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Sue Perkins Author of Dragon Clans

August 13, 2012 / Katie L. Carroll

Today Sue Perkins, author of the Dragon series, is guest posting about her newest YA fantasy Dragon Clans. Welcome, Sue!

Thank you Katie for inviting me to your blog.

My young adult fantasy ‘Dragon Clans’ has been released. It’s the second in the Dragon series, following the first book ‘Dragon Flame’ and with one more to come. The second book continues the tale of the dragons of Nuer who have come to an alliance with the human settlers on the planet.

Nuer is an earth like planet with two continents. The humans settled on one, unaware there are dragons on the other continent. The dragons have their own culture and are divided into four clans. Each clan has its own area, the Fordra have the forest, the Mondra the mountain, the Seadra the sea and the Landra the desert. To the south in a mountainous arid region are the red dragons, the Valdra, outcasts from the other clans and considered to be dangerous rebels.

Sie, an orphaned young woman rescued by the Valdra, is adopted into the clan. She and her new family must convince the other dragons they are no threat and only want to be part of the dragon treaty. The problem is how to convince the other clans when every approach ends in an aggressive response.

I’ve included an excerpt from ‘Dragon Clans’ to wet your appetite. Don’t forget to leave a comment and be in to win an ebook of ‘Dragon Clan’. The winner will be by random draw at the end of the blog tour.

Buy Link: http://tinyurl.com/dragonclans

Webpage: http://www.sueperkinsauthor.com

Excerpt

The waves washed over the boat, swamping the small vessel. Sie huddled in the stern, her knuckles white with cold, hands clamped to the wooden sides. The hood of her cloak had blown back some time ago, allowing the rain to plaster her red hair across her face. She didn’t dare raise her hand to clear her eyes, this would mean letting go of the boat. Clothes soaked with rain clung to her body, and the chill went through to her bones.

What am I doing here?

At the front of the boat her two older brothers struggled to keep them afloat. The crashing waves filled the vessel with water and with food bowls in hand they tried to bail the water back into the sea. Gorva, the eldest, yelled at her to come and help, but Sie couldn’t move for fear. She knew this would mean a beating later, but surviving the present held more importance.

Ever since her parents’ death her life had been miserable. The older brothers had grudgingly provided a home for appearance sake, but they didn’t want her with them. A fifteen-year-old cramped their style. She hated her life in their house as a drudge. If anything went wrong they blamed her, and the rebuke often ended with a smack across the face or worse.

They’d come up with this stupid idea and dragged her along. Dragons lived on the other continent, and they were convinced there would be dragon treasure to steal.

The two idiots hadn’t planned anything, the normal way for their escapades. They’d set off in a boat too small for the journey across the ocean. The food had run out after a few days, and she’d borne the brunt of their anger, catching the blame for everything. Now the storm had descended on them with the sea and rain crashing and pounding their frail craft.

Someone help us, please! We’re in the middle of an ocean in a terrible storm. The boat will sink soon. Please, if you can hear me, I need your help!

Sie knew no one would hear her mental scream. If they did, who would care enough to rescue them? A clap of thunder shook the sky, followed by a lightning flash into the sea. Huge waves crashed across the boat. Her younger brother lost his grip, and Sie heard him cry out as he disappeared overboard.

“No!” Gorva lunged to the side, but his movement made the boat lurch and dip lower, curtseying to the waves. Sie grabbed the sides as the vessel overturned and threw her into the water.

Her cloak tried to keep her beneath the surface, but Sie fought against the drag and rose up for air. Nearby, the upside down boat tossed in the waves, and she swam toward it, grabbing hold of the ridge along the upturned bottom. Once secure, Sie looked round for her brothers, but could see no sign of them. The tumultuous sea and the dark clouds scudding across the sky filled her view.

Elixir Bound and Other Book News

August 10, 2012 / Katie L. Carroll

After receiving so many great comments on my lucid dreams post, I have been planning (and by planning, I mean thinking about in my head, but not writing down a single word) another thoughtful blog post.

Instead (given I have an almost 1-year-old, a full-time job and several part-time ones, and a vacation to get ready for), I present to you this slightly less thoughtful newsy post.

Elixir Bound is up for pre-sale on the MuseItUp website! Feel free to order a million copies (give or take a few) for your reading pleasure. You can also read an excerpt from the beginning of the book.

This weekend I met a young author (and by young, I mean she’s 13 and is already working on her second book!) at a book signing. Kyla LoPresti had a dream about reincarnation that inspired her to write Flashback. She is certainly an inspiration to all writers, young and old!

And finally, on Monday author Sue Perkins will be guest posting about her YA fantasy Dragon Clans book two in her Dragons series.

Enjoy the weekend!

Elixir Bound Excerpt on Muse Blog

July 28, 2012 / Katie L. Carroll

I’m super busy gearing up for the release of Elixir Bound on August 31. Soooo….get ready for a promotional frenzy in late August and continuing into September.

I’ll be sharing excerpts of Elixir Bound; inside info about creating the cover; why I wrote the story in the first place; interviews; writing tips on scenes and characters; writing lesson from The Boy; and who knows what else.

But guess what? You actually don’t have to wait until late August because the frenzy starts today! It just so happens, you can get a sneak peak of Elixir Bound on the MuseItUp blog. And it’s a lip-smacking juicy one!

I’d love to know what you all think. (Unless you don’t like it…then you can kindly keep your terrible opinions to yourself!)

Flying Through Lucid Dreams

July 23, 2012 / Katie L. Carroll

Did you ever have a dream that you realized was a dream? That’s a lucid dream. Did you ever have a dream where you realized you were dreaming and then you were able to manipulate what was going on in the dream? That’s a crazy, awesome lucid dream (no, that’s not a technical term, but it should be).

I’m not even talking about Inception type stuff either (I wish I could do that). It’s just a regular dream, and then Whoa! you realize I’m in a dream and I know it. The subconscious dream become conscious, but you’re still asleep. (You can go from awake directly into a lucid dream, but that’s never happened to me before.)

For me, a lucid dream usually starts when I notice some logical inconsistency. It’s like my brain can’t just let the dream world unfold before me; it has to question it. Right now I can’t even think of a concrete example (even lucid dreams are fickle to remember in a wakeful state), but I know the feeling it gives me. All of a sudden something happens in my dreams that I know can’t happen in real life, and just like that, I’m aware.

And you know what the first thing I almost always do is? Fly! I imagine that says something about my personality, like I have lofty aspirations or I feel I’m in control of my life or something, but really being able to fly is just fun. It’s never a Superman faster-than-a-bullet flying, but more of a floating, gliding flying. I tend to drift up and then down, even landing on the ground at times.

I had a lucid dream the other night, and man was it exhilarating. And not only because I, of course, went for a nice fly. The experience alone of having that kind of power in a world, where you can pretty much do anything you want and physics be damned, is unbelievable.

What kind of dreams have you been having lately?

The Guests Get Creative Again!

July 18, 2012 / Katie L. Carroll

I’ve been remiss not to share the wonderful magnetic poetry that has been languishing on my refrigerator for awhile now. Such creativity needs to be shared with the world. As always, I kept the spaces in between the different magnets and I’ve decided to show line breaks with a slash (or is it a backslash..I always forget the difference).

gray man give s life like dark dream s do burn (as long as it doesn’t burn when you urinate, you’re fine)
good light / some easy / look (I couldn’t tell if the look was actually part of this poem, but it felt like the right closer for this particular piece…forgive me if I’ve overstepped my bounds a mere purveyor of poetry)
genius obsess es / inspiration play s / hard work succe ed s (the ed was cleverly placed over the ss in success)
bake me a beautiful (I love how this one is almost like a fill-in-the-blank…bake me a beautiful cake, a beautiful world, a beautiful life)
chance create s a spark of light / visible between rain and snow fall / never to be experience d after (yes, I know that moment)
blue sky / fruit trick / naked will (that will just had to ruin the party by getting naked)
always another step bird fight (can’t thosestep birds just get along)