Blog Stop, Review, and Giveaway: Sacrificial Muse

Today I have a review of Sacrificial Muse.  Wow.  What a disturbing, exciting, heart-pounding thriller!  Be sure to read the guest post and enter the giveaway before you go!

 

Title: Sacrificial Muse
Author:
Maegan Beaumont
Release Date:
July 8th 2014

Publisher: Midnight Ink
Add to Goodreads



Sabrina opened the red envelope and saw one word…
 
 Mox. Soon.

After learning the identity of the serial killer behind her 83 horrific
days of rape and torture, Sabrina Vaughn has suffered more physical and
emotional wounds than she can handle. Despite reeling with pain both old
and new, Sabrina is given a second chance as a San Francisco homicide
detective. But as reporters dog her every step and hordes of mail pour
into her office — from supporters and nutjobs alike–Sabrina falls
deeper into a pit of humiliation and anxiety. When nine red roses
repeatedly show up on her desk, followed by an ominous red envelope
addressed to Calliope, Sabrina realizes that a new killer is targeting
her. She is his chosen muse, and the Fates require sacrifice.
Guest Post Banner

Finding my way home

home

By: Maegan Beaumont


I grew up reading books that caused dubious glances and concerned frowns to dance across the face of any adult who made the mistake of asking me, “So, what are you reading?”

What I was reading was whatever I wanted to. And usually whatever I wanted to was considered wildly inappropriate for a “girl my age”… or even a girl in general.

In grade school I was enthralled by Lloyd Alexander’s The Book of Three and Robin McKinley’s The Hero and the Crown. In these books I caught my first glimpse of something that I needed very much—female characters who were like me. Bookish and a bit brazen. Awkward but unflinching in their resolve to be themselves. I still love these books. I own then and will push them on my kids every chance I get. 

I had my brief fling with romance novels in junior high… Dusty cowboys and roguish pirates, rescuing damsels and marrying women they won in card games. I like to joke that everything I know about sex, I learned from Danielle Steele novels. Reading Family Album in the 5th grade changed my life… it also made me the girl no one was allowed to invite over for dinner. 

In high school, I peppered my required-but-very-much-enjoyed readings of Shakespeare and Hawthorne, Dostoyevsky and Dickens with as much Stephen King and Thomas Harris as I possibly could… and it was in books such as Harris’ Red Dragon and King’s The Dark Half where I finally found my literary home.

In thrillers, I felt a click. They made sense to me like nothing I had ever read, before or since. There were no cowboys. No dragons (unless you count the one tattooed on a serial killer’s back…). No pirates. No magical swords. These were not stories of love and redemption or good versus evil in any obvious sense, but in them I found a fundamental truth I’ve never found in any other genre of book. 

We all harbor darkness. 

A good thriller not only shows us this darkness, it entices us to invite it in. Gives us characters we not only relate to, but shakes us to the bone with their disturbing sameness to ourselves. A good thriller will show us what we are made of. Put us in situations that force us to poke at our own secret wounds, to test our own battered moorings. Situations that we can’t help but use to measure what we hope ourselves to be against what we truly are. A good thriller will force us to question how far we’re willing to go to protect ourselves and the ones we love. How close to that darkness we are willing to tread in order to survive…

And if the thriller is great… we don’t always like the answers we come up with.

 

Croft smiled and came forward. She skirted around the
hood of the car, throwing the uniforms and crowd a curt wave, “Thanks for the
help, guys.”
            “You sure—”
            “I’m sure. You two have better things to do than schlep my mess around,” she said,
softening her refusal with a quick smile. Waiting for a break in traffic, she opened her door to see Croft leaning over the driver’s seat, his blood-stained hand hovering over the envelope that waited there.
            “Don’t touch it.” She kept her voice low but his head snapped up and he moved back in his seat. The uniforms weren’t going to leave until she did, and neither was the impromptu film crew gathered on the sidewalk. Shit, even Little was still standing at The Sentinel’s window, waiting to see what she’d do next.
She looked down at the red square resting on her seat and weighed her options. The envelope that showed up at the station had been handled and shuffled from counter to bag to box by multiple people before it reached her. Even if there had been prints or trace
evidence on it, she’d had little to no hope of gathering any of it. This one was different. It was in her car. The only person who’d touched it so far was responsible for leaving it there. She needed to bag it, but there was no way she could preserve the evidence without doing so in full view of everyone watching her.
            She dug a glove out of her back pocket and pulled it on. “Get a paper bag out of my
glove box,” she said to Croft. He didn’t hesitate, didn’t ask—just opened the compartment in front of him and pulled out a bag. She snapped it open and dropped the envelope inside it before folding the top of the bag over. Sliding behind the wheel, she twisted around and placed the bag on the backseat before she started the car and pulled into traffic.
            “That envelope. Does it have anything to do with what you asked your roommate last
night about the word mox?” Croft finally said.
            She shot him a look. “Why would you think that?”
            He didn’t answer. “It does, doesn’t it?”
            Sabrina pulled into the first parking lot she found and slammed on the brakes before
throwing the car into park. “Did you put it in my car?”
            “No.”
Croft looked her in the eye when he said it. He was either telling the truth or he was a fabulous liar—God knew she’d been fooled before.
            “But you’ve been following me all morning.” It wasn’t a question and Croft was smart
enough to know he’d been caught.
            He shrugged. “Just like any other day, right?”
            “So, if you didn’t leave it, you saw who did.”
            His eyes narrowed before he took a quick look at the bag behind him. “No, I didn’t.
I figured out where you were going before you got there so I parked and made a few phone calls before I followed on foot. By the time I got there, you were already at your car.”
            Truth or fabulous liar—she still couldn’t tell, but it didn’t matter. “Fine. You
don’t know anything useful? Get out of my car.”
Croft settled deeper into his seat. “Maybe you just aren’t asking the right questions.”
Mox… it’s Latin. It means soon. For some reason, Croft had drawn an immediate connection between that word and the envelope left on her seat.
“The word—name—written on the front of that envelope. Is it Latin?” she said, every word sticking in her throat. Asking Croft for help was a painful thing.
            “No, but you’re right, it’s a name. What do you know about Greek mythology?” he
said, the corners of his mouth hugged tightly against the words as if he didn’t want to let them go.
“Zeus. Thunderbolts. Mount Olympus…” she said, trailing off impatiently. He just sat there, looking at her. “Look, Croft. Playing with me—not a good idea for anyone. For you, even less.”
He fixed her with a defiant glare. “I want to know what really happened that day in the woods.”
She’d known it was coming, but hearing him say it made her want to break his nose all over again. They stared at each other for a few seconds. “Forget it,” she said, reaching across his lap and opened his car door.
He shut the door. “You just beat me up. Me—the reporter who took your very private and very painful story national—in front of a newspaper office, not to mention several outraged citizens with camera phones.”
“What does it matter? You don’t even write for The Sentinel anymore.” Her voice sounded whiny and complaintive. It made her nauseous.
He ignored her. “Answers, Sabrina. Not just one. I want as many as I ask for, and I want the honest truth to every question I ask,” he said, his eyes burrowing into hers.
She sat back, glaring at him. “Or you’ll write a story about how I attacked you, unprovoked in the middle of the street. That I’m unhinged and should be locked up, is that it?”
After what’d happened to Sanford—found dead in his truck, face caved in with a
baseball bat—and the connection she had to his death, it would be as easy as
breathing to convince the public that she was an unbalanced threat to society.
“That’s exactly it. I may
not write for The Sentinel anymore
but I’ve got plenty of freelance contacts.” His tone was hard. “A story about
you finally losing your shit would be an easy sell.”
She’d be lucky if they let
her write parking tickets after Croft was through with her—and he’d do it, even
if he didn’t want to. She’d just had her career in homicide yanked out from
under her. That was more loss than she could stomach for one day.
“Okay.”
Croft’s mouth flopped open but he recovered quickly. “Yes? You’ll talk to me. Just like that?”
“You just successfully blackmailed me, Croft. Try not to sound so surprised.” From Sacrificial Muse by Maegan Beaumont. © 2014 by Maegan Beaumont. Used by permission from Midnight Ink Books, www.midnightinkbooks.com.
~~~~~

 

Published
May 8th 2013
by Midnight Ink

Add to Goodreads



Past horrors bleed into a present day nightmare

Fifteen years ago, a psychotic killer abducted seventeen year old Melissa
Walker. For 83 days she was raped and tortured before being left for
dead in a deserted church yard… But she was still alive.

Melissa begins a new life as homicide inspector, Sabrina Vaughn. With a new face and a new name, it’s her job to hunt down murderers and it’s a job
she does very well.

When Michael O’Shea, a childhood acquaintance with a suspicious past, suddenly finds her, he brings to
life the nightmare Sabrina has long since buried.

Believing that his sister was recently murdered by the same monster who attacked Sabrina, Michael is dead set on getting his revenge–using Sabrina as bait.

 

 

Maegan Beaumont is the author of CARVED IN DARKNESS, the first book in the Sabrina Vaughn thriller series (Available through Midnight Ink, spring 2013). A native Phoenician, Maegan’s stories are meant to make you wonder what the guy standing in front of you in the Starbucks line has locked in his basement, and feel a strong desire to sleep with the light on.
When she isn’t busy fulfilling her duties as Domestic Goddess
for her high school sweetheart turned husband, Joe, and their four children, she is locked in her office with her computer, her coffee pot and her Rhodesian Ridgeback, and one true love, Jade.

 

 

SACRIFICIAL
MUSE BLOG TOUR
July 3rd – 17th

 

 

Thursday 3rd
July
Author InterviewMythical BooksReview & Spotlight/PromoThe Book Reading GalsGuest Post & Spotlight/PromoThe Book Faery ReviewsSpotlight/Promo

Angie’s Reading
Dungeon

A Book Junky’s Obsession

Loves All Things Books

K&S Book Blog

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Angels With Attitude Book Reviews

Bookworm Betties

 

Friday 4th JulySpotlight/Promo

Jodie’s W.I.N.E. List

Saturday 5th July

Spotlight/Promo

Shersinghzn

Sexyways of Reading

Indy Book Fairy

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Monday 7th July
Interview & Spotlight/Promo
My Book Chatter

Guest Post & Author Interview

Writing Dreams

Review & Guest Post

Sarah Aisling

Spotlight/Promo

Best Books

Sweet Treat Reading Reviews

Here Is Some of What I Read

Who Picked This?

Cajun Book Lover

 

Tuesday 8th July

Guest Post & Spotlight/Promo

The Cavanaugh Connection

 

Review & Guest Post

Words I Write Crazy

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Some Like It Hotter

Wednesday 9th July

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Blue Chrysalis Book Promotions

Thursday 10th
July

Author Interview & Spotlight/Promo

JeanzBookReadNReview

Review & Spotlight/Promo

MHZ Book Reviews and Giveaways

Guest Post & Spotlight/Promo

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Friday 11th July

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Sunday 13th July

Review

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Monday 14th July

 

Guest Post

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Tuesday 15th July

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Wednesday 16th July

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Thursday 17th July

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Review

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Any Date

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Sambeana

There For You Editing



~~~~~

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