Thursday, April 6, 2017

Other Breakable Things by Kelley York and Rowan Altwood


 

Hello readers! Welcome to the Release Week Blitz for
Other Breakable Things by Kelley York and Rowan Altwood
presented by Entangled Teen!
 
Congratulations Kelley York and Rowan Altwood!!
 
 
According to Japanese legend, folding a thousand paper cranes will grant you healing.
Evelyn Abel will fold two thousand if it will bring Luc back to her.
Luc Argent has always been intimately acquainted with death. After a car crash got him a second chance at life—via someone else’s transplanted heart—he tried to embrace it. He truly did. But he always knew death could be right around the corner again.
And now it is.
Sick of hospitals and tired of transplants, Luc is ready to let his failing heart give out, ready to give up. A road trip to Oregon—where death with dignity is legal—is his answer. But along for the ride is his best friend, Evelyn.
And she’s not giving up so easily.
A thousand miles, a handful of roadside attractions, and one life-altering kiss later,
Evelyn’s fallen, and Luc’s heart is full. But is it enough to save him? Evelyn’s betting her heart, her life, that it can be.
Right down to the thousandth paper crane.


Other Breakable Things by Kelley York and Rowan Altwood Publication Date: April 4 ,2017 Publisher: Entangled Teen

 
 
Nembutal isn’t a name I recognize. One of Luc’s medications? Something he wanted to try that he couldn’t get here? He didn’t tell me anything about it. I Google the name and get an array of results: Nembutal (pentobarbital), sedative and anticonvulsant. Used to treat tension, anxiety, nervousness, and epilepsy. Pentobarbital may induce death in high dosages and is used for euthanasia in both humans and animals.
My legs nearly give out.
The night Luc went to the hospital, I saw webpages open on his phone on euthanasia in Oregon. It hadn’t seemed right, and I hadn’t been able to wrap my head around it at the time, and so I’d shrugged it off and never even broached the subject with Luc. He could have been looking it up for any number of reasons. Curiosity brought about by temporary desperation.
This, though? This is a step further. This makes me feel cold all over.
The bathroom door swings open and Luc steps out. I hadn’t even heard the shower turn off. He’s dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, towel around his shoulders, and he
pauses when he sees me. “Evelyn?”
I could ignore it. I’m overreacting. I have to be…right? Yet I find myself turning to stare at him, holding up the business card and trying to keep my voice level. “What’s this?”
There’s a hitch in Luc’s step as he crosses the room to take it from me, and he won’t meet my eyes. “Just something someone gave me the other day. I don’t know.”
Any hope I had that this was some dumb misunderstanding is quickly fading. “Don’t lie to me.”
“It’s nothing,” Luc insists, pushing a hand back through his wet hair and turning away. “Just…don’t. I don’t want to—it’s not…”
“It’s not what? Not what I think it is?” My voice cracks near the end, and Luc goes still, as though he knows this entire conversation is about to hit the roof. I snatch my phone back up and read to him aloud: “Pentobarbital is contained in a group of drugs called barbiturates.”
“Evelyn…”
“Used to treat insomnia and seizures—”
“Evelyn.”
“—and for human euthanasia. Death in a bottle.” I lower the screen and stare at him, fighting back the overwhelming flood of tears threatening to reduce me to a complete mess. “Is that not what I think it is?”
Slowly, Luc turns to me, his expression one of guilt and grief and frustration. “I’m dying. You know that.”
I twist my fingers around my phone so tightly it hurts.“We’re all dying, Luc.”
“Some of us faster than others.”
 
Kelley York and Rowan Altwood are a wife and wife writing team living in central California with their daughter and way too many cats. Kelley is the author of Hushed, Made of Stars, and Modern Monsters, and Other Breakable Things is Rowan’s debut.



  a Rafflecopter giveaway
 

Wednesday, April 5, 2017

Top Ten Fictional Villains I Feel Sorry For by Brett Armstrong, Author of Day Moon

Please help me welcome my fellow Clean Reads author, Brett Armstrong, to the blog today. His new YA urban sci-fi novel, Day Moon, looks fantastic!!


While I can’t say I’m in the following character’s camps or agree with any of their ethos, these are the:

Top Ten Fictional Villains I Feel Sorry For…
by Brett Armstrong

10.  Mr. Freeze (Batman the Animated Series|TV) – Victor Fries was just a scientist trying to cure his wife of a terminal illness when a greedy industrialist made him permanently seek the cold and lose his wife in the process.  Mr. Freeze can be cruel, but as a grieving husband whose life-work was ruined, he’s a bit more easy to sympathize with than a lot of villains.

9. Captain Hook (Peter Pan|Play) – Peter Pan cut off his hand and fed it to a crocodile which is determined to finish him off… and we cheer for Peter Pan?  It’s really interesting because JM Barrie’s initial portrayal of Peter Pan makes him seem like the villain and Captain Hook as “not wholly unheroic”.

8. Bowser (Mario|Video Games) – Bowser kidnaps Princess Peach, a rival dictator, and a plumber from Brooklyn (Mario) shows up and starts taking out Bowser’s children one by one. 

7. Cato (The Hunger Games| Book/Movie) – From birth he was raised to fight in the Hunger Games and when he got there, it was too late when he realized he wasn’t the prized champion he thought.  If he had thought it through, maybe he would have released Peeta and could have stood in defiance too.  Either way he had one of the most horrific deaths in a story.

6. Smeagol (The Lord of the Rings| Books/Movies) – He accidentally found the One Ring, killed his best friend, and then turned into a pale, hunched skeleton of his former self who ate fish raw and had a terrible cough.  Oh, and he went insane and didn’t remember what potatoes are…

5. Robert Fischer (Inception|Movie) – The entire premise of the movie is that one businessman fears what will happen when the son of a rival inherits the family business and wants to have him break up his company through dream coercion.  But Robert never reveals any evil plans along the way, so we don’t really know if he was ever going to be so malevolent in the first place.

4. Imhotep (The Mummy| Movies) – So messing around with Pharoah’s wife was a bad idea all around, but the idea that Imhotep suffered a lot of horrible things and was doing everything he did for love makes him seem a little less monstrous than some of the classic movie monsters.

3. Magneto (X-Men | Movies/Comics) – Magneto’s backstory is pretty tragic.  He was a Holocaust victim and once he had grown up and reintegrated into society, his wife and child were killed in front of him because he was a mutant.  Most of his schemes do not begin involving extreme violence against normal people (ex. Asteroid-M) and he often espouses a separatist policy… it just rarely works out that neatly.

2. Cats in General (Various| TV, Movies, etc.) – Pete, Sylvester, Tom, Meowth, Shere Khan…

1. Macbeth (Macbeth| Play) – It may be my Scottish ancestry rising up, or the fact that there was a real Macbeth whose rule wasn’t characterized as bad by historians, or the fact that evil witches and an ambitious wife awoke the worst in man who begins the play as otherwise honorable.

Wow! I am never going to look at Mario games the same. I think that many villains have extraordinary backstories. While we can't condone their actions, we certainly relate to the feelings. Perhaps that's why we all love a good villain so much. They get their revenge rather than waiting for karma to catch up. Cats though... I love cats, and they do get a bad rap!
~Kimber


Day Moon
Tomorrow's Edge Trilogy One

Brett Armstrong

YA Urban Sci-Fi
Clean Reads
March 2017


The year is 2039, and 17-year-old computer prodigy Elliott is assigned to work on a global software initiative his deceased grandfather helped found.

Project Alexandria is intended to provide the entire world secure and equal access to all accumulated human knowledge. All forms of print are destroyed in good faith, to ensure everyone has equal footing, and Elliott knows he must soon part with his final treasure:  a book of Shakespeare’s complete works gifted him by his grandfather. Before it is destroyed, Elliott notices something is amiss with the book, or rather Project Alexandria. The two do not match, including an extra sonnet titled “Day Moon.” When Elliott investigates, he uncovers far more than he bargained for. There are sinister forces backing Project Alexandria who have no intention of using it for its public purpose.

Elliott soon finds himself on the run from federal authorities and facing betrayals and deceit from those closest to him. Along the way, Elliot questions what is real and about truth, relationships and the meaning of freedom and security.

Following clues left by his grandfather, with agents close at hand, Elliott desperately hopes to find a way to stop Project Alexandria. All of history past and yet to be depend on it.



New Novel by Brett Armstrong Eerily Taps into Today’s Anxieties of What is Real
“Day Moon” follows a teen’s discovery of a sinister plot that threatens the world’s reality 


Charleston, WV, March 28, 2017 – West Virginia author Brett Armstrong raises a timely warning in his dystopian thriller, “Day Moon,” about where current trends could lead if left unchecked. 

“’Day Moon’ grabs the reader by the imagination and doesn't let go! I daresay it's a classic in the making.” – Robert Walker, author of “Random Violence, Killer Instinct”


About the Author

Brett Armstrong is an award-winning author of Destitutio Quod Remissio, a story about the struggles of a Christian Roman senator. All profits from sales of the book were donated to charity. The author lives in St. Albans, West Virginia, with his wife and 2-year-old son.

Tuesday, April 4, 2017

The Penance of Pride by T.S. Adrian


The Penance of Pride
T.S. Adrian
(Shadyia Ascendant, #2)
Publication date: March 31st 2017
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Shadyia’s Adventure Continues!
‘I will never leave you, and I will always come for you.’
Shadyia’s vow to her lover is put to the test when the Innocenti rise and envelope the sisterhood she adores.
As the magician she aided hunts for the path to an ancient city, the new madam of the Silver Rose strives to please the evil that has promised, upon its freedom, to make her a queen.
Meanwhile, the advisor to the Innocenti prepares the final stage of his strategy to crush the faith of the old gods. He needs but a bit of magic to carry out his ultimate plan.
Magicians. Zealots. Madams. Whores. It’s all the same to he who waits within the enchanted box. Soon he will unleash his servants, and every horror of the abyss will once again consume humanity.


CHAPTER 1:

IN THE SHADOW of the Black Tower, Shadyia nudged the shoulder of the scruffy, tired woman strolling by her side. When Deresi turned her head, she offered her a spirited wave. Hello, my sweet friend. They both needed a hot bath and a good night’s rest, but that hardly mattered. Deresi was alive. They had each survived the horrors of Mirrikh’s labyrinth with whole skins and sound minds.
Deresi crossed her eyes and stuck out the tip of her tongue.

Shadyia shifted her attention to the damp street. Yes, I know. I should stop gawking at you. She couldn’t help it. Her fingers ached to get lost in the tangles of Deresi’s red curls; her ears yearned for the sounds of Deresi’s passion, and her skin craved the warmth they had not shared often enough. I almost lost you. The death they had faced during the past two days made her crave another night, like the smallest fox in a litter peering at the last quail egg. Words Shadyia had spoken that morning they lay entwined in arms, legs and blankets—the morning Deresi had pledged her love—coursed through Shadyia’s veins and spurred her heart to beat. I will never leave you, and I will always come for you. Shadyia had never made such a promise to anyone before.

She yanked her thoughts from the past and listened in on the men walking a few paces in front of her. Aaron was asking his apprentice what it had been like to hear Verthandi’s voice in his thoughts.

“I didn’t know it was his voice,” Benjamin replied. “I thought it was mine.”

Aaron swept a hand through his graying hair and narrowed his gaze at the young man. “But you had no idea how to open the tower. Didn’t it seem odd to you that these thoughts were in your head?”

Benjamin shrugged. “It does now. At the time, I thought I was just guessing, experimenting. Do this, turn that, push, pull—and then the doors opened. I couldn’t believe it.”

Shadyia seized the pommel of her blacksteel sword. She couldn’t believe Benjamin had left Janell outside while he bumbled around inside the Black Tower. Janell may be a fellow sister of the Silver Rose, but for all of Madam Amrita’s training, she was a mewling kitten lost in a rainstorm. 

Anderholm was no city to walk about alone, even for a veteran with a drawn sword and a stern gaze on every dark alley. Shadyia tamped down her anger. If Benjamin hadn’t opened the doors of the tower and entered, she, Deresi and Aaron would now be facing a slow death from thirst and starvation in Mirrikh’s oubliette, the place the ancient magician had used to forget people who had angered him.

Aaron led them north. They followed the smooth stones of Queen’s Way, the scrape of their footfalls the only sounds in the damp streets. Shadyia glanced around. Too quiet. Today was the second day of Samprina and so the citizens were either fasting in their homes or visiting relatives in the country, but the silence didn’t feel right. Anderholm was a city of noise. The clap of hooves, the roll of wagons, merchants bellowing over one another, armed guards hollering to clear a path for a snobbish lord on horseback, the squeal of orphaned children, the bark of dogs—chaos was the lifeblood of Anderholm. Quiet did not become the trade capitol of the northern realms.

“Here, this way.” Aaron turned them down a long alley between the Ministry of Art and a pottery warehouse. As Shadyia recalled, the alley ended at the Rum Barrel Inn near the Bridge of Swans. Aaron’s Featherquill Manor, packed with the historical books he had written over his many centuries, was a short walk up a winding road past the other mansions in the Artisan Quarter. When they arrived, he had promised to treat them to an evening of relaxing and recovering. Shadyia blew a gust through her lips at the thought. After two days and a night in the dark, twisting halls of labyrinth, pits of spikes hidden under false floors and shadow beasts that drained the life from their victims, she craved a quiet evening in Deresi’s arms more than all the gold in Anderholm. I just hope Janell made it back there without trouble.

Midway through the alley, a single-horse cart, driven by two cloaked men, rolled toward them. Shadyia and the others flattened themselves against the wall. She turned her head as it passed. Some mortified soul lay wrapped in a heavy cloth in the back of the cart. Likely the men were gravediggers on their way to—The corpse! Shadyia recognized its white boots.

“Stop that cart!”

The driver snapped his reins against the horse as Aaron grabbed the air and twisted his fist. The wheels locked and dragged until the cart screeched to a halt. The driver lashed his reins again, but the horse only reared. The men, one thin and the other large, jumped back off the bench, stepped around the wrapped figure and dropped to the street. They threw open their cloaks and pulled out a pair of long knives. Shadyia drew her blacksteel sword as she and Aaron met them halfway. Aaron twisted his hands, palms outward, and the fat one was hurled against the wall by an unseen force. The other stood dumbfounded until Shadyia knocked the knife out of his hand with a downward slash and pressed the tip of her sword under his chin. “Over there, move,” she said, urging the driver, a man with dark lines tattooed on half his face, to stand next to his fat companion. He lifted his hands in surrender and complied.

The force holding the large man released, but Shadyia moved the tip and pricked the fleshy pouch under his chin. “Drop the knife.”

The knife clattered to the street and the fat man lifted his portly arms.

“Dee, check the cart.”

Deresi snatched the thin man’s knife off the ground and leaped into the cart. Shadyia heard her cut the ropes. She glanced down the alley to make sure no others were coming, but only Benjamin stood there, ringing his hands and looking as if he were not sure what he should do.
Silence from the cart drove Shadyia to risk a glance. Deresi was sitting back on her heels, her shoulders slumped, staring down at the person she had partly exposed beneath the cloth. “Dee, who is it? Is it Janell?”

Deresi’s mouth moved but no sound came out. “I…”

What’s wrong with her? “Dee!”

“I can’t tell!” Deresi briefly covered her lips with trembling fingers. “I think it is.”

Benjamin charged, jolting Shadyia as he passed, and leaped into the cart.

A freezing wave passed over Shadyia. Deresi couldn’t tell? She glanced at Aaron, who had remained at her side, then faced the portly man and jabbed him with the tip. “What did you do to her?”

The fat man’s jaw shuddered and a drop of blood leaked down his pouch. “She asked to join us.”

Shadyia nearly stabbed him again when Benjamin’s wail echoed along the alley. “Mentor, please help!”

Aaron rushed the cart as Shadyia coiled back her sword, daring either man to move. She glanced as Aaron further pulled open the cloth, stained dark red on the inside, to reveal a naked body. Benjamin wailed anew as Aaron placed a hand on her forehead. Deresi scooted back into the corner of the cart and stared at Janell, as motionless as one posing for a sculpture. Benjamin sobbed. “What have they done to her?”

“She’s alive,” Aaron said.

Movement from the tattooed man caught Shadyia’s attention. His hands came down—back!—and she stabbed deep in his shoulder.

He snarled, reeled and fell against the wall, his hand over the wound. “You bitch.” He checked the blood on his fingers.“Next time it will be your eye.”

A bellow of anguish tore Shadyia from the men. Aaron fell off the cart, hit the cobbled stones hard, and rolled on the ground. Benjamin called his name and jumped down as Deresi stood high on her knees, her face pale. Benjamin kneeled and grabbed Aaron by the shoulders. “Mentor, what’s wrong, what’s happened?” Aaron knocked the hands away and rolled on his side, agony twisting his face. He howled and thrashed as if someone had set fire to his clothing. Shadyia glared at the men. Had they done something? No. They stood with gaping mouths and baffled stares.

His hands covering his face, Aaron seemed to bring his torment under control. He sat up and turned eyes of pure rage on Shadyia’s prisoners. “Innocenti. They mutilated her,” he said through seething gasps. “That one and that one. There was a third, but he’s not here. They raped and tortured her for hours.”

He pushed Benjamin back, rolled to his feet, and brought his hands up as if he were lifting the end of a table. The men slammed against the wall and slid up until their feet dangled.

“Vile warlock,” the tattooed one said then spat. “Fate will be your judge.”


Author Bio:
The Shadyia Ascendant Book Series is the kind of fantasy book I wanted to read, but could never find. Sexy, powerful, positive.
The heroes are beaten, but are never broken.
Although this is a medieval setting (more or less 15th century Renaissance), the characters don’t scratch at fleas and trug through the book ass-deap in mud and blood and disease. I’m sure all that is accurate, but I never wanted to read about it.
I wanted magic that is rare, women that are bold and beautiful, mysterious magicians with a hidden agenda, and gods that move mortals about like pieces on a chessboard. That’s the book I wanted.
I was inspired by the fantasy writer David Gemmell in terms of pace. When you read one of his books, you get your money’s worth. He won’t spend eleven chapters with this characters arguing in a castle. The term “I could never put it down” fits a Gemmell book perfectly, and it’s what I have striven to accomplish in the Shadyia Ascendant series.
Get ready for a sexy adventure you won’t soon forget!
A graduate in history, specializing in Central-European history, I'm an avid computer gamer, reader enthusiast, and teacher of English as a foreign language. I'm American and currently reside in Poland.

XBTBanner1