Message of the Pendant by Thomas Thorpe #Historical #Mystery #AmReading

The room was not completely dark. High above the floor, five window slits provided flickering bursts of light whenever distant lightning struck. Beneath dark wooden beams, flashes created menacing shadows that quickly disappeared until the next glimmer.

Huddled in a corner with her sister, Emily, the wait became excruciating for Elizabeth. Where was the stalker now?

A large stone fireplace under an antlered head of a stag stood at the far side of the room. She decided to edge over to the hearth and look for a tool or piece of wood which could be used against the blackguard.

On hands and knees, she carefully advanced along the room’s perimeter trying not to make any noise. Fifteen feet, ten feet, five.., she felt the bricks. She reached out for a poker, but had to settle for a two-foot log, three inches in diameter. Clutching her prize, she turned to start back. A new creak punctured the air in the middle of the room.

She froze.

Several English chairs and Queen Anne upholstered seats rested between game tables, turned at various angles to her sight. The sound had come from there. She stared at the outlines.

Lightning flashed again. To her terror, a dark figure rose behinda seat turned away from the chimney. Light disappeared before she could see anything more.

Elizabeth’s mind raced, wondering if she had been heard.

Another flash. The figure had moved toward Emily’s corner.

“Emily! Emily!” she screamed. “Wake up. Someone’s coming toward you!”

She could hear Emily stirring, muttering words that made it clear she did not understanding their plight.  She had to help her sister! Her legs felt weak and a rush of panic welled up inside her. She could not move.

Glint came again. The figure had stopped.

William Darmon and wife Elizabeth were powerful figures who in 1818 set society’s pace from expansive grounds known as Mayfair Hall. When a family member is murdered, a mysterious pendant is found containing a long lost request by Napoleon Bonaparte for an American mission to burn down Parliament buildings. The couple sets out on an action filled pursuit of the killer. While interviewing Henry Clay in post-war Maryland about the failed mission, they uncover evidence of a conspiracy to free the Emperor from exile. The Darmons infiltrate the cadre, but a shipwreck off the coast of Scotland, a firestorm at the Darmon’s Manor and a harrowing assault on the Island of St. Helena loom before the mystery can be unraveled.

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Genre – Mystery, Historical, Thriller

Rating – PG

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Website www.darmonmysteries.com

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Meet & Greet with @Marie_McKean (BORN OF OAK & SILVER) #YA #Paranormal #Fiction

What color represents your personality the most?

Pink. There are so many shades that can be classified as pink. Some are deep, some are spunky, and others are bright or muted. But still, they’re all pink.

What movie do you love to watch?

“The Phantom of the Opera.” That movie is the only movie that will make me cry. I also LOVE” The Last of the Mohicans.” But as mentioned before, I love to laugh, so it goes without saying that I will never turn down a good comedy. I find “Step-Brothers” to be funnier every time I watch it. “Nacho Libre,” “Out Cold,” or anything by Chris Farley is always a classic.

How do you feel about social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter? Are they a good thing?

I’m sure for most people they are a good, if not great thing. But for me, I just don’t have the time to spend my life on either of them. I’d rather spend my free time writing.

If you could do any job in the world what would you do?

Archaeology. Don’t even get me started on how cool it would be to discover something that hasn’t been touched in centuries. I love the romance and mystery of it. Yeah, you’re crouching in dirt, in the heat, for hours on end. But that one moment where you hold a bead that someone once wore . . . and wonder what that person was like. Well, that would make it all worth it.

What are you most passionate about? What gets you fired up?

Anything that has to do with the wellbeing of children. I just start thinking about kids suffering in anyway, and I feel motivated to do something about it.

What makes you angry?

People who choose to be stupid. Even thinking about it makes me angry.

Are you a city slicker or a country lover?

The city has some nice perks, but at heart, I love the country. I love nature and the wide-open spaces and looking around you and seeing no one. Even thinking about it now makes me miss the small town I grew up in.

How do you think people perceive writers?

As either crazy people or hermits. I’d like to think that I’m neither, but I guess I can’t really know that. But whatever it is that people are thinking about authors, I hope for the most part it’s good. As an author, you are expected to be indifferent, but that doesn’t mean that you actually are. 

What’s your next project?

I’m in the throws of writing a sequel called Born of Ash and Iron. I am loving where this story is going. After that, it will be the next book in my YA series. The goal is to always be writing and progressing in something.

What would you love to produce in your life?

A decent loaf of bread. I’m cursed when it comes to making breads. But, one day I will make that one loaf of perfect bread!

What’s the reason for your life? Have you figured out your reason for being here yet?

I often tell people that my children are both the bane and light of my existence. It’s no different here. My reason for living is to teach them how to be the best they can, and at the same time, not forget the people around them. I try to make other people’s lives better, and hope to carry on that compassion to my children, and even their own.

YOU CANNOT CHANGE THE LIFE YOU’VE BEEN GIVEN.

All that you can do is make the most of what you’ve been dealt—fight a good fight, resist being beaten by circumstance, and hope that somehow, despite it all, you’re able to accomplish the impossible.

But even then you cannot change the fact that you were born cursed.

I am one of those unlucky few upon whom the Curse of the Four Fathers has fallen.

It is I who must bear the burden of having a life that is unchangeably intertwined with the Fae. A sorrow made all the more great by knowing that where they are tragedy, loss, misery, and despair most assuredly follow.

As a Druid it is my responsibility to uphold the boundaries that keep the worlds of the Tylwyth Teg, and our own, separate. As a man it is my only ambition to protect the family and woman I so desperately love.

The only problem: I’m not sure this curse will allow for me to do both.

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Genre - Paranormal Fantasy, Horror

Rating – PG-13

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Website https://www.mariemckean.com

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The Big Dirty #Publishing Secret: #Novels Are Products, Says @GreyAuthor #AmWriting

Every author should watch 1987s Throw Momma from the Train with Billy Crystal and Danny DeVito. It’s a wonderful comedy, but that aside, it is a wonderful expose of the minds of writers. My wife, also an author, and I quote that movie to each other all of the time. One of the more poignant quotes in the movie happened when the protagonist Larry gets fired by his literary agent, played hilariously by Rob Reiner, who finally says, “You want to be an artist? Fine. Go to Mexico—the rest of us need to make a living.”

It’s so easy, given the tremendous amount of work we put into our books, to remember that our books are products and our work is to create a product. That is not to say novel writing should be void of art and creativity, but we should never lose sight of the fact we are trying to sell the book. That is why it is so important that authors let the professionals take them through the process—editors, publishers, book designers, marketers—they all know the trade and while you may know how to write a book, that doesn’t mean you need to be an expert in all facets of publishing.

The best thing an author can do after a book is born, is to let it go. Detach oneself from the novel so that it can be groomed, tailored and packaged. Without the rest of the industry doing its job, your novel can never truly reach its potential.

For me, the antidote for letting go of a book, is to write another one. By the time you are immersed in the next story it’s much easier to let the last one go.

In the fall of 1947, Will Shakespeare saw the world collapse around him. Shakespeare, a secret soldier for the Knights Templar, barely escapes the slaughter of his entire knighthood at the hands of a rogue militant arm of the Vatican in a small Montreal church. With orders to escort Templar business associate Dorothy Wilkinson back to her home in Bermuda, Will must locate and rescue the most important secret treasure in human history before it is devoured by a hurricane in the watery caves beneath her father’s property. The spiraling quest sends Will and Dorothy into uncovering dark secrets that make up the origins of the knighthood as they confront the traps and puzzles that masterfully protect the world’s most coveted treasure.

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Genre – Action, Adventure

Rating – PG

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THE COPPER WITCH by @JessicaDall #Historical #Fiction #MustRead

She couldn’t help glancing again, looking away when he glared. “How old are you, Antony?”

He paused momentarily. “Does that matter?”

“I was just curious,” she said. “You’re much younger than the painters we used to have come here.”

“I’m not as well-seasoned as them, I would think,” he said. “And I imagine I’m quite a bit cheaper.”

“Oh.” She fought away a smile. “So I shouldn’t be surprised when my nose comprises the better part of my face, then?”

“I think I’m skilled enough to keep that from happening,” Antony answered, continuing under his breath, “Anyway, if I were going to make a feature too large it would much more likely be your eyes.”

Her eyes slid over to him again.

He met them for a second before looking away sharply. “Stay still.”

“You just started painting, then?” She looked down and away again.

“I’ve been painting my entire life,” he said, seeming relieved. “Just finished my apprenticeship a year or so ago.”

“So you’re what then?” Adela did the math in her head. “Twenty? Twenty-One?”

“Something like that.”

She smiled. “You don’t know which one?”

“Relax your face.”

She took a breath, forced off the smile. “Is it a secret?”

Exasperation leeched into his voice. “Is what?”

“Your age.”

He released a breath. “I just don’t see how it’s relevant.”

“I asked,” she said. “That doesn’t make it relevant enough?”

“I don’t believe that’s the way it works, Miss Tilden.”

She shifted. “Can I please move. I’m going to freeze in this position if I have to keep it up much longer.”

Antony set down his brush, holding his hands up, motioning his surrender. “We can take a break.”

Adela rolled her shoulders, standing quickly to stretch her legs. She turned. “Can I see now?”

He looked up from straightening his paints.

“I’d like to see how you’re painting me,” she continued at his silence.

Antony hesitated. “I prefer people not to see what I’m painting until I’m done.”

She moved closer. “I’m paying for it. I’d think you’d want to know if I’m unsatisfied in any way.”

He opened his mouth, cleared his throat before starting. “Your grandmother’s paying for it, Miss Tilden. Maybe I should show her.” Adela pouted. “Please?”

He looked at her for another moment. Finally, sighing, he backed up for her to take a look.

Adela moved quickly, her soft slippers barely making a sound on the stone floor. And the painting slid into view. Unlike the other china-doll portraits in the manor—with every inch of the women in them softened, pale—the picture in front of her looked as though he had taken her reflection and pressed it onto the canvas. She studied herself, fascinated for a moment before collecting herself. She pulled herself straight. “You’re using a lot of red in my hair.”

His eyes lifted to her scalp. “Well, there is a lot of red in your hair, Miss Tilden.”

She twirled a strand absentmindedly around her finger, didn’t dispute it.

“Satisfied?” he finally asked.

“You are quite talented,” she said, looked from the painting to him. “I don’t think you have my lips quite right, though.”

Adela Tilden has always been more ambitious than her station in life might allow. A minor nobleman’s daughter on a failing barony, Adela’s prospects seem dire outside of marrying well-off. When Adela catches the eye of the crown prince, Edward, however, well-off doesn’t seem to be a problem. Thrown into a world of politics and intrigue, Adela might have found all the excitement she ever wanted—if she can manage to leave her past behind.

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Genre – Alternate Historical Fiction

Rating – PG-13

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Website http://jessicadall.com/

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THE HOUSE by Sebastiana Randone @sebasti29567440 #AmReading #Romance #HistFic

The architecture resembled a fairy tale model. That in this case lamentably, was more like something found in a horror story. Grim and inhospitable, the imposing structure, defended by an overgrown garden, spoke of long neglect.

Situated amongst strangulating weeds, mossy statues of curvaceous goddesses whispered secrets of time past. Whilst centrally, an arid birdbath stained turquoise from the decay of time, stood lonely and forgotten. On the whole, one could only deduce human absence by the squalid state of things.

Large ageless trees posed as guardians, while their silhouetted branches danced upon the cracked, time worn walls, moving to the wind’s song rustling through leaves.

Above, a turret rose defiantly out of the roof of the two storey house, embellished by carvings of strange beasts. This cluster of gargoyles and winged beings cast their mischievous eyes upon the world, sending a shiver through the visitor. Who could not help but fear that housed within the decrepit walls of this unwelcoming abode, a dark scene from Grimm brothers, wicked witch and all awaited, ready to pounce.

Venturing forward towards the entrance nevertheless, she pushed against the rusted lacework gate before her. It grunted as it opened reluctantly, the hinge barely able to submit through lack of use. As she entered into the garden, sounds, almost inaudible at first, seemed to emanate from somewhere within the house. Assuming the trees to be the perpetrators, she stood still so as to listen. Strangely, the birds complied by desisting from chatter, as did the forest, whose breathing had stilled.

Now a piano was vaguely audible. This compelled her to knock on the door that, much to her surprise, opened on its own.

Calling out she crept into a vestibule filled with an array of paintings and other exquisite objects. Oddly, the brightness of the foyer defied the impending gloom of night’s approach.

Growing ever louder, the music had a magnetic affect on the young visitor, who, in a state of increasing curiosity, entered into a great hallway that seemed never-ending in grandeur. Somewhat surprising was the lack of dust and decay, which contrasted sharply with the derelict appearance of the house’s exterior.

The House is an adult fairy tale rich in mystery and intrigue.

Here is a tale of a woman so absorbed with historical novels that her own reality ceases to offer any hope of romance and beauty.

Until one day this dreamy idealist finds herself in a mysterious forest. How she arrived there is unknown. Soon she encounters a dilapidated house, within whose ancient walls magical rooms that transport to parallel worlds lie in wait.  There she is transmigrated to 18th century England, where our heroine interacts with an odd mix of characters whose dysfunctional lives become immediately apparent.

Her first tribulation involves a nefarious lord, an archetype of the monstrous characters one encounters in fairy tales. The ramification from this confrontation sets the tone for the narrative.

A magic portal finally enables escape from the austere Georgian dwelling. She is then spirited back to the enigmatic house, and a journey to Regency London follows, where a large cast of eccentric identities present themselves.

Late one night, following a long stay in Florence, a young, heart-broken poet arrives. His introduction to the beautiful time traveller offers promise of restoration and love. But there are several more obstacles ahead before her destiny in this curious adventure is made apparent.

In the end an unexpected twist is revealed. But like all good fairy tales, this surprising conclusion is pleasing, even though the means of getting there are dark, and at times sinister.

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Genre - Historical, Fantasy, Romance

Rating - PG-16

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10 Things You Didn’t Know About @EileenMakysm #GoodReads #YA #Paranormal

1)    Eileen has three siblings: her older half-sister Christine, younger sister Michelle, and younger brother Ben.

2)    She was born in Carbondale, IL, a college town and home to Southern Illinois University, where her parents met.  Her family left Illinois when she was still a baby, and she grew up in Naples, Florida, a city of sharp contrasts: between nature and development, elderly retirees and young families, tourists and residents, the wealthy in million dollar beach front homes and the struggling middle to lower class on the other side of highway 41.

3)    One of her favorite TV shows as a kid was The Mysterious Cities of Gold, an animated show that was a complicated mix of historical and science fiction about three children searching for the eponymous cities during the time of the Conquistadors.  Many of her early stories were basically fanfic for the show!

4)    Growing up, Eileen at times wanted to be a parachutist, an astronaut, a biologist, a lawyer and an actress, but she’s always wanted to be a writer.

5)    During high school she was active in The Naples Players, a local community theater.  She acted in Bye Bye Birdie, Into The Woods, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, and Stop The World, I Want to Get Off, and worked backstage onNunsense and Little Shop Of Horrors.

6)    Eileen went to Yale, where she started off majoring in biology, switched to psychology, then finished up in philosophy.  She was very active in a number of organizations, including Yale Children’s Theater, The Party of the Right, and the Yale Precision Marching Band.  If you’re wondering when she slept, the answer is hardly ever!  She considered three hours to be a decent night’s sleep, and drank a prodigious amount of coffee.

7)    In college, Eileen was also a member of The Anti-Gravity Society, a group that teaches and practices juggling and other circus arts.  She learned how to juggle balls, clubs, knives and torches, crack a bullwhip, and breathe and swallow fire.  The latter two came in handy for the group’s yearly Fire Show on Halloween.

8)    Eileen stage managed a number of plays as an undergrad, including a production of The Tempest  that was staged at the university’s olympic-sized swimming pool.  Her favorite production was of her favorite play,Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard.  She’s very proud of that production, and thinks it was worth the symbolic logic class she flunked that semester.

9)    Eileen has a Masters Degree in Theology from Weston Jesuit School of Theology (which is now the theology school at Boston College).  Her concentration was Theological Ethics, and she had a particular interest in the problem of suffering.

10) Eileen loves animals!  Growing up she had cats, a dog, parakeets, a chicken, ducks, a rabbit, and a truly ridiculous number of guinea pigs.  Currently she has a dog named Blaze and a 19-year-old cat named Jane.  Both are rescue animals: Blaze came to the family from a kind woman who rescued her off the side of the road as a puppy, and Jane has been with Eileen since her junior year at Yale, when she adopted her from the New Haven Cat Project.

Tara Martin – exceptionally accomplished neurobiology major with a troubled past. Steven Trent – confident political science major with an irresistible attraction to Tara. Paul Stratton – history major who is able to hear spirits. Together, they make up the Society for Paranormal Researchers at their prestigious New England University. When they’re not in class or writing papers, the three friends are chasing their passion….ghosts.

When the group learns of a local retired couple trying to sell a house they claim is haunted, they decide to investigate. As the clues unfold, a familiar spirit interrupts their investigation and Tara finds her life in danger. Can her friends save her before it’s too late?

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Genre – YA paranormal, NA paranormal

Rating – PG-13

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Connect with Eileen Maksym on Facebook & Twitter

Website http://eileenmaksym.wordpress.com/

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@KellenBurden Shares His Experience With Choosing a Setting #AmWriting #Thriller #WriteTip

There is nothing more magical than snow falling on a city. All the dirt and dinge and noise and movement is cleaned, shined, muffled and stopped. Falling against the sparkling lights and piling in the gutters and driven by the wind. See a couple, holding hands in Central Park as the snow blankets the trees. See a single rider on a black horse in a clearing in Tennessee as the flakes stream down like an omen. Or maybe it’s hot. 120 degrees in the middle of the day in July in Arizona, the sun looming and terrible in the washed out sky as your hero stands sweating through his T-shirt, holding a beer that has gone flat and warm an hour ago.  Maybe it’s hot like Miami. Maybe like Arizona. Maybe Afghanistan.

Choosing a setting is obviously vital to the way that your story plays out and is perceived by the audience. Sleepless in Muncie, Indiana would have been a totally different movie. Different settings breed different characters. They hold different challenges and offer different benefits. Try having a running gun battle through New York City without police involvement. Good Luck working out the specifics of that. But on the flipside, try waving down a cab in Tempe, Arizona. Also not going to happen. When choosing a setting it’s important to have a basic working knowledge of the area you’re talking about, whether it’s through independent research (blogs about the area, reading books that take place there etc.) or from having visited the place. You can then fill the gaps by interviewing people who live there, (calling information booths, or local libraries is a good place to start). By doing those things, you can talk about a town or area without deeply offending its inhabitants or drawing your reader out of the world you’re creating.

With that being said, no research you could ever do would come anywhere close to having lived in a place. No one else can know what the train sounds like, screaming past your window at 4 in the morning. No guide book will tell you about what the Park smells like when the ducks come back in spring, or about the feeling of watching a flash flood swallow the street in front of your house. Interviews are alright, but they don’t measure up to seeing a city 24/7 for 365. They don’t measure up to falling asleep to its sounds, having them permeate your dreams and then waking with them again in the morning. Building that from scratch isn’t easy. Not impossible of course. Obviously, J.K. Rowling has never been to Hogwarts, and I’m fairly certain that J.R.R. Tolkien had never been to middle earth, but even Tolkien and Rowling had places that they built their fantasy worlds off of. A structure that they used to compile a place of their own. The point is, to be a believable, successful writer you have to be able to put your reader in your world. To make them feel with their whole bodies, the things that your character is experiencing. It’s a tall order when you yourself have not done these things.

Sebastian Parks is drowning in a flood of his own creation. Dishonorably discharged from the Army, he’s wracked with night terrors and an anger that he can’t abate. Unemployable and uninterested in anything resembling a normal job, Parks makes his living in fugitive apprehension, finding wanted felons on Facebook and thumping them into custody with his ex-military buddies John Harkin and Eric “Etch” Echevarria. When the body of a teenage Muslim boy is found in front of a downtown Denver nightclub Parks, Harkin and Etch are called on to do what they do best: Find bad men and make them pay. 

First-time author Kellen Burden serves up edgy humor, brutal action and characters you can’t get enough of. Flash Bang will keep you turning pages until the end.

Received “Honorable Mention at Los Angeles Book Festival 2014″

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Genre – Thriller, Mystery

Rating – R

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