#TeaserTuesday: The Bowl

 

I've seen authors argue that beginning a project is the most difficult part, but I'd argue it's finishing one. In the beginning, you're laying down lore and building characters, but sticking the landing takes no small amount of effort and attention to detail.

With Field of Fire, I'm not just ending a book, but a series, and so there are many loose ends to tie up - and hopefully tie up in a satisfying way. 

The scene I'm working on today links back to this scene from Demon of the Dead:

“Then,” Ragnar continued, voice touched with strain, “they brought out this – this bowl.”

Leif lifted his brows.

Ragnar showed his teeth, a quick, unhappy flash that was defensive, rather than aggressive. “It was this massive golden bowl full of black liquid. They made me look into it, and I – I saw things, Leif.” It was the first time he’d said his name in weeks, rather than alpha. “It felt like – like I went somewhere, like I wasn’t inside my body anymore. There was this golden city – it was like nothing I’d ever seen. It made this palace look like a hut, it was so…” He shrank down into himself. “There were drakes. Flying in the air. More than I could count. There were – there were other things. Animals. Maybe? I don’t…”

He shook his head, hard. “When I was standing on my own two feet again, that bastard said, ‘That is the heart of our empire. That is what’s coming for you.’” He deflated. “No one can stand against that. Not even your bloody-minded uncle.” He sighed and wiped both hands down his face, exhausted simply from remembering. 

The fantasy genre offers a chance to explore self-delusion, confusion, and the lies we tell ourselves in a very literal sense. Here's Oliver learning more about the bowl:

“Very well,” Romanus said, and stepped up to the table; gripped its edge and tossed his hair back over his shoulder with a flick of his head. “Come, then.”

“I’m not drinking that.”

“I don’t want you to. Come,” Romanus said again, firmer. “Gaze into the bowl.”

“Do you hear yourself?” Oliver said. “Gaze into the bowl.”

Romanus lifted his brows. “What will you do instead? Return to your shivering, failing body? Lie in fever-wracked misery?”

Oliver could only frown. The last thing he wanted was to return to his physical form; he wanted it even less than he wanted to cooperate with his gods-bedamned grandsire. “What will happen if I gaze into the bowl?” he asked, tightly, but he was already caving, and the flicker of Romanus’s mouth said he knew it.

“You will be shown a truth. It might be the past, and it might be the future. It might be something you want, and it might be something you fear. It’s different for everyone. But it will be true.”

“If it’s a want or a fear, how can it be true? Isn’t that just projection?”

“Is truth not a kind of projection?”

“Gods, you’re insufferable,” Oliver muttered, and stepped up to the table to avoid further semantic discord. “All right. I’m gazing. Now what?” The black liquid—the blood—lay quiet and still in the bowl, not disturbed by the faint breeze that blew in from the balcony. Its surface gleamed, glossy and thick, opaque as midnight. Oliver glimpsed his reflection in it, sunken-eyed and messy-haired. He searched for the now-familiar wink of silver beads in his braids, but there were no braids, and the beads were long gone.

He shuddered. 

If life can calm down for two seconds, I can't wait to get this book finished and into y'all's hands! 

Teaser Tidbit: The Winter Palace

 

I wanted to post this yesterday for Teaser Tuesday, but ran out of time, so we'll do a bonus Wednesday teaser instead. 

I don't know if I've ever fully explained what's going on with The Winter Palace...? So let me do that now. I called it a novella originally, and I'm still not sure whether the page count will land it in that category or not (though I suspect, given my long-winded tendencies with SoR, that it'll easily hit novel length), but I decided several years ago that I had too much content to cram into Lionheart. Hence, The Winter Palace. It takes place in Buffalo, NY, at Trina's family compound out in the woods, and it handles the post Golden Eagle fallout of Nikita's pack. A quiet moment for all of them to catch their breath gains tension by slow degrees until they reach a decision point: keep to themselves? Or commit fully to Vlad's impending war? 

We'll get lots of slow beats, quiet moments, and relationship building amongst our major players. We have a chance to see some new dynamics form between characters, and we explore everyone's powers in a less stressful environment. 

Every time I work on this, I feel like a kid playing with new toys on Christmas day. I love these characters so much, and this book is going to be very self-indulgent, and very fun for anyone who loves them. 

“I forget, sometimes,” she admitted. “That you’re—”

“A campy C-list horror movie villain?”

“Different,” she amended. “And then you’ll say or do something that makes me remember, and it’s…no, don’t,” she said, when he started to say something else. “And then it’s…jarring. For a second.”

His gaze narrowed. “Do people say ‘jarring’ out loud? I’m asking seriously here. I thought that was just shit people said in books.”

“Well,” she said, fighting the tug of a smile. “I’m saying it now.” More seriously: “It’s jarring sometimes. But then I get over it. It’s like…”

A real smile cut across his face, sly and pleased, and she realized he was about to fill in the blank for her.

She sighed. “What?”

“It’s like you’re dating Clark Kent, and then it hits you.” He smacked his hands together. “‘Damn. I’m dating Superman.’” He made a face. “Shit, wait. Superman sucks.”

Trina shook her head and started walking again. “Okay, which superhero does the grown-ass man want his new reality to resemble?”

“Tough call. I’m gonna have to go with Wolverine.”

“Interesting. You going to grow the sideburns out?”

“I’ll have to check with my girlfriend.”

By Its Cover

Any day is a good day to recommend the work of one of my absolute favorite authors, but St. Patrick's Day is an especially good day, given she's Irish. Tana French has a new book dropping on the 31st of this month, and I will most definitely be setting aside all my other reads to attend to it. 

We've all heard "don't judge a book by its cover" before. In the case of my books, it's always meant to imply (or is outright stated) that my covers are lousy and the reader was surprised by their enjoyment of my work. The truth, whether we like it or not, is that covers do matter, which is precisely why I select covers for my work in a very purposeful way. Nine times out of ten, those head-turning, gorgeous book covers frame trite and underwhelming prose. I choose covers for my books that would attract readers like me: covers that make you go "huh, wonder what that's about."

That's what happened when I discovered Tana French for the first time.

I was perusing the aisles of a Borders bookstore, long before Bookstagram and Book Tok wrested control of the book marketing world and started splashing viral book sensations across all of our phone screens. The first novel of Tana French's Dublin Murder Squad series was not featured on an endcap display, nor laid out on a table; it was slotted alphabetically alongside the other mystery novels, easy to miss - and I sometimes shake my head in wonder when I think of missing it - and it was the title that first caught my attention. In the Woods. Simple. Vague in a delightful way. The woods can be so many things: a sun-dappled clearing where a doe sips from a burbling stream; a cozy glen where smoke curls from the stone chimney of a cabin; or it can be a sinister place of crowded tree trunks and shifting shadows. Snapping twigs, hooting owls, rustling underbrush. 

I pulled the book out to catch a peek at the cover. 

Have you ever stood amidst a patch of trees in the winter, tilted your head back, and looked up? I have always found a melancholic enjoyment in the silhouettes of bare tree branches stamped against a white January sky. On the cover of In the Woods, the bare branch aesthetic was subtly foreboding. This, I knew, was no cozy cabin story. 

I turned to the first page, and within two paragraphs knew that no matter the outcome of the plot, Tana French's writing was exquisite. Some fifteen years later, she's still my most-recommended author. Given she's a New York Times bestseller, and far more successful than I'll ever be, I still feel that she's a vastly underappreciated author. I don't see her mentioned on the thriller rec accounts, and rarely encounter a fellow fan in the wild. 

She only puts out one book every two years (don't ever come at me about how slowly I write again, y'all), but the wait is always more than worth it. She writes rich, lyrical literary mysteries full of the most complex, flawed, loveable characters. She tends to take side characters from previous novels and bring them into the spotlight, and manages to shift your opinion of them one-hundred-and-eighty-degrees from one POV to another. 

Happy St. Paddy's Day! Let me know if you give Ms. French's work a try. 

#TeaserTuesday: No Pretending

 

The seventh and final installment of the Drake Chronicles series, Field of Fire, is coming later this year! Get caught up on the first six books now. 

“There can be no pretending, as a drake. Dominance—true dominance—is undeniable. Others give immediate sway to an alpha.”

“Ah.”

“Hm?”

“I see now why you’re eager for me to try it.” Oliver closed the book with a solid thump, filling his face with dust. He sneezed. After, he dabbed his nose on his sleeve. “You want me to learn to shift so that, once we’re both drakes, your alpha nature will compel my less dominant drake to submit.”

Romanus frowned.

“You hope that once I submit on four legs, I’ll fall in line with your plans on two legs.” He held the book back out to him; tried to do so with one hand, but was forced to use both. “You think you’re very clever, don’t you?”

“I think you suspect the worst of me, unwarranted.” Romanus waved his hand through the air, and the book vanished in a curl of smoke.

“I think you are an emperor, first and foremost. If that makes you the worst, that’s all the more reason not to aspire to become an emperor.”

#TeaserTuesday: Tommy's Wedding (eventually)

 

One of my very favorite things to write is characters who've faced down death and terror dealing with the terrors of ordinary, domestic frustrations. 

This is from the promised Tommy's Wedding scene I'm working on now and will eventually put on Substack. I'm drawing it out a little for maximum domesticity. 

It started at Christmas.

The holiday marked Cass and Shep’s second Christmas as a married couple, and the first Christmas for Raven and Toly’s second child, Alina, born in July. They celebrated at Raven and Toly’s, as usual, and Natalia was old enough to be a holy terror with the wrapping paper. She’d received a plastic tricycle, and Shep and Toly griped their way through putting it together while Nat bounced around with one of her new dolls, imploring them to hurry. Or “huwwy,” rather.

Shep pulled the packet of provided screws out of his mouth and sighed. “Kid, I’ve got no idea what you’re saying.” He ignored Toly’s glare and bent back to the trike’s front wheel. “Where in the fuck are these screws supposed to go? Fucking field surgery’s easier than this shit.”

“Don’t curse in front of the children, Shepherd!” Raven called from the kitchen.

Cass leaned forward off the couch to thwap him in the shoulder, and he shot her a betrayed look. She tried not to smile. “Are you going to curse in front of your own children?”

He blinked at her. “Yes!”

She gave up and laughed. Just in time for Raven to come back into the room with a tray of fresh coffee. “No,” she said, gaze zeroing in on Cass. “Don’t you dare encourage him.” She kicked at Toly’s hip on her way to the couch. “And don’t you let him do it in the first place.”

“Do you think I can control what he does?” Toly asked. 

#ThrowbackThursday: BoD

 

“Listen, sweetheart.” His voice was all gravel, breath warm on her face. “I’m not a martyr, so I’ll give you the spiel once, and I’m not gonna torture myself about it afterward. I’m too old for you. You’re smart, and you’re talented, and you’re going to school—you ought to change your name and run as far away from the life as you can get. Marry some dopey little shithead art nerd. Your old man’s a spooky short weirdo, and he’s absolutely gonna kill me for this. But f***, I love you.” He pressed his forehead to hers. “I oughta play the better man and tell you to get lost, but I’m not gonna. If you want me, I’m never gonna tell you no.”

I think it's no secret by this point that I will find any reason to write about Devin's Brood when it comes to Dartmoor. They're my favorites, the whole gang. Beware of Dog was the most fun I've had writing Dartmoor in years. It's also the book that continues to tug at me. I loved writing about Cass and Shep, and about Raven and Toly, too. I know the Knoxville crew will always be the readers' favorite, but the Manhattan bunch are the ones who keep offering me little plot bunnies, as if I didn't already have enough to write. When I'm meant to be writing something else, I find myself thinking about Raven and Toly's kids; about Shep blundering his way through Cass's art and fashion world. When my brain wanders back to the world of outlaw bikers, it usually finds its way to one or both of those couples. 

A new chapter of Inherent Violence will go up tomorrow, and I'm hoping to have some time to work on my Substack vignette about Tommy's (horrendous) wedding this weekend. A little domestic fluff and humor to get us through all the drama about to unfold in other areas. 

If you haven't picked up Beware of Dog yet, it's the last official Dartmoor/Lean Dogs novel, and one of my favorites in the bunch. Join me over on Substack for all things future Dartmoor. 

The Current WIPs

 

Val’s expression didn’t waver, but Trina saw his hands tighten together, one slow pulse of tension, before they relaxed again. Nik had struck a nerve. It seemed to be a family trait.

Lanny gathered a breath as if he meant to speak, and Trina jabbed him in the ribs so hard he flinched away from her with a muttered curse. No other sound broke the strung-tight silence of the room. Trina swore she could hear the snow melting in the windowsills. The vampires probably could.

This was not, everyone save Lanny seemed to grasp—and he likely did, too, but he’d never been one for awkward quiet spells—, remotely similar to the standoff Trina and Nikita had held on the hill an hour ago. Not two family members bitching at each other over inclusion and exclusion. It was an old-school power struggle, a war for supremacy over not simply a family, but a potential army. Four of the people in this room held royal titles. One was the last tsarevich of Russia. One was not only a prince, but the son of one of Rome’s original founders. It didn’t much matter that Nik was a vampire; he’d been a civilian, unremarkable, without a drop of noble blood, forced into the Cheka to save his own royalist skin. By rank alone, he shouldn’t have been considered for a leadership role.

But she knew that everyone in this room had looked at him on more than one occasion to lead them. That when push came to shove, it was his coldness, his history, his brutal efficiency, that they all needed as head of the pack.

Even Val knew it.

But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t want to draw swords and fight him to the death on principle. He was Dracula’s brother, after all. 

Amelia was already up and moving about the chamber, silk robe belted tight against the morning chill, slipper-shod feet slapping quickly across the floor as she retrieved the fireplace poker and knelt to stoke the coals in the hearth.

“No, allow me,” Cassius said, and hurried forward to deposit the breakfast tray on the table in front of the sofa. “Amelia.” There was a pleading note in his voice, one he’d never heard leave his own lips before. It startled him so badly that he tripped on the edge of the rug and nearly lost his balance.

Amelia added fresh pieces of split wood from the leather sling beside the mantel and pulled the grate closed. She stood, brushing bark and dirt off her hands, and sent him an amused look. “Did you hurt yourself?”

“No,” he said, face warm. “I was going to build the fire back up when I arrived. I didn’t expect you to be awake this early.”

“I couldn’t sleep,” she said, and folded her arms tight across her middle. Then she snorted. “Besides: I’m used to war camp hours. Do you really think me a slugabed?”

“Of course not. But I thought, after so long on the march, in bed rolls and cots, you might be in desperate need of a good night’s sleep somewhere warm and safe.”

“Safe?”

“Warm and comfortable at least.”

“Did you sleep well when you were my prisoner?” she challenged.

“At times, yes.” When her brows lifted in surprise, he said, “I was more afraid of being returned than of being killed. Whatever my fate, I took rest when I could.”

Her lips compressed, and twitched to the side, as though unhappy with his answer.

“I’ve not known freedom. Not ever. This is more of an adjustment for you, my lady.”