BLOG TOUR - LILLIAN HOLMES AND THE LEAPING MAN BY CIAR CULLEN

Today I am hosting Ciar Cullen and her new release: 

The Leaping Man

Included in this post is an excerpt from The Leaping Man, and the results of a Meyers/Briggs Personality Test on Lillian Holmes, Cian Cullen's MC. Also, at the bottom of this post you will find my review!

Welcome Ciar, and all the best with the release and the Tour!

Title: Lillian Holmes & The Leaping Man

Author: Ciar Cullen
Genre: Paranormal Historical Romance
Publisher: Boroughs Publishing Group

Blurb: 

At the cusp of the twentieth century, an heiress turned detective enters a world of deception and danger and must learn to trust her nemesis with both her life and her love.

Tormented by a tragic past, Miss Lillian Holmes nonetheless found the strength to go on, to become the greatest female detective of her time. To make her uncle proud. Except...he was not truly her uncle. Sherlock was a fictional character, and Lil was less a true detective than a sheltered twenty-six year old heiress with taste for mystery...and morphine. But then she saw him. Leaping from her neighbor’s second-story window, a beautiful stranger. With the recent murders plaguing Baltimore, here was a chance to
reveal the truth.

Except, the Leaping Man was far more than he seemed. A wanton creature of darkness, an entry point to a realm of deception and evil, and to a Truth she had waited countless years to uncover, he would threaten far more than Lillian’s life. He would take both her heart and soul. And she would rejoice in it.


Excerpt: Lillian Holmes & the Leaping Man

At the cusp of the twentieth century, an heiress turned detective enters a world of deception and danger and must learn to trust her nemesis with both her life and her love.

Tormented by a tragic past, Miss Lillian Holmes nonetheless found the strength to go on, to become the greatest female detective of her time. To make her uncle proud. Except…he was not truly her uncle. Sherlock was a fictional character, and Lil was less a true detective than a sheltered twenty-six year old heiress with taste for mystery…and  morphine. But then she saw him. Leaping from her neighbor’s second-story window, a beautiful stranger. With the recent murders plaguing Baltimore, here was a chance to  reveal the truth.

Except, the Leaping Man was far more than he seemed. A wanton creature of darkness, an entry point to a realm of deception and evil, and to a Truth she had waited countless years to uncover, he would threaten far more than Lillian’s life. He would take both her heart and soul. And she would rejoice in it.

Lillian Holmes Takes the Myers/Briggs Personality Test

I had my heroine take a personality test, although she really thinks that sort of thing is nonsense and not provable. But I wanted to see how well I understand her. Lillian Holmes will face many, many trials in upcoming books, and it’s important for me to understand who she is, at a very basic psychological level. Honestly, I was relieved that we don’t have the same “type,” as I’m an INFJ – Introverted Intuitive Feeling Judging - (a lot of writers are), and she’s an INTJ. T is for Thinking. So, she pretty much comes up the way I’d envision her hero, Sherlock Holmes would—introverted (not shy), meticulous, and above all, favoring reason. Except she does have a soft heart, but her depression gets in the way sometimes. I was not surprised to see that Lil shares her type with Fitzwilliam Darcy.  

To outsiders, INTJs may appear to project an aura of "definiteness," of self-confidence. This self-confidence is sometimes mistaken for simple arrogance, like Darcy. Personal relationships, particularly romantic ones, can be the INTJ's Achilles heel. (Oh, Lil, is anyone good enough for you? How could you have fallen in love with your nemesis? And can’t you see that he’s taken with you as well?) 

Many INTJs do not readily grasp the social rituals; for instance, they tend to have little patience and less understanding of such things as small talk and flirtation (which most types consider half the fun of a relationship). That is one reason why Lillian Holmes (and Mr. Darcy) loathes balls and the like. What to say? Why would one waste one’s time on small talk? Where is the fun in small talk? Depth! Give me an intellectual equal, she cries.

To complicate matters, INTJs are usually extremely private people and can often be naturally impassive as well, which makes them easy to misread and misunderstand. Perhaps the most fundamental problem, however, is that INTJs really want people to make sense.  Poor Lil, who makes sense? Certainly not a brooding vampire in love.

What is your personality type? Do you identify strongly with any fictional characters? What is their type? You might not be so surprised to find that you share a type. If you’ve never taken Myers/Briggs, it’s quite fast and fun, and can be taken here: http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/jtypes2.asp A lot of psychology types hates these tests, so this is for fun. I hope you like my heroine as much as I do. And I know some of you will identify with her. That makes me happy. But I’m an INFJ, and we tend to want others to be happy.

  My Review:

Vampires! This story by Ciar Cullen is set in the past, when the norm was to have a household, full of servants and when ladies were expected to behave a certain way.

Lillian Holmes, the MC, is a little different and definitely is not the norm. She lives in a fantasy of her own making and has difficulty distinguishing reality from her hallucinations.

But, when she discovers a man leaping from her neighbour's high set window in the middle of the night, her life changes. 

The Leaping Man is quite a different tale and is an entertaining read, as Ciar takes her readers into the early Twentieth Century, where science, machine and man began to entwine. 

Ciar has captured the era magnificently, in her descriptive text and style. The voice of this time period is brought to life through the language and mannerisms of the main character, Lillian Holme's.

I really enjoyed this take on Vampires, and even though I do not habitually read books set in this time period, Ciar captured my imagination with the storyline, settings and characters. I would recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys a good vampire read and those who love to read novels set in this time period.