Congrats to Emma Michaels, winner of last week’s big YA Indie Carnival Anniversary Giveaway. Emma receives 13 indie novels including books 1-3 of the Midnight Guardian series. Nice!
The giveaway was so much fun that we’re having another contest this week. Join the YA Indie Carnival for our Chemistry Contest.
Here’s how it works: Each author in the carnival is posting an excerpt on their site. YOU vote for your fave at http://yaauthorclub.blogspot.com. Just put a comment on the Chemistry Contest post with your vote. Your vote enters you to win a book from me. Well, that’s not exactly true. It enters you to win a book from the author you picked. I’m just doing some wishful thinking.
My excerpt comes from Shadows Rising (Book 4, Midnight Guardian series). For those who vote for me, you’ll get a chance to win an ebook copy of Shadows Rising when it debuts this fall! Plus, for every vote cast in my direction, I’ll post a sneak peek sentence from the new book. How awesome is that?
Excerpt: Shadows Rising
At the end of Midnight Child (Book 3), Broo uses a hypnotic trigger to unlock Colby’s memory. Suddenly the night he spent time traveling with Ann Martin floods back to him.
ANCIENT GREECE, ATHENS, EXACT YEAR UNKNOWN
The damp night air hinted at spring. Roses surrounded them, giving off their strong perfume which forced Colby’s nose to run and eyes to water. He sneezed. Ann shushed him and pulled him behind a large bush of yellows. She parted the leaves, careful not to touch the thorns. From their hiding place they spotted a girl swinging her legs as she sat on a stone bench a short distance away. She couldn’t have been more than five-years-old. Her simple white tunic fluttered gently in the warm breeze, but she paid it no mind. She flung a single rose to the ground. Tear-streamed eyes focused on her index finger.
Ann nudged Colby with her elbow. He turned to see her pointing to another small creature making its way down the entrance path toward the bench. Colby’s mouth dropped open. He had never seen one before. It appeared to be a mogdoc child.
Its claws, though tiny, still looked lethal. Its skin, even though it was blue-green and scaly like any other mogdoc, seemed more vibrant than the ones he had seen prior. Oddly, the creature seemed happy, skipping and jumping as it ran along the path. A tiny pouch looped around its neck bounced up and down against its chest.
When the mogdoc child reached the girl on the bench, Colby nearly leapt from his hiding spot. Ann held him back.
“Just watch,” she whispered. “We can’t interfere.”
Distracted by the scene before them, he hadn’t realized how close Ann was until she spoke. She seemed oblivious to the closeness as well. She had pulled back slightly, but her hand was still on his back, urging him to stay down.
The girl was crying and the mogdoc shushed her gingerly. It appeared to be consoling the girl. It dipped a claw into its pouch and spread the contents, what appeared to be some type of primitive medicine, on the girl’s finger.
To Colby’s amazement, the girl did not run or scream. She sat quietly while the mogdoc rubbed the medicine into her cut. After a few minutes, the girl wiped the tears from her face and hugged, actually hugged, the mogdoc. The kids then skipped into a nearby building.
“How can a mogdoc and a human be friends?” Colby asked.
“This was before,” Ann said, her eyes pleading with him to understand. “Three days from now, the mogdoc will eat the human girl. This story will be told over and over again by the guardians as a warning. Even the youngest mogdoc is manipulative and evil beyond all imagining.”
Her words stirred a memory in him. “I know this story, don’t I? The mogdoc befriended the girl to gain access, healed her… Whoa, that just happened. The mogdoc healed her from the rose thorn to save every drop of blood until the time was right.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “Keira told you this story on the day she gave you the Atlantis token.”
“How could you know that?”
“One day very soon you will tell me,” she smiled as she ran her fingers along his cheek, staring into his curious eyes. “And I will hang on your every word.”
Check out the other indie excerpts (below) and vote at http://yaauthorclub.blogspot.com