Blog Tour: Embrace by Jessica Shirvington

Series: The Violet Eden Chapters #1

Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire

Genre: Fantasy, Paranormal

It starts with a whisper: “It’s time for you to know who you are…” Violet Eden dreads her seventeenth birthday. After all, it’s hard to get too excited about the day that marks the anniversary of your mother’s death. As if that wasn’t enough, disturbing dreams haunt her sleep and leave her with very real injuries. There’s a dark tattoo weaving its way up her arms that wasn’t there before. Violet is determined to get some answers, but nothing could have prepared her for the truth. The guy she thought she could fall in love with has been keeping his identity a secret: he’s only half-human—oh, and same goes for her. A centuries-old battle between fallen angels and the protectors of humanity has chosen its new warrior. It’s a fight Violet doesn’t want, but she lives her life by two rules: don’t run and don’t quit. When angels seek vengeance and humans are the warriors, you could do a lot worse than betting on Violet Eden… 

My experience with young adult angel books has been...limited. I am very new to this subsection of the paranormal genre. And the ones I have read are usually a little cheesy and predictable. So imagine my surprise when I found myself pouring through Jessica Shirvington's Embrace. I loved the characters (especially Phoenix *swoon*), I love the action and most of all I love the incredible amount of detail. Jessica clearly did her research with this one.

One of my biggest pet peeves with angel books so far has been the glossy over of the very rich and intricate mythology that comes with them. Some titles are dropped with the brief descriptions and there you go. Embrace really gets into the nitty gritty of the mythology and I couldn't get enough of it. Thankfully, however, Jessica offered to write a guest post about her research into Angelology and it's use in Embrace.

Angels Have A Pecking Order

Researching for EMBRACE, I discovered the entire subject of Angelology to be truly fascinating. In the end, I chose to go with the most popular theory, that there are 3 choirs of angels and within each choir, 3 ranks.

At the top of the angel hierarchy sit the Seraphim. They are the angels that are supposed to burn with an all-consuming white flame and who perform the all-important role of maintaining the source of Existence within the physical world.

Following the Seraphim come the Cherubim, and Thrones. I always like the descriptions of the Thrones – bringers of justice.

In the second choir are Powers, Dominations and Virtues. And in the third choir – Principalities, Archangels and Angels (guardians).

In writing EMBRACE, discovering each of these ranks and their purpose on earth was what led to the development of my characters powers. Each character is specifically placed within a rank of angels and then given powers accordingly. For example: Griffin is parented by a Seraph angel, meaning he is a leader and his unique power is a mind power (that of reading and delivering truth) to correlate with the description of the Seraphim’s function in the universe. It is a great way of keeping order to the power pool!

Each angelic rank also has a different appearance and different color that represent them and I found this really interesting. Any time I describe an angelic image, it relates back to this research in some way. Additionally, combining this research with things like the Chakra has led me to the use of color as a representation of power and also gemstones as a link to old mythology. For example: Phoenix’s hair is like opal – so black that it shimmers with purple and it catches the light exposing streaks of dazzling silver. First, I loved the idea of his hair being different, but also, it linked to the significance to his power, and his heritage in the story.

Basing the story around the bones of angel mythology and hierarchy gives me a solid structure to use as my foundation. It anchors the story and gives me direction any time I think the story might be straying.

Also, it allowed me to develop one of the big mysteries within the series: what rank is Violet from?

Thanks for the great post Jessica! Makes me want to dive into the book all over again!! Be sure to add Embrace and its sequel Entice to your Goodreads shelves and check out the epic trailer while you wait for the book's release of March 6!