I’m so excited today to post the cover reveal for Of Fire and Ash, the next book by Gillian Bronte Adams! I LOVE her Songkeeper Chronicles, and I’m sure I’m going to love this one even more…after all, it features magical horses and their warrior riders!!!! How COOL is that!!!! Of Fire and Ash will be releasing from @enclavepublishing in December 2021. This is the first book in the YA fantasy trilogy, The Fireborn Epic, and is available to preorder in Limited-Edition Hardcover.
About the Book:
She rides a fireborn, a steed of fire and ash, trained for destruction.
Ceridwen tal Desmond dreams of ruling like her father over the nation of Soldonia, where warriors ride to battle on magical steeds—soaring on storm winds, vanishing in shadow, quaking the earth, and summoning the sea. After a tragic accident claims her twin brother, she is exiled and sworn to atonement by spending her life—or death—for her people.
But when invaders spill onto Soldonia’s shores and traitors seize upon the chaos to murder her father, Ceridwen claims the crown to keep the nation from splintering. Combatting overwhelming odds and looming civil war, she begins to wonder if the greatest threat to the kingdom may, in fact, be her.
With fire before her and ash in her wake, how can she hope to unite instead of destroy?
Ready to see the cover???? The illustrator is Darko Tomic, who illustrated Gillian’s other series.
After years of many of you asking for me to put together a fandom store for The Blades of Acktar, I’ve finally done it! I’m ridiculously excited with how these items turned out, and I’m trying really hard not to buy all the things myself!
And, yes, you’ll be taken over to my pen name’s website to a secret page hidden there exclusively for all of you. It was simpler to combine the store for both publishing names into one site due to costs and stuff like that. If you didn’t yet know that I had a pen name…yes, I have a general market pen name. I hope you enjoy those books too.
There are some big changes coming to this website.
First, I’ve added a store! Right now, you can purchase the 4 audiobooks for The Blades of Acktar directly from me. This means you pay less than retail, you completely own the audiobooks, and I get all the profits. It’s a serious win-win! When you purchase the audiobooks directly from me, you’ll be able to either listen to them in the Bookfunnel app or download the MP3 files to listen however you like.
I’m really excited about being able to offer direct sales of audiobooks this way. I’ve tested out the purchasing of audiobooks directly from the author, and I really liked the experience.
Besides audiobooks, I’m planning to expand the store to include direct sales of the ebooks of all my books as well.
To do this, that means the ebooks will be leaving Kindle Unlimited this summer.
It will be a gradual process as each book’s enrollment in KU ends and I can switch them over. The ebooks will still be available for purchase on Amazon. They just won’t be available for rent via Kindle Unlimited. BUT they will eventually be for sale everywhere ebooks are sold, including directly from me via my website!
Dare and Decree are the first books that will be leaving KU. For that reason, I’m running a sale on both of these books for this weekend so that you can snap up your copy! (Please note that the sale starts tomorrow).
Eventually, I might add more things to the store. The Blades of Acktar fandom merchandise, perhaps. Preorders of The Blades of Acktar hardcovers once they are released this summer or fall. Fun stuff.
What would you like to see available in a shop on my website?
I know I haven’t done much of a writing update lately, especially here on the blog.
If you are following this blog, I am going to be putting more effort into my mailing list rather than posting here. About the only thing I plan to post on this blog are posts for blog tours.
That means if you want to be the first to know about new releases or news, then signing up for my newsletter mailing list is the BEST way to do that. You are likely to miss something if you are only following the blog. You can sign up for my newsletter here.
The question I get asked the most often is “Will there still be a Blades of Acktar book 6 and when is it releasing?”
I am still planning to eventually release a Blades of Acktar book 6 & 7. BUT I don’t have a release date. I can tell you already, it most likely won’t be this year.
If you want to know right away as soon as I have a release date, then signing up for my newsletter is the BEST way to do that.
Hello, everyone! I hope you all had a wonderful and healthy Thanksgiving yesterday! Even in this crazy year, we all have so much to be thankful for (I know I do!) and Thanksgiving Day is a good time to stop, pause, and reflect on the year. Even if you don’t live in the United States, the end of the year is a good time to pause and reflect and be grateful, even if you aren’t celebrating a specific holiday.
So even though the rest of this post is going to be flooded with advertisements of books sales, those books sales are one of the things I’m grateful for this year. I’m grateful I get to write stories and share them with people. I’m thankful to have formed relationships with so many fellow authors who are writing amazing stories and sharing them with the world. I’m thankful for readers who are so voracious for stories that I’m forever getting asked for other books I recommend now that they have finished all of mine. So, thank you!
My books on sale!
All of my ebooks are currently on sale for $.99 each! Yes, that’s right. All NINE of my books are $.99 each right now! Except for Dare, which is FREE!
As per usual, I’m participating in an indie author Black Friday Sale. This year is our biggest year yet, and there are a LOT of Kindle indie books in a variety of genres for Free or $.99! If you want to stock up for fall and Christmas reading, this is definitely a sale you will want to explore!
To highlight a few of the books participating in this sale:
Once again, all these book sales and more can be found in one place: click here!
A few more sales!
Here are a few more books on sale who are not a part of the indie Black Friday Sale (even though these authors are also indie authors!)
I have had the pleasure of getting to know Lucy Tempest over this past year, and I adore her fairy tales! They have some violence and some mild language (mostly in the first three books) but they are otherwise clean!
I’ve had the pleasure of having Emily Hayse ride with me down to Realm Makers two years in a row, and we bonded over our shared love of horses and NASCAR. This past Realm Makers, her book Seventh City won Book of the Year. If you haven’t picked up her stories yet, they are amazing!
I’m sure there are plenty of other sales on Amazon today through Cyber Monday. If you know of any other good ebooks on sale today, feel free to share in the comments!
Interview and a Giveaway!
Finally, I participated in a group interview with over twenty other fantasy authors! This was a fun interview, and also includes a giveaway (which goes live on December 1!) If you have time, you’ll want to give this a read!
Today is the day we have all been waiting for! Poison’s Dance releases today! Yay!!!!!!!!! I am really excited to share the next part of Alex’s, Daemyn’s, and Rosanna’s adventures with all of you, and I hope you enjoy it!
To celebrate the release, I currently have Dagger’s Sleep and Midnight’s Curse on sale in the Kindle store. Dagger’s Sleep is FREE while Midnight’s Curse is $1.99. So if you have been waiting to start this series, now would be a good time to pick them up!
Poison’s Dance
Book Description:
Beyond the Tales #3 If he falls to the lure of the curse, the dance might trap him forever.
Alex has survived his first year as high king. The new counsel has improved cooperation between the kingdoms, and peace seems achievable. When the Tuckawassee queen sends him an invitation he can’t refuse, Alex must once again face his greatest threat for the sake of peace.
Princess Tamya of Tuckawassee, along with her eleven sisters, has danced from sunset until sunrise every night of her life. It is her gift and her curse. When Queen Valinda wishes to use the power their cursed dance gives them to rule all of Tallahatchia, Tamya must decide if she will do what is right even if it betrays her own sister.
Daemyn Rand has survived a hundred years’ worth of battles. All he wants to do now is safely marry his princess. Will he be forced to choose between the love of his life and the high king he has loyally served for years?
They have faced certain death before. This time, they might not make it out alive.
Don’t miss this re-envisioning of the Twelve Dancing Princesses fairy tale.
Tricia Mingerink is a twenty-something, book-loving, horse-riding country girl. She lives in Michigan with her family and their pack of pets. When she isn’t writing, she can be found pursuing backwoods adventures across the country. Find her online at: Website || Goodreads || Facebook || Twitter || Instagram || Amazon
Each year, a group of fairy tale authors sets a challenge to write a retelling of a fairy tale, then release those books together for cross promotion and to build hype for that particular tale. So these books aren’t one series or related to each other except that they are all retellings of the 12 Dancing Princesses fairy tale.
I’m so excited to share about all of these books, and I’m especially excited to finally share Poison’s Dance, where Alex’s, Daemyn’s, and Rosanna’s adventures continue!
Today’s release is The Dancing Princess by Kendra E. Ardnek, who also happens to be the organizer of this fairy tale group challenge each year. She puts a ton of work into helping all of the authors in the group get their books ready, and she deserves an extra round of applause for making this group release happen!
The Dancing Princess
Book Description:
A Twist of Adventure #5 Plagued by nightmares for the last few years, Katrine only wanted answers. Instead, she finds herself trapped in a tangled web of melody as she tries to free a cursed king and his brothers. No one deserves existence such as theirs, but dare she risk her very life?
Kendra E. Ardnek is the self-proclaimed Arista of Fairy Tales. She lives in the Piney Woods of East Texas with her dragon babies and massive herd of mini-giraffes, and she is still waiting for one of of her fifty nutcrackers to come to life and marry her. When not writing, you can usually find her sitting in a random box, and she’s frequently known to act before she thinks. Find her online at: Website || Blog || Goodreads || Facebook || Twitter || YouTube || Newsletter || Instagram || TikTok || Amazon
There is still time to sign up for the blog tour or to receive a review copy! If you just want to review, not post for the blog tour, scroll past the first sign up sheet to the second sign up sheet in the link below. You’ll have opportunity to review not just Poison’s Dance, but several other 12 Dancing Princess fairy tales if you wish:
I just set up the Poison’s Dance ARC, so if you sign up for a review copy, you should be getting it next week (hopefully)!
About Poison’s Dance:
If he falls to the lure of the curse, the dance might trap him forever.
Alex has survived his first year as high king. The new counsel has improved cooperation between the kingdoms, and peace seems achievable. When the Tuckawassee queen sends him an invitation he can’t refuse, Alex must once again face his greatest threat for the sake of peace.
Princess Tamya of Tuckawassee, along with her eleven sisters, has danced from sunset until sunrise every night of her life. It is her gift and her curse. When Queen Valinda wishes to use the power their cursed dance gives them to rule all of Tallahatchia, Tamya must decide if she will do what is right even if it betrays her own sister.
Daemyn Rand has survived a hundred years’ worth of battles. All he wants to do now is safely marry his princess. Will he be forced to choose between the love of his life and the high king he has loyally served for years?
They have faced certain death before. This time, they might not make it out alive.
Don’t miss this re-envisioning of the Twelve Dancing Princesses fairy tale.
This week Dagger’s Sleep released on audiobook! I’m so excited to have this book finally available in audiobook for everyone (like me) who adores listening to books while driving or doing housework. You can find it here on Audible and here on audiobooks.com. You can listen to a sample on Audible or Amazon if you’re curious how it sounds.
Dagger’s Sleep was produced by Tantor, an audiobook company that produces a LOT of fairy tale audiobooks. I should know. I personally own most of them, lol. I’m so excited to have Dagger’s Sleep join their fairy tale library!
Because Dagger’s Sleep was produced by an audiobook company, it isn’t exclusive to Audible. You’ll be able to find it pretty much everywhere audiobooks are sold, and its available to libraries! So if you can’t afford audiobooks, consider asking your library to add it to their elibrary.
Tantor will also be producing the audiobooks for Midnight’s Curse (scheduled to release Sept. 23) and Poison’s Dance (release yet to be determined).
Dagger’s Sleep is narrated by the amazing Emily Lawrence, and she did a great job working with all the various accents and voices. She really brings Tallahatchia alive, and I’m so excited with how the narration turned out!
Do any of you like audiobooks? Do you listen to them a lot or infrequently? Perhaps never?
If you like audiobooks (fairy tale audiobooks specifically), here’s a list of a bunch of other fairy tale books that are available on audiobook.
Since I have listened to all but one series on this list, you can find my reviews of these books on my Goodreads page in my fairytale book list. Feel free to message me if you want more in depth review about a book.
Produced by Tantor:
Four Kingdoms by Melanie Cellier (in the process of releasing)
Today, I am FINALLY revealing the cover for Poison’s Dance, book 3 in the Beyond the Tales series. I am so excited to share this cover. My cover designer, Savannah Jezowski of Dragonpen Designs, knocked it out of the park with this cover!
This cover took us a few tries to get right. It is one of the few times I have ever gotten partway into making a cover (with a model and background picked) and told Savannah, “Nope, I’m not liking this at all. We need to start over.” Amazing, she was nice and patient and didn’t mind that it took 3-4 models, 3 backgrounds, flipping the cover several times, and fiddling with all the sparkles before it was finally just right.
But when this cover finally came together…Eeep! So stunning! The golden leaves swirling around her…the sister lurking in the background…the movement of the dress that perfectly captures the feel of a Twelve Dancing Princesses retelling.
Don’t all three books looks so pretty together?
In case you want to see the full cover…
About the Book:
If he falls to the lure of the curse, the dance might trap him forever.
Alex has survived his first year as high king. The new counsel has improved cooperation between the kingdoms, and peace seems achievable. When the Tuckawassee queen sends him an invitation he can’t refuse, Alex must once again face his greatest threat for the sake of peace.
Princess Tamya of Tuckawassee, along with her eleven sisters, has danced from sunset until sunrise every night of her life. It is her gift and her curse. When Queen Valinda wishes to use the power their cursed dance gives them to rule all of Tallahatchia, Tamya must decide if she will do what is right even if it betrays her own sister.
Daemyn Rand has survived a hundred years’ worth of battles. All he wants to do now is safely marry his princess. Will he be forced to choose between the love of his life and the high king he has loyally served for years?
They have faced certain death before. This time, they might not make it out alive.
Don’t miss this re-envisioning of the Twelve Dancing Princesses fairy tale.
I am really excited to share this book with you! Alex really comes into his own with this book and finally shows a hint of that heroic high king we all knew was inside there somewhere. Daemyn has his loyalty tested in new ways, and the entire Rand clan gets to let their wild side show.
For those who are unfamiliar with the Twelve Dancing Princesses fairy tale, here’s a link that gives a brief explanation. (Yes, it’s Wikipedia. But, for once, it’s accurate enough).
Even more exciting, I’m participating in the Tattered Slippers challenge/group release with Poison’s Dance.
“The Tattered Slippers are part of the Arista Challenge, which is a sort of spiritual successor to the Rooglewood collections, which sadly ended with the Five Poison Apples. However, unlike those books, this is NOT a contest, nor is it a single-volume collection.
Each of the stories published in this release is published on its own, with its own cover, and the author retains all rights. We’re merely releasing together – banding together for promotion, if you will. And all of our books happen to be retellings of the same fairy tale.”
Previous years have done Snow White and Rapunzel. As much as I wanted to participate, I never had a project that fit (I was too busy writing a Sleeping Beauty retelling the year they did Snow White and a Cinderella retelling the year they did Rapunzel). I was super excited when they announced Twelve Dancing Princesses would be the fairy tale this year, since that was the one I was planning for book 3!
Here are all the books that will be participating this year! These covers are stunning, and the books sound even more amazing! You can scroll through the Facebook Party to find posts about each book and author, or you can click the links below to find each book on Amazon.
All of these books sound so amazing, from a detective story to a Greek-inspired to Fae kings.
If you want to help spread the word about these books and the covers, here’s a link where you can download all of the lovely images + bios and blurbs and such. Take the stuff and share it to your blogs/social media and email the organizer (Kendra Ardnek) the link to your post – Kendraeardnek (at) Gmail (dot) com.
EVERYONE who shares the covers (and emails Kendra) will be receiving a early peek at the stories – the first chapter of each (including the first chapter of Poison’s Dance!). This is an exclusive offer you don’t want to miss, so get posting.
*the link will be live through Saturday, and you have until then to post. Thanks so much!
Tricia Mingerink 