My good friend, Patricia Kiyono, "introduced" me to today's guest. April Jones is a fellow Michigander, and she writes fantasy. Here's a little about her and her journey to publication.
I spend most of my writing time as an editor and book coach. There’s something about stories (any story, any format) that I can’t help but be drawn to. I have just as much fun walking a writer through their plot holes as I do writing my own story, so it can be tricky to block off time for writing my own stories. The Curse Breaker took just under two years from start to finish to complete. Having worked for several publishers, I thought I would have to collect rejections for a while before I found the right publisher. However, I was at a writing convention chatting with a friend about my intentions to pitch my book to one of the publishers there when he suggested that I send it to his publisher instead. When I got home from the convention, I took a couple of weeks to comb over my story for imperfections before I sent it off to Dingbat Publishing. In less than a month I had a reply. It took all my courage to open that email, haha, but when I did I saw the words, “I love this!” and “Tell me there’s a second book!” (Spoiler, there is so I hope you like dragons). So to all the writer friends out there, keep the faith. It might take several rejections to find the right place for your novel, but maybe all it will take is the right friend’s suggestion and a little bit of courage.
Book Blurb:
Eris's sister is missing, and Magic is definitely to blame! Eris knows only Magic can bring her back, but even as a Light Magic born, is she strong enough to save her sister?
Knox is cursed to spend his days as a corpse and his nights trying to find the prophesized girl who can break the curse. If he can't find her by his 20th birthday, he'll stay dead forever.
Eris and Knox will discover there are scarier things in their path other than curses and half-truths. If the Queen of the Underworld has her way, everything and everyone will die. The only thing standing in her way is the curse breaker, and Eris will have to choose between saving herself or everyone she loves.
Excerpt:
The Queen paced in front of
her blood-red throne. After so many years, she was finally going to meet the
thief who had stolen her amulet. And when she did, she was going to slowly
sever every one of their limbs, one by one, before feeding their soul to Madame.
The thought made her smile a wicked smile. That would teach them to steal from
the Queen of the Underworld. Stupid humans were always trying to prolong their
lives in the most feeble ways. Tonics, magic, deals. Death was something that
could never be avoided entirely, but they didn’t seem to think that universal
rule applied to any of them.
Three more months and her
amulet would call to her like it always did when she could get free of this
place, and then she would have her revenge. Whoever they were, they had been
granted twenty years that did not belong to them, and she would make sure they
paid for that stolen time. That was part of her job, after all, not that she
was complaining.
“I apologize for being late,
your Majesty.” Madame hurried in, a little out of breath.
The Queen turned and stared
at a slightly disheveled Madame. Normally her long hair was braided and wrapped
elaborately around her head, causing her to look like a long-lost ancient queen
from the human world.
“We can discuss that in a moment.
I called you here because I have a proposition for you.”
“I am but your humble
servant, your Majesty.” Madame feigned humility they both knew she did not
possess.
The Queen rolled her eyes
and continued. “If you can find the insect that stole my amulet before three
months are up, I will give you a special treat.”
“I will find the human. I
will make it suffer.” Madame smiled.
“No. You will not touch a
hair on its head. Bring it to me, and I will deal with it.” Madame looked
disappointed but nodded.
The body of a girl suddenly
appeared in the air in front of them, along with one of her servants. Madame
examined the girl for a moment, but then seemed to lose interest once she
realized the girl was neither alive nor dead. The Queen walked over and swept the
girl’s long black hair back enough to see her face. She scrunched up her nose
at the young girl’s beauty.
Snapping her fingers again
brought new servants running.
“Take her and put her with
the rest of the cursed.”
The women gently plucked the
girl from the air. The Queen wondered how many bodies lay waiting in the limbo
between life and death. Not that she would forgive the vermin that had stolen
her amulet, but she would enjoy watching the human be tortured by all the souls
it had trapped prematurely in the Underworld. Eternity would not be long enough
for all the lives that heartless human had taken trying to break the curse that
came with stealing something born from the Underworld’s power. Since the human
had not been able to break it thus far, she continued to collect bodies stuck
in the in-between, their lives connected to the cursed one’s. When that insect
finally died, so would all of those souls, and she would have a lovely new
collection of pets.
The Queen smiled to herself
as she watched one of the servants wrap her arms around the girl’s legs while
the other wove her arms around the girl’s back. Slowly they carried her out,
leaving the Queen to her thoughts again.
Buy Link:
Author Bio:
April Jones has read, written, or edited her way through numerous fictional worlds. When she's not teaching or writing, she spends her time trying to learn other languages or keeping her mischievous cat from eating the pet fish. She received her bachelor's in English and her M.F.A. in creative writing.
A Tennessee native, April currently lives in Michigan with her husband and three children. You can find her poems and short stories published in various literary magazines across the internet and in print. You can also check out her debut novel, The Curse Breaker. For more information visit her website thepathtostory.com
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