#1SENTENCESATURDAY Double Edition - The Divine of Callaire

Every week, I'll be sharing a sentence from a WIP. This week I'm revealing TWO SNIPPETS from the the next LEGEND MIRROR book, The Divine of Callaire, out September 28th!

Come back next week for another snippet!

~Saruuh

#1SENTENCESATURDAY - The Divine of Callaire

Every week, I'll be sharing a sentence from a WIP. This week's snippet is from the the next LEGEND MIRROR book, The Divine of Callaire!

Come back next week for another snippet!

~Saruuh

#1SENTENCESATURDAY - The Divine of Callaire

Every week, I'll be sharing a sentence from a WIP. This week's snippet is from the the next LEGEND MIRROR book, The Divine of Callaire!

Come back next week for another snippet!

~Saruuh

#1SENTENCESATURDAY - The Legend Mirror (Urban Fantasy)

Every week, I'll be sharing a sentence from a WIP (even though I took a whole month's break, oops). This week's snippet is from the the next LEGEND MIRROR book!

Come back next week for another snippet!

~Saruuh

Words & Wonders (32)

Welcome to Words & Wonders, a weekly journal of writing updates, links I've found useful or interesting, and book recommendations. I hope W&W will prove to be useful to you writers out there as well as offering an insight into my writing progress for my readers. Don't forget to leave a comment with your own writing progress!

Sorry about the late update! Completely slipped my mind, with Christmas and everything :)

In the Writing Cave, this week I have:

- Written 4,006 words of PERSEYUA, my novel-in-verse and IT IS FINISHED!!! Please imagine me doing a very happy shuffle right now (my non-dancing version of a happy dance!) And since I'm so chuffed to be finished, here's an unedited snippet from the first draft:

- Planned several things I ought not to be planning

- Begun second drafting Wicked Song, a short story for release in an anthology next year.

In my life:

- Every time I read that little 'in my life' header my mind automatically goes 'there's been heartache and pain. I don't know if I can face it again...' Foreigner. Great song.

- I celebrated Christmas and it was EPIC.

On the internet, this week I found useful:

- this post about the word when in showing vs telling
- this post on Amazon KDP + Smashwords

What have you written this week? And how was your Christmas/holidays???
~Saruuh

Words & Wonders (27)

Welcome to Words & Wonders, a weekly journal of writing updates, links I've found useful or interesting, and book recommendations. I hope W&W will prove to be useful to you writers out there as well as offering an insight into my writing progress for my readers. Don't forget to leave a comment with your own writing progress!

In the Writing Cave, this week I have:

- Written 15,352 words of PERSEYUA, my Nanowrimo novel-in-verse. And because I've only posted one snippet from this book, and it's been a loooooong while, here's an unedited stanza.

In my life:

- I've got to the part in my book where I'm slogging through a very deep bog that's made of quicksand instead of mud.

On the internet, this week I found useful:

- Actions Speak Louder Than Dialogue Tags
- 3 Tips For Nanowrimo Success, An Agent's Perspective

What have you written this week?
~Saruuh

OCTOBER: Fairy tales and first chapters (including an excerpt of Love In The Gilded Age!)

 The Wandering is now out in the world in shiny paperback form!! It's very pink and, in my opinion, very pretty. If you signed up to the waiting list, your copy is winging its way to you right now. You can find a couple photos of The Wandering over on my instagram (and follow me if you're into books and photos of my cat.)

But this month isn't only the paperback release of The Wandering - it's the month Love In The Gilded Age comes out! It's not actually set in the Gilded Age, rather a fantasy world called Fissure, and is an anthology of fairy tales retold with a focus on diversity. The title is a nod to one of the fairy tales -  Rumplestilskin - in which the protagonist is expected to spin straw into gold. All the main characters of the anthology are people of colour, one of them is a lesbian, and one of them is disabled (a supporting character also has partial hearing.) LITGA explores themes and ideas I think traditional fairy tales lack - ladies saving themselves (and other ladies!), ladies being in charge of their sexuality, and so on.

It's out today, so I hope you'll check it out and buy it. It's just 99 cents/77 pennies and available on Amazon for Kindle. If you want to read the blurb or know more about the anthology, click the other books link on the navigation bar above, or visit my website.

BUY NOW

Want a sneak peek at Love In The Gilded Age?

Read on for the first chapter of A Fortress of Thorns, a retelling of Brier Rose (Sleeping Beauty)

SEPTEMBER: Of wanderers and sequels

It's the 23rd of September and the sequel to The Forgotten is finally released!! You can get it free from Smashwords right now and from B&N and iBooks in a couple days. It's on amazon for $0.99 but if you report the lower price at B&N or Smashwords (please do this!) we should be up and running and $0.00 in a few days! If you've yet to read The Forgotten, you can find that for free in the same online retailers.

I don't have much to talk about this month, other than to say I'm gearing up for the release of Love In The Gilded Age (28/10) and very excited to finally behold The Wandering in print form. And as promised last month, here is a snippet of each of the main six in The Wandering. Some are from their POV, some are not. Enjoy.

Honour

I’ve always believed what the Officials told me. I never questioned them, not even once. I might have thought I did, but deep down I believed everything they said. 

Horatia

Staring at a twisted chair, I think, I can’t tell Tia about what might have happened to her. She’s not a carrier—The Guardians know that much—but States could have done God knows what to her, made her into anything. 

Branwell

I’d like to feel clarity now. Well, what I really want is to be curled up in the window seat in Bennet’s bedroom, her shoulder resting against mine, listening eagerly to whatever cheap paperback I’d picked up that week. But since that’s about as possible as growing wings and flying away from my loss, I’ll accept being in this box room with two girls who are fast becoming my friends. 

Bennet

I have no choice but to remain here, and I won’t waste the rest of my life on moaning and melancholy. Not when this City has so much to offer me.

Yosiah

It’d be a lot easier if I could just let things lie, if I didn’t have to know the truth. But I’ve never been like that. I never could just go along with something without knowing the details and now that I have access to information about Great Britain and the rest of the world, I want to know it all.

Miya

I’m there again—on the train. Another version of myself stands at Yosiah’s side, her life falling apart when she sees the resolute expression on his face. I’m somewhere in the crowd, watching myself. I don’t want to watch. I know what will happen.

I have to stop it.

The Beast of Callaire cover, snippets + giveaway

This week the shiny cover for The Beast of Callaire was revealed. As you can see it features the main lady Yasmin, a purple/gold colour scheme and some nods to Yasmin's shape-shifting nature (the moon, the wings, the trees of the woods) Personally, I really love it. It's my favourite of all my covers so far, and I've had some pretty good feedback on it. I hope everyone loves it!

Below is the full wrap-around cover with the blurb, though it's subject to small changes. I'm quite the perfectionist, and will be tinkering with the finer details right up to the minute it's printed.

(Click to make bigger!)

The Beast of Callaire will be available to buy on Amazon in paperback, and digitally for Kindle, on B&N, Sony Ebooks, Apple iBooks, and Smashwords. Preorder links will magically appear at the beginning of April, and I hope you'll preorder. There'll be some rewards and swag for those who do.

If you want to win an advanced reading copy of BEAST, you can do so by entering the giveaway below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

And lastly, I posted a bunch of snippets on twitter to celebrate Friday (read: Valentine's Day).

I hope this convinced you to check out The Beast of Callaire. If not, I still have three months. Challenge accepted. If you wanna know more, click on the Legend Mirror tab on the nav bar.

Hope everyone had a good Friday and got a metric tonne of chocolate.

~Saruuh