In a quiet village in rural Kent, a magical mystery leads to murder . . .
Woodville has returned to ‘normal’ after the departure of the Crow Folk. The villagers put out fires from aircraft shot down in the Battle of Britain, and Faye Bright discovers that magic can be just as dangerous as any weapon.
The arrival of a trio of Jewish children fleeing the Nazis brings the fight for Europe to the village. When their guardian is found dead, Faye must play nanny to the terrified children while gathering clues to uncover a dark magic that threatens to change the course of the war. And she must do it quickly – the children have seen too much and someone wants them silenced for good.
Mark Stay co-wrote the screenplay for Robot Overlords which became a movie with Sir Ben Kingsley and Gillian Anderson, and premiered at the 58th London Film Festival. He is co-presenter of the Bestseller Experiment podcast and has worked in bookselling and publishing for over twenty-five years. He lives in Kent, England, with his family and a trio of retired chickens. He blogs and humblebrags over at markstaywrites.com.
My thoughts: I usually avoid Second World War fiction as it’s often either jingoistic or exploitative, but Mark Stay has handled it beautifully here. The three Jewish children are very much the heroes of the story, having been brought over on the kindertransport ship and protected by their cousin Klaus, they come to the unusual village of Woodville, hoping to find some peace.
Unfortunately for them, and Faye Bright, peace is in short supply and they soon find themselves in danger. But the village witches, Faye, Miss Charlotte and Mrs Teach, will do what they can to protect not only the children, but also a very special apple tree.
One of my favourite random facts is that all apples are descended from the original apples grown in Kazakhstan, which is relevant to this story. And that apples feature in lots of notable myths, legends and religions, tells you how important they are to humanity. Magda, Max, Rudolf and Nelson the dog will have to be very brave and clever to outwit some rather nasty people and save the day. Faye’s visions help guide events and her final one of the book, made me smile. It was filled with hope.
This series just gets better and better as the witches of Woodville grow in their strength and the village stands strong against a variety of evils.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
When a reaper comes to collect Wallace from his own funeral, Wallace begins to suspect he might be dead.
And when Hugo, the owner of a peculiar tea shop, promises to help him cross over, Wallace decides he’s definitely dead.
But even in death he’s not ready to abandon the life he barely lived, so when Wallace is given one week to cross over, he sets about living a lifetime in seven days.
Hilarious, haunting, and kind, Under the Whispering Door is an uplifting story about a life spent at the office and a death spent building a home.
My thoughts: TJ Klune writes books that make me cry, The House in the Cerulean Sea had me in tears and now Under the Whispering Door. Beautiful, moving queer love stories set against odds that seem to be insurmountable. Here Wallace is a ghost, he and Hugo can’t even touch. But they fall in love slowly and surely anyway.
The teashop is something rather magical, something special, and not just because there’s a door to the afterlife in it. The people that live there, even the dead ones, have a wonderful bond and kindness abounds, which helps break Wallace’s walla down. He never really had a family or friends and here at the end of his life he finds both and doesn’t want to leave them. Simply beautiful. Have some tissues handy.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
Congratulations to author T.R. Slauf on the release of the second installment in the Legends of Lightning series, Redemption! Read on for more details!
Redemption (Legends of Lightning #2)
Publication Date: November 2nd, 2021
Genre: Fantasy
“Blood seems to be the only thing flowing in this Realm. The day I found out the truth of who I was, was the day I died.”
“Sometimes you must die so you can be re-born.”
Esther escaped the horrors of Castle Rose, but at a cost. Believing her lost guide is still alive deep in the bowls of Adam’s dungeons, she aims to save him, but the other Huntsman are not so sure he’s alive… Desperate to rescue Oisin, Esther makes tempestuous allegiances with dangerous foes. Walking a fine line between enemies and allies, life and death, she rages war against the monsters of the Hidden Realm.
Esther’s journey continues in this heart wrenching sequel as she navigates the politics and grudges of ageless Queens. By night, she’s haunted by what she’s seen fighting in a war that was never hers. What she’s done to survive in the Hidden Realm will haunt her forever and she’s terrified of losing herself in the darkness without a star to guide her. Will Esther be able to save Oisin and the lands before the shadows of her mind overtake her spirit?
Esther stifled a scream. A sheen of cold sweat dripped from her face and soaked her clothes. Gathering her wits, she looked around. It was early evening, and she was in a dark cramped room full of sleeping bodies at Auburn Keep.
Her heart pounded; she was safe. There were no Faye ravishing her body while the shadows laughed, there were no beasts torturing her while the misshaped yellow eyes of the gremlins watched. The sound of rushing waters and Oisin’s screams were only in her mind
“The next Realm Walker will bring with them a storm. Lightning must fight the Crimson Shadow, or the lands will be cast into eternal darkness.”
When she was a child, Esther was plagued with vivid nightmares. Now they have returned to haunt her. Bloodthirsty monsters chase her through a forest of dead trees while a mysterious hooded figure stalks her. After waking with fresh wounds from her dreams, Esther searches for the truth about who she is and the Hidden Realm she is destined to save.
Join Esther on her journey of self-discovery as she travels into a world long forgotten. Unsure if she can trust her hooded guide, she is hunted by unknown enemies and smothered by expectations of grandeur. Deciphering friend from foe she travels the lands, trying to unite kingdoms torn by pride.
Giveaway: Win Paperback Copies of the Legends of Lightning Series
About the Author
I have always been torn between two halves of myself; one half revels in all things scientific and longs to explore the secrets of the universe, while the other half finds solace and excitement within the arts. When it came time to choose a college degree, I put aside my creative hobbies and perused a career path in biochemistry. For me, college was an expensive privilege, thus I decided a degree within STEM was the most logical route for my costly investments. Through my years in college I still tried to enjoy the arts, reading novels and drawing in my sketchbooks when time permitted.
Five long years later, I graduated from Michigan State University with a Bachelor of Science in biochemistry and molecular biology. I immediately began working full time in an academic research lab, it was miserable. I quickly grew weary and depressed in the toxic and hostile work environment created by our supervisor. I begun interviewing for other jobs and exploring my creative hobbies again when my congenital heart condition required me to have another open-heart surgery.
In the months before my operation, I became determined to finish my first novel; I had started and abandoned several over the years. Once I was well enough, I continued writing during my recovery. Nine months after my operation, I left my job at the research lab and invested more of myself in my novel. It wasn’t an easy transition and it did not happen over-night, but I decided to start a new career as a novelist.
Welcome to the book tour for Annabelle Lewis’s novel, Cut and Run. The perfect thriller for the spooky season!
Cut and Run
Publication Date: August 14th, 2021
Genre: Contemporary Thriller
Their story continues . . .
The four Boston clairvoyants, blessed—or cursed—with special powers, must fight a ruthless enemy and stop injustice. In Dead Cat, Run, the Sisters of Fate drove them together, but at what cost? The God Apollo wasn’t playing around. He’s still dead set on vengeance.
Sinister forces will have a wicked agenda. An energy grab, a mineral rights war, and deadly mercenaries create a mortally serious game. But the psychics’ sibylline abilities aside, they’re only human. At least three of them are. (What’s up with that?)
Can they stop the killers? And who will survive?
An energetic contemporary thriller, Cut and Run will have you on the edge of your seat as the dance between good and evil resumes.
Annabelle Lewis is a pseudonym for the author who lives in Minneapolis with her husband, children, and a wild thug of a dog who sleeps beside her. A multi-genre writer and publisher of 9 novels to date, her humorous mystery caper books have a theme – taking down the bad guy. Villains beware! She also writes a scathing blog and highly entertaining monthly newsletter.
Happy book birthday to author Kelsey Josund! Today marks the release of her murderous Cinderella retelling, Pretty Deadly! Read on for details.
Pretty Deadly
Publication Date: October 26th, 2021 (TODAY 🎉)
Genre: Dark Fantasy/ Fairytale Retelling (Not YA)
Cinna would quite literally kill for the throne.
She’s spent years forced to serve her wealthy cousins rather than attend society events alongside them, waiting for the chance to prove herself and exact revenge. When a ball is announced at the castle, promising to bring many powerful people to town, she seizes the opportunity to strike.
She bets her best friend, a small-time thief and con-man, that she can land a greater score the night of the ball than he can. They embark on parallel heists. But as their plots unfold, things begin to unravel: by the end of the night, the castle’s on lock down, a duchess is dead, a mansion has burnt to the ground, and Cinna hasn’t stolen anything. Or has she stolen something more valuable than gold and jewels?
How interesting, Cinna thought. She had spent so many hours bent over a stove in the kitchen or crouched before the hearth, stoking flames carefully that refused to light. But she had prepared: this house was waiting tinder, ready to be consumed.
She couldn’t hear the screams over the roar of the flames, but surely they were there. Strangely, she didn’t feel cheated to have not heard their voices. It was fine that they died in silence.
It did not take long for the neighbors to begin streaming out of their own houses, and she did hear their screams. They swarmed around the flames, politely mute once they realized they could not do anything, full of awe before the enormity of the fire. Cinna blended into the crowd, nearly invisible in her costume.
At last, just as she had always pledged she would, she watched the house fall in on itself.
I am a software engineer and author living and working in Silicon Valley, California. I studied computer science at Stanford University, but I’ve always loved stories in all their forms. I approach writing fiction the same way I approach writing code: I like to know where it’s going, but I want to figure out the details as I go along. Good software is a lot like a good story, full of neat and clever solutions to tricky problems, beautiful at a granular level but also from a distance.
Originally from Seattle, I love getting outdoors and living in places that allow me to escape to the mountains on the weekends, and I care deeply about the ecosystems that humans impact and that impact us. My writing explores these issues while also following classic coming-of-age arcs in science fiction and fantasy. I’m also very interested in stories and characters that complicate the traditional and familiar, leading me to fairytale retellings from unexpected angles.
’It was a rainy day that the magic came, and once magic has entered your life, you stay in its glittering clutch forever’
Nottingham, 1906
Marietta Stelle longs to be a ballerina but as Christmas draws nearer, her dancing days are numbered. At the wishes of her family, she will be obligated to marry and take up her place in society in the New Year. But when a mysterious toymaker, Dr Drosselmeier, purchases a neighbouring townhouse, it heralds the arrival of magic and wonder in her life. Although Drosselmeier’s magic is darker than Marietta could have imagined…
When he constructs an elaborate theatrical set for her final ballet performance, Marietta discovers it carries a magic all of its own. As the clock chimes midnight, Marietta finds herself walking through a land of snow-topped fir trees leading to a frozen sugar palace silent with secrets and must find a way to return home.
In the darkness of night, magic awaits and you will never forget what you find here…
My thoughts: inspired by The Nutcracker, this is a magical fairy tale fantasy for adults. Perfect for a winter’s evening reading, we follow aspiring ballet dancer Marietta through a magic clock into another world, one fraught with dangers but also where she’ll find friendship and love.
Rejecting the strictures of early 20th century society, refusing marriage to the frightening Drosselmieir (named for Clara’s godfather in the ballet, and the book that inspired it) and his magical creations, Marietta wants to choose her own path and not the one of marriage and obedience her father expects of her. She’s an inspiring and brave character, fighting back against Everwood’s evil king, gaining freedom for herself and her friends, then exerting that strength of will to set out on her own road, not wanting or needing her family’s money.
Lyrical and beautifully written, this is a Gothic delight with its fairy tale land of sugar hiding the bitterness beneath.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
She had saved her. But at what a cost! Her position, her name, her character – she had given them all, but Clarissa was hers. Upon the death of her mother, Agatha Bodenham finds herself alone for the first time in her life. Solitary and socially awkward by nature, she starts to dream about her imaginary childhood friend – the only friend she ever had. Much to her surprise, Clarissa starts to appear, fleetingly at first, and engage with her, and eventually becomes visible to everyone else. Agatha, a 32-year- old spinster, must explain the child’s ‘sudden’ appearance. In a moment of panic, she pretends that Clarissa is her own daughter, her love child. Olivier constructs a mother/daughter relationship which is both poignant and playful. As the years roll by and Clarissa grows into a beautiful young woman, Agatha’s love becomes increasingly obsessive as she senses Clarissa slipping away, attracted by new interests and people her own age.
Edith Olivier (1872–1948) Biography
Edith Olivier’s life encompassed the conservative and the bohemian in quite an extraordinary way: the circles she moved in later in life could not have been predicted from her upbringing. Born on the last day of 1872, Olivier was one of ten children of the Canon of Wilton and the granddaughter of a bishop. Though she had no formal schooling, or even a governess for much of her childhood, Olivier won a scholarship to St Hugh’s College (then St Hugh’s Hall) at Oxford University (see page 163). While there, she got to know Charles Dodgson – also known as Lewis Carroll. She had to leave after four terms, due to severe asthma.
In 1916, Olivier helped form the Women’s Land Army in Wiltshire, which became a model for a national scheme (see page 177). In 1920, she was awarded an MBE for this work. Wilton and Wiltshire remained important to Olivier throughout her life, and she was mayor of Wilton in 1938–41.
It wasn’t until Olivier was in her fifties that she turned to writing, after the death of her dearest sister, Mildred. The Love Child was her first novel in 1927, started when the idea came to her in the middle of the night: ‘Before morning I had finished two chapters,’ she relates in her autobiography (see page 141). The novel reflects Olivier’s keen belief in the supernatural, or what she called ‘things past explaining’ – for instance, she believed herself to have witnessed a pre-1800 fair at Avebury stone circles (see page 145), and to have seen the lost city of Lyonesse off the coast of Cornwall, a legendary kingdom that was supposedly submerged in the eleventh century (see page 157).
After The Love Child, four other novels followed by 1932, after which she turned her attention to non- fiction, including biographies of Alexander Cruden (who wrote a concordance to the Bible) and Mary Magdalene.
From childhood, she had aspired to a more creative life – the title of her autobiography, Without Knowing Mr. Walkley, is a lament on never having become an actor and thus not knowing Mr Walkley, the dramatic critic of the Times. But Olivier’s late career as a writer brought her to a new social circle, and she got to know many of the ‘Bright Young Things’ of the period. The artist and illustrator Rex Whistler was a particularly close friend, and others included Cecil Beaton, Siegfried Sassoon, William Walton and the Sitwell family. When Olivier died in 1948, Cecil Beaton noted that she was mourned by ‘young and old, those who had shared in her widely different interests’, recognised both as a bohemian creative and as a celebrator of Wiltshire.
About this Series
A curated collection of forgotten works by early to mid-century women writers. The best middlebrow fiction from the 1910s to the 1960s, offering escapism, popular appeal and plenty of period detail to amuse, surprise and inform. Stories about women’s lives, often written, performed and directed by women, are becoming more and more popular among audiences of film and TV series. The Women Writers series taps into this growing trend.
My thoughts: this is an interesting little story about loneliness and wish fulfilment. Agatha is alone after her mother’s death and remembers her childhood imaginary friend – another girl like herself, called Clarissa. My imaginary friends were penguins and rabbits, I think I wanted to be a zookeeper! But for an only child, it makes sense to imagine a playmate.
In this case however, Agatha is now in her 30s, unmarried, possibly as a “surplus woman” following the First World War, and childless. This version of Clarissa is as much a daughter as a companion. But she slowly becomes more real, appearing to others, eating, drinking and growing up. Gradually Agatha’s hold on her becomes weakened and Agatha fears she might lose her.
There’s a terrible sadness at the heart of this story, it reminded me of The Little Prince a bit – this magical creature from the stars, who leaves behind a sadness at their parting. The afterword compares its genesis (as per the author’s own recollection) to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, a story born from a dream. Much like Agatha’s imagining into being of Clarissa.
The author herself seems to be have been an incredible and fascinating woman, studying at Oxford where she knew Lewis Carroll, then helping found the Women’s Land Army during the Second World War. The extracts from her autobiography included in this edition were almost more compelling a read than the story.
It’s why the British Library’s work in bringing these women writers and their books back into print is so important. When I studied Literature at university, even in a module called Women Writers, the focus was on ones we all know – Brontes, Austen, Eliot, Woolf, etc. Not these equally fascinating, but somehow forgotten writers. I have enjoyed everyone I’ve read so far and am pleased more are to come.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
A sister searches for her missing brother as a new power rises amid the splendour and the squalor of a once great city in this thrilling hydropunk debut from J.S. Emery. Lower Rhumbsford is a city far removed from its glory days. On the banks of the great river Rhumb, its founding fathers channelled the river’s mighty flow into a subterranean labyrinth of pipes, valves and sluices, a feat of hydraulic prowess that would come to power an empire. But a thousand years have passed since then, and something is wrong. The pipes are leaking, the valves stuck, the sluices silted. The erstwhile mighty Rhumb is sluggish and about to freeze over for the first time in memory. In a once fashionable quarter of the once great city, in the once grand ancestral home of a family once wealthy and well-known, live the last descendants of the city’s most distinguished engineer, siblings Samuel and Briony Locke. Having abandoned his programme in hydraulic engineering, Samuel Locke tends to his vast lock collection, while his sister Briony distracts herself from the prospect of marriage to a rich old man with her alchemical experiments. One night Sam leaves the house carrying five of his most precious locks and doesn’t come back… As she searches for her brother, Briony will be drawn into a web of ancestral secrets and imperial intrigues as a ruthless new power arises. If brother and sister are to be reunited, they will need the help of a tight-lipped house spirit, a convict gang, a club of antiques enthusiasts, a tribe of troglodytes, the Ladies Whist Club, the deep state, a travelling theatrical troupe and a lovesick mouse. Epic, rollicking and in love with language, Jacob and Sara Emery’s sprawling debut novel of humble kitchen magics and awe-inspiring civil engineering is a rare and delicious commodity – the world’s first hydropunk novel. Amazon
J. S. Emery is a brother-sister writing team, born in North Idaho into a homeschooling family of seven children, each of whom received an air rifle and a copy of The Odyssey by way of a fifth birthday present. This background prepared them wonderfully for writing fantasy novels but very poorly for formal education. After dropping out of secondary school, they worked jobs including ballet dancer, emergency room janitor, and map librarian in various parts of Europe and North America. They now live in the United States, where they are godparents (and, increasingly, dungeon masters) to one another’s children.
My thoughts: this is a big book, a nice chunky doorstop but I whizzed through it, like the river rumbling its way through the pipes beneath the city. The plot crackles and carries you through the streets of Lower Rhumbsford and out into the countryside beyond with Sam and the drawing rooms of the finest houses with Briony. They uncover ancient plumbing on its knees, plots to wipe the city away, murderers and theatrical types, Sam is forcibly enrolled in the army, Briony almost marries a despot and the two siblings have so many adventures on their way back to each other.
This was so much fun, even if it was a bit heavy to hold, it might have been good in two smaller tomes, each with a lovely cover – the bronze river flowing down the the dust cover. Also one of the heroes of the book, possibly the most heroic, is a small spotted mouse.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
Welcome to the highly anticipated tour for dark fairytale, The Queen’s Keeper by J.L. Vampa!
Read on for details, an exclusive excerpt, and a chance to enter an incredible giveaway!
The Queen’s Keeper
Expected Publication Date: October 12th, 2021
Genre: Dark Fairy Tale/ Fantasy
What if I told you that everything you knew about your life was a lie and that you’re being hunted?
What if I told you that you were prey?
This is the reality for Luvenia Rousseau. Amidst the struggle to survive in a famished, war-torn country and the fight against the phantoms of her past, her family is brutally ripped apart by a tyrant queen’s venomous army. Just when all hope seems lost, she stumbles upon an enchanted realm while the queen hunts for the one who got away.
A page-turning debut novel among the likes of Hunger Games, Snow White, and Throne of Glass, this dark fairy tale adaptation will have you on the edge of your seat.
The Queen of Aureland strode into her castle’s training hall like an ancient warrior comprised of bone crushing strength and the breathless wonder of snow-capped mountain air. Rarely did she wear riding pants and a tunic—for she believed one’s attire should reflect one’s character and she was a leader of others into excellence and virtue—but today her leading required a different sort of approach and a gown would not do. Granted, her tunic glistened with fine jewels—there was no need to look like a peasant. Her protégé thought she’d seen fierce opponents in her training, but she hadn’t seen Nuria. The queen’s most guarded secret may be of an entirely different nature, but her hundred years of honed battle skills came in at a close second.
“Hello, Luvenia,” she said to get the girl’s attention, her voice silken. “No need to look so shocked, darling. I will be conducting your training this fine morning. Darius needed to sleep. Though achieving his agreement on that fact was a battle in and of itself.” She rolled her eyes and smoothed her bejeweled tunic, then clapped both hands together. “Right, then, let us get to it. You are weakest in hand-to-hand combat, yes?” Veni nodded mutely, feeling as though she were about to discover the queen’s beauty and gentle spirit had merely been the adorned scabbard sheathing a powerful blade. “Very well.” The queen eyed the girl. “I will not hold back. Your training will not be complete until you are capable of disarming and defeating me. That will not happen today. There is no need for unrealistic expectations. Though you, my dear, will beat me one day. Recognize your potential without masking it in obscured reality.”
Veni’s mind spun. She’s going to run me into the ground, physically and mentally. “Use your words, dear. Are you prepared or not?” Veni smirked and sighed a breathy laugh. “Ready as I’ll ever be, I suppose.” Nuria’s beauty turned lethal as she lunged for the wide-eyed girl. Before Veni could even get her hands up to defend herself, the queen nicked her chin with her bare knuckles, enough to stun her. In an instant, she had Veni’s own arm twisted behind her and forced her to her knees. The queen released her captive and Veni stood as her vision swam a bit from the blow to her chin. Nuria wiped the blood from her split knuckle on her pants. “My Hordemen go easy on you and spar with you.” She shook her head. “You have had enough of that. Sparring is unrealistic and you have grown used to how it works.” The queen put a finger to her temple. “Your mind is quick, dear heart, but wits alone will not win a battle. A sparring session, perhaps, but not a battle. Darius has taught you well how to predict your opponent’s next move, this is wise. However, most of the people you come across in a fight will not be calculated. They will be ruthless. There is a fine line between noble ferocity and ruthless ferocity. The truth of it is you will need to dance on the edge of that line in order to get your sister back. We will help you stay on the noble side, but you must embrace the ferocity. You can spar and train all day long, learning all the perfect maneuvers and defenses, but until you can take a true blow and get back up, you are not learning what you will need to succeed in bringing Ester home. Do you understand?
” Veni’s jaw stung, and her heart pounded, but she knew Nuria was right. It was time to cease pretending that she was learning to fight and to truly take hold of it. “Yes,” she told the queen. “Again. Let’s go.” Fast as lightning, Nuria came at her with no mercy over and over. The girl’s blood was splattered on the queen’s sparkling tunic and Nuria’s knuckles continued to bleed. Veni forgot everything she’d learned in routine sparring sessions and had little success discerning Nuria’s next move. That is, for the first half of their session. Once she’d taken several hits and tasted self-preservation as well as a sense of wildness, her training came back to her in a new way. She ended up on her back or rear or face countless times, but it would only take one hit. Luvenia had to hit that beautiful queen one time and she would be satisfied for the day.
“Are you certain you would like to continue? Your eye is beginning to swell.” Nuria watched her protégé struggle to stand, yet again. “I’m sure,” she said through gritted teeth. “Again.” Her eye was indeed swelling shut and her mouth was thick with blood and saliva, but she was going to hit that perfect face. Just once.
J.L. was born and raised in the great state of Texas. After attending college in Oklahoma, J.L. became a bookkeeper and office manager. She swiftly discovered she was to be a Keeper of Books and a Manager of Fantastical Worlds, instead. Thus began the unfolding of her literary journey,
J.L. now lives with her husband and two children, penning her next masterpiece for you to enjoy, while running her own bookish shop, Wicked Whimsy Boutique.
Giveaway: A paperback edition of the prequel to The Queen’s Keeper, Gypsy Secrets, AND a $50 gift card (US) to spend at Wicked Whimsy! (US/ Canada only)
Perfect for fans of I am Number Four and Gone, Rachelle Storm’s debut, Absolution weaves together an unforgettable plot of forbidden desire and sworn duty as three immortal brothers struggle to protect themselves—and all of humanity—from a corrupt world.
Chris Harris’s destiny was bestowed on him before birth, just as it was on his two brothers, John and Randy. Not human but the physical embodiment of elemental water, earth, and fire, they’ve been burdened with protecting Earth and freeing the world from the Ultimate Evil.
However, unlike their elemental forms, their human selves have desires of their own. After being hidden away in the remote town of Anderson, North Dakota, Chris and his two brothers hoped that their problems would end, but they’ve only just begun. Now their individual destinies are intertwined with the unpredictable McNamara sisters—Joanie, Victoria, and Stacie—and the Ultimate Evil is drawing ever nearer. Forced to choose love or duty, regardless of their decisions, nothing will ever be the same for the Harris brothers.
The first in a four-book series, Absolution blends together the forbidden romance of Twilight, the hidden magic and secret guardians of City of Glass, and the non-stop action of The Fifth Wave. Absolution is a whirlwind of adventure for Chris and his brothers as they explore a world more vast, and more dangerous, than any of which they’d dreamed. But now, the nightmare comes.
Author Rachelle Storm, a self-proclaimed fandom geek, has built a new world readers won’t want to leave. With a fast-paced story that hooks you immediately, this stunning debut will keep you turning the pages with straightforward writing that doesn’t overshadow the complex characters, plot, and action.
“A contemporary, modern fantasy-romance, the story is traditionally romantic and yet feminist, mainstream and diverse, with multiracial characters looking to break through the glass ceiling to shatter the expectations of what love interests and heroes in the genre can embody,” Storm says. “The book is a love letter to the YA fandoms of the past who embraced and welcomed me as a young adult.”
Wanting to write multiracial, diverse main characters she wished would have been available when she was a young reader, Storm’s story shares her message that what we are taught to believe and told we are in the world are not the only things that define us as people.
Rachelle Storm has been a fandom geek since its earliest beginnings and never stopped. A Black scholar holding a doctoral degree in Writing Studies, she researches rhetoric, music, and popular culture. In truth, Rachelle never isn’t writing or sharing her knowledge with her fans. However, on the off-chance she isn’t working or experimenting with paper and ink, you can find her at music festivals and independent bookstores. Absolution is her debut novel. The second book in the series, Absolution: Revelations, will be published July 2022. Find her online at rachellestorm.com or connect with her on social media (Instagram; TikTok; Twitter; and Facebook). Join the Absolution fandom on Facebook or Goodreads.
My thoughts: this was an interesting premise, and although the brothers start out sounding a bit like robots, as they get to know the McNamara sisters and interact with humans, they become less wooden and stilted in their speech. The idea of raising these heroes in isolation might have made sense to the mysterious Guardians, but it means they don’t really understand who and what they’re protecting.
The three sisters, on the other hand, are warm and affectionate, openly teasing each other and finding joy in life. The opposite in many ways. They offer a balance in terms of the way the Harris’ think and act. And when one of them is threatened, they band together in defence.
The epilogue sets up the narrative for the next book, offering up villains, people who want to find the brothers and manipulate them for their own means. As naive as they are of people, it will be interesting to see how they defeat this threat, while still learning about their own humanity.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
ramblingmads 