Interview Kathryn Troy Author of Dreams of Ice and Shadow
Give a warm welcome to Kathryn Troy, Author of Dreams of Ice and Shadow, release date May 18, 2018!
Pull up a chair, grab a drink of your choice from the cooler, a Chocolate Chip or Peanut Butter cookie from the plate, and let’s find out a little about Kathryn and her Dreams of Ice and Shadow, book 2 of the Frostbite series!
How about a fun word association speed round so people can get to know you a little better?
“I’m always game, let’s do it.
Speed Round (one word only answer): Yep, I know torture for a writer!<evil laugh>
Favorite movie: The Omen
Favorite book: Dracula
Last book read: Twin Peaks: The Final Dossier
Favorite color: Black
Stilettos or flipflops: Stilettos
Coffee or tea: Tea
Ebook or audiobook or paperback: Paperback
Pencil or pen: Pencil
Favorite song: “Devour” – Disturbed
Streak or not: Hmmm…
Favorite dessert: Chocolate
Favorite junk food: French Fries
Favorite thing to do to relax: Play video games
Champagne or gin: Champagne
Paranormal or Historical: I couldn’t possibly
Wonder Woman or Top Model: Wonder Woman
Favorite TV show: Xena: Warrior Princess
Hot or cold: Hot
POV: Third
I’d die if I don’t have: my passport
Review or Not: Review
Tell us a little about Dreams of Ice and Shadow;
Luca has discovered his father’s hideout. He hunts the legendary vampire alone, pushing Katelyn away to safety. But Dracula is not so easily bested. He evades Luca so he can tap into Katelyn’s power—the magic that lies at the heart of Icarya. Luca’s heart sinks as his father draws him further and further from his eternal love.
Across the Great Sea, Katelyn is summoned to the slave city Likhan. After the death of Seht Reza, Likhan teeters toward revolution as her nephew Darien seeks the throne. To help him, Kate must work alongside Alaric, the assassin who will stop at nothing to win her back in Luca’s absence. The dark forces mounting against Darien leave Kate vulnerable to the destructive pull of her elemental nature.
Dreams of Ice and Shadow is the heart-stopping second volume of the Frostbite series, where gothic terrors invade epic fantasy. Sinister, unnatural horrors are unleashed, and Katelyn and Luca’s passions burn brighter than ever as the dangers facing Icarya threaten to separate them forever.
How about a sneak peek between the pages of Dreams of Ice and Shadow?
The Indigo Forest was steeped in shadow as the sun sank, staining the waters beyond the cragged slope leading to Cathair. The canopy of the trees pulled closed, a tightly woven net drawing the darkness into its dense center. There, a shape blacker than the forest’s deepest shadows lurked. Two bright lights ringed with a searing, luminescent red darted between thick trunks. Elongated paws crept through underbrush without the resounding crunch of dried leaves and dead grass. The beast stopped in a small clearing and rested on its powerful haunches. Baring its extended canines, the wolf reached its front paw up to its face. The paw separated into pale, prehensile fingers midair and reached into the mouth of a human face. The menacing canines remained. The lycanthrope’s clear eyes, straight nose, and thick dark brows made him the mirror-image of Luca. Or rather, this visage had been Luca’s inheritance. The sole difference was the cold, calculating countenance that was permanent on the shadow’s face.
He retrieved the crystal orb he had carried in his lupine mouth, examining it carefully. He had taken the orb from an abandoned campfire, trying to uncover its secrets, and the path to wielding the untold power he sensed with every fiber of his undead existence.
Dracula had studied for days and nights without end, searching for the clue that would unlock the magic trapped inside the crystalline sphere. Just as he felt he was nearing a breakthrough, his hideaway had been discovered by his son, born of a human mother, and razed to the ground. Luca had also succeeded in destroying Rene, the only consort Dracula had taken since unwittingly tracking his son across the universe and into the magical realm of Icarya. His seething anger was mitigated by his pride.
Despite the setback, the vampire lord seemed to have stumbled upon the very answer he sought. Before Rene’s house had collapsed, the orb had soaked in blood and grown before his eyes. His piercing gaze dissected the orb now, sifting through its murky contents for an explanation. His pupils caught the impression of a quick, slight movement. He rotated it in his palm, but the center of the orb remained stubbornly obfuscated by a pale cloud of plasma.
Tempting fate, the dark prince brought his index finger to his mouth, puncturing the tip and dropping a small quantity of blood onto the orb. The crimson droplet ran down the curve of the orb, filling in a crease in his palm. A moment’s disappointment was stymied as the line written in blood shrank, pulled into the orb by an unseen force. It took a breath, emitting a sound like ice expanding. Dracula peered again into the milky obscurity. This time, he spied an impossibly small, humanoid form.
Elated, Dracula laid the orb at his feet and pulled a small, sharp dagger out of his singed coat. He dug the point into his hand, feeding the orb a continual stream, eyes gleaming as he watched it grow. Sensing his son’s nearness, he withdrew his blade suddenly. Their fated reunion, the meeting that Dracula had planned with such diligence for millennia, was rapidly approaching. Father would soon be ready to face his formidable son. But not yet. He grabbed the sphere, grown too large for him to close his fist around, and evaporated. The cells of his body transformed into waterlogged air, spreading a thick blanket of fog throughout the forest, looking for refuge.
Buy Link: Amazon
More about the Author:
Kathryn Tory is an historian by day, a novelist and baker by night. Her nonfiction book, The Specter of the Indian: Race, Gender, and Ghosts in American Séances, 1848-1890 was released by SUNY Press in September 2017. So was A Vision in Crimson, the first book in the Frostbite series. Kathryn’s academic expertise in the supernatural and the Gothic inform her fiction at every turn. She lives in New York with hyer husband and two chilluns.
Where to Find Kathryn:
Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/Kathryn-Troy/e/B06XNJNH7Z
Blog: https://ladybathoryscloset.blogspot.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kathryn.troy
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/16571460.Kathryn_Troy
It was wonderful having you with us today. Please feel free to stop by anytime. Good Luck with Dreams of Ice and Shadow and your Frostbite Series!
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Posted in Authors' Secrets Blog and tagged Dark Fantasy, Frostbite Series - Book 2, Kathryn Troy, Paranormal Romance, Vampires by Tena Stetler with comments disabled.
Interview with Laura Bickle Author of Witch Creek
Give a warm welcome to Laura BIckle, author of Witch Creek, second book in The Wildlands Series just released on February 27, 2018! Following Nine of Stars comes the next chapter in Laura Bickle’s critically acclaimed Wildlands series.
Pull up a chair, grab a drink of your choice from the cooler, a Chocolate Chip or Peanut Butter cookie from the plate, and let’s find out a little about Laura Bickle and Witch Creek.
Lets start with what inspired this particular story?
I’ve always been very curious about alchemy, about how the ideas of magic and science got mashed up in our history before taking divergent paths. Researching alchemy has been one of my hobbies, and I finally got the chance to work what I learned into the Wildlands series.
I created Petra Dee, the protagonist of the series, to reflect some of the uncertainty of alchemy. She’s a scientist, a geologist working in the back country of Yellowstone. But she’s also the daughter of an alchemist, and has to come to terms with magic that’s unraveling the edges of her world.
This magic takes various forms – an undead cowboy she’s fallen in love with, drug-dealing alchemists, the alchemical Tree of Life. In WITCH CREEK, she faces off against a sinister mermaid. Muirenn was once a witch, cursed to take the shape of a flesh-devouring mermaid. She’s been imprisoned underground for more than a hundred and fifty years. But now she’s on the loose, and it’s up to Petra and her coyote sidekick, Sig, to stop her.
What secret do you use to blast through writer’s block?
For me, there’s no cure for writer’s block except doing it. I’ve been experimenting with various carrots, like promising myself some relaxing time in the garden for completed scenes. But I haven’t really come up with a solution other than sitting down and writing. I tend to get into a trap of perfectionism, and giving myself permission to write something imperfect (to edit later!) helps a lot.
Who is your favorite character of all of the books you’ve written and Why?
I’ve written a lot of characters who I adore, but my most recent favorite is Sig, Petra’s coyote sidekick in the Wildlands series. Petra first encountered Sig digging up a magic compass in the field outside her trailer, and he’s stuck around ever since. At first, she thought he was hanging around solely for lunch meat. But Sig is has remained her loyal ally. He may or may not be The Coyote with a capital C, working his own agenda that runs parallel to hers. I find him to be charming, impish, and a lot of fun to write about.
If writing is your first passion, what is your second?
Heh. I think I’d have to say that one of my passions is working with animals. I have a pretty dense garden in our backyard, and every so often, a feral cat will find his way in. I will work with the cat until he’s ready to come indoors, get him medical care, and he’ll eventually decide to be tame. It takes a long time, sometimes years. But I am most proud of the cats that have come to trust me as much as they do.
I have one that I’m working with now. He’s very terrified at the moment, but has turned out to be quite the gourmand. He likes milk, tuna, salmon, but his favorite thing is hiding behind a bookshelf. Someday, though, he’ll be curled up at the foot of my bed, dozing in the sunshine. It always happens. It just takes time, patience, love…and a whole lot of tuna.
Petra Dee has battled supernatural horrors and experienced astonishing wonders.
But there’s no magic on earth that can defeat her recent cancer diagnosis, or
help find her missing husband, Gabriel. Still, she would bet all her remaining
days that the answer to his disappearance lies in the dark subterranean world
beneath the Rutherford Ranch on the outskirts of Temperance, Wyoming.
the sheriff and heir to the ranch, Owen Rutherford. Owen is determined to
harness the power of the Tree of Life—and he needs Gabe to reveal its magic.
Secretly, the sheriff has also made a pact to free a creature of the underground,
a flesh-devouring mermaid. Muirenn has vowed to exact vengeance on Gabe, who
helped imprison her, but first . . . she’s hungry. Once freed, she will swim
into Yellowstone—to feed.
Petra must descend into the underworld to rescue Gabe before it’s too late . .
. for both of them.
Peering through the cattails, she saw a man with a fishing pole, standing on an outcropping. He seemed alone, caught in a bit of reverie, gazing at his line skipping along the surface of the water.
She dipped below the surface of the water, toward the shiver of the fishing line. With green-spotted fingers, she lifted the struggling fish from the hook. The line jerked away.
The man swore.
Muirenn lifted her head above the water.
“Holy shit.” The man stumbled backward. “I didn’t realize you were swimming there . . . I . . .”
His expression changed from embarrassment to curiosity as he looked at her. The pupils of his eyes dilated. “Who . . . are you?”
Muirenn gripped the fish close to her chest, giving a small smile.
The fisherman crouched on the rock, setting his pole beside him. “Wow. You’re uh . . . green? Is that real?”
Muirenn cocked her head and slipped forward a bit in the water. The edge of her tail skimmed above the surface.
“Is that like . . . one of those tails that the girls have at that park in Florida? For a movie or something?” His suntanned brow wrinkled. “No. That’s real,” he decided. “You, um . . . want the fish? You can have it.”
She was within arm’s length of him. She released the squirming fish into the water.
“You wanted to let it go? Look, I . . .”
The man talked too much. She swam closer, tentatively.
The fisherman looked at her, at her dappled skin and the dark rust hair spreading into the water. She wouldn’t ordinarily have been so bold. The weight off her tail was going to her head. She let him take in the black of her eyes, the gills on her throat. He gazed in wonder, and his fingers twitched to a small square piece of plastic on top of his tackle box.
“Can I take your picture? What . . . are you?”
A smile played across her lips, and she spoke to him in a silvery voice. “I’m the Mermaid.”
“Wow. I . . . wow. I’m, uh, Norm. Do I, like, make a wish or something?”
“You can, if you want. I’ll listen.”
She reached up with delicate fingers to touch him. Her fingers brushed the pockets of his fishing vest, playing with wonder over the bits and baubles there meant to lure the attention of fish. The man forgot about his camera and stared, transfixed.
Muirenn reached up for his collar . . .
. . . and dragged him down into the water.
He splashed and flailed. She brought him down—down to the bottom of the creek. It wasn’t so far, but it was far enough for a land dweller. He couldn’t fight her for long. He thrashed until his lungs grew heavy with creek water. He convulsed as the lack of oxygen reached his heart and filtered up to his brain. And then he stopped.
Muirenn grinned, showing row upon row of shark-like teeth. She ripped off his arm and began to chew. It had been so long since she’d had anything but the errant fish that wandered into her realm . . . this was a meal worth waiting for.
The creek ran red.
Red as the idle red-and-white bobber drifting on the surface of the water.
You can find Witch Creek at the following online retailers.
Ohio, reading entirely too many comic books out loud to her favorite Wonder
Woman doll. After graduating with an MA in Sociology – Criminology from Ohio
State University and an MLIS in Library Science from the University of
Wisconsin-Milwaukee, she patrolled the stacks at the public library and worked
with data systems in criminal justice. She now dreams up stories about the
monsters under the stairs, also writing contemporary fantasy novels under the
name Alayna Williams.
ALA’s Amelia Bloomer Project 2013 reading list and the State Library of Ohio’s
Choose to Read Ohio reading list for 2015-2016.
It was wonderful having you with us today. Please feel free to stop by anytime. Good Luck with Witch Creek!
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Posted in Authors' Secrets Blog and tagged Dark Fantasy, Laura Bickle, Yellowstone by Tena Stetler with 2 comments.
