GIVEAWAY + Blog Tour: Dog Days by T.A. Moore

T.A. Moore and her dystopian wonderland are here to welcome us all with an excerpt from Dog Days!

I suppose it is a bit predictable for a Brit to write a book about weather, but there you go! Dog Days is my first shifter novel and I had a blast writing it. I love the characters, obstreperous little sods though they could be when I needed them to behave, and the setting in Durham is one I have a lot of time for. So, welcome to my dystopian Winter Wonderland, and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did writing it.

And to whet your appetite, here’s a deleted scene that never made it into the final edit of Dog Days.

Blurb

The world ends not with a bang, but with a downpour. Tornadoes spin through the heart of London, New York cooks in a heat wave that melts tarmac, and Russia freezes under an ever-thickening layer of permafrost. People rally at first—organizing aid drops and evacuating populations—but the weather is only getting worse.

In Durham, mild-mannered academic Danny Fennick has battened down to sit out the storm. He grew up in the Scottish Highlands, so he’s seen harsh winters before. Besides, he has an advantage. He’s a werewolf. Or, to be precise, a weredog. Less impressive, but still useful.

Except the other werewolves don’t believe this is any ordinary winter, and they’re coming down over the Wall to mark their new territory. Including Danny’s ex, Jack—the Crown Prince Pup of the Numitor’s pack—and the prince's brother, who wants to kill him.

A wolf winter isn’t white. It’s red as blood.

Title: Dog Days
Author: TA Moore
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Cover Artist: Anne Cain
Genre: Paranormal Romance
Release Date: 09/09/2016

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Cover Artist: Anne Cain

Excerpt

     The rain battered down like gunfire in an American cop show. Puddles lay in glistening sheets across the driveway, reflections shattering as the raindrops bounced. It had been raining for two days, Lee had been dying - full of pus-stench and pain - for two days.

     With the moon-itch working under Danny’s skin already, the walls around him felt more like a trap than shelter. He’d abandoned his room entirely - much too close to the smell of something dying badly - and lay on the floor in the kitchen, an old rug protecting his rangy bones from the slate. He was reading the Gods of Olympus for the fifth time. It was soothingly unrelated to his life. For a species that traced itself back to the origins of Rome, the wolves had always taken their religion more from Pict and Viking legends. Probably from spite at Hadrian.

     The Greeks didn't have many end of days myths prophecies either. With Jack's 'can't it be the apocalypse AND weather?' argument rolling around his head, Danny could appreciate that.

     The stench of pus bloomed in the air. They were changing Lee’s bandages. He’d stopped screaming this morning.

     He turned a page and stared at the words, squinting at the type as if that would help. It didn't. Danny couldn't remember a word of the last few pages he'd read. Muttering to himself, he flipped back to the last page that lined up with the words in his head. He was about to start reading again, when the door swung open and the storm blew Jenny in.

     She was muddy from her toes to her toes and the cheap plastic slicker someone had - in happier times - brought home from Disney flapped madly around her as she tried to catch the door. Flipping his book over, Danny jumped to his feet and jogged over. He edged around her and threw his shoulder against the door, manhandling it shut. It felt like the wind was pushing it back from the other side.

     'Thanks,' she gasped out, doubling over and bracing her hands on her knees. Water dripped from her nose. 'It is horrible out there. I'd thought, I'd hoped, that last week would be the worst of it.'

     Danny helped strip her out of the slicker. ‘At least it’s not snowing.’

     ‘Touch wood,’ Jenny said, tapping her knuckles to her skull. Despite the slicker, she was wet to the skin. Her wan smile faded to nothing and she glanced up at the ceiling. ‘How’s Lee?’

     Dying. Soaking up meds. Stinking.

     ‘Holding on.’

     Jenn sighed and nodded.. ‘He’s stubborn.’

      ‘Yeah.’

      She glanced at him sidelong, mouth crimping at the corners in a wry smile. ‘Danny.’

      He shrugged. ‘I didn’t say anything.’

     ‘Whatever Lee did, he doesn’t deserve this. no one does.’

     ‘What he deserves isn’t the point,’ Danny said carefully. ‘What we can take is. He’s not going to get better.’

      ‘He’s not dead. He deserves the chance to not be dead tomorrow too.’

       Danny opened his mouth and stopped himself, scrubbing his hand over his face. He wanted an excuse to get away didn’t he? This was as good a one as any. He didn’t even have to lie.

     ‘I was thinking of getting away for a few days,’ he said abruptly. ‘Go see Jack, maybe, see how he’s doing.’

     She blinked at him, then nodded. There was an unflattering amount of relief on her face. Danny clenched his jaw and tried not to be offended. He couldn’t pinpoint anything in particular that he did, but around the fattened moon people did seem to find him tiring company.

     ‘Maybe that would be a good idea,’ Jenn said carefully. ‘Give you a bit of breathing room, time off the hot seat. First time I’d seen you joke around in ages was when Jack was here.’

     Danny shifted under that thought, uncomfortable with the idea that Jack made him comfortable. Why? Because it was easier to be around a wolf than humans? Because it made him feel better to have the wolf claim dominance? The heat in his face felt like a blush. Danny clenched his jaw, hoped his skin was weathered enough to hide it and pressed on.

      ‘I’ll only be a few days,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to worry anyhow, so-’
Jenn squinted up at him curiously. ‘There’s no rush, Danny. You sound like you’re about to go running out into the rain.’

     ‘No time like the present.’

     Dark eyes went huge and round. ‘Out in that? It’s biblical out there, the rain’s not waiting to come down and there’s the lightning and-’

     Maybe it was because the lunar cycle was ruffling his hidden fur, but he let some of the edges sneak out around his usual Labrador geniality.

     ‘It’ll be better than me sitting it out here,’ he said calmly. ‘If I have to spend another night smelling him rot, I’ll put him out of his misery.’

      Surprise took root on Jenn’s face, but after a second of looking at him she nodded. ‘Then go. Just take care.’

Bio:

TA Moore genuinely believed that she was a Cabbage Patch Kid when she was a small child. This was the start of a lifelong attachment to the weird and fantastic. These days she lives in a market town on the Northern Irish coast and her friends have a rule that she can only send them three weird and disturbing links a month (although she still holds that a DIY penis bifurcation guide is interesting, not disturbing). She believes that adding ‘in space!’ to anything makes it at least 40% cooler, will try to pet pretty much any animal she meets (this includes snakes, excludes bugs), and once lied to her friend that she had climbed all the way up to Tintagel Castle in Cornwall, when actually she’d only gotten to the beach, realized it was really high, and chickened out.

She aspires to being a cynical misanthrope, but is unfortunately held back by a sunny disposition and an inability to be mean to strangers. If TA Moore is mean to you, that means you’re friends now.


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