I hope you’ll check out my thoughts, (click here) and while you’re there, take a peek at some of the stellar work by the other authors in this intrepid group!

At Booksquawk, April 11, 2013:

In The Moon of Asterion may be the grand finale of The Child of the Erinyes trilogy, but as the author points out in the blurb for the first book, “What seems the end is only the beginning.” See more

From author, Lucinda Elliot, at her website Sophie De Courcy:

Aridela’s awful sufferings at the hands of Harpalycus have changed her, just as her taking on the responsibilities of a ruler must, and she is gradually developing a different perspective from that of the careless worshipper of external beauty we met in the first volume. See more

Reviews at Amazon: read them all

In celebration, I’ve set Asterion‘s price at .99 cents, plus I’ve dropped the price of Book One, The Year-god’s Daughter, to .99 cents as well. I invite you to pick up a copy and give the series a read if you like series books. (Links at the bottom of this post.)

I’ll be retreating into my lonely writing garret as I work hard to get Book Four, The Sixth Labyrinth, polished and ready to go. As you might have read here on the site, The Sixth Labyrinth takes a giant leap forward in time and space, to 1870s Scotland. How is it that we can still follow the lives of Aridela, Chrysaleon, Menoetius, and their followers in such a different place and time? Well, you’ll have to read on to find out. An excerpt of the first three chapters has been included at the end of Asterion.

Meanwhile, a short excerpt from In the Moon of Asterion:

Aridela remembered how the guards had struggled to open the heavy oak door, but for her, it moved effortlessly, at the touch of a finger.
“Asterion,” she whispered. The chamber was not so well lit as last time. There was but one lamp now, giving off a faint glow that only intensified the weight of darkness.
Again, she heard rustling beyond her vision. This time, instead of fear, she felt a thrill of anticipation.
The Beast loped into the circle of light. Incredibly huge, he smelled pungent, musky, like the wild aurochs they captured for the ring. He nuzzled the palm of her hand. She stroked his face, clasped his heavy horns, and kissed his forehead, where a gold rosette glowed.
He prodded her with his snout until he had her trapped against the wall of the chamber. There he kept her, between his implacable enormous head and the immovable wall, snuffling at her stomach as though he could smell the baby. He backed up, snorting, swinging his head from side to side. His eyes were white-rimmed; she sensed the danger and covered her abdomen, afraid, but then divine Athene transformed him, and he who pressed against her was a man.
Anything could happen in the place of dreams, where no boundaries existed.

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The Blurb:

There is a beast in the labyrinth… a monster. The people say he is both man and bull; they call him Asterion.
Of all Crete’s citizens, only two dare enter his lair. One bears his child. The other sees the Goddess in his eyes.
Terrifying yet compelling, the beast offers Crete’s only hope for redemption.

In the third installment of The Child of the Erinyes, Queen Aridela sets out to rebuild her devastated country. Will she sacrifice her beloved consort as ancient tradition demands?
Chrysaleon seeks a way to escape his vow of death and subjugate his adopted land. Can he thwart the Goddess and survive?
Menoetius must offer his allegiance. Who will win his loyalty? His brother, or the woman he loves?

The choices these three make have unforeseen, horrific consequences, changing the course of history and propelling Goddess Athene’s triad toward fulfillment of a bold, far-reaching design.

“What seems the end is only the beginning.”

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One of my favorite reader reviews: “The Year God’s Daughter and The Thinara King were page turners but this is where the real fireworks take place!”

Links:

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

Kobo

iTunes (Only The Year-god’s Daughter as of now)

(paperback of Asterion will be out in May, 2013)

The Priest King

An author, once she or he publishes that debut novel, imagines, expects, and hopes for many things.  I am no different. Something I never anticipated, however, was becoming a college assignment.

A professor at the university in question happened upon The Year-god’s Daughter. She read it and contacted me to let me know she was assigning it to her spring 2013 semester class. They’ll be writing  up essays on the culture and ideologies covered in the book.

She asked me to provide a statement about my research, which I was happy to do and which was fun to write, though it taxed my memory. Eight pages later, I felt like I was back in class myself!

To those students in the class who dislike historical fantasy, love stories, and/or class assignments, I’m sorry you’re being dragged through this, (and I do remember some of my own university assignments…. some better loved than others….)

First and foremost, I sincerely hope the tale is enjoyed!

What is the working title of your book? In the Moon of Asterion

Where did the idea come from for the book? It evolved over the (centuries, lol) years as I learned more about Greek myths, and the tradition of the year-king sacrifice. Did any of these men ever try to escape their death obligation? I was intrigued, and wanted to explore the idea.

What genre does your book fall under? Historical Fantasy for adults.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? If my story was put to film, I’d want completely unknown Greeks or men and women of Greek descent, to play the characters. But for the requirements of this tagging game, I’ll throw out a few actors who seem to sort of fit the bill.

Mila Kunis has the lush, incandescent look of a sixteen-year-old Aridela.

Mila Kunis

Chrysaleon…. he’s a bit thuggy, (thug-like?) but with that certain charm so irresistible to sixteen-year-old girls.

Theo Theodoridis

And my oh-so-elusive Menoetius…. at seventeen, before the lioness got him.

Christopher Douglas

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book? “A Cretan queen, Goddess Athene’s disciple, survives a volcanic eruption and triumphs over Greek invasion, only to be betrayed by the man she loves and trusts, a betrayal that sparks consequences on a divine scale.”

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? My books are published by Erinyes Press.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? Two years. The rewrites took about thirteen. In the Moon of Asterion is part of a much larger book.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre? Maybe it aspires to The Red Tent, (Anita Diamant) The Mists of Avalon, (Marion Zimmer Bradley) or Dreaming the Eagle, (Manda Scott).

Who or what inspired you to write this book? Anne Kent Rush’s book, Moon, Moon, was an early inspiration. Robert Graves and Jacquetta Hawkes added their visions, and the story was born.

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest? Not only does it have elements of heroic Greek tales, it also has an epic love story, murder, betrayal, natural disasters like the world rarely sees, spirituality, and even reincarnation.

I now tag the following world’s greatest writer pals!

Lucinda Elliott

Hannah Davis

Melissa Conway

Lavender Ironside

Hannah Warren

Click HERE to join the party.

Today’s Book of the Day is a very highly rated Historical Fantasy by Rebecca Lochlann. The Year-god’s Daughter has a very impressive 4.9 star rating and is on sale for only $2.99 – save $1!

READ THE SAMPLE

It gets busy at Costco during the lunch hour on any given day because they give out samples of various food products. Samples help me decide whether to purchase a product. Oftentimes, if I like the sample, I’ll try the product.

Read the sample.

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You can read this blog post at its original website at Whimsilly and many more posts of a helpful and intriguing nature. Melissa Conway is the author of the excellent novels:

Xenofreak Nation (Book One, XBestia)

Selfsame

The Gossamer Sphere (Book One: The Gossamer Crown)

Anyone (A Gossamer Sphere Novel)

“Nestled behind my childhood home lay a wild wooded area we called ‘the lot.’ To the casual observer, it was no more than a tangle, serving as a screen between our house and the street, yet there was so much more to it than unkempt vegetation and rocks. The lot was my own private retreat—a region of enchantment that fed the imagination and initiated my first ideas of writing.

In the simmering heat of summertime, I would slip away into deep green foliage, and disappear from this world into another. Mysterious and quiet, foreign and impenetrable to adults, it sheltered and nurtured me. A well-hidden path I discovered (or created) once led me to a miniature enclosure made by a circle of skinny trees. This became my sanctuary. Here, with stubby pencil and notebook paper, I crafted stories woven from forest whispers, which is a green, amused, softly breezy language one forgets how to understand when grown. (There’s only one place I’ve found as an adult where I can still hear it.) I had not yet read Thoreau or Kipling, but my time in the lot resembled the simple, free existence of Walden or The Jungle Book. Eventually I taught myself how to step without sound through brittle undergrowth—to move against the breeze until I could surprise foraging sparrows. Rather than human intruder, I named myself a creature of this wood, belonging there as much as robins or squirrels.

Here, in this earthy, secret atmosphere, I first read C.S. Lewis’s Narnia Chronicles, and believed. While traversing forest paths, I was always searching for the doorway that would whisk me into that magical land. Charms tingled through my fingertips and Aslan’s golden breath kissed my cheeks.

Though the lot ultimately kept its portals to other worlds hidden, it proved generous in other ways. Once, I happened upon a gray wooden staff, four feet tall, as straight and round as a pole, with even, sanded ends. Worm-sign covered it like druid runes. Perhaps they were druid runes. Another time I unearthed a complete mouse skeleton, airy and fragile, from my enclosure’s moss and leaf-carpeted floor.

One of the lot’s most valuable, long-lasting gifts was a distinct appreciation of solitude. I learned to lie still, watching the changing cloud patterns through a frame of leaves and branches, for hours. Under this fertile canopy, stories crept through my mind like dreams, or voices perhaps, from other lives.

At times, so many years later, I still wonder what happened to my walking stick. The mouse bones crumbled, and my childish stories were tucked into nostalgia’s drawer. Yet the lot remains, after a fashion. When my parents moved, the new owners contained it behind a high cedar fence and chopped down most of the old trees. Landscaped and civilized, the once-wild area now lies obediently prim and suffocated under benches and flowerpots. I wish they had paused to listen first to the elegant, rustling wisdom those trees were so willing to offer. Would they still have wanted to lift the axe?

I wonder what our world would be like if every child had access to a wild, secret place of his or her own? My time in the lot didn’t prepare me for this life—rather it offered seclusion from it. Indeed, it hindered me from taking my place in the cold city forest. Though I became adult in body, the world’s constant blare and metallic essentials has always battered at my sensibilities. I have unconsciously constructed walls to shield myself from the assault. Nonetheless, I will always believe my small plot of land did cultivate something tangible. It wrapped me in a cocoon of poetry that tinges every word I write. Because of the lingering effect of those days, I suspect writers cannot be social beings in the same way other people can. They must thrive in solitude. They must discover how to listen to unseen things, and they must learn to trust what they hear. My voice came to me under a leafy awning, murmuring within the breast of Mother Gaia. The lot actually turned out to be far more supportive than my mortal parents; without it, I doubt I would have ever found my writer’s voice, or the courage to do much of anything.

What the lot gave me didn’t disappear, turn to dust, or molder in a drawer. Graciously it remained, an integral part of my writing and of me.

You know, maybe the lot did allow me through its invisible gateway after all. For now, even in stark adult reality, the fantasy and magic that first befriended me there, on a tiny scrap of wild, isolated land in Kansas, remains vivid and alive, a mere thought away.”

Excerpt from The Thinara King:

A blanketing mist rolled in from the sea; the caress of water against sand gave off a hushed, tranquil susurration. Themiste’s voice faded away beneath the heightened sound of Aridela’s breathing. It filled her ears, punctuated by the steady thrum of her heartbeat.

Menoetius’s gaze shifted from Chrysaleon to her. As they stared at each other, shocked surprise replaced the frown on his face.

She had never felt so strange, so separated from what was real. Her mind seemed to soar into the mist. She saw Menoetius as he used to be, his youthful beauty restored—Carmanor as she remembered him.

Through some divine visionary gift, Aridela was allowed to see through Menoetius’s eyes everything that happened the morning he carried her out of the shrine, bleeding, near death. She felt his desperate need to save her, the tenderness with which he held her, the kiss he placed on her forehead. She startled along with him when the doves in their cages began their terrified fluttering and the dim torches abruptly blazed. She felt her soul slip away as he raced up the steps, shouting, and saw the beautiful, shining handmaid, smiling at her.

Her eyes stung with tears.

At that moment a voice broke into the memory. Gentle and melodious, it merged with the whisper of the sea. She couldn’t distinguish if it was male or female.

I have lived many lives since the beginning, and so shalt thou. I have been given many names and many faces. So shalt thou, and thou wilt follow me from reverence and worship into obscurity. In an unbroken line wilt thou return, my daughter. Thou shalt be called Eamhair of the sea, who brings them closer, and Shashi, sacrificed to deify man. Thy names are Caparina, Lilith and the sorrowful Morrigan, who drives them far apart. Thou wilt step upon the earth seven times, far into the veiled future. Seven labyrinths shalt thou wander, lost, and thou too wilt forget me. Suffering and despair shall be thy nourishment. Misery shall poison thy blood. Thou wilt breathe the air of slavery for as long as thou art blinded. For thou art the earth, blessed and eternal, yet thou shalt be pierced, defiled, broken and wounded, even as I have been. Thou wilt generate inexhaustible adoration and contempt. Until these opposites are united, all will strangle within the void.

Aridela couldn’t move. She couldn’t even blink. As she stared at Menoetius, he disintegrated and remolded into his blood brother, with Chrysaleon’s green eyes and honeyed hair, but the cruel expression worn by this phantasm immersed her in dread and anguish.

The voice spoke again.

I have split one into two. Mortal men have burned my shrines and pulled down my statues. Their arrogance has upended the holy ways. I decree that men wilt resurrect me or the earth will die.

More excerpts can be found here and here.

Albert Einstein said, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” I couldn’t agree more.

And I didn’t have to do a thing!

HERE is the link to his inimitable (yet “male-ishly” convoluted) style.

I do maintain that the sacrifice of the male “before he got boring” originated in Africa–by the time of my story, the Cretan kings were merely being sacrificed to assist the crops. (The serpent picture is for Barks. He’s fond of them.)