Pages

  • Home
  • 09/2021 Books
  • 2021 DAC
  • 2020 DAC
  • 2019 DAC
  • 2018 DAC
  • 2017 DAC
  • 2016 DAC
  • 2015 DAC
  • 2014 DAC
  • 2013 DAC
  • 2012 DAC
  • 2011 DAC
  • Mash Ups +
  • Review Policy / Contact
  • About Us
Showing posts with label A Promise of Fire. Show all posts
Showing posts with label A Promise of Fire. Show all posts

Friday, August 05, 2016

Guest Blog by Amanda Bouchet, author of A Promise of Fire


Please welcome Amanda Bouchet to The Qwillery with a guest blog about some of her favorite places in Greece. A Promise of Fire, Amanda's debut and the first novel in the Kingmaker Chronicles, was published on August 2nd by Sourcebooks Casablanca.







You were born and raised in the United States, but your heritage is part Greek. Can you share some interesting places you’ve visited in Greece?

Anyone who grew up in an even moderately Greek household knows that Greece is the center of the universe and the origin of all learning, language, and basically everything worth knowing—at least according to my Greek grandmother! The first time I went to Greece, I was eight, and my family stayed for a month on the island of Spetses. There was a quiet village, a monastery on a hill, stony beaches, and the Mediterranean Sea. My most vivid recollections are of the donkey in the field next to our rented house (with the owner’s permission, we fed his donkey our corn flakes because we could only find goat’s milk on the island—after tasting it, the whole family decided cereal wasn’t necessary in the morning) and of my older sister dragging me out of the water when I was tumbling around in the undertow. And apricots. Endless, juicy, delicious apricots. But whether I was younger or older (my two other trips to Greece were during my college years), this captivating country has left me with some amazing memories and a yearning to go back, if only to breathe in dry air that smells of hot stone and wild thyme and to watch the sun glinting off the turquoise sea. The list of interesting places to visit in Greece is virtually endless, but here are a few of my personal favorites.

Meteora—Imagine a valley scattered with natural sandstone pillars jutting high up into the air, the name Meteora literally meaning “middle of the sky.” (Right now, my grandmother would be instructing everyone within earshot about how meteorology, the word describing the study of the atmosphere, stems from this Greek root.) Then, imagine 9th century hermit monks deciding a pretty great place to escape bandits and other unwanted visitors was on top of the towering sandstone pillars. By the end of the 14th century, more than twenty impressive, fortress-like monasteries soared above this ancient valley in central Greece. Six remain today, awe-inspiring evidence of the motivation of religion and the determination of men. The Meteora monasteries are open to tourists now, but anyone with a real fear of heights might want to enjoy the view from the valley floor. It’s easier to get up to the cliff-top structures now than it used to be, but some of the rope ladders and steep, carved-out-of-sheer-stone steps are still deliciously terrifying and might leave even the most intrepid adventurers a little lightheaded. Luckily, teams of monks no longer have to haul the goods and visitors arriving at Meteora up the vertical cliffs using only baskets and nets—and only replacing the ropes, apparently, “when the Lord let them break.” Gulp!

Santorini—This island in the southern Aegean is so picturesque and richly interesting that it’s hard to know where to start! First of all, it’s the quintessential Greek island with bright, whitewashed houses, splashes of brilliant blue on the occasional roof, and vibrantly blooming bougainvillea tumbling from terraced buildings—a picture perfect post card. The principal city crawls up a high cliff and then sprawls like a sunbather across its top, overlooking the sparking sea filling the gigantic caldera making a huge lagoon in the center of the inland’s more-or-less circular embrace—a caldera because this place got blown to bits once upon a time.

The volcanic eruption on Santorini (around 1600 BC) is one of the most violent in recorded history, wiping out the prosperous city on the island, dumping enough junk into the atmosphere to ruin crops in China, and maybe even indirectly bringing down the entire Minoan civilization, one of the most flourishing of the Bronze Age, when the resulting tsunami decimated the culturally important and highly populated island of Crete. Not only that, but evidence from archeological excavations at Akrotiri, which tourists can visit to see frescoes, pottery, artwork, the remains of impressively large buildings, and even hot and cold running water systems going straight into homes, bathing rooms, and even toilets (three cheers for Bronze Age Minoans!), shows that the layout of Akrotiri resembles Plato’s description of the legendary lost city. This once-thriving metropolis buried under lava and ash, and its terrible fate, may well have inspired the famous myth of Atlantis. And if all that’s not reason enough to visit Santorini, I guarantee you there are a ton of really cute cats.

Delphi—Delphi, which ancient Greeks considered the center of the world, has quite a few claims to fame. Most notably, it housed the famous Oracle, who supposedly spoke for Apollo and who was regularly consulted throughout classical times on important decisions by Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, and more. As a tourist site, it’s hugely rich in archeological remains, with temples, sanctuaries, a theater, and a large stadium—because this is also one of the four places where every four years athletes from all over the ancient Greek world came to compete in athletic games, precursors of our modern Olympics. Setting Delphi apart from the other three locations was also a music competition: the mousikos agon. This UNESCO World Heritage Site is frankly jaw-dropping, but what I remember most was the feeling I got there. Magic. The arid bite of the air, the droning of insects, a breeze whispering over stone, the mountains at my back, the sea spread out before me, and history in every breath… Simply magic.

I’d love to talk about Mycenae, Athens and the Acropolis, and so much more, but I’ve already gone on too long. Thank you for having me on the blog and letting me share some of my favorite memories of Greece with you!





A Promise of Fire
Kingmaker Chronicles 1
Sourcebooks Casablanca, August 2, 2016
Mass Market Paperback and eBook, 448 pages

KINGDOMS WILL RISE AND FALL FOR HER…

“Cat” Catalia Fisa lives disguised as a soothsayer in a traveling circus. She is perfectly content avoiding the danger and destiny the Gods—and her homicidal mother—have saddled her with. That is, until Griffin, an ambitious warlord from the magic-deprived south, fixes her with his steely gaze and upsets her illusion of safety forever.

BUT NOT IF SHE CAN HELP IT

Griffin knows Cat is the Kingmaker, the woman who divines the truth through lies. He wants her as a powerful weapon for his newly conquered realm—until he realizes he wants her for much more than her magic. Cat fights him at every turn, but Griffin’s fairness, loyalty, and smoldering advances make him increasingly hard to resist and leave her wondering if life really does have to be short, and lived alone.
Amazon : Barnes and Noble : Book Depository : Books-A-Million : IndieBound


Download the first FIVE chapters here.





About Amanda

Photo © Richard Beban, 2015
Award-winning author Amanda Bouchet grew up in New England and studied French at the undergraduate and graduate levels. She moved to Paris, France, in 2001. Her first novel, A Promise of Fire, won several Romance Writers of America chapter contests, including the Orange Rose Contest and the paranormal category of the prestigious Golden Pen.






Website  ~  Facebook

Twitter @AuthorABouchet








Publisher Giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thursday, July 28, 2016

Spotlight - A Promise of Fire by Amanda Bouchet - and Giveaway



The Qwillery is thrilled to share with you an excerpt from Amanda Bouchet's debut novel - A Promise of Fire. And don't forget to enter the giveaway below to win a copy from Sourcebooks Casablanca!




A Promise of Fire
Kingmaker Chronicles 1
Sourcebooks Casablanca, August 2, 2016
Mass Market Paperback and eBook, 448 pages

KINGDOMS WILL RISE AND FALL FOR HER…
BUT NOT IF SHE CAN HELP IT

Catalia "Cat" Fisa lives disguised as a soothsayer in a traveling circus. She is perfectly content avoiding the danger and destiny the Gods—and her homicidal mother—have saddled her with. That is, until Griffin, an ambitious warlord from the magic-deprived south, fixes her with his steely gaze and upsets her illusion of safety forever.

Griffin knows Cat is the Kingmaker, the woman who divines the truth through lies. He wants her as a powerful weapon for his newly conquered realm—until he realizes he wants her for much more than her magic. Cat fights him at every turn, but Griffin's fairness, loyalty, and smoldering advances make him increasingly hard to resist and leave her wondering if life really does have to be short, and lived alone.
Amazon : Barnes and Noble : Book Depository : Books-A-Million : IndieBound





Sourcebooks Casablanca is thrilled to announce that we are releasing our very first fantasy romance! Coming August 2016 from debut author Amanda Bouchet is the un-put-downable
A Promise of Fire, the first in the Kingmaker Chronicles series.

To celebrate, we’re giving you the first FIVE chapters to read FOR FREE!

Download the first five chapters here.

To get you started, we’ve included the first few pages below.



Chapter 1

I pluck at my crimson tunic, tenting the lightweight linen away from my sticky skin. The southern Sintan climate isn’t my worst nightmare, but it sometimes ranks pretty high, right along with the stifling layers of cosmetics masking my face, my leather pants, and my knee-high boots.
         Heat and leather and heels don’t mix, but at least looking like a brigand means blending into the circus. Here, discreet only gets you noticed.
         Craning my neck for a breath of fresh air, I navigate my way through the beehive of tables already set up for the circus fair. The performers on the center stage are the main attraction. The rest of us surround them, carving out places for ourselves amid the crowd. Tonight, hemmed in on all sides in an amphitheater lit by hundreds of torches and filled to capacity, I feel like a Cyclops is sitting on my chest—suffocated.
         Damp curls cling to my neck. I peel them off and tuck them back into my braid, scanning the crowd as I walk. I recognize some of the regulars. Others I don’t know. My eyes trip over a man and get stuck. He’s looking at me, and it’s hard not to look back. He’s striking in a dark, magnetic way, his size, weapons, and bearing all telling me he’s a tribal warlord. His build is strong and masculine, his gait perfectly balanced and fluid. He walks with predatory confidence, unhurried, and yet there’s no mistaking his potential for swift, explosive violence. It’s not latent or hidden, just leashed.
         Watchful, alert, he’s aware of everything in his vicinity. Especially me.
         Our gazes collide, and something in me freezes. His eyes remind me of Poseidon’s wrath—stormy, gray, intense—the kind of eyes that draw you in, hold you there, and might not let you go.
         Adrenaline surges through me, ratcheting up my pulse. My heart thumping, I blink and take in the rest of him. Intelligent brow. Strong jaw. Wide mouth. Hawkish nose. Black hair brushes a corded neck atop broad shoulders that have no doubt been swinging a sword since before he could walk. Body toned to perfection, skin darkened by a lifetime in the sun, he’s battle-chiseled and hard, the type of man who can cleave an enemy in two with little effort and even less consequence to his conscience.
         He keeps staring at me, and a shiver prickles my spine. Is this man my enemy?
         There’s no reason to think so, but I didn’t stay alive this long without the help of a healthy dose of paranoia.
         Wary, I sit at my table, keeping an eye on him as he weaves a bold path through an array of potions, trinkets, and charms. He’s flanked by four similar men. Their coloring varies, but they all have the same sure look about them, although they pale in comparison to the warlord in both authority and allure. The man with the gray eyes is a born leader, and only an idiot would mistake him for anything else.
         He stares for so long that I start to wonder if he can somehow bore through my layers of face paint and unmask me, but I’ve never seen him before, and he can’t possibly know the person underneath. I’m from the north of Fisa, where magic is might. He’s from the south of Sinta, where muscle and cunning decide who lives or dies. Our paths would never have crossed in the past, and warlords don’t usually frequent the circus.
         I look away, hoping he’ll do the same. There are plenty of reasons a man stares at a woman. An exotic face and generous figure attract as much attention as a good mystery, if not more, and the warlord’s intense scrutiny feels more appreciative than alarming.
         Ignoring the flush now creeping into my cheeks, I smooth the wrinkles from the coarse wool blanket covering my table and arrange my paraphernalia like usual. My glittering, gold-lettered sign advertises Cat the Magnificent—Soothsayer Extraordinaire, even though flashes of the future only come here and there, usually in dreams. Luckily, it only takes a few questions for truths to reveal themselves like flowers opening for the sun. I read people’s body language and glean who they are, what they want, and maybe even what they’re capable of. It’s about knowledge and illusion. I get a copper for it, which is more than a fair deal for me. I won’t peddle futures. I have an idea of my own, and that’s more than enough.
         My leg starts a nervous bounce. Prophecies can be interpreted loosely, right?
         The audience gasps, and I turn to see what’s happening on the stage. Vasili is throwing knives at his wife. She’s strapped to the flat side of a vertical, rotating wheel, and he’s blindfolded. He’s never hit her, but my heart still comes to a complete standstill every time they perform. Tonight is no exception, and I hold my breath, both riveted and terrified, until he runs out of knives.
         The crowd is too caught up in the circus to take advantage of the fair, so I get up again and head to the performers’ gate to watch the end of the show and put some distance between the warlord and me. He’s still looking when he shouldn’t be.
         The air coming through the gate is fresher, bringing with it the sound of Cerberus’s chuffing breaths and the scent of sweaty dog. He’s Hades’s pet, so I doubt the heat bothers him. I toss him a wave, and two of his three upper lips curl in a snarl of acknowledgment. One of these days, I’ll get all three, although in eight years I never have. I think his middle head just doesn’t like me.
         Finished with his performance, Vasili unstraps his wife while Aetos launches himself onto the stage with a triple flip and lands in a fighter’s crouch that shakes the platform. The solid wood creaks under his colossal weight, and the rapt crowd murmurs in awe. Aetos straightens, pounds his chest, tears the horse pelt off his giant back, and catches fire. His roar shakes the amphitheater. No one can roar like Aetos. I’ve seen him perform hundreds of times, and I still get chills.
         Seven and a half feet tall, muscle-bound, and tattooed blue from head to toe with Tarvan tribal swirls, he moves his hands in an impossibly fast dance, weaving fire until he’s encased in a sphere of living flame. He bursts through the crackling barrier with another roar. The explosion blasts the hair away from my face and dries out the inside of my nose. I’m forty feet away but feel like I’m in the furnaces of the Underworld. Fanning myself is useless. I’ll never get used to the southern heat, and with Aetos performing, it’s even worse.
         The Sintan Hoi Polloi can barely contain themselves. It’s like doing tricks for children—everything enchants. For them, the circus is a whirlwind of power and impossible magical delights. Everywhere from the hard-packed dirt floor surrounding the fair tables and stage to the high, far reaches of the circular stone seating, people jump up and down, hooting and stomping their feet.
         My feet tap along with the crowd’s, my eyes following Aetos around the stage. What a relief to be back in Sinta, even with all the dust and heat. I do whatever I can to stay on the west side of Thalyria. Our recent sojourn in the middle realm of Tarva made my lungs tight and my fingers itch for a knife. I’d probably start jumping at shadows if the circus ever went all the way east to Fisa. Just the thought of my home realm makes my sweat turn cold.
         Sinta. Tarva. Fisa. West to east. Here to… Nothing I’m going to think about.
         The audience whoops in approval of Aetos’s fiery moves. Hoi Polloi in the amphitheater are ecstatic—and not only with the show. They’ve been celebrating ever since a warlord from the tribal south hacked his way north to Castle Sinta to put his own sister on the throne. You’d think Dionysus had dumped a three-month supply of wine over the entire realm. Temples are overflowing with Sintans offering prayers of gratitude, their holy men overcome with gifts to help clothe and feed the poor. Statues of Athena, who is apparently well loved by the conquering warlord, have been spontaneously erected in towns and villages from here to the Ice Plains in Sinta’s north. Happiness and generosity abound, and I don’t even want to think about how many sheep have been slaughtered for celebratory feasts.
         For the first time ever, the magicless majority is in charge, and Hoi Polloi are literally dancing in the streets—but only when they’re not throwing themselves in abject loyalty at the feet of the new royal family. Or so I’ve heard. I haven’t actually seen the new royals, but news spreads fast when there’s something to say. After the warlord and his southern army secured the Sintan throne last spring, his family took weeks just to move north. Not because they’re slow, but because of the sheer number of adoring people in their way.
         It’s no secret the northern-born Magoi royals here in Sinta were despots, just like everywhere else in Thalyria. Hoi Polloi know they’re better off with one of their own in charge.
         But royals without magic? My cynical snort is lost in the boisterousness of the crowd. It’ll never last.



Want more? Download the first FIVE chapters here.

Click here to learn more about A Promise of Fire by Amanda Bouchet.





About Amanda

Award-winning author Amanda Bouchet grew up in New England and studied French at the undergraduate and graduate levels. She moved to Paris, France, in 2001. Her first novel, A Promise of Fire, won several Romance Writers of America chapter contests, including the Orange Rose Contest and the paranormal category of the prestigious Golden Pen.





Publisher Giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

2016 Debut Author Challenge Update - A Promise of Fire by Amanda Bouchet




The Qwillery is pleased to announce the newest featured author for the 2016 Debut Author Challenge.


Amanda Bouchet

A Promise of Fire
Kingmaker Chronicles 1
Sourcebooks Casablanca, August 2, 2016
Mass Market Paperback and eBook, 448 pages

KINGDOMS WILL RISE AND FALL FOR HER…

“Cat” Catalia Fisa lives disguised as a soothsayer in a traveling circus. She is perfectly content avoiding the danger and destiny the Gods—and her homicidal mother—have saddled her with. That is, until Griffin, an ambitious warlord from the magic-deprived south, fixes her with his steely gaze and upsets her illusion of safety forever.

BUT NOT IF SHE CAN HELP IT

Griffin knows Cat is the Kingmaker, the woman who divines the truth through lies. He wants her as a powerful weapon for his newly conquered realm—until he realizes he wants her for much more than her magic. Cat fights him at every turn, but Griffin’s fairness, loyalty, and smoldering advances make him increasingly hard to resist and leave her wondering if life really does have to be short, and lived alone.
Amazon : Barnes and Noble : Book Depository : Books-A-Million : IndieBound