Sacrificial Magic by Stacia Kane (Downside Book 4)

Sacrificial Magic (Downside Ghosts #4)
Author: Stacia Kane
Publication Date: 3/27/12
Publisher: Del Rey

READING, WRITING, AND RAISING THE DEAD
When Chess Putnam is ordered by an infamous crime boss—who also happens to be her drug dealer—to use her powers as a witch to solve a grisly murder involving dark magic, she knows she must rise to the challenge. Adding to the intensity: Chess’s boyfriend, Terrible, doesn’t trust her, and Lex, the son of a rival crime lord, is trying to reignite the sparks between him and Chess.
Plus there’s the little matter of Chess’s real job as a ghost hunter for the Church of Real Truth, investigating reports of a haunting at a school in the heart of Downside. Someone seems to be taking a crash course in summoning the dead—and if Chess doesn’t watch her back, she may soon be joining their ranks.
As Chess is drawn into a shadowy world of twisted secrets and dark violence, it soon becomes clear that she’s not going to emerge from its depths without making the ultimate sacrifice. 

So this isn't going to be a review, because I haven't read the book yet, but I've read the first three, (and a few short stories that go along with them), as well as following Stacia's updates on the books progression, so I am beyond excited for the release.

The Downside books are part of the Urban Fantasy genre - which is one of my favorite genres of literature - The heroine is Chess Putnam, a church witch with a nasty drug addiction, and a talent for routing ghosts and getting herself into dangerous situations.

The first three books were a thrill a minute, I found myself chewing on my fingernails, and biting my lip numerous times throughout all of the stories.

Stacia has created a rich and intrinsic world for this series, one so full of vibrant and varied characters, and settings that at times I swear I could smell the smells of Downside, and feel the fear of the murderous ghosts. To make this world she's created even more realistic Stacia has gone so far as to create slang and colloquialisms for her characters, if you read it right you can even "hear" the accents and the speech patterns in the dialog, Terrible, Chess's Boyfriend is the best for this, he's got this drawl that well, lets just say Chess is a lucky girl.

*AHEM* Pardon, I got a bit distracted there. I wouldn't call this a romance series, there aren't any bodices to rip, and unless you count that one time she OD'd Chess really isn't the type of girl that needs to be rescued and carried off.  But there are some pretty hot and heavy scenes that just might leave you tingling too.

So here we are, Sacrificial Magic is just a week away from being released and all of us in the Downside Army are salivating. From the blurb above it looks like we're in for another stomach twisting thrill ride with Chess, and good old Lex is coming back around, you just know that's going to be trouble right there, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't bite my lip in concern for what Chess might have gotten herself into this time.

I expect Amazon to be getting a lot of my money in the next few weeks, because the latest installment in Stacia Kane's Downside Ghosts is just the tip (a very tantalizing tip) of the new release iceberg that is heading our way.

Click the cover up there if you want to pre-order Sacrificial Magic, or buy the first three books, which really you should do too because I can almost guarantee that as soon as you read one of these books you'll be just as addicted to Chess and Terrible as I am.

Free stuff, the fun and easy way.

There is so much going on, new releases in both books and music, new electronics and websites. I really have been putting off updating because I didn't even know where to start.  That won't cut it, so I thought I'd tell you all about where I've been spending a good portion of my web time and what I've been getting there.

You may have noticed the widgets in my sidebar, you may even have clicked on them to check out what they were about, but if not, well even if you have, I'm going to go into a little deeper detail about one of the sites.

The site I'm going to tell you about today is Swagbucks.com,

Click to find out how!

You maybe familiar with it, you may even be a member, I know I was a member for easily a year before I started to actively use it, but I'm so glad I decided to give it another shot, and I'm going to tell you why, but first let me tell you about the site.

Swagbucks, is a loyalty program that rewards its users (called "Swaggernauts") with "swagbucks" which can be redeemed for entries in "Swagstakes" or saved for things like jewelry, electronics, gift certificates and even real money if you have a paypal account!

Earning Swagbucks is easy, there are a number of ways you can earn and it can be lots of fun, I have a couple of favorite ways to do it.
First, I use the search engine every time I need to search. Searches can garner anywhere from 5 to 35 swagbucks, the results are nearly as good as Google or other mainstream search engines, and its nothing to use a different engine if my results aren't satisfactory, there's also a bit of thrill when a random search turns up 8 swagbucks.
I also do the surveys, you can earn a lot from the surveys you qualify for, sadly a lot of them are looking for demographics I don't fit.
There are tasks to do, games to play and videos to watch, all of which earn swagbucks.

As I said earlier I've had an account for nearly a year, but I never really did much with it, however once I took a second look I really started getting into it, and I started earning stuff.  It quickly became one of my favorite sites.

Why Swagbucks? There are a number of similar loyalty programs out there, they're all the same right? Well I've tried a few of them but I keep going back to SB because they just don't compare on any level, not in their earn ratio, not in site aesthetics and definitely not in fun.

I've already earned over $30 in amazon.com gift certificates in just a few months time, and found some really fun games to pass an idle 10 minutes.
If you are an amazon nut like me, or you just like free stuff then you can't beat Swagbucks its like getting paid for just doing the things you already do online.

I Haven't forgotten.

I've just been massively busy, so much to do, there has been no time for reviews, but I will be back. And we'll have lots to talk about then.