All for a Rose

Jennifer Blackstream

Aug 2015 · Blood Realm Book 1 · Skeleton Key Publishing

About this ebook

Sometimes the princess chooses Prince Charming.

Sometimes she chooses the dragon.

Sometimes, they’re one and the same.

Damon bargained for a prisoner, thinking he was getting the witch whose curse trapped him in between his dragon and human form. But the woman who shows up at his castle isn’t the witch—she’s her sister.

Beauty soothes the savage beast, and soon the fire in his blood feels less like anger, and more like passion. But their budding romance is threatened when Maribel’s sister comes to rescue her.

Now Damon will have to decide which is more important. Love…or revenge.

The Blood Realm series is a spin-off/continuation of the Blood Prince series, so you can expect even more sensual romance told in the style of the old fairy tales we can’t get enough of. Look forward to moody dragon shifters, roguish pirates, morally flexible fae, cursed bear shifters, and a thief who’s more than meets the eye.

All of my books are written in the same universe (yes, even the Blood Trails series, which is contemporary, not historical like the Blood Prince/Blood Realm series—and you’ll have to read Deadline to find out how I managed that…). Be ready for crossovers and cameos!

Ratings and reviews

Alright. First off, I have to confess to being a long time Jennifer Blackstream fan, so you know from the start. Second, I'd like to point out that this Blood Realm series follows directly after the Blood Prince series (also of note, though The Pirate's Witch is part of the first series, it is not crucial to either series) and though I do feel you can read the stories without needing the background, the small moments at the end of the book, as well as some of the characters within, will be lost to you if you haven't read the first series. It is an amazing set of books, so I highly suggest giving them a read first. All for a Rose is a Beauty and the Beast remake. If you don't like fairy tale retellings, walk away now. If you DO like them, and like them with so much more depth and passion, then please give this a go! Even as a child I loved knowing the origins of the stories that Disney chugged out on their assembly line and secretly snickered at how far off they were (on purpose of course, but still). This is a gritty, heartbreaking rendition of the beloved tale of a woman who trades her life for her father's to become the prisoner of a reclusive beast. Maribel is not head in the clouds and flighty at all. She is very down to earth, level headed, and dependable. Her family, consisting of her father and older sister, recently found themselves uprooted from their lives when a bad turn of luck for her father sees them falling from mid level high society down to barely surviving on what they can grow. Maribel steps up and takes on the challenge not only with courage, but with relish. She flourishes in the country away from society whereas her sickly sister, a witch, grows weaker and languishes in misery in what she sees as an absolute hell. Maribel takes on most of her sisters work and also cares for her as best she is able. When her father accidentally insults the wrong man, the 'beast', and is sent home to bring his daughter in his place (he intends only to bid them farewell and let them know his fate, to his credit, as he is definitely a loving father), she actually finds herself excited to go. Damon is a Naga; a being capable of taking on either a dragon form or a human one at will, and who has dedicated his life to saving changelings from harm. He was cursed by a witch and is stuck in a half-form between his two normal shapes with his lower half being tail and his upper mostly human. When he sends for Maribel he believes her to be the witch that cursed him and intends to make her change him back. He is confused when she turns out not to be the witch at all, but finds himself hard pressed to free her as she makes his life less lonely. So we have the basic facets of the beauty and the beast story, and it moves pretty steadily from there with both growing to know one another and a rather convoluted story playing out and unraveling as we go. I really enjoyed Damon and Maribel both as people unto themselves, and getting to see them interact together was also very interesting. Mrs. Blackstream always does a wonderful job of fleshing her characters out and making them feel well rounded. We also had an appearance from a certain cuelebre (a tiny dragon like creature) from the Divine Scales novel. I think what really clenched the five stars for me was the fact that through the book we watch Damon struggle with his animal nature. He's stuck between forms, so he has the confusing problem of being stuck with multiple drives always clashing. That sometimes makes him very volatile and that very obviously upsets him greatly. Just because she comes to care for him, that doesn't just vanish like some writers will have happen. Maribel has to come to accept him for what he is and embrace that while learning to deal with those quirks. I thoroughly enjoyed the romance in this book, for that reason alone (among others). (spoiler)My heart ached for the sister, even if she did deserve some punishment. I haven't seen any sign of a separate book for her, so I just tell myself she learned her trade well and made a better life for herself.

About the author

 USA Today bestselling author Jennifer Blackstream is…odd. Putting aside the fact that she writes her own author bio in third person, she also sleeps with a stuffed My Little Pony that her grandmother bought her as a joke for her 23rd birthday, and she enjoys listening to Fraggle Rock soundtracks whether or not her children are in the car. 

Jennifer understands that it is customary for authors to talk about how they started writing, and how they’ve been coming up with stories since they were children. But Jennifer is a rebel, so she’s not going to talk about that. Instead, she’s going to share a quote from Terry Pratchett that she feels best describes where authors get their inspiration: 

“Little particles of inspiration sleet through the universe all the time travelling through the densest matter in the same way that a neutrino passes through a candyfloss haystack, and most of them miss. Even worse, most of the ones that hit the exact cerebral target hit the wrong one. For example, the weird dream about a lead doughnut on a mile-high gantry, which in the right mind would have been the catalyst for the invention of repressed-gravitational electricity generation (a cheap and inexhaustible and totally non-polluting form of power which the world in question had been seeking for centuries, and for the lack of which it was plunged into a terrible and pointless war) was in fact had by a small and bewildered duck.”

All of that is to say, that authors are what happens when a falling particle of inspiration strikes someone insane enough to think spending their life arguing with imaginary people about how their story should be written is a grand idea.

Jennifer doesn’t have spare time, but she makes it a point to spend at least one night a week with her sibling binge-watching whatever show they’re currently plowing through (currently Numbers on Netflix), and she ferociously guards quality time with her son and daughter. She cooks when she has the sanity for it—adding garlic to the recipe whether it calls for it or not—and tries very hard not to let her arachnophobia keep her out of her basement on laundry day.

Jennifer’s influences include Terry Pratchett (for wit), Laurell K. Hamilton (for sexual tension), Jim Butcher (for roguish flair), and Kim Harrison (for mythos). She is currently writing the series of her heart and her dreams, the series that has been percolating in her brain for the last decade…Blood Trails. An Urban Fantasy Mystery series that will combine the classic whodunit spirit with a contemporary fantasy setting. Expect mystery, magic, and mayhem, with characters that will make you laugh, cry, and probably stare at the screen with your jaw hanging down to the floor. Well, that’s how they affect Jennifer anyway…

Jennifer currently has three series going:

BLOOD PRINCE SERIES (COMPLETE):
Book 1 – Before Midnight
Book 2 – One Bite
Book 3 – Golden Stair
Book 4 – Divine Scales
Book 5 – Beautiful Salvation

Bonus Adventures in the Blood Prince World:
Book 2.5 – What Big Teeth You Have (free when you sign up for mailing list mentioned below)
Book 4.5 – The Pirate’s Witch
Book 5.5 – Dead to Begin With (available only between Thanksgiving and whenever Jennifer takes her Christmas tree down)

BLOOD REALM SERIES (IN PROGRESS SPIN-OFF OF BLOOD PRINCE SERIES):
Book 1 – All for a Rose
Book 2 – Blue Voodoo
Book 3 – The Archer
Book 4 – Bear With Me
Book 5 – Stolen Wish


BLOOD TRAILS SERIES (URBAN FANTASY RELEASING JANUARY 2018)
Book 1 – Deadline