeed? Of course.For she has been coined The Urban FantasyQueen, the Super Iconic Writer of this Age, The Lyrical Genius of Our Generation. Granted, these are all terms coined by her, within the private walls of her bathroom as she still sings the Michael Jackson thriller song.Kenya Wright currently resides in Miami with her three amazing, overactive children, a supportive, gorgeous husband, and three cool black cats that refuse to stop sleeping on Kenya’s head at night.
 
 

You can purchase Kenya’s books by clicking on the images below.