Aliens, menages and winged woman...

It feels like ages since I had a SFR release (checks notes...it has been ages). This release is also an MMF romance (and it's been a long time since I released one of them).  

The Precinct One series is set in a fun world where the women have wings and the men don't. I got to re-imagine society--how would it be different and how would it be similar? 

Menages became the norm for relationships and cities are stratified with men on the lower levels and women on the upper and everyone meeting in the middle for...er...a good time ;) 

There are no humans as it takes place entirely on an alien planet, so if you want to escape Earth for a bit you might like the politics of Velli for a change. You can pre-order HERE and get it 3 days early (22 Feb instead of 25 Feb) 

Severed

Halle Ish, one of Velli’s elite police Arrows, is shot down during a Precinct One riot. Wounded and unable to fly, she tries to hide and avoid capture, knowing that if she is found by the razor gangs or Clipper Sect they will sever her wings. She needs to get out of Precinct One.

Avin Lent was once a promising medical student, but he started sniffing Mumble to beat the stress and is now the doctor to one of the biggest gangs in Precinct One—while not part of the Clipper Sect, they are just as dangerous. He knows he is only as useful as his next surgery and they would have no qualms about killing him. Only Jarro is keeping him safe.

Jarro Coblic is deep under cover and has been for a year. Immersed in the gang, he suspects his hands will never be clean again. When he finds the wounded Arrow, he knows he can’t turn her over even though everyone is looking for her. With his lover’s help, they hide her and heal her wing. All the while, falling for her. He prays Avin will not crumble and reveal their secret as Jarro tries to figure out a way to get them all out of Precinct One before the Sect and the gangs bring the full wrath of Velli on Precinct One. Tearing the place down can’t come soon enough, but there will be blood before the slate can be washed clean.

Why do I do this to myself?

Every time, I get part way through a book and ask myself that question. Because, man, do I like making life difficult, not just for my characters, but for me.

Thing is, I like a challenge so with each new book or story, I set myself one. Try this technique, or that way of writing. Try something I’ve never tried before. Only this time, I didn’t set myself the challenge, at least not consciously. My characters did it for me. I think they’d heard how cruel I am to my characters and decided on a bit of cruelty back.

And what challenge did they set me? Well my hero hasn’t spoken a word in eight years. Then he meets the heroine (for the second time, the first is the last time he spoke) and he might speak then, in fact he tries to. Only…they don’t speak the same language, not more than a couple of words anyway. And I have to show how and why they fall in love. Without them speaking to each other….

The love scenes were even more of a challenge! But I think I managed it, and I suppose that the underlying theme (or one of them) then became ‘Actions speak louder than words’. Because without speech to fall back on to show how they fall in love, it was all down to what they do, for each other and themselves. As challenges go, I think it went quite well, and I certainly learned a lot, and hopefully made it a good read too!

Anyway, my Viking and his Saxon lady are now available from Carina. It’s not strictly fantasy, which this blog is all about, but my Viking, being a Norseman in 844 Norway, utterly believes in magic, so it counts! :D

Here’s the blurb:

Viking raiders destroyed Wilda’s home. She witnessed the murder of her mother and would have been killed herself if it weren’t for the Viking boy Einar, who saved her from his ruthless brother. The blood and murder left Wilda cold and shorn of feeling.

Eight years later, the heathens return for Wilda. As a captive in the Viking village, she finds protection and silent comfort in the man who once gallantly saved her.

Einar has been cursed to silence by his brother. With the dark net of his brother’s power cast over their village, silence is a small price to pay for his family’s safety. But Einar is immediately drawn to Wilda, and the need to protect her from his brother awakens his Viking courage. Can Einar break his brother’s curse in time to save the village and the woman he loves?

the Viking's Sacrifice is available from Carina Press, Amazon, Barnes and Noble and all good e book stores.

You can find out more about Julia Knight, her books and reviews, here, or follow her on twitter @Knight_Julia

Head Games

Recently, I started editing a book I wrote a number of years ago. I must say it was a little scary re-reading my early writing. I alternated between cringing and being pleasantly surprised. On the upside, after revisiting my old work I was able to see how I've grown as a writer.  I'm going to invest some time and hopefully make it fit for public viewing eventually. However, the one thing that hasn't changed in all this time is my love of writing paranormal stories. 

I love having the freedom to create my own world and make up my own rules. I love mixing reality and science with the seemingly impossible. As a reader I enjoy being drawn into strange new worlds whether they be just a few degrees off normal or a land far, far away. Getting swept up in exploring the mythology that another author has created is part of the fun. With the popularity of books like Twilight and the Sookie Stackhouse series, I'm clearly not the only one enamored of this genre.  For that matter the fact that you're reading this post here at Here Be Magic  means I'm obviously not the only one in love with paranormal romance. However, as much as I enjoy a sexy shape shifter or dark and brooding vampire, there is one thing I like better. 

I love stories about people with psychic abilities. Precognition, telekenesis, pyrokineses, whatever, I find all of it fascinating. I can't tell you how many times I reread Linda Howard's Dream Man or rewatched Firestarter or episodes of The Dead Zone. I figure the reason I enjoy stories about psychics so much is because they appeal both to my creative side as well as my inner science geek. The idea that there are amazing abilities hidden deep within untapped areas of the human brain is a cool concept. It gives me all types of inspiration. Prime example, one of my current WIPs involves a character with telekinetic abilities. He gets upset and things start flying around the room. I'm having fun writing it especially now that I'm getting into the action of the story and he'll get to use this ability to defend himself. Now that I've shown you mine, it's your turn.  

What kind of paranormal stories do you like?  

Who is on your must read list?  

~Rayna

When in the Old West…

A funny thing happened on the way to publication of my upcoming steampunk/alt-history romance Badlands. The biggest one? It actually became a steampunk/alt-history novella.

When I first envisioned it, the story was a space western. Somewhere I still have all the initial background for the planets and the history and the politics. Then I started writing, and I discovered that I made the “world” too big. My crew had to hit multiple planets for the storyline to work and I never felt like I did any of them justice. Plus I felt my characters got lost in the shuffle.

So I shelved it.

But I couldn’t stop thinking about how much I loved the basic storyline, and how much I loved Ever (the heroine). So after letting it sit for a couple months, I decided to take another crack at the story…as a steampunk. When I made the shift, I didn’t realize quite how much would have to change as a result.

The setting was a given, and it was the most simple change. I knew where Ever was going to come from and quickly figured out how to make the society similar to how I had originally envisioned it (with minor tweaks). But in order for that to work, I had to re-examine the political arena. As soon as I realized that America needed to be divided in more significant ways, that moved along smoothly.

So…the big stuff was easy enough. Then I tried to start writing. I never considered changing Ever’s name or appearance. The name fit her too well and I didn’t want every woman in this world to wear corsets and bustle skirts. I wanted her as wild and untamed as the land she grew up in. And since it was a new nation with its own societal rules, I could get away with it.

Not so with everyone else. Not only did I have to severely trim my character list (certain roles no longer made sense on a dirigible instead of a spaceship), but all of them needed new names too. So out went all my cool, wacky, original names, and out came websites with 19^th century monikers. As an author who has an obsession with names fitting characters, this was a big challenge since in my mind all of them fit their old names (in fact one I still think of as “Stone”).

Names took up far more time than they should have…and then I realized the gender of a key character had to change as it wouldn’t work historically to have them as female. It was a major *head-desk* moment. And then I had to think about fashion and character histories that actually, you know, fit history (I was changing many things but still wanted it to feel familiar to readers).

In the end, the story still dictated everything. I just had to work around the genre and time period a bit. It makes me wonder though, how many readers would have cringed at anachronistic names (particularly for the men: Brendan and Stone)? Would a female in a position of power in the late 19^th century US have made you roll your eyes and throw the book?

As the author, it mattered to me, but basically, how much does this stuff matter to a reader?

I am a Magician

I am a Magician.

As you read this, I am looking across a room full of virtual strangers. I will speak a two-word invocation—and each and every one of them will go down on all fours and stick their butts in the air.

All week we’ve been debating in this country the power of words. From the role of rhetoric in the tragic shootings near my old grocery store in Tucson, to the role a mother’s words play in crafting her child’s future, we ask, “Is the speaker responsible for how his speech influence the actions of others?”

My first reaction is, "Well, duh. That's the whole POINT of language." My more reasoned, analytical conclusion is still a limited “Yes.”  Sure I’ve been misread. I’ve been misunderstood. I’ve been mistaken (and spread my error like a disease to others). And yet, when I ask someone to please pass me the butter, he generally does.

Language is magic. We use it to change the minds and behaviors of others. We want them to love us. We want them to serve us. We want them to leave us. We want them to fear us.  We want them to pass the butter. We want them to stick their butts in the air.

Words cross time and unfathomable distances—my signature has gone to Mars, but I certainly never will. The wishes of a dead woman written in a will have power and authority far beyond the requests she made when she was alive.

People I’ve never met are emailing me that they’ve begun talking to inanimate objects in their house and yard since they’ve read Stone Kissed (in which the statues talk). Did I anticipate or intend such an effect? No. But I’ve changed their behavior, nevertheless.

In my faith tradition, words go beyond a magic tool or weapon we wield. I’ve been taught, quite simply, “…the word was God.” It doesn’t get much more powerful than that.

So I write romance. If I’m going to put ideas in people’s heads, I want them to be good ones. I want to convince someone (anyone, everyone) we are each worthy of and able to find love, in spite of the most horrible things that happen to us. Love survives and triumphs in the face of everything from abandonment to the zombie apocalypse.

Through romance novels, I sneak into that space just over your left ear and secretly sway you to my way perspective. Through the stealthy application of romantic fiction, I will change the world.

I don’t think that’s unreasonable. Do you?

And can you guess my magic phrase?