Chloe Stowe's Blog: The Words and Madness of Chloe Stowe - Posts Tagged "writhe"

As Leslie Nielson is swallowed by a New Year’s wave and an upside down Christmas tree looms dangerously overhead, me, my dog and Frank welcome you to another morning at Chloe’s.

For those of you wondering who Frank is, well, long story short he’s the impending failure of Writhe. He showed up yesterday on my couch, hasn’t left and keeps asking for crumpets… See yesterday’s blog for all the gory details.

Now back to regular programming, which today is 1972’s “The Poseidon Adventure.” One of my all-time favorite disaster movies, this baby is a classic. Gene Hackman, Ernest Borgnine and Shelley Winters (in an amazing performance) all join the mayhem on the doomed ocean liner. Highly recommended piece of film history.

I have mostly recovered from yesterday’s unexpected shot of panic, so onward and upward we go!

While I still don’t have the exact release date for Writhe, I imagine it will be sometime next week or the week after. So, to get everybody’s blood hot and pleasantly jazzed for my 15th novel’s release, I’ll be tacking on to each post a little goodie I like to call… A Taste of Writhe.

Don’t worry. There will be no clowns, no banners whipping in the breeze. I’m not even expecting any confetti, although a little confetti is always welcome if you feel the need. *grins brightly*

A Taste of Writhe is simply a sentence-sized excerpt from each chapter. You’ll get one a day here (possibly two if the release date leaps up a little quicker than I expected). Tomorrow, the Taste of Writhe will be at the top of each post, but this morning I thought I’d ease you into all the spine-tingling excitement (note the sarcasm here).

So here we go! As is my custom, the first excerpt will be the first sentence of the novel. Please remember that Writhe is a contemporary romance. The past is only visited in the Prologue. Enjoy this tiny taste of Writhe!

Prologue:

“On a bright winter’s day in 1787, Caspar, a boy of just thirteen, stood at the edge of a frozen lake and cried.” (page 1)

Until tonight…

Chloe

Welcome one and all to the “Special Edition: Have You Writhed Today?” blog.

To celebrate the release of Writhe, my 15th novel, you will find below a spicy smorgasbord of sizzle. From the official blurb to a reveal of the cover, you may find yourself tantalized to the writhing point… or so an author with spirited delusions of grandeur can hope. *grins*

At the end, you will also find an excerpt from the novel. In fact, you will find the entire published Prologue to Writhe.

I guarantee the Prologue will not be what you expect.

At the very, very end, you will find a list of, what I hope will be, helpful links.

Please enjoy and spread the word!

Until tomorrow…

ChloeWrithe

Writhe by Chloe Stowe
(Book One of “The Lion and the Steed” Series)

Trauma surgeon. Widower… 28 year old Samuel Lyon defined his life by these words alone. Five years had passed since the car accident that had stolen his wife and only child. Five years in which Sam simply survived but no longer lived.

Black market art. International rings of thieves... Brevyn Steed’s world pulsed and thrummed with these. Chasing down stolen masterpieces around the globe defined this 28 year old’s very existence. He wanted for nothing more.

But when the case of a stolen 19th century painting sets these two opposing men’s lives on the same course, Sam and Brevyn collide in a heart-stopping mystery in which their hearts slowly weave together and blazingly writhe.

A romantic thriller from the author who brought you Forever Bound, Taken and the “Hellesgate” Series, Writhe is the story of an extraordinary love born of Fate and forged in passion.


Prologue to Writhe

On a bright winter’s day in 1787, Caspar, a boy of just thirteen, stood at the edge of a frozen lake and cried.
The wails of his aunt and the frantic screams of his father, the young man ignored. Caspar’s world had narrowed down to one finite point—

Johann.

Younger by two years, Johann always trailed behind his older brother like a puppy. Caspar didn’t mind. He enjoyed the little boy’s company; in fact, Caspar pandered to it—

But now, Johann was dead.

The ice had broken.

The boy had fallen in.

Stunned for a fatal instant, the eleven-year-old child had drifted away below the ice.

No one could reach him.

Now, an hour later, the sun beat down on the little body, trying in vain to warm the pale, pale skin.

Caspar watched, tears burning down his cheeks, tightly fisted hands trembling at his side.

“My fault … my fault …” he muttered under his breath. A thousand times he hiccupped those words that day, but no one heard him. So lost in their own agony, no one paid Caspar any mind.

By the time night fell, the young man had gone silent. When he spoke again, three days later, Johann was not mentioned.

In fact, Caspar never spoke of Johann and that terribly bright winter’s day again, until fifty years later—

Caspar stood in front of an artist’s easel and spoke of the tragedy not in words, but in paint. The truth of those fateful minutes when young Johann fell beneath ice, Caspar laid out across the canvas as his confession.

Furiously he worked, finishing the piece in less than a single day.

Standing back, satisfied though terribly sick at heart, Caspar David Friedrich, a painter now of international fame and regard, raised his brush to sign his name—and collapsed from a stroke.

Friedrich would survive, but his once-heralded career was over.

The subject of Johann, in neither word nor paint, would ever be brought up by Caspar again.

The painting, Caspar’s lone confession, disappeared. When the artist returned home from his long convalescence, the piece he had simply entitled “Johann” was nowhere to be found. Only the rumor of the painting’s existence remained.

As the decades passed, the rumor itself was even lost to all but a few.

In carefully worded whispers, the gossip of a missing masterpiece was kept alive by eager, often unscrupulous, collectors. These people, in their tight circles of high art, made it perfectly clear they were willing to pay any price and go to any length to own the lost confession of Caspar David Friedrich—

A painting known simply as “Johann.”


Links…
To purchase Writhe from the Ravenous Romance publishing house… http://www.ravenousromance.com/modern...
You can also find Writhe at these major markets…
All Romance Ebooks:
https://www.allromanceebooks.com/prod...
Amazon (it should be up sometime today):
http://www.amazon.com
Barnes & Noble (hopefully today):
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/chloe...