book – Selina J. Eckert

This Cursed Shadow COVER REVEAL!

IT’S FINALLY COMING!

I know, I know. I’m slow. It’s been a year and a half since This Cursed Flame came out. But I really wanted to be sure I had something special for you! And believe me, it was a lot of work. I rewrote this beast from the ground up and completely changed a lot of what the story had been when I originally wrote it… 7 years ago.

Yeah. The first draft was 7 years old. Crazy!

I think you’re really going to like the results of this rewrite, though. Let me tell you a little more about this story.

First off, while your favorite characters from This Cursed Flame are here, they take a back seat to the new story and new characters (but don’t worry… they are back in book 3!). In This Cursed Shadow, we meet Lacey, a Jenari (part human, part djinn) with aspirations of being a magical archaeologist and finding her lost father, and Senka, a Soul Shadow Guardian, or a creature made of light and shadows tasked with protecting the citizens of the Shadow Realm.

Here’s the official blurb:

Sometimes the darkest shadows lie within.

Senka, a Shadow made of light and dark, is finally a Guardian of the Shadow Realm, years after her parents were killed by the same deadly creatures now trapped there by the djinn. But when the creatures ambush her on one of her first days on the job, she finds herself with a fatal curse, and decaying barriers eject her from her home—threatening to release hordes of the shadow-creatures right along with her. Her only choice is to find the one person who might be able to reverse the curse and get her home in time to warn the other Shadows of the impending disaster.

Lacey, granddaughter of the great Ghadir, has been living among the humans with her brother since the Candrani revolted and plunged the Djinn Realm into chaos. When her mother, still in the Realm, suddenly stops answering Lacey’s calls, Lacey is desperate to bring her to safety. But when Lacey returns to the Realm, she finds a world far different from the one she had left years before.

Escaped shadow-creatures attack Lacey, and Senka comes to the rescue, thwarting everything Lacey had ever been taught to fear about Shadows. Then, news of a once-lost Shadow artifact reaches them—an artifact capable of leading them straight to the man who can save Senka and maybe even to Lacey’s missing father. But a power-hungry djinn official, Auretta, is determined to hide the most powerful artifacts to steal control of the Realm for herself. With time running out, can they escape Auretta in time to stop the wards from breaking?

Or will Auretta succeed in destroying everything?

So are you ready for the cover now? Let’s see it with the previous covers!

Isn’t it GORGEOUS??? Savannah over at Dragonpen Designs made another wonderful addition to this series!

You know what else is pretty great? The book will be here on December 20, and This Cursed Light (the prequel starring everyone’s favorite shapeshifting wild cat) is now FREE on all platforms!

I’m also setting This Cursed Flame at a special pre-release sale price of $1.99, so be sure to check back to see when that goes live (I’m currently waiting for the price change to be approved). It will be on sale all the way through Christmas! This is a great time for those of you who haven’t read it yet to pick it up and give it a read before TCS comes out!

Here are all the links you need (pending approval for some of them, so check back later if they don’t all work yet):

Get This Cursed Light on Amazon or other retailers for FREE! (as of the time of this post)
Pick up This Cursed Flame on Amazon or other retailers on sale! (please check for the sale price of $1.99 before purchasing, otherwise full price is $3.99)
Pre-order This Cursed Shadow on Amazon or other retailers! (There will be a paperback, but you’ll have to check back closer to the release date as I work on formatting and checking a proof copy!)

Thanks for reading this far, and we’ll chat closer to the release date about this story again. Until then, stock up on these deals, catch up, and enjoy!

Happy reading ❤

The Alchemyst’s Mirror Blog Tour… And a Recipe!

Looking for a steampunk read? How about one that comes with its own recipe???

Hey folks! I have an extra special treat for you this week. I’m a smidge late on this one, but I am helping out to spread the word for a brand new steampunk release, The Alchemyst’s Mirror by Liz Delton! And even extra special, this post comes with a recipe from the book so you can have some delicious bites to eat as you read!

And there’s also a Facebook launch party coming up on November 10, so head on over for some fun and festivities!

First, let’s hear a little about the book itself.

Petra and Maisie Everturn just want to run their family’s tea shop, but when their explorer brother Jiordan goes missing while looking for an alchemycal artifact, none of them are safe.

The sisters must enlist the help of another explorer in order to find Jiordan or the artifact—before the mysterious alchemyst society finds them first.

However, when one of the sisters stumbles into the clutches of the most dangerous alchemyst in the city, the race to unravel the clues becomes desperate. And when they discover the truth about the artifact, their quest to infiltrate the alchemyst’s secret society becomes a matter of life and death.

I love the idea of a tea shop in this story, and secret societies? Definitely sounds like a ride!

But I did promise you a recipe. And what better than some sandwiches fit for a tea shop themselves? I could picture settling in with this book, a whole plate of these delicate treats, and a nice big mug of Irish Breakfast (my favorite tea, currently).

And that recipe card is so cute! Feel free to print yourself a copy for your own recipe box. 🙂

The author herself also sent over a couple of delectable pictures so you can envision it for yourself. Check them out!

I hope I’ve inspired you to try out a new book, and maybe some tea sandwiches! The blog tour may be over now, but the book is just waiting for its next reader. 🙂

You can get your copy here!

About the Author

Liz Delton writes and lives in New England, with her husband and son. She studied Theater Management at the University of the Arts in Philly, always having enjoyed the backstage life of storytelling.

She reads and writes fantasy, especially the kind with alternate worlds. Liz is the author of the dystopian Arcera Trilogy, and the fantasy Realm of Camellia series, and the new steampunk novel, The Alchemyst’s Mirror. World-building is her favorite part of writing, and she is always dreaming up new fantastic places.

She loves drinking tea and traveling. When she’s not writing you can find her hands full with one of her many craft projects.

Visit her website at lizdelton.com or find her online on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Amazon.

And don’t forget to grab your copy of The Alchemyst’s Mirror, available now, and head over to the Facebook party on November 10th!

Cover Reveal: Freeze Thaw!

It’s time!!!

Guess what? It’s time again! The next Seasons of Magic is coming!

You may have seen this one floating around on the home page of this site for YEARS, and I kept promising to release it. It’s a story I wrote as part of Rooglewood Press’s Five Magic Spindles contest (Sleeping Beauty retellings), and it hit the top ten finalist list! Of those ten, five were chosen for the anthology…mine wasn’t picked because it didn’t quite fit with the others.

But that one thing inspired the entire Seasons of Magic series. We’ve already seen Rapunzel in Of the Clouds and Hansel & Gretel in Pumpkin Spice Pie-Jinks.

Now meet Talia, my Ice Age Sleeping Beauty, waking in the middle of a glacier archaeology dig.

Here’s the blurb:

An archaeology student, an Ice Age princess, and an undead sorceress…

Talia was meant to be her clan’s greatest leader. But when her parents fail to invite a powerful—and very dangerous—sorceress to her birth party, the clan’s long-desired blessing becomes their final curse. As Talia comes of age, the power of the sorceress finds her, and she is lost in a blizzard.

Millennia later, archeaology student Owen is on the field trip of his life to a glacier dig. But what begins as a routine dig soon becomes much more when he discovers a perfectly preserved mummy in the ice—a mummy that returns to life and drags him into a millennias-old dispute.

For deeper in the glacier, dark magic is at work, waking the sorceress known as the Shadow Woman, and she will stop at nothing to end Talia’s life and destroy the clan once and for all. If Talia and Owen can’t stop her, she will destroy not only Talia but also Owen and the rest of the team. But if they can survive, they may just re-discover more than they could have ever hoped for.

This was a Top Ten Finalist for the Five Magic Spindles contest by Rooglewood Press.

And now, without further ado, what you’re all here for: the cover!

Isn’t it beautiful? (Image shows the cover for Freeze Thaw, mostly black with an Ice Age woman standing in the foreground and an aurora and waterfall in the dark background. The title looks like it is made of ice, and green sparkles surround it and the girl. The text around the title reads “Cover Reveal”, then “An archaeology student, an Ice Age princess, and an undead sorceress…” followed by the title, the author Selina J. Eckert, and the designer Dragonpen Designs. Surrounding text is on a backdrop of green ice.)

And, as promised, this was a finalist, so I HAD to share my finalist medal on SOMETHING:

(Image of the cover again, this one including a medallion that says “Five Magic Spindles Top Ten Finalist”)

Convinced?

You can preorder this beauty, or it will also be available through KU…this is my first book ever available through the program, so take advantage of it!

If you’re not quite ready to order, you can also add the book to Goodreads.

The story will be available on February 14 (just in time for Valentine’s Day). I can’t wait for you all to read it! 😀

~~~

PS: If you have read any of my previous books, I’d love it if you could leave a review on either Amazon or Goodreads (or your favorite book seller’s website!). It doesn’t have to be long and can say whatever you want! I’m so, so grateful for every review I get (even the critical ones), and I’d really appreciate any additional reviews. But even if you choose not to, I hope you continue to enjoy my stories! ❤

Blog Tour: Kandi Wyatt’s An Unexpected Escapade (And Cover Reveal!)

Hi friends! I have a another special, not-regularly-scheduled post for you today. Today we are celebrating the cover reveal and upcoming release of Kandi Wyatt’s middle grade fantasy, An Unexpected Escapade! And make sure you read all the way to the bottom for a scavenger hunt clue, the cover, and an excerpt!

Here’s a little bit about it:

Protect friendship, family or a creature that’s not supposed to exist?

Ana and Daisy have been friends since third grade, but a rift in the space-time continuum in their little town may change that. When a unicorn waltzes into the pasture with Daisy’s appaloosas, a poacher, who will stop at nothing to gain the unicorn horn and its healing tears, shows up. Daisy is focused on saving the unicorn while Ana’s parents face sudden life-threatening health issues. When Ana learns about the healing tears, she’s forced to choose between friendship and her family’s health.

Can the girls find the grace to compromise and save Ana’s parents and the unicorn?

Sounds amazing! And if you’re still not sold on that summary, how about a little taste of what you’ll find inside?

Daisy frowned. Usually, the horses waited for her by the barn. The drought this summer had left little grass in the pasture, and Daisy’d resorted to supplementing the horses’ feed with hay. By the end of the day, the mares were eager for their extra food, so where were they? She squinted into the fading light, catching a glimpse of speckled white rumps down by the woods. With a shrug, she hopped the fence and moved toward them, whistling.

Once she was close enough to see the horses more clearly, she realized that instead of two horses, there were three! Daisy rubbed her eyes and looked again. Sure, enough there was a third mare, but how in the world had it entered the pasture?

“G-ginger? R-root?” Her voice was barely above a whisper.

None of them moved. Daisy knew enough about the creatures to not approach a strange horse lightly. Aside from the dangers it posed in itself, a herd initiating a new member could have physical confrontations as they established the new pecking order—something she would not want to be in the middle of. But she also knew that any trepidation she felt would transfer to the animals, so she took a firm grip on her own fear before she stepped forward.

“Easy, girls. Who do we have here?” In the dim light she recognized Ginger’s distinctive spots and laid her hand on her horse’s rump. She felt the shiver of Ginger’s skin at her touch.

Daisy moved toward Ginger’s head, running her hands firmly along her coat and keeping up a soft litany of soothing words. Feet shifted beside her, and Daisy looked up to see Root, placing her other hand on the mare’s back. That left the stranger in front of her.

At that moment, the moon broke over the mountains to the east, shining brightly on the newcomer. The white coat glowed in the moonlight. Daisy blinked and shook her head, breath catching in her chest, while her hands moved of their own accord up to Ginger’s and Root’s halters. She stared. It had to be a hoax! Out of the horse’s forehead protruded a wondrous horn, equally beautiful and impossible.

Okay, okay, enough suspense. Here’s the beautiful cover for this adventure with heart!

You can buy this gorgeous book here.

And if you looked closely, you may also have noticed that this is book 2 of the Myth Coast Adventures. Well, it turns out that you can also get book 1 on sale for only $0.99 from March 11-18. If you want to start from the beginning, sales are definitely the best time to do that! You can buy the book here.

Giveaway Scavenger Hunt!

Remember how I said this post is part of a blog tour with a scavenger hunt? Well, here’s the info!

First, here is your clue! (And if you are having trouble figuring out what’s in the picture, let me just tell you how much I love the smell and taste of cranberries in the fall and winter!)

Visit all the blogs participating in the cover reveal to gather all the clues and win a prize, a felted unicorn and unicorn charms!

Here are the other participating bloggers:

Make sure you fill out this form to enter! https://goo.gl/forms/UjLD2iJXyjFywNPA3

About Kandi Wyatt

Even as a young girl, Kandi J Wyatt had a knack for words. She loved to read them, even if it was on a shampoo bottle! By high school Kandi had learned to put words together on paper to create stories for those she loved. Nowadays, she writes for her kids, whether that’s her own five or the hundreds of students she’s been lucky to teach. When Kandi’s not spinning words to create stories, she’s using them to teach students about Spanish, life, and leadership.

You can find her at her website, Facebook, Google, Twitter, Pinterest, Goodreads, and Amazon.