Book Launch and Excerpt

Today I had the joy of having my very first book launch at Fenwick St. Books in Leonardtown, MD. If you’re a fan of quirky bookstores and you’re in Southern Maryland, I’d highly recommend it. It’s one of those small, independently run shops that just begs for a browse and the people who run it are just awesome. The store was busy and I had plenty of people stop by to chat. I love talking writing. There were some who were interested in writing, but didn’t know where to start. I even got to talk to another NineStar Press author Ivy L. James who writes queer romances. Here is her website if you are interested: https://www.authorivyljames.com/

I also got some surprise visits from friends and family, which made my day. Shout out to my beautiful sister Amanda and two of her best friends who came by. Plus, my two best friends from forever swung in. So that was really neat. I’m doing one last event this year and then I’m taking a break from fairs, cons, and bookstores until 2025. The holidays are almost upon us and my work overtime is getting the best of me. It’s going to be November 2nd, from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. at the Alexandria Holiday Crafts & Treats Fair in Alexandria, VA.

The Monster Within came out on Tuesday. It’s wild to me to see how much of a difference 20k makes in size, which tells me that my current epic fantasy is going to be a chonky boi indeed.

I want to thank the wonderful blogs that posted a blitz about it this week. When you’ve been away from publishing for a few years, you worry that you’re going to have to start from the ground up again. Queer SciFi, Love Bytes Reviews, the Faerie Review, IndiGo Marketing and Design and Rainbow Book Reviews. Some of them have contests which may still be going on. If I missed any, my apologies, I’ll try to catch them next time.

Here is a quick excerpt from The Monster Within. I will fully admit, it took a while for my heroes to meet and converse. There was so much to set up for them both, but when they did, the attraction was immediate, even if the trust wasn’t.

As they poured over the maps and made plans, a knock came at the kitchen door. Salome moved to answer it and returned a moment later. “My lord, there’s a Monsieur Constantin Severin here to see you. The one who’s been sending you the notes. Shall I invite him in or send him on his way? He says to tell you, ‘I know what you search for in your journals when you are alone at night, and I know why you allow no visitors. I have some of the answers you seek.’”

“Oh, him.” Régine made a disparaging sound. “He’s an odd one, if you ask me, impatient and rude. He’s a con man, looking for a payout. What a ridiculous message.”

Michel-Leon glanced up from the maps, intrigued by the cryptic message as the ancestors tried to call out through the barrier he’d erected. What were the chances that his intruder would return so boldly? That was the one person he could think of who would give such a statement. Michel-Leon suspected that at least one mystery from last night would be solved. He lowered the barrier in his mind long enough to send out one query, and the answer came before he’d even fully formed the thought.

“The watcher is here.”

Indeed.

“Go ahead, invite him in and offer breakfast. I doubt another refusal will deter him.”

Michel-Leon sat back and studied the man as he came in. He had the impression of a slim figure swathed in layered and patched clothes. A hat jammed low over his head shaded his face, and long, wavy, gold-shot hair tumbled halfway down his chest. He didn’t appear like a man who could render himself invisible. He appeared to be a harmless vagabond. Someone with abilities such as that could steal whatever they wanted and live like a king. Now, this was interesting.

“There is no point in me staying since our guest has no use for women,” Régine announced as she rose with a glare in their visitor’s direction. “I’ll let Hadrien know we’ll leave within the hour.”

Michel-Leon almost warned her that Severin was their intruder from the night before but stopped himself. He could handle the man, despite his abilities. They needed to move faster on what was happening with the mists. If she knew, she’d insist on staying. “Be careful,” he urged, and she waved him off.

“I’m always careful, Michie.”

Michel-Leon waited until she left and then turned to Severin. “You’re a man who has an uncanny knack for uncovering secrets. Seems like that would be a very dangerous profession,” Michel-Leon said as the stranger sat on the bench across from him. “Almost as dangerous as infuriating my sister.”

“It has its hazards, same as any other.” The voice was husky and then it lightened with rueful amusement. “As I have so recently discovered to my chagrin. My apologies to your sister. I thought you were trying to foist me off with some excuse.” He took off his hat and Michel-Leon found himself staring, to his profound embarrassment.

Monsieur Severin was beautiful, with sharply chiseled features, a sensuous, soft mouth, and dark eyes too old and mysterious for his lovely face. The man gave him a cynical smile as if he knew what Michel-Leon was thinking.

Michel-Leon glanced away, caught off guard. He’d known for years that he was more attracted to men than women. Not that it mattered since he’d taken his vow to not wed, to concentrate on his duties as a chevalier and nothing more.

 

 

Moodboard and Spotify Playlist for The Monster Within

This week’s blog is going to be short and sweet. I’m at a hotel right now in the beautiful Shenandoah for a craft fair with my other Feral Writers. So if you’re in Warren County, come by the Fairgrounds and say hi.

My day job has been absolutely kicking my ass and interfering with my writing time. I hope that’s going to end soon. This is also the season of four painful anniversaries all within less than three weeks of each other, my husband’s birthday, the date of his fall and when he went into the hospital for the last time (which I had mercifully forgotten his year until Facebook reminded me), the date of his death and our wedding anniversary. It would’ve been twenty-five years this year, though in truth we were a couple far longer since we started in high school. I am grateful that in the other months of the year; I forget how hard this time is. I’m also grateful for the reminder of just how loved my sweet Keir is.

I’m in the process of getting a new tattoo, one to celebrate turning 50 this year and starting a new chapter of my life. It’s the Crone, Mother, and Maiden on my calf. I’ll get that finished up on Wednesday, which is our anniversary. I think that’s fitting.

So, onto The Monster Within. We are 9 days away from it being released! I’m so excited. Every writer approaches the craft in their own unique way. You have your planners and pansters and those who fall in between. You have writers that plan by story beats or get lost in a lot of world building, those who are character centric or plot centric. Some make moodboards or play certain music while they're writing. For me, I fall in between planning and pansting. I can’t outline, because I won’t follow the outline. Invariably, my characters or subconscious drives me off the rails. I have to know enough about my story to get started, but I absolutely have to leave wiggle room for improvisation.

The characters almost always come first, usually in a what if idea. I collect images as I’m plotting and coming up with ideas. For Monster, I found images of the mountains where Michel-Leon confronts the goblins, pictures of what I consider to be his home in both Sangipay and Paris. Pictures of what the swarm consists of, kind of a cross between cicadas and Star Spawn. I don’t necessarily make a moodboard like many do, but I have that collection, so I decided to grab some of them and make one for you all.

I also always make a playlist on Spotify. The mood of each one is very different. I can’t listen to music while I’m writing, but this playlist is absolutely on every time I’m in the car, or cleaning my house, or going for a walk. It helps get me into the mindset of the story and generates ideas. The one for Monster is an interesting mix of genres, so if you’re interested, here’s the link: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2bErhhHENjpPKst9j1z4QE?si=NEsTOfIWTfOVQDp9YkAGmw

I hope you all have a wonderful week!

Meet the Heroines

First off, I apologize for not getting the blog out last week. The day job is kicking my ass with too much overtime and last weekend would’ve been my husband’s 50th birthday, so I ended up taking the weekend to chill with family and friends for my mental health. But I’m back at it this week. A bit ago, I talked about the main characters for The Monster Within. As much as I love my heroes, it’s time to talk about the ladies.

I love a good, strong female character and this book has two of them. Where would Michel-Leon and Constantin be without our heroines? Régine is Michel-Leon’s right hand, confidant, the person who has kept him grounded since he found himself without a home.

Though rumors have abounded for years that she’s his bastard half-sister, in truth, they are a family by bonds, not blood. Régine lives and breathes the life of a chevalier, yet the attitudes of the era toward women hamper her. Even Michel-Leon struggles with this from time to time, leading to arguments between them. It is a stance that Régine often finds frustrating, especially given that a woman found the Chevaliers de Rouen.

Régine is fiercely protective of Michel-Leon and often the more pragmatic of the two. She gives him a balance he desperately needs when he’s likely to fly off in several directions. She is courageous to a fault and doesn’t hesitate to dive into dangerous situations. This is a trait of the two that often makes Constantin nervous. Her protective nature also rouses her suspicions toward Constantin and his motives. It doesn’t help that Constantin dismisses her initially because of her gender.

Régine grows as well during the book. She forges a role for herself outside of just being Michel-Leon’s second. She even goes on to challenge the villagers to allow their women, who want to help defend their homes, to join the chevaliers as well.

Gabrielle is like Constantine. She’s a fey kissed child, only she’s locked in the nightmare that Constantin once escaped from. She recognizes the magicman is an evil creature that feeds off the children, not the doting grandfather it tries to pass himself off as.

Before he meets Gabrielle and sees the other children at the orphanage, Constantin is ready to run away from the torments of his past. Meeting her changes everything. He can’t leave her in the magicman’s clutches, even if it might cost him his life. She gives him a purpose again and her courage convicts him.

Though she appears waiflike, there’s an inner core of steel in Gabrielle that carries her through her time in the orphanage and eventually gives her the trust to allow Constantin to steal her away. Upon meeting Régine, she discovers women can fight back and she takes to those lessons with a relish that Constantin sometimes finds alarming, even as he recognizes she needs to be able to protect herself. He allows her to dare as much as she can safely do while he struggles with trusting himself enough to provide a stable home for her. In the end, her faith in her Constantin is justified.

Régine and Gabrielle will definitely lead the forefront of the next generation of chevaliers. I hope you enjoy reading about them as much as I enjoyed writing them. 

Going Home - And Hitting My Bucket List

View from the Commonwealth Hotel

 So for those of you who follow me you may know that I'm originally from New Hampshire. There's definitely a lot of Maryland gal in me, I've lived here now for 36 years, but my family is from the Great North Woods. I was born in Dover. And I still have a lot of family left up here. Whenever I cross that line past Franconia Notch I feel this incredible peace come over me. I'm home.

My beautiful cousin Sarah was marrying her love Steph this weekend and we were going to have one hell of a party up in Pittsburg. My son couldn't come with me on this venture and though my sisters were coming too I knew I needed some peace and quiet in between the partying. I'm a morning person. They are not. Lol, I also like road trips and side quests so I invited one of my besties to come with me. I knew she wouldn't mind 5 a.m. start times and taking the car and stopping by places for quick hikes.

Statue of Paul Revere

One of the things I knew I wanted to do was catch a game at Fenway. I love the Red Sox. I'm a third generation fan, but I've never, ever been to a game at Fenway. Whenever I go home, I feel guilty for stopping in Boston because I have so much family to see in New Hampshire and Vermont. Lucky for me, my niece goes to school in Boston so I had every excuse to hang out for a few days. So I texted her and asked if she'd be interested in a game. To make it even better, they were playing the Baltimore Orioles. So here I am in Boston, at a game in Fenway lol and I brought I bunch of O's fans with me. It was an amazing game. You could see Fenway from our hotel. It went into the 10th inning and we had great seats. 

Since my friend and I are also nerds and foodies, we had to get some Italian in the North End. We also found an amazing LGBTQ owned BBQ joint that had the most amazing biscuits and homemade jam. We also did a portion of the Freedom Trail. (I'm going to have to go back and finish it.)

Sweetcheeks BBQ

We left for New Hampshire the following day and stopped in Franconia Notch for a little hiking. I dearly wanted to do more, but I'm still working on building up my stamina after getting Long Haul Covid. I can do a 2.5 mile hike, but that was also on lesser climbs so we limited this first one to a mile. In between visiting family and figuring out where in the Great North Woods I'd build my house when I retire up here we also visited Lake Francis, had some ice cream in Moose Alley, went to Beaver Brook Falls and hiked along the stream a bit until a saw a pretty good sized fisher cat and said nope, we're going in the opposite direction. If anyone has read All Bets Are Off they'd know that fisher cats can be real assholes.

Red Sox vs Orioles

The wedding was beautiful. My uncle owns a good part of a mountain in Pittsburg and so we had it in my cousin's back yard. Absolutely gorgeous land. They'd been smoking brisket, chicken, pork and pork belly all week. We ate like kings, danced our feet off, and made the mountain ring with music. If there's one thing my family does well, it's a wedding. 

So I hope you enjoyed the pictures and the break from talking about writing and books. I'll be back next week with more. (There will be more pictures later when I talk hikes LOL.)

Meet the Heroes From The Monster Within

Hello everyone. I’m back after a crazy week of trying to keep my head above water at my day job and spending Saturday at Leonardtown’s first Local Author Book Faire. It was a lot of fun. I bought too many books. And we were chased out early, less by the threatening rain and more from the high winds that caused havoc among the tents. Most of the day was absolutely gorgeous, though.

The last couple of weeks, I talked about the origin of The Monster Within and about one of my monsters. This week I’d like to focus on my heroes, Michel-Leon and Constantin. Later on I will have to include a post about the brave woman and girl who are family to Michel-Leon and Constantin.

Meet Michel-Leon Parisee the Baron de Dagonville and a Chevalier de Rouen. His family has served as chevaliers since 1431. His father preferred the older son, who was more of a warrior, while Michel-Leon was a scholar. The wounds from his relationship with his father and the death of his family in a fire continue to haunt Michel-Leon. He is utterly dedicated to his calling, as Constantin would say, sometime to a frightening degree, but his relationships with his adopted family give him the sense of home he needs to be more balance. He sometimes has a childlike way of looking at the world, full of wonder, and openness to embrace the different.

However, his wounds and dedication have isolated him from opening his heart to another. He has taken a vow to remain single and changing Michel-Leon’s mind is not an easy task.

Constantin Severin is a man haunted by the monster who destroyed his childhood. Fear of the creature keeps him moving from city to city, eking out what living he can. However, when he actually does encounter the magicman again and discovers that it is preying on another group of children, Constantin finds the courage to stand his ground. Using the unusual glamour abilities of the fey kissed, he seeks out any weakness in the magicman. His search also leads him to Michel-Leon in the hopes that a chevalier will aid him or provide him with the weapon he needs.

He is a man jaded and terrified of becoming a monster himself, whose life has become nothing but a bid for survival. Michel-Leon once says of him “You are a marvel who creates marvels, but I fear people have let you down so often you cannot see the wonder in the world.” Despite this, he is a man willing to risk everything to protect those most in need.

It is a rough start for our two heroes who are mistrustful of each other at first, though they are willing enough to work together to achieve their own ends. Though they are attracted, they both resist to various degrees. They do have an ally, though, who is more than willing to speak to both of them to nudge them toward each other. In this scene below, Janvier urges Michel-Leon to really consider the idea of a romance.

“I am not your father,” Janvier replied gently. “I don’t care that he’s a vagabond with no home. Nor do I care that you both are men. I’ve witnessed you engage in conversations with him for hours, and it’s not always about the problems you both face. I care that you both share an interest in things outside of hunting monsters. You can work side by side with him in your lab and you both are content. He’s a man who would plunge into known danger to rescue you and call you out for risking yourself later. You need that. As I believe he needs someone who gives him a sense of home, a reason to return. You can do that for him.” 

Magicmen

 The Monster Within has many villains, monsters, creatures that the characters strive against. It starts with the goblins who are more of a nuisance than bad guys. The swarm is a menace to be sure, and the Boar is another danger, but for me nothing is more monstrous than the magicmen. Creatures who were once human, twisted by their addiction to souls, most particularly, the souls of children.

I cannot claim that the magicmen are creatures of my imagination. They belong wholly to my husband. When he was young, he came up with a group of superheroes he called The Repellers led by a fallen angel to save the world. In high school, he designed a role-playing game around his concept and for four years we battled magicmen, My’riah, Hotep, and black widow sharks amongst many other villains.

My character was an empath who had a particular aversion to magicmen. She developed a sixth sense for when they were around, but oftentimes her companions didn’t believe her until they came to light. She developed a big of a Cassandra complex from it. The magicmen were her nemesis and one even ended up stealing her own daughter.

I don’t remember exactly how I came up with the idea to use them in Monster but Keir loved the thought of me including a creature he created. The fey kissed link was new to this book, but everything else about the magicmen derived from Keir. They’re hard to detect because they tend to lie low. Each magicman feeds differently, and some aren’t quite as evil as Andre Nightingale. Which was often quite a dilemma for my high school character.

When it came to designing this particular magicman, I was greatly influenced by Stephen King’s Storm of the Century. I loved that movie. I loved the horror of the choice the town had to make. I loved the sheriff who kept fighting to keep all the children safe. How he kept searching even after it was too late. (There is definitely a bit of him in Constantin.) And I really loved that bastard who forced that choice on the town.

At first glance, he looked completely normal, that seemingly bland face that held such evil. The way he relished the townspeople’s infighting and pain stuck in my mind. Like Andre Nightingale, he was dangerous when crossed. And Nightingale also enjoyed toying with those around him.

I wanted to connect this particular magicman to French history. So I did some research into French serial killers and came across Gilles de Rais. The fact that he served in the 100 Years’ War with the founder of the Chevaliers de Rouen only cemented my choice. Gilles is not the magicman, but one of his servants who helped with everything and was also executed serves as the base for my monster. I hope he creeps you out as much as he does me.

As a little Easter Egg if you notice when Michel-Leon reaches out to his colleague in Prussia regarding a magicman who had been hunting in Hamelin, that is absolutely a reference to the pied piper.

 

The quote I use above probably sums up Nightingale. He’s arrogant. He’s cruel. And he has zero remorse. The full dialogue for that little bit is here:

“I can crush Constantin’s mind anytime I wish to.” Nightingale’s finger stabbed the air, and then it straightened with a sly smile. “It amuses me to make him suffer. He deserves to suffer after what he has stolen from me.”

“An interesting conceit, considering you stole from him first.” Michel-Leon braced himself on the railing and opened his mind further to the ancestors and their unceasing whispers. Those who had fought such monsters in the past vied for his attention.

“Do you apologize to the lamb when it graces your table?” Nightingale sneered. “The children are prey. Those who should shelter them cast them out, and I take them in. They are unwanted, unloved. If you valued them so much, you’d ensure their care. So spare me the lecture.”

Michel-Leon couldn’t deny the partial truths the magicman threw at him. If it hadn’t been for Constantin, no one would’ve ever noticed the children’s sufferings. There were too many in need of shelter, food, and love. They had to do better.

Origin of The Monster Within

 I am sitting here on a mountaintop in northeastern Pennsylvania at my last writer’s retreat of 2024. I’m so excited to announce the release date for The Monster Within and to reveal the cover art. (Those of you who follow me on Facebook have seen both, so I have a little extra fun for you here.) Some exclusive content that never made it into the book.

On October 15, 2024, The Monster Within will finally (and I mean finally) be released from NineStar Press. https://ninestarpress.com/product/the-monster-within/

Isn’t the cover gorgeous? Wow, they took my suggestions and exceeded my expectations. I love that the various elements could represent so much, that dark cloud hovering could be the mists or it could be the swarm coming down. The figure in the forefront could be our hero, Michel-Leon, the last Chevalier de Rouen, but it could also represent our villain who roams the mists hunting for children. The shadowy figures could be the people who disappear into the mists or the shades of Michel-Leon’s ancestors that he meets on the astral plane. And I think the image of the Arc d’Triomphe gives it a certain amount of hope because for as dark as the story can be it is at it’s heart a story of love not just for our heroes, but also for people, for a nation, even love of the strange and wondrous.

The Monster Within has taken over a decade to come from concept to this date. One very foggy morning on Veteran’s Day in 2012, when the streets were weirdly deserted because most everyone in the city had the day off because of the Federal holiday. I remember exactly where I was when the idea hit me - as I navigated the ramp from 295 to 395.

Its original working title was Dark Things from a line my husband gave me for Janvier. “I never involved myself in your father’s affairs out of fear. Your grandpère told me more than I wished to know, even more so after he saw I took on the responsibility of tending to you. They sought dark things and those things ate your father’s soul raw. I watched him die two deaths and could do nothing to stop either.” Originally, the book was supposed to be set in London because where else would I set a novel that has a city beset by fogs and mists? However, the story stalled. London just wasn’t working for me.

It wasn’t until I moved the story to Paris and renamed it Mists on the Seine that I got a better idea of what the story would entail. Below is an excerpt from Michel-Leon’s journal. As much as I wanted this journal entry into the novel it never did make it. The voice didn’t really work for Michel-Leon who can be quite humorous for a man who lives with what he does.

The mist rose from the Seine, smothered Pont Neuf and then spread to ooze through the streets of Paris. It crept down the broad boulevards, wreathed the gaslights and rendered them all but useless in the consuming nothingness. Tendrils of gray, sleepy, sentience surrounded both palace and hovel. It reared up to clamber over the Notre-Dame de Paris, slithering around the buttresses, swallowing the gargoyles, until it only a faint outline remained in the shadows. It seeped under doors and sought the cracks in the window shutters. The fog hunted day or night and struck when hungry.

And when the sunlight broke through, driving back the fog in shredded tatters, it revealed the damage left behind. Individuals, families, sometimes whole streets of people… gone. Doors and windows flung open, evidence of tasks or play interrupted, and no trace of violence. The people had disappeared and were never seen again.

It was never spoken of. Not by the denizens of the slums, huddled in their pleasure houses or taverns, fodder for the dark rites practiced by those whose greed for power and knowledge had enslaved them. By the factory owners and the bourgeois, those who forced toil and rent out of their workers and tenants, ignoring the screams that pierced the dark and the diminished numbers in the morning. It was never spoken of by the lingering nobility who clung to their crumbling titles as if they still had meaning and dreamed of a return to relevance.

Throughout all the madness, those who considered themselves the elite, the ones who held the reins of power continued to meet in secret with their circles and salons, thinking they were orchestrating events when in fact, they were the ones being manipulated like so many puppets on a string. They could not see the trap closing in about them.

Something was coming. The taste of it hung heavy in the air. It coated the throat until it had become so thick it could be choked upon. And that omen too was ignored. Only now, even as I write this, I’m not sure if the portents I sense are true ones or merely the effects of the slow, eroding insanity that had consumed my father and his father before him.

Over the next couple of years, it stayed on my radar, but I didn’t do much with it as I worked on other projects. I was having a hard time conceptualizing the lifecycle of my swarm and the science behind everything. The magicman wasn’t a problem. I’ve been wrestling with magicmen since I was 14, but the crux of the story was the swarm and I needed to get that handled. In 2018, my sweet husband ended up in ICU for months. He had multiple surgeries, was in and out of consciousness, and I spent countless hours at his bedside. It was that nightmarish spring that I finally figured it out and work began on Monster in earnest.

I originally had the idea of writing an epic poem to go with it and putting a couplet at the start of each chapter, but the epic nature of it never arose. It ended up being quite short so I never used it, but I quite like it so I’ve included it here.

Grave symbols etched in strange motif,

Warning of perils yet unborn.

And break of dawn brings no relief,

To those who ever mourn.

Do not heed the alluring cries,

When the mists on the river rise. 

In 2019, I finished the rough draft and my husband passed away. Writing used to always be an escape, but suddenly I couldn’t write anymore. All my words left me. It hurt, but I set writing aside until I could focus and free that part of myself again. When I did start writing it was poetry which was what I started with way back when in elementary school. Eventually, in September 2020, almost a year later, I picked it up. I focused mostly on fun writing. A fantasy around a couple of D&D characters my husband and I had that I didn’t expect to go anywhere. That fun writing brought me back to the joy and discipline of writing again and I began to think of my abandoned project. I wanted it out there. I needed it out there. It carried so much of my husband and I within it.

It was slow going, but I edited it and eventually got it off to betas. I took their suggestions worked on the third draft and more betas before I finally, finally had it where I thought it was good enough to submit. I’m so glad I stuck with it. I hope you enjoy this tale of monsters and love as much as I did.