Saturday, March 30, 2013

Cover Reveal + Giveaway: Of Silver and Beasts by Trisha Wolfe

Of Silver and Beasts (A Goddess Wars Novel)
Release Date: June 1, 2013
Genre: New Adult Dark Fantasy
Cover Reveal Organized by: YA Bound
Cover Designed by: Steven Novak



Summary from Goodreads:
In the sand-covered queendom of Cavan, the goddess once saved a young Kaliope’s life, preventing the mercury her father attempted to hide in her blood from reaching her heart. Now, a cybernetic clamp filters it, but the silver streaks swirling faintly beneath her skin are a constant reminder that she’s different.When nineteen- year-old Kaliope is chosen as head of the Nactue Guard, she becomes the sworn protector to her empress.

 In the midst of an invasion on a neighboring land, Kaliope is placed in charge of guarding Prince Caben, the last heir to his kingdom. But when they’re attacked by the feared Otherworlders, Caben and Kaliope are abducted and taken below to a realm where they must fight for their life in a caged arena.

Kaliope struggles to protect her princely charge, keeping him and herself alive while battling inhumanly opponents, and trying to save the stolen, sacred relic that will restore her empress’s life force and all of Cavan. And if she can somehow awaken the goddess within her, she may save what’s most important.


I open my mouth to say something comforting, but I’m unsure of what. In this moment, I’m reminded that I know little about him. Other than the sarcasm and desire to understand nothing of my queendom, he hasn’t allowed me past the surface. But then, I have my own walls, hiding things I’d never want him or any other to know. And I understand that need to hide them. You can’t trust anyone. “Caben…” I start, but still can’t find the right words. He lowers his hand from his face, never taking his eyes off the glinting water top. “You’re right,” he finally says. “Let’s find the access to Lilly’s section.” A hollow pang hits my chest, and I’m not sure why. Something in his voice sounds lost, broken. I imagine the gears around my heart spinning faster, trying to keep up with my racing heart. When he sidesteps me, I reach out and grab his arm. “Caben, I didn’t mean—” “It’s fine, Kal,” he snaps. “We have work to do.” “No, I’ve said something to offend you.” I drop my hand, but keep close to him, not allowing him to leave my side. Goddess, trying to understand the male brain is harder than anything in protector training. I’ve heard people say that you have to tip-toe around a woman’s emotions, but a man’s ego is every bit as fragile, if not more so. He releases a heavy breath through his nose and walks back to the pool. He sits down along the edge and rolls up his pants, then slips off his boots. “I honestly don’t think Bax or his goons will be returning tonight.” He sinks his bare feet into the water and sighs. Glancing at the back of the cave, I plant my hands on my hips. We don’t have time for indulgencies, but the prince is still my charge. If it were my empress, I’d give her anything she’d ask for. Allow her as much time as she needed to collect herself. I have to watch over his mental state as well as protect him, so I try to push the pending need to find Lilly aside and sit down next to him. “Here,” he says, turning his hand out near my crossed feet. “You have to feel this.” A smile tugs at the corner of my mouth. “I can remove my own—” “Have you never been pampered a day in your life?” he asks, lifting an eyebrow. “I know that the Nactue are fierce and will put a hurt on any man for touching them. But try to relax.” “Is that the rumor in Perinya?” “What?” I bite my lip, suddenly regretting my blurt. “Nothing. Never mind.” From the corner of my eye, I see his lips pucker into a pinched smile, as if he’s trying not to. “Ah,” he says, like he’s made some great universal connection. “Well, there are many whisperings about the Nactue. Some I dare not repeat for fear I’d leave here missing a limb, but that’s one, yes.” He takes my booted foot and begins to unlace it. “I’ve heard that the empress’s protectors are untouchable—forbidden to give themselves to men. And that they’ll snap a man’s neck just for making an advance.” My mouth drops open. Appalled, I counter, “That’s not true.” “All right,” he says, as if he hasn’t just insulted my very existence. “It’s only rumors. Things men jaw about in pubs. The unattainable woman is a fantasy, Kal. Don’t be offended.” “Unattainable?” I grit my teeth, trying to maintain my composure. “Tell me, prince. Do men in your country just go around bedding every woman they can in order to keep them compliant?” I shake my head. “If their fantasy is a woman that would have nothing to do with them, it seems to me it’s their way of feeding their egos after being rejected.” His eyes widen. “No! How does your brain come up with these—” He bites off his words, his lips thin as he presses them together. “Look, it was a joke.” I nod, many times. “Another joke. I’m glad that our hard work and sacrifice is amusing to the men of Perinya.” Caben lets out another sigh and slowly pulls off my boot. His warm fingers skim my calf as he inches up my pant leg. “Just stick your foot in,” he says, then adds lower, “while I stick mine in my mouth.” Unexpectedly, I laugh. “At least it’s now clean,” I say. “Would you like some help getting it to your face?”

Open to everyone!
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Friday, March 29, 2013

Giveaway Winners Announced!


Thank you so much to everyone who entered the the following giveaways:


Both winners get to choose one book from the pile found here:


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Congrats to you both! :) I will be e-mailing you each very soon. 






Congrats Kai! I will be e-mailing you as well very soon.


Thank you again to everyone who entered. Welcome all new followers! *waves*  I ❤ my readers, old and new! You all are what make blogging so much fun for me.

 Looking for another giveaway here to enter? Check out the tab above labeled "Current Giveaways".


Thursday, March 28, 2013

Grimm Diaries by Cameron Jace Release Day Blitz Excerpt + Giveaway!


Presenting...

Grimm Diaries Release Day Blitz

 Hosted by:

The Grimm Diaries, Volume 11-14
Grimm Diaries by Cameron Jace 
Prequels 11-14 
Publication date: March 28th 2013 
Genre: YA Fantasy/Fairy Tale


10.5) Happy Valentine’s Slay by Wee Willy Winkie The real Sandman Grimm sheds a light on what happened in Jawigi, and tells about how some of the teens in Sorrow spend their Valentine’s Day.

11) Children of Hamlin by the Devil The Devil tells the story of the Piper of Hamlin, who he really is, the historical events he witnessed, and his relationship to Ladle Rat. Most of all, why they call him the Black Death.

12) Tooth & Nail & Fairy Tale by Jack Madly Jack Madly stole a sack full of baby teeth from Bluebeard’s enchanted castle, which reminds him of when he first met the Tooth Fairy when he was a child; a memory he wishes to forget.

13) Ember in the Wind by the Little Match Girl All the Little Match Girl wants is to sell her matches so she uses the money to eat and find  shelter from the cold. But no one in the cruel city of crowded London helps her. Eventually, she learns something about who she really is, and it changes her life forever.

14) Jar of Hearts by the Queen of Sorrow The Queen of Sorrow, still trapped in the Dreamworld summons Cassandra, the fortuneteller, to ask her about the identities of Lost Seven. The problem with Cassandra is that she’s cursed that her predictions will never be believed. The Queen is still determined to believe her, but it will cost more than she can bargain for.

SALE: The first and second bundle will be 0.99 each from the 28th until the 31st.
Purchase: HERE & HERE


Excerpt from Snow White Blood Red


Dear Wilhelm Carl Grimm,


She is not that giddy, naïve, and helpless princess she pretends to be. Please don’t let her fool you with her innocence if you see her sing to the birds in the forest. Resist her charm from bringing joyful tears to your eyes, and shield yourself from her devious beauty before she deceives you into wanting to kiss her awake. It'll  be a kiss of death. Your death. That’s how she fooled the Huntsman, Prince Charming, and me, her birth mother.
I still remember the original script of the fairy tale, the one you wrote in 1812. It clearly stated that she was my own flesh and blood daughter. I don’t have the slightest idea why you altered it fifty years later.
What was the point of turning me into an evil, narcissistic, and heartless stepmother, blinded by jealousy and envy of the young princess?
For years, I have been looking forward to telling you the truth about her, but you were impossible to reach.
I am glad I found your brother, Jacob. He told me that you wanted to tone the stories down so children could sleep better at night, instead of having nightmares about the Queen who sought to eat her daughter’s heart and liver.
Shame on you, Wilhelm.
You, of all authors, knew why I wanted to kill her. My actions were justified. I was trying to save my kingdom from her wrath, before everything we loved was destined to an end. The same way you had to rewrite the true fairytales after cursing us, so the War of Sorrows would end forever after.
Night after night, and year after year, parents fed their children false bedtime stories, until your lies grew into inescapable memories. Your happily ever after lies, Wilhelm, shaped the so called fairy tale world.
I wondered why you didn’t burn the original scripts, instead of rewriting them. You must have figured out that sooner or later someone would dig up the truth and expose you. Altering it was the smarter solution. You let children believe that the bites were resurrecting kisses, and that torturing glass coffins were made for sleeping beauties, waiting for a prince to come and kiss them awake.
A wise man once said that the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he was someone else. You did the same with us, Wilhelm. You turned us into pastiches of the immortals that we really are, and made it harder for us if wanted to persuade the world otherwise.
I know that you did it to save us from her. And I appreciate how you concealed our real names, or we would have ended up like Rumpelstiltskin, tortured by those who knew of his real name.
But sometimes, I can’t help but wonder why no one ever questioned why I was called the Evil Queen, and why I was never given a real name in the books.
Was I so superficial to the world, so stereotypical and mundane? Why was I treated as if I were the monster of the week?
You know what I think? I think that the world never got the time to hate me. It just wanted to hate me long before it met me.
If I tell those who detest me about the true nature of their little princess, would they ever care about me half as much as they care about her?
I know that deep inside, they adore me. They like the way I talk, walk, dress, and even the way I kill.
They are just afraid to admit how much they love me. I am the Snow White Queen, strong enough that I don’t need anyone’s pity or love, because I am loved by the greatest and most majestic heart in the world:
Mine.


Open internationally! For my blog readers only.


About The Author: Cameron Jace

Find Cameron @ Website | Goodreads | Facebook | Twitter

Wonderlander, Neverlander, Unicorn-chaser, enchanter, musician, survived a coma, & totally awesome. Sometimes I tell stories. Always luv the little monsters. I write young adult paranormal romance, urban fantasy, and science fiction mostly. The Grimm Diaries series is a seven book saga that deals with retellings of fairy tales from a young adult POV - it connects most of the fairy tales together and claims to be the truth about fairy tales.  I live in San Fransisco and seriously think circles are way cooler than triangles.

Skeleton Key Guild by M.J. Fletcher Cover Reveal & Giveaway!

Skeleton Key Guild by M.J. Fletcher
Release: May 2013
Genre: Young Adult, Urban Fantasy, Steampunk, Paranormal

Her parents dead, her sister missing, and those she loves branded traitors to the Old Kind... Chloe Masters is on the run.

To fulfill a parent’s dying wish she will do anything to save the sister she has never met. Can she learn the secrets of the Artifacts before it’s too late? Surrounded by her friends; Slade, Edgar, Jess, Val and the man she loves James Nightshade, Chloe has never had so much to live for... but will her enemies let her?

Reviews about The Doorknob Society


I am SO GLAD that I said I’d review the 
book!! It had me interested from the first 
chapter, and HOOKED shortly after that!” 
Puretextuality.com 

Let me start by saying that I'm a pretty picky 
reader. I have to be captured by a story almost 
immediately in order to continue reading. Well, I 
was captured by The Doorknob Society...and I 
am hooked!” Amazon 

I couldn't put it down and read straight 
through and was so mad at myself for finishing 
it. I. CAN. NOT. WAIT. FOR. THE. NEXT. 
BOOK!” Goodreads 



Other books in the series...




About M.J. Fletcher
MJ Fletcher is the creator of the comic book series Adam Zero: The Last Man of Earth published by Ronin Studios. He’s also been published in Hope: The Hero Initiative and Digital Webbing Presents. The Doorknob Society series is his first book series and he’s thrilled about it. He lives near the beach with his wife, daughter, and dog.


The Doorknob Society Book Trailer






Win an ebook copy of the first in the series, The Doorknob Society! Open International! 


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Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Waiting on Wednesday # 10 / Life's a Witch


"Waiting on Wednesday" is a weekly event, hosted by Jill @ Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.


I am waiting on...




Life's a Witch (Life's a Witch, #2)
Life's a Witch (Life's a Witch #2)
by Brittany Geragotelis
Hardcover, 304 pages
Expected publication: July 9th 2013 by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers 


Add on Goodreads / Preorder


This witch lives a charmed life…


Hadley’s the envy of every girl—and the desire of every guy. But being at the top of the social pyramid has its drawbacks. Hadley’s always kept her frenemies close and her secrets closer—one big secret in particular. Her key to magically having it all is that she’s an actual witch.


As a descendant of the first woman executed in the Salem Witch Trials, Hadley understands the consequences if her secret gets out. The only ones who know about her powers are members of her coven—other kids and parents who, like Hadley’s own family, have magic in their blood. But there’s no way to cover up an attack that causes every adult in the coven to vanish. All the evidence points to an age-old rival coven as the culprit. Now it’s up to Hadley to lead the young witches against the Parrishables and to rescue their missing parents. At the same time, she’s caught up in her feelings for a mysterious guy named Asher, who has plenty of secrets of his own. With everything at stake, can Hadley trust her magic—and her heart?


Wyatt needs time to reflect or, better yet, forget about what happened to his best friend, Tyler. That’s why he’s been shipped off to the Adirondacks in the dead of winter to live with the oldest lady in town. Either that, or no one he knows ever wants to see him again.

Dani disappeared seventeen years ago without a trace, but she left behind a journal that’s never been read, not even by her overbearing mother…until now.


So what book are YOU waiting on this Wednesday? 

Leave me a comment below. If you have a blog leave me your link to your WOW post. :)


Thank you for stopping by.


Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Review: The Grimm Chronicles vol. 1 by Isabella Fontaine & Ken Brosky

The Grimm Chronicles, Vol. 1
Title: The Grimm Chronicles vol. 1
Authors: Isabella Fontaine & Ken Brosky
Number of Pages: 386
Published:  August 3rd 2012 by Createspace
Source: Authors / Paperback
Genre: Fantasy > Fairy Tale Retellings
Reading Level: Young Adult


Add on Goodreads 
Purchase @ Amazon / B&N / 
The Book Depository



200 years ago, the Brothers Grimm unleashed their stories upon the world. Literally. Now the characters of the Grimms’ stories walk among us. With every day that passes, they grow more evil. They are the Corrupted, and only a hero can stop them.

For 18-year-old Alice Goodenough, that means taking precious time off from her summer vacation. In addition to volunteering at the local library, Alice must stop the Corrupted who are now actively hunting her down. With the help of her magic pen and her trusty rabbit friend, the world has suddenly gotten a lot more complex. The Corrupted are everywhere, and only Alice can see them for what they truly are.


This book contains the first 3 episodes of the critically acclaimed series: 



Episode 1: Prince Charming Must Die!


Episode 2: Happily Never After

Episode 3: Revenge of the Castle Cats


Like most children we grew up hearing fairy tales read by our Mom or Dad or other family. We wish we could jump into stories like Cinderella or Snow White and be saved by the handsome prince. Deep down we believed they were real and someday our prince will come. But what if the very stories we love to read are in fact REAL! 

Once upon a Time.... there was a girl named Alice. Alice loves to read, she volunteers at her local library, and is dating a "to good to be true" boy name Edward. Life if good. On her first day volunteering at the library she is asked to re-shelve books. While doing so, Alice comes upon a very old and tattered looking book with the author, Grimm. She is temped to just take a peak at what lies inside. While reading she is suddenly cut by a part of the book that looks like it has been glued together many years ago. To her surprise, Alice find a silver pen and a old note stuff between the pages. When Alice reads the note she find out it has been addressed to her. *insert shocked face here* 

The message: 
 Alice, Go to the far wall. Use the pen to draw a door. Don't forget to draw a doorknob!

Now Alice must choose whether she does what the note says or turns around and leaves. Her choice will change her life forever! 

Soon Alice learns that the characters in The Grimm fairy tales are in fact real and they walk among us. But this is a whole new kind of story....one where these once kind and harmless characters are PURE EVIL. 

Now the world needs a hero, someone who can stop them from taking over. 

.ALICE!


The Grimm Chronicles Vol.1  is a brilliant read. Like most of you I too love fairy tales. I grew up reading ones like Cinderella, Snow White and the Seven dwarfs, Rumpelstiltskin and many more. This book took me back to when I was a child and truly believed it fairy tale magic. What really got me into the book was the idea of these sweet and kind fairy tale characters also have a dark side. You learn that somehow (I wont say) they make their way into our world and  soon wanting to take over. Year by year they become more and more mean and evil. It was so interesting to read The Grimm tales being told this way. I found Alice to be a very strong lead character in the book. She was very likable and down to earth. The books pacing was fast and easy to read. Middle-Grade and YA readers are most suited for this book but I think adults will love it as well. (I know I did)  The one thing that didn't go over well with me is how thick the book is and how long the story was. If you like a good chucker then this book would be a good choice but for those who don't like a long story then this book may not be what your looking for. Although the story reads quite fast and captured your attention most of the way through....or it did for me.

I look forward to reading the next installment in The Grimm Chronicles. I can't wait to see what happens next to Alice....as she saves the world one fairy tale creature at a time.


 Totally Awesome! I loved it, would read again.


Visit the author and find out more about this series @ Website | Facebook

Monday, March 25, 2013

Silver Hollow by Jennifer Silverwood | Except + Guest Post + Giveaway!


WELCOME to the Silver Hollow by Jennifer Silverwood blog tour hosted by Bewitching Book Tours.

I have a awesome guest post from the author to share with you all and of course of great giveaway for some free goodies. ;) Sit back and relax and enjoy this post.
                                                                   






Silver Hollow by Jennifer Silverwood
Genre: Paranormal Romance/ Fantasy
Romance/ Chick-lit
Publisher: SilverWoodSketches
ISBN: 1481000144
Number of pages: 322
Cover Artist: Najla Qamber

Amie Wentworth writes paranormal romances, not because she is looking for a
degree in ectoplasm, but because she’s got bills to pay. Ever since her parents’ car
crash, she has been led a reclusive life and trusted books more than people. Not
even a letter from her long-lost uncle, begging her to visit, gives Amie incentive
for anything other than ire – until she is stabbed in an alley and brought back to life
by a mysterious stranger.

After crossing the Atlantic to her father’s homeland, Amie is dragged into the very
sort of tale she is used to selling. Silver Hollow is a place of ancient traditions and
supernatural dangers, where everything is the opposite of what it seems and few
escape sane.

To make matters worse, the man who saved her life keeps turning up and her
would-be-murderer is still at large.

But when she comes face to face with the ugly truth, will she too be sucked into
her father’s madness? Or will she discover that madness is just another name for
honesty?

Purchase @ Paperback | Kindle | Smashwords | B&N

The hour before dawn found Amie pulling her car round the back alley. Through the gloom and decades-buried waste behind Pat’s Delights was a narrow strip leading to the back staircase leading up to her flat.
The stranger’s face came unbidden to her as she gathered her things and moved her weary legs. Black eyes set deeply in a shadow-drenched face haunted her, eyes which seemed to accuse and praise, sift and wonder. Now that she knew, she realized she must have seen him before today, maybe even in the past she had tried to forget.
The faded yellowing parchment marked with heavy black ink, with words too absurd to be true, flashed in her mind. Clutching the key hidden in her jeans pockets while digging through her purse for her keys, she remembered Uncle Henry’s letter. Mulling over the words, she once again recalled how angry she had been ten years ago after reading his first note. So what the cops were uncertain how the accident had happened. So what her father had known some powerful people. Amie had been primped and pushed into the upper-class social sphere through her teens and knew how to handle that sort. She could take care of herself just like she always had. She would tear up the letters and the tickets tonight. The twins and James were her family now.
As she placed her shoe upon the first rickety metal step, two thick and powerful hands grabbed her in the same moment.
It happened so quickly she forgot to scream. Dropping her purse she struggled, kicked and bucked against the crazy person lifting her and pulling her deeper into the shadows of the alley. And the harder she struggled the tighter his choking embrace became against her chest.
She thought at last to cry out, only to feel her face being smashed against a brick wall. She gasped as the figure suddenly pushed her aside, out of his embrace. Amie stumbled back and nearly tripping over a metal pipe. She righted herself only to come face-to-face with the black-masked figure. His brilliant blue eyes blazed into hers, now filled with unmistakable purpose. Too late she realized his intentions as a sickeningly cool object was plunged into her chest and pulled quickly out again.
Her vision swam, then blurred as she slumped against the trash-littered concrete. Her mind began to fade into an ever-deepening sleep though her eyes watched on. The black-garbed man was fighting someone else. Unmasked, this guy was taller, broader in the shoulders than her murderer and wrought by fury.
Pain…she had not known the meaning of the word before now and even this too was fading into the deep sleep. The further she fell the less sense the scene before her made. Her mind didn’t believe that the tall man had really tossed her attacker five feet into the air over his shoulder and into the brick, or a strange light and energy crackled in the suddenly luminous alley.
She was too afraid to hope when a pair of warm hands cradled her in a firm embrace. He pulled her from the muck and fixed his dark eyes on her. Obsidian-cut eyes, familiar eyes, pierced through her gaze and reached deeper. His face, once so indiscernible it could be called plain, was now twisted as though in agony. Even though she was slipping, falling into a calm quiet darkness, he refused to let her go. His hand moved from her neck to her cheek with the faintest touch. He pushed past and clasped hold of something tearing deep inside of her then. The black of his irises gave way to a strange mix of blue and green flecks gleaming in their depths. She saw…
Fields of brilliant emerald grass and a sun filled with more colors than she knew to name.
Darkness and a dirty cell, where heavy fists punctuated his pain.
Time beyond counting became a lifetime lost.
A green-eyed dark-haired beauty bathed in sunlight stretched out her hand to him.
Someone was screaming. Amie frowned as the woman’s cries grew louder. Pain spiked up in her chest as her lungs constricted and her heart was ripped apart then reformed. The woman’s screams died when she took a breath and realized the voice was hers.
She blinked.
And then she was lying within the narrow strip between two brick buildings, alone.


Beginnings & Sisterhoods

I remember my dad once telling me, every time he performed a piano piece in front of an audience, that he never worried about the middle part as much as the end or beginning. Because what’s important is that you begin and end well, even if you mess up somewhere along the way. And if you play your cards right, you can fool the audience into thinking it was meant to be played that way.
Now obviously writing books and playing music are two completely different things, but they’re not as separate as people might think. Everyone wants to know what the author listened to while writing their books, and if they don’t want to at least they’d be interested in finding out. And the way we throw ourselves into crafting a finely polished, finished “piece,” is the same way a musician gives their lives daily to master their instrument and those notes.
I started Silver Hollow with a book within a book. Ever since The Neverending Story, I’ve loved the idea of worlds within worlds, especially worlds within books. But there was a time when I played around with a couple different beginnings to this story. After consulting my life long betas, the twins, I decided to stick with what you can see now.
If you’ve been following this tour, then you might already know how much I owe Silver Hollow to the two ladies who helped inspire the story in the first place. I wrote for them as much as me growing up. Partly because we grew up in the country and there was nothing more entertaining to do, and mostly because we honestly loved working on our books together.
Our brainstorming sessions in the past often sounded something like this:
Faye: Think Jo needs to die!
Jo: I think you do!
Faye: I can’t, I’m fading with the wind!
Jo: Whatever! I’ll pull you underneath the sea so the shark dwellers can feed on your body down there!
You get the gist. Another thing that changed during the big overhaul transformation with Allison (another bestie who I couldn’t have finished this project without! She pretty much helped me write the second draft) were the flashbacks.
Originally they were flashbacks to Amie’s time with her parents and growing up with the twins. I hated scrapping them for plot purposes, but it had to be done. And because y’all have been so awesome and I like sharing secret things, here they are for your viewing pleasure.


Draft 1 Flashback- the sisterhood
Amie’s family had made a holiday of it that summer. It was going to be a slam bang Fourth of July no matter how much her father protested. But if Amie had to hear one more story about how America betrayed its mother nation she might just lose it for real this year.
Jo and Faye helped her convince him in the end, argued that if he hated America so much he wouldn’t have rushed here in the first place.
Low and behold but Drustan Wentworth had the most fun that night. He was laughing and swapping stories with Robert, the twins’ balding cop dad. Their mothers shook their heads over the men’s antics. And while their parents’ backs were turned to the fireworks display on the lake, Amie twirled her sparklers.
So she freaked when Faye jumped in her line of vision, eyes gleaming mischievously, “Hey!”
“Good grief Faye I almost set your hair on fire!” Amie grumbled. Faye was trying to communicate something with her eyes, which as usual came off as hardly subtle. Jerking her head back to the trees behind them finally turned Amie’s vision. Sure enough a flashlight blinked at them once, then twice.
Amie groaned. “Now? We’re about to make smores!” Faye hooked arms and was already dragging her into the forest.
“Come on, if we don’t leave now we won’t have the chance.” And then she went into Mission Impossible mode, jumping behind trees, fingers bent into fake guns. Amie usually joined in. But she was too bitter over the chocolate marshmallow pieces of heaven she was missing out on.
Jo stood up once they reached her hiding spot, flashlight under her chin. “Whahaha!” Amie rolled her eyes but couldn’t help her grin. Jo had the effect of lightening anyone’s bad moods when she wanted. Turning to Faye, “What took you so long beans?!”
Faye held up a hand, currently the latest cool fad apparently. “Whatever! You know I’m working on my ninja skills. I needed the practice.”
Amie interrupted the brewing argument, “Where are we going that’s so great y’all took me away from my chocolate?”
Faye stopped them at the middle of an empty glade. Fireworks crackled in the distance. Through the uppermost branches they could still see a shower of lights. Hands braced on Amie’s shoulders, the taller twin rushed to a dark heap on the ground. “First you need one of these!” When she twirled back around three nets were in her hands.
Amie stared, “We’re catching butterflies? Are you kidding me? It’s almost midnight!”
Jo jumped up and down, clearly on another sugar high and blew a pink bubble the size of her fist. “Yeah beans!”
“No!” Faye argued. “Fireflies. So take one and wait for it.” They sat together in that glade for what felt like an hour to three preteens, and in reality was more like five minutes, before the first blinking lights appeared.
And Amie’s foul mood disappeared the moment not one but dozens of golden lights began to buzz around them. She’d never seen anything like it. It was just like one of father’s stories…magical. They captured fireflies and placed them inside the giant glass jar Jo brought. After poking holes the girls sat in a circle around that jar and made a solemn vow.
“I solemnly swear to always be true to the sisters three…” Amie recited while placing her palm over the two already covering the jar. They all smiled. Thus the secret AJSS club was born.


You’ll be seeing more glimpses behind Amie and the twins’ friendship again in the future. For now, I hope you’ve enjoyed yet another piece of this “making of” expose. I am so thankful that the twins helped me begin well and Silver Hollow wouldn’t have come into being without them. They were there with me in the beginning and I look forward to seeing what life’s adventures hold for us next, Faye and Jo.


About The Author: Jennifer Silverwood

Find Jennifer @ 
Website | Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads

Jennifer Silverwood was raised deep in the heart of Texas and has been spinning yarns a mile high since childhood. In her spare time she reads and writes and tries to sustain her wanderlust, whether it's the Carpathian Mountains in Transylvania, the highlands of Ecuador or a road trip to the next town.


After attending three different universities without managing to square a degree, she decided to the next logical thing; become a writer. Always on the lookout for her next adventure, in print or reality, she dreams of one day proving to the masses that everything really is better in Texas.


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