Eden Royce's Blog, page 11

Black Beauty Blog Tour: Random Facts

Constance Burris is the author of the horror short story, Black Beauty, a cautionary tale about putting too much emphasis on one standard of beauty.  I interviewed her for my Graveyard Shift Sisters feature here.  She was kind enough to send me a few random facts about her release for her blog tour.

Plot Summary:

At Vista Apartment Complex, life drastically changes for four of its residents when they decide to do business with Crazy Jade—the supposed voodoo witch who can grant your wish for a price.

Shemeya wants the confidence to stand up against the girls bullying her at school, but she soon has to choose between keeping her dreadlocs or living a normal life. After catching her boyfriend cheating, Latreece just wants to have the same curves as all the other girls. Ashley will do whatever she can to have “White Girl Flow”, but takes her pursuit too far when she steals from Crazy Jade.

Constance was kind enough to share with us a few random facts about her tale, Black Beauty.

Most of Black Beauty is set in an apartment complex in Oklahoma City

I’m from Oklahoma, and I wanted to write about my childhood. Until junior high, my family lived in various apartment complexes across the city. I didn’t realize it at the time, but it was a very social type of living.  Apartments are a type of ready-made communities where adults and children have no choice but to interact with each other. It’s different living in houses, where you don’t have to talk with your neighbors if you don’t want to.

Medusa was inspired by a fellow author

One of my favorite authors has dreads down her back.  In the TSA line, they patted her hair and treated her dreads like they were snakes. And I thought, “wouldn’t that be a cool if her dreads were snakes.“

Music Videos and Body Image

Latreece is affected by the images of black women she sees in music videos: big butties and curvy. What happens if you don’t fit the stereotype?

Reality Is Stranger Than Fiction

One of the reasons I wrote Black Beauty was because I have a teenage daughter. I had to watch as she went through puberty, be verbally assaulted by boys, and be ignored by boys.  Black Beauty is the closest I’ll ever get to a self-help book for her.

There will be sequels

Shemeya, Andre, Ashley, and Crazy Jade will have their own stories.

Get your copy of Black Beauty at the links below:

Amazon: Purchase Link Itunes: Purchase Link Barnes & Noble: Purchase Link Goodreads: Connect about it on Goodreads!  Book Depository: Pick up internationally!

Graveyard Shift Sister: Constance Burris

Next up on my Graveyard Shift Sisters review and interview series is Constance Burris.

Constance is usually a fantasy author, but when I spoke with her about her latest release, Black Beauty, she said that when she came up with this particular story, she knew it had to be horror.  It’s the prequel to her fantasy tale, Coal, which is doing brilliantly in the rankings for multi-cultural young adult fantasy.

N’Bushe Wright in Blade

Read the entire review and interview on the Graveyard Shift Sisters website.

Fall Into Horror with Mocha Memoirs Press

Mocha Memoirs Press is celebrating the new Fall season by showcasing their love of horror and the authors who write it. Please welcome TOM OLBERT as he shares his thoughts on fall and horror.

WHAT LIVES IN THE DARKNESS?

And fall is here. Only just, but its chill fingers can already be felt creeping up our spines. Before we know it, the leaves will turn, the days will shorten, and the shadow of the equinox will creep in silently in summer’s wake. The time of transition, when, it is said, the veil between this world and the next runs thin, and spirits walk the earth. Time for tales of horror to slip under the wire of our reason and stoke the fires of our nightmares.

Horror takes many forms, both subtle and gross. Ghosts, vampires, werewolves and ghouls. The shadows of arcane superstition that never stop haunting us, even into this digital age. The unknown touching our primal fears from the inky blackness of the dark.

But, there’s another kind of horror, too. The horror of the dark places within the human mind and the dark places buried deep in the human soul, where we fear to look, perhaps even more than we fear the darkness outside. The demons we carry within are the ones we can never escape. Such evil can take many forms. Like the shadowy figure of Jack the Ripper skulking in the shadows of dark, misty, gas lit midnight streets, transcending time and space, a seemingly eternal horror that will always be with us. Because such evil is waiting to be born in the depths of each human soul, and will never die.

In my novella Black Goddess I tried to explore those dark depths we call evil. The evil of the torturer. Of the murderer. The evil of hate and revenge and unimaginable cruelty that defies all reason and devours the soul of both victim and victimizer. Such darkness has been with us from the beginning, in particularly dark chapters of history, taking on forms of evil so pure, so horrific that our darkest dreams pale in comparison.

The eternal question presents itself to a troubled young man who has seen evil up close and intimately: Is evil merely a random perversion of human emotion spawned by violence and chaos, or is evil a primal force, like a dark infection stealing its way into the human soul, feeding on it from within like a parasite, until nothing beside remains?

The protagonist of Black Goddess becomes obsessed with the nature and essence of the evil that has destroyed his life and his faith. His search for answers evolves into a dark quest that is destroying him, little by little. The closer he draws to the dark, forbidden cosmic truth at the heart of the darkness, the more he hungers for it to the exclusion of all else, like a drug addict endlessly seeking his next fix. He has given his life, and possibly his soul to a dark experiment through which he reaches closer and closer to the center of time and space. What will he find at the center of creation? God, or Satan? When he looks into the mirror of the first moment of time, will he find light or darkness at the core of his own soul?

What can any of us expect to find, when we peel back the layers of sanity we show to the world, and face the darkness we carry inside?

BLACK GODDESS

BUY LINK

Comment below and click on the rafflecopter options below for a chance to win the tour prize, a $25 Amazon Gift Card! a Rafflecopter giveaway Continue on with this FALL INTO HORROR. You can join Mocha Memoirs Press authors and share in their love of horror on Facebook. You can also click on the links below to meet other horror authors:

1.
Mocha Memoirs Press




2.
Mocha Memoirs Press – Blog




3.
Selah Janel – Come selahaway with me






4.
Lexxx Christian – The Southern Belle from Hell




5.
Eden Royce-The Dark Geisha




6.
Sumiko Saulson – Things That Go Bump In My Head






7.
Carole Ann Moleti




8.
Rie Sheridan Rose — The Bardabee Poet




9.
Amy Braun – Literary Braun






10.
Marcia Colette




11.
Laurel Cremant







What is a blog hop?

Get the code here…
Linky Tools  |  Linky Blog 2013

ABOUT MOCHA MEMOIRS PRESS:

Mocha Memoirs Press, LLC is a genre-oriented publishing company. Their vision is to provide an outlet for outstanding speculative and romance stories that often fall beneath the radar of traditional publishing houses. They seek to provide quality stories that invigorate the reader’s literary palette like a good, strong coffee. Like great coffee houses, they offer a variety of flavors. They publish stories in the following genres: science fiction, fantasy, horror, and romance, including the sub-genres of steampunk, cyberpunk, diesel punk, alternate history, weird westerns, and mash-ups.

WEBSITE | FACEBOOK | TWITTER | INSTAGRAM

Featured Author: Jeff Carroll

It is my pleasure to have on the blog today, Jeff Carroll: author, filmmaker, and hip-hop dating coach.

Yes, you heard that last one correctly. Jeff isn’t on my blog for his dating advice today, but you can find out more about that aspect of his career here.

I had the chance to catchup with Jeff and ask him about his writing, what inspires him, and what he’d like the future of speculative fiction to be.

ER: Thank you so much for granting me this interview. Tell us a bit about yourself and your writing style.

JC: I am a Gemini to the fullest so my stories have deep political subject told with a lot of action and fun. I’ve done a lot of things in my life from leading marches with Rev Sharpton to booking comedy shows with Kevin Hart. I’ve always been a movie fan. When I was 12 years old my cousin and I would see movies on 42nd street and recommend them to our local Harlem movie theater. Since movies are my first love my stories read like movies. People tell me all the time that they would love to see my book as movie.

ER: When did you start writing and what drew you specifically to speculative fiction?

JC: I started writing screenplays in 2003 after my mother had a stroke. I made two movies low budget B movie horrors, Holla If I Kill You and Gold Digger Killer. In 2007 after my second film Gold Digger Killer was released I wrote a tie-in comic book. I sold the comic book while screening my film at film festivals. Finally in 2009 I wrote the novelization of Gold Digger Killer. It was so liberating to write without having to be limited by my production budget that I decided to write another book. After writing the novelization of my movie I fell in love with writing. I even started reading more and learning a the different genres and Black Science fiction.

ER: What was the impetus for your story in The City anthology, “Dreamer’s Recall”?

JC: When I read the City bible outlining all of the elements I felt confined and felt that if I were there in the City I would want somebody to help me escape. So, as a story creator I wanted to tell a story where someone could have that possibility. Dreams have always been a form of escapism for me so that was the entry point for me to starting my story.

ER: How did you perform research for your characters and scenes or did you work from existing knowledge?

JC: I am not necessarily your grandmother’s sci-fi writer. I am a hip hopper. I grew up on movies like Krush Groove and Boyz in the Hood as much as I did Star Wars and Independence Day so I blend the energy of hip hop with the speculation of Sci-fi. With the characters of “Dreamer’s ReCall” I simple said what if there was a couple and one of them started having life changing dreams. I didn’t go as far as Love and Hip Hop but I did want to have something for Streetlit readers who’s stories have a lot of relationship drama.

ER: When using real events and people, how do you decide when to fictionalize and when to stay true to history?

JC: In my book It Happened on Negro Mountain I used the Mountain as my inspiration because it’s name was profound. Sci-fi is the genre which explores the “what ifs” and I use that use question to determine what person or event I fictionalize.

ER: For you, what makes a great tale? What do you like to read?

JC: I love adventures with happy endings. I love good triumphing over evil. I also like the escapism that Sci-fi provides. I like urban stories with a paranormal element. The writer which provided me with the most inspiration was LA Banks. I also like Steven Barnes but my favorite Sci-fi book is Zuro a Tale of Alien avengers. However after writing in the City I am fully turned onto CyberFunk and Afrofuturism. I am planning to write my story “Dreamer’s ReCall” into a novel.

Cover art for the collaborative cyberfunk anthology, The City, which features Jeff’s story, Dreamer’s ReCall.

ER: What scares you?

JC: A lot of things scare me. I’m not a sacredly cat because I fight through my fears. I am scared of sharks in the ocean. I am not scared of ghosts or demons. I am scared of people. Psychopaths and serial killers. I am also squeamish so my stomach can’t take realistic operations with lots of organs and blood. However, I was there for the delivery of my son.

ER: Of the works you’ve written, what’s your favorite? Of which are you most proud?

JC: I am proud of all of my writings. I’ve written a piece of myself and my family and friends into each of my stories. I do think my third book It Happened on Negro Mountain was my most unbelievable book to sell and it became the first of my stories to get a publishing deal.

ER: How can African American artists (actors, writers, filmmakers) succeed in speculative fiction circles? Do you feel your work has been received differently?

JC: I think we are at an opportune moment where opportunities for black creators are opening up. I think the main thing a black creator could do is hone their craft and put it out in the market for people to see.

ER: What’s your next project?

JC: I am currently writing a story I had for a movie into a novella. It’s about transgender serial killer in a CyperFunk world. I also have three manuscripts circulating for possible publishing deals so any of those could be my next book. I just released my first collection of short stories this past August called Sci-Fi Streetz.

ER: What’s missing in fiction? What shape would you like to see the future of speculative fiction take?

JC: When I first started reading Sci-fi there were a lack of stories I wanted to read but now there are more books than I can read. I still feel we are on the tip of the iceberg with manifesting our unique African America Sci-fi expression. I think when we fully developing our variation it will be as different as manga (the Japanese comic book form) is. I think black people have a unique worldview and cultural past which inspires our ideas and solutions to the problems and discoveries of the future. I even think we will have a common storytelling pace that will appeal to black people like the TV shows Empire and Scandal.

ER: Many black authors of speculative fiction tell me they struggle for fans. What’s your advice?

JC: Thinking of the future is directly connected to your knowledge of the past and because many black people don’t know of the glory of African people they see the future as frustrating as the past. I remember watching Brother From Another Planet feeling that “Dagg, we are slaves in the future too”. Dystopian stories are big right now but for Black people the Black Lives Matter movement makes them feel like we are living in a Dystopian present day world. I think also that since white male writers dominated Sci-fi so much that Black Sci-fi is still new most black people. Once we get that hit book like The Coldest Winter Ever then everybody will know about Black Sci-fi.

ER: What’s the most difficult part of writing for you?

JC: Because I work full time finding the time to write and work social media are the hardest aspects of writing for me. The actual writing process presents its own challenges with each story.

ER: What do you do when you’re not writing?

JC: When I’m not writing I’m reading as much as I can. I make it a point to read Black Sci-fi but not exclusively. I try to read the latest Sci-fi books and I mix it up with old Sci-fi.

ER: Thank you for the interview. Is there anything else you like to mention?

JC: I just want to say that The City is an amazing project and I would like to thank Milton Davis and Balogun Ojetade for creating such a glorious project. Inviting other black writers to share in their universe was a historical move. The City is the first of its kind.

Thanks for the interview, Jeff!  Find out more about Jeff and his work on his blog, Facebook, and on Twitter.

HorrorAddicts.net 121, Eden Royce

Eden Royce:

So happy to be the featured author on the Horror Addicts podcast! Listen to me reading an excerpt from my short story collection, Spook Lights, some great music, horror con wrap up, and tips for your Halloween prep.

Originally posted on horroraddicts.net:

Horror Addicts Episode# 121

Horror Hostess: Emerian Rich

Intro Music by: Valentine Wolfe

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eden royce | klaus von karlos |

thriller season 1

Find all articles and interviews at: http://www.horroraddicts.net

42 days till halloween

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Live Action Reviews! by Crystal Connor: Spook Lights: Southern Gothic Horror by Eden Royce

Eden Royce:

What a wonderful review of Spook Lights from Horror Addicts. Thank you, Crystal Connor–I’m beyond flattered.

Originally posted on horroraddicts.net:

 This is one of the hardest book reviews I’ve ever had to write. A while ago Eden Royce asked me to review her novel Spook Lights, and after reading it a second time the problem became glaringly clear.

I am completely jealous of how this woman writes.

This makes no sense. Eden and I met when both our stories, The Monster and Devil’s Playground were accepted for publication in Matt Nord’s Strange Tales of Horror and we have been friends ever since. She has been my friend in every aspect of the word, we’ve kept in touch, we’ve reviewed each other’s books and once again we have both have stories that have been slated for film adaptations in the upcoming horror anthology 7 Magpies, the movie.

Sometimes when I am reading a really good book I go from being entertained to being taught, but with Spook Lights I…

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Exsanguinate–World of Blood: A Review

In addition to writing, I love gaming. Mostly tabletop RPGs such as Dungeons and Dragons, but I’ll try just about any game once—board games, card games, online quests to rescue princesses in other castles. That Exsanguinate includes gaming and other geeky culture like writing code and such warms my heart.

Exsanguinate is a beautiful book, and I don’t say that often about horror novels. The cover is stunningly rendered and the inside of the book is no different. Time and attention is paid to the inside fonts and images at the beginning of each chapter.

While there are a few wordage slip ups—gate instead of gait, and palette instead of palate, for example—they don’t detract from the work put into this novel. There are some fantastic extras in the books as well, including a References section listing the movies, music, and even a restaurant that are mentioned in the book.

The stunning cover of Killion Slade’s Exsanguinate.

But Exsanguinate is not just horror. There are plenty of bloodshed and horrific scenes like breeding farms and blood orchards—remote areas where vampires keep human victims for food and for procreation—come to mind immediately that will unnerve the reader. But there are elements of high fantasy and courtly romance as well. I enjoy when a story has many genres mixed smoothly into one.

Our ‘fraidy cat protagonist Cheyenne O’Cuinn is being dragged out of the house on Halloween by he horror-loving sisters. To add to the anticipation and fear of the inevitable haunted houses, Cheyenne is due to meet her online boyfriend in person. Scary enough in itself. While at Halloween Scream Night, things go wrong. Cheyenne is attacked and wakes up in a hospital to discover both of her sisters are missing.

Before she can process that information properly, she discovers she’s turning into a vampire. She also finds there are werewolves and dragons in the world. Talk about piling on.

Cheyenne is sympathetic and relatable, especially to members of the geeky community. She is reclusive and most comfortable behind a computer screen. (Know that feeling.) But when her family and friends are in danger, she finds it in herself to push past her hesitance and get things done.

Slade has created a character to cheer for in this first installment of her trilogy, all the while placing her in true dangerous situations where you wonder how she’ll respond. The story ends in a good place, and you feel satisfied as a reader that while there is calm for now, the storm is yet to come. Several plot lines are still available for Slade to weave into any follow-up books.

And I look forward to the rest of the series.

Blood Moon Rising 2: An October Event

The season of fear is almost upon us.

No, not tax time. Halloween. All Hallows Eve.

Already the stores are start into stock themed candy, costumes, and pumpkin spice flavored everything. (Not my thing, but hey…get those lattes while you can.)

This is also the time of year that dark fiction artists love. Especially writers and authors. It gives our dark creations a perfect stage on which to shine.

It also means parties. Like the Blood Moon Rising Party that is happening all October long on Facebook.

“Join us on Blood Moon Rising 2 – for fans of horror, fantasy and sci-fi, this is the place to be Oct 1st on Facebook.” 

Blood Moon Rising 2—the first was in May—is an event where thirty dark fiction authors will be chatting about their latest projects. There will be giveaways, free stories to read, and good old-fashioned shenanigans. And who doesn’t love that?

Each author will have one day to take over the event and post about their books and why they love this time of year. (My day is October 30.) Stop by each day for games, prizes, excerpts… whatever these authors’ mysterious minds can create. Everyone is welcome to join, comment, and participate in the festivities.

Here’s the Facebook link for Blood Moon Rising. Click it and join thirty authors of speculative fiction—horror, fantasy, and sci-fi—for a scary good time. Even if you can’t stop by each day, click the Thunderclap link and support the event on Facebook, Twitter, or Tumblr.

See you in October!

Featured Author: Simone Salmon

Camille and the Bears of Beisa—Drafnel is a sci-fi/fantasy/thriller tale that has been compared to Frank Herbert’s masterpiece, Dune in its sweeping worldbuilding.  In addition, it has several urban settings, a matriarchal society, and a female protagonist of African descent.

Cover art for Camille and the Bears of Beisa–Drafnel.

Sliding seamlessly between modern day Brooklyn, 20th century Jamaica, and the fictional world of Narvina, Drafnel chronicles Camille’s fight for knowledge and self-preservation. When those worlds clash, secrets unravel and hidden agendas are exposed.

The book trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of3lw5XxmKM

Camille and the Bears of Beisa is available today on Amazon and my review is forthcoming. But here is an excerpt to whet your appetite:

Narvina, Nu-century 2055

Aknanka clamps down with all her might. Her teeth tear into Sephia’s wrinkled skin, digging for chunks of flesh. They only grind against bone. A fist smashes into her cheek, jerking her head sideways. Sephia yanks her hand away right before Aknanka chomps down again. Blood gushes everywhere.

“I’m not going anywhere with you!” Aknanka’s scream rages through the interior, punching a small dent into the door. It slams shut.

Any experimenting she needs to conduct today will be done right here. And without blindfolds. The metal restraints chafe Aknanka’s wrists as she wriggles around for freedom.

“Stop fighting, Dreamer. You make this harder than it has to be.”

“Bet you’ll think before trying that again, oh Wise One!” Aknanka’s aim is accurate. Bloody sputum soils the middle of Sephia’s tunic.

A med-bot enters the room and stitches the bandages over Sephia’s wound. The pale Elder clenches her fists. Her eyes blaze to match the blood staining the floor. The med-bot’s front panel flashes, absorbing the charge from Sephia’s quelled anger. Sparks bounce across the overloaded circuits. The bot spins over to the sealed porthole and then powers down.

“These gene markers will soon confirm our suspicions, Dreamer.” Sephia’s shoulders stiffen, tugging at the hood to expose her protruding frontal lobe. Her white skull magnifies in the dimness. Her lips never move.

Na-mum Camille warned Aknanka that the Elders would spare no sympathy once they discover her true kinsatah. She followed every painstaking instruction: the implants are undetectable, even from their host.

Jamaica, 20th Century

The food on display and the brilliant dyes of the hand-loomed textiles hanging at the market made me homesick. The marketplace crowded with vendors selling varied crafts and wares. The frenzied pitch of the hagglers echoed under the tin roofs. Voluptuous women wearing multi-colored wraps balanced huge straw baskets on cornbraided heads, while children darted through stalls with jaws stuffed of toffee candy or juggled melting snow cones with syrup-stained hands. Fruits ripening in the heat sweetened the layer of jerk pork and chicken charring over coals inside huge metal drums.

At first Miss Mattie kept me close, but as the market became more crowded her clenched fingers slackened. I searched the aisles, worried about returning home empty-handed. Failing to find any spices, I started making my way back to Miss Mattie and then noticed a young woman with a basket tucked between her knees. Loose braids stuck out from under her head scarf. Kind hazel eyes invited me forward. Curious, I bent over to check out the samples. The woman pulled me closer and stuffed a piece of cloth into my waistband.

“A gift from the Goling family, Miss. Put it in safe-keeping. This has been my honor.”

Miss Mattie swooped in at my heels in a matter of seconds. She sniffed the air several times and shoved me away from the vendor’s stall. We left thirty minutes later, my impatience to unwrap the cloth’s contents shielded.

Unpacking the supplies, I started dinner. Then, while the meal simmered, I sneaked to my room and pulled out the puffed packet. Wrapped inside were five cinnamon sticks. My smile must have been a mile wide. I decided to add them to my hideaway after Miss Mattie left for church that Sunday.

As my guardian angel instructed, I wrapped a small piece under the ribbon tied around my braid. I noticed Miss Mattie’s immediate reaction. Her harsh tone gentled and she even allowed me to eat with her at the dining table. A welcomed change, my nerves were still on guard, unsure of how long Miss Mattie’s tolerance would last. Against my better judgment, I decided to ask about Caleb and Cassandra.

“Miss Mattie, do you think I can visit with my sister and brother sometime soon?”

Growling, Miss Mattie cocked her head and then swung around to face the door. Her eyes rolled back into their sockets. Her head snapped back as she sniffed the air.

“Why are you sitting at this table?”

I warned you, Grandmother. Leave the table now!

Miss Mattie’s neck protruded as her limbs extended. Fingers mutated into claws and hind legs ripped through her lower extremities. Wiry tufts of hair sprouted all over her body. Her face contorted and elongated as saliva slimed down enlarged jowls. My hand stifled the scream roaring through my head.

Get up and walk away slowly. Do not turn your back on it. Now!

Author Simone Salmon

Simone Salmon, a Jamaican born New Yorker, is the mother of two sons and a Jack Russell terrier. Simone is still working on her exit strategy from Corporate America, but in the meantime she writes novels, poetry and expands her multi-sensory perceptions.

She is a spiritual truth seeker who appreciates psychic phenomena and timelessness. Music of all kinds, warm weather, lounging on the beach, and experiencing the unknown are just a few of her most favorite things. Learn more about Simone on Facebook, Twitter, her blog: Origisims, and her website. You can also find her on Goodreads, Pinterest, and her Amazon Author Page.

Featured Author: Auden Johnson

In one of my recent forays onto Twitter, I came across the profile of one Auden Johnson.

I stopped because I rarely come across black female dark fantasy writers–even fewer that write sword and sorcery–and I love to talk with other female writers of dark fiction to get a feel for their experiences writing in the genre. I’m also excited that she has a dark fiction world-building guide planned. So I reached out.

Auden was gracious in responding and agreed to be a featured author on my blog. A little about her in her own words:

I am a Dark Fantasy writer. I can’t help but be one and believe me, I’ve tried. It seems no matter how far you run, your passion always catches up with you. I didn’t make the choice to be a writer, the stories made it for me. Dark Fantasy allows me to combine my two great loves–horror and fantasy. 

Darkness and dark things have always fascinated me. I’ve tried to write light or “normal” stories but you can’t make the stories into something they don’t want to be. Subtle creepy is beautiful. Without meaning to, all my stories deal with darkness in some way.

“The written word reaches into my soul and pulls out someone I didn’t know existed. ” –Auden Johnson

Words are an escape. They somehow lift the weight of the world off my shoulders. I talk about them as though they’re alive.  Well, a writer’s job is to make words come alive for you. I’ve been writing for ages and I’m still surprised by the things my mind creates. My mind has always been this vast other world, bottomless, where nothing is impossible. I love it! 

Cover art for The Marked Hosts.

Auden has published three short stories: No Vacancy, Clipped Wings, and Welcome to My World and three novellas: Visible Through Darkness, Shadows under the Light, and Devdan Manor. Her first two novels in The Merging Worlds series, The Sciell and Chains of the Sciell are now available. Her latest release is a dark fantasy/sword and sorcery novella titled, The Marked Hosts.

Synopsis:

She should’ve left the boy to die.

Contessa Torain’s job was simple: Talk humans out of blowing up her homeworld, Devortus, because of a few rogue Brevia soul eaters. A moment of pure insanity leads her to save a child, Asamee Banks, and the brat follows her home. He smells like her kind, but different. His existence creates a mystery she must solve.

The brat is an aggravation when all she wants is a quiet life.

But more Brevia invade the human world, feeding off the residents. Contessa, and her team–along with the bratty Asamee–escape back to Devortus, but find it empty.

The Sencil, dragon-like guardians of Devortus, are dying and they now care only about getting another body as host to survive. Contessa’s only goal is to find her family. But which one of her team is marked?

If you’d like to pick up a copy of Auden’s latest release, The Marked Hosts, you can find it on Amazon here.

Dark fantasy author Auden Johnson.

Auden’s bio:  Lover of dark worlds. Nerdy & proud. Anime fan. Nature photographer. Sometimes silly, everyday dreamer, forever lovely. Just trying to be me–writer to the core. Find out more about Auden on her blog, on Twitter, or on G+.