For the first time ever, The Priest and Pax in the Land of Women, respectively first and second book in The Ginecean Chronicles, are part of a giveaway taking place during the Stuck in a Good Book Hop. Enter to win a set of the two books.
the indie life
PSA: Le me interviewed live
Quite sure my announcement doesn’t serve any public service purpose, but I didn’t decide the acronym. Anyway, tomorrow, Sunday September 16, I’ll be interviewed by Krista Kedrick on A Novel Idea Live at Noon Pacific/3:00 pm Eastern, and I wanted to let you know. Hopefully, I’ll manage to say nothing silly. There’s even hope I’ll say something that makes sense. I’m an unrepentant optimist.
Friday Snippet #18
This week I’ve posted on time and every day. I’m feeling rightfully entitled to boast about my accomplishment.
From X:
“What are you doing?” She felt Julius’s aura pushing her anxiety away and she didn’t like it. “I told you I need to be in control.”
“Your heart rate is too elevated. You won’t be in control for long.” Sometimes, he acted without consulting her. They had huge rows about it once or twice a month.
“Not now, please.” She didn’t want to argue with him, but her sense of smell was already dimming. “You’re blinding my nose.”
“It’s okay, your olfactory power is stronger than mine anyway. You can function even at reduced capacity and still sense more than a normal human being.” He was calm as usual and forcing her to calm as well. “Yield. It’s pointless and you know it.”
She did know. It was how she had passed all her finals with flying colors. She was prone to panicking when under pressure and he couldn’t bear to feel her anxiety building. He had let her have her way only once and she had regretted it. “Just to prove a point,” he had explained to her, when calming her down after failing an important test. But someone who she thought was her father was hiding from her just meters away and she didn’t want to listen to Julius, even though she knew he was right.
“Allegra, reason.” The pressure on her arm increased, until it was uncomfortable and at that point he repeated her name.
“You won.” Allegra emptied her mind and let his aura invade hers. For the briefest moment, she saw blue circles playing behind her eyes, then a sense of calmness descended slowly on her. Wave after wave of blue light covered her until she was in control of herself once again.
“Better?” Julius massaged the spot where his fingers had left a mark on her skin.
“Yes.”
Friday Snippet #15
Here it is, and it is still Friday here in the Pacific Northwest.
From X, my little fun project which is getting darker and darker:
With uncertain steps, her heels loudly clicking on the stones, Allegra led the way to her parents’ house, a mere fifteen minutes away from the bridge. A few people hurriedly walked through the alleys, disappearing behind darkened glass doors. She took a good look at the buildings, at first incapable of understanding what was different. Then, she saw it.
“It’s early,” Julius said, “It’s not surprising there aren’t lots of people around.” He didn’t comment on the darkened glasses.
Every single soul on Terra knew of Cartaghena’s see-through skyscrapers. It was as if the fires that had ravaged the earth had also obscured the city’s soul. It was a morbid thought and Allegra didn’t need it.
“I’m sure there’s a reason.” Again, Julius had connected his aura to hers.
“It doesn’t seem right.” Allegra let him calm her. “Thank you.”
“Anything for you.” It was his usual response, but somehow his words sounded different.
She dared looking up and Julius averted his eyes, but she caught a lingering pale blue shade flickering through his aura before he could revert to neutral once more. Longing.
Unsettled by nuances of feelings she couldn’t decipher, Allegra hurried her steps, his hand protectively splayed on her back. Although she was his eyes, in moments like these she couldn’t have walked a single step by herself.
Friday Snippet #14
Following last week successful experiment, this Friday snippet was written just for fun. Coincidentally, I wanted to know what Allegra and Julius were doing. I left them unattended on a running train last week.
From X:
Cartaghena the Beautiful, it was called. Allegra rejoiced at seeing it still held true. They had jumped down the train worried it wouldn’t stop long enough to let them out. The city was still there. Unwalled. Unexed. Funny how words that hadn’t existed a year ago, now were part of their vocabulary.
“Ready?” Julius took her hand in his and gently squeezed it.
“Ready.” She smiled, not wanting to show him how scared she was and knowing it was a futile attempt. She had thought she could cope with going back home, but she had been wrong. Back at the boarding school, the pupils were shown footages of their home cities to prepare them. Mostly, it was done in good faith to help them visualize what they were going to find once out of the safety of the institute. But there had been accidents. Not every mind was strong enough to accept their families were lost to the world. Unreachable behind dark walls. And that was what scared Allegra the most. The unknowing quality of waiting for the truth to reveal itself. What if there was nobody alive behind those un-climbable barricades? What if the people you loved the most were worse than dead? One look at the glass towers and she sighed in relief; the buildings were mirrored on the placid waters of three rivers insinuating through the city. Cartaghena was intact. The destruction bordering its limits a palpable reminder nothing was what it used to be, but the city had been spared. For now. How long would it take for the Malady to corrupt her city?
“To your place first.” Julius’s good nature shone bright even in times like this.
Friday Snippet #13
Thankfully, being Italian the infamous number thirteen doesn’t have any effect on me. Seventeen on the other hand… I had my final high school exam on a Friday seventeen and it happened to be an Ancient Greek poem to translate in Italian. Serial killers were born that day.
I followed Clare’s suggestion and wrote just for fun. I know, incredible concept isn’t it? I have several works in progress—just remembered there’s a third story I started and never looked at again—but between the jet lag and life in general, I can’t concentrate. So here it is something I poured on the keyboard without thinking. It’s so liberating to put down words without worrying about writing from beginning to end. Forgive me the length, I didn’t have time to shorten it. Aptly named X…
The train didn’t stop. Allegra looked at the landscape outside the window, an ever-changing river of colors following each other in a maddening rush.
“I know where we are.” She tapped at the window with her long, brightly painted nail.
“Do you?” Julius raised his head from the article he was reading and looked outside.
“See the greens and the violets?”
“Yes, and the oranges and the reds.” He squinted but his expression remained puzzled. He did close the glass reader though and focused on her words.
She could see the news flowing under the surface of the reader, but she tried her best to ignore it. “I remember when I was a kid, my mom and I travelled for miles and miles through lavender fields and orchards to visit an old uncle. He lived in Rallen—”
“I have a cousin who lives in Rallen,” Julius started saying, then realization dawned on him. “Lived, I guess. So the rumors about Rallen being exed were true. ”
“So it seems. I’m sorry for your cousin. Maybe he’s still alive. Nobody knows for sure what happens behind the city walls.”
Julius cleaned a tear with the palm of his hand, sadly smiled and took a deep breath before saying, “Rallen was all white marbles and spires. It looked like delicate lace from faraway.”
Allegra understood his silent request to change the subject and didn’t interrupt his reminiscence. “We took tons of pictures inside the Mosque. Its ceilings were so high.”
A few minutes later, browns replaced the rainbow and she knew Cartaghena was next. Orchards once stretching for acres had been destroyed by wildfires soon after Centralia proclaimed martial law and started putting cities under quarantine by drawing the letter X on the municipal buildings doors. Only one month after the first exing in the ancient city of Lavi, walls were erected as a precaution to ensure the safety of the healthy citizens. Allegra had never believed Centralia’s good intentions.
“Will the train stop to let us go home?” Julius asked, the news already forgotten under the transparent screen of the reader as Cartaghena drew closer.
Got Germany!
Only Spain missing. Thanks to one smart and I’m sure extremely good looking customer, my German brown bar of shame is gone for the month of August. Here is the pic showing how smashing is The Priest at number 50 of the paid science fiction list in Germany. Vielen dank.
Friday Snippet #12
Back in Umbria to my parents’. A heat wave has been following me from the sea to the hills and only at night temperatures lower to reasonable digits. Today, despite the merciless weather condition, I wrote 2k words. Too bad they are the only words I typed in a week.
Although I should be working on both projects, my mental energies are depleted and I can’t see a clear path out of an impasse in the fantasy plot. Therefore, dystopian TCOM it is, again.
The man under the brunette’s care moaned in pain as she threaded the needle in and out of his skin. “I’m sorry, but it’s better this way. The longer it takes the more painful it is for you.” She patted his arm in a display of tenderness Marie found out of place. “The rector sent me another useless, snotty girl,” the brunette said under her breath, but loud enough to be heard. The man smiled through thin, bloodless lips.
Marie had already reached the door and was looking longingly at the darkness of the stairs, when the brunette called her back, “Where do you think you’re going?”
“I thought—” Sweat freezing on her forehead, Marie understood she wasn’t getting away from that job.
Friday Snippet #11
For a week at Santa Marinella, maritime city north of Rome and ancient Roman port. Today, later in the afternoon, I greatly enjoyed the refreshing breeze from the Mediterranean Sea. Despite the glare associated with the incredible phenomenon called “sun”, I suffered under the yellow light and—practically blind—wrote a staggering one thousand six hundred words. Lately, for several reasons, I haven’t been prolific, so I’m feeling quite proud of my hard work.
From TCOM, here’s snippet number eleven:
Madame Lana’s fingers came dangerously close to Marie’s moving lips, but thankfully stopped before making contact. Marie had inadvertently stepped back to avoid being touched by the rector’s cold hand and now realized she had probably offended her. Something flickered behind the woman’s eyes, something as cold as her skin. “Finish what you’re doing and go upstairs.” She barked several orders and then left the kitchen followed by two unlucky girls who were culpable of having poured one teaspoon of sugar too many in her coffee.
The chef smiled a sad smile Marie’s way and she shivered. Chef had just treated the two crying girls with the same show of affection. “I’m going to train as a nurse,” Marie said out loud to test how the idea sounded once worded.
Friday Snippet #10
Technically speaking there are still six minutes left before Saturday in Redmond. The fact that I’m typing from Porano in Umbria and it’s already 8:54 of the next morning it only proves the Earth isn’t flat after all. It’s not cheating.
Before it’s too late, here is the snippet from this week. TCOM, again.*
Marie had been taught that ending in a waste plant was a better fate than serving as a mother, but she wasn’t sure Carnia would be happy. “She’ll be fine, don’t worry.” She didn’t have a clue of what she was talking about, but she felt the need to reassure Verena once more. The wind shook the branches with more strength and the whole green umbrella swayed under the assault. Something swiftly moved at the corner of Marie’s eye and she automatically turned to her right only to see Grant stepping back into the shadows of the corner. He was listening. Her heart skipped a beat.
“What was it?” Verena tilted her head and Marie rearranged her body in a useless attempt at hiding Grant’s presence when he was probably already gone.
“Nothing.”
“A cat, probably.”
Marie wished she was alone. “Yes, a cat.” He wants to know about Carnia. She felt her stomach contract.
*For the sake of being honest, it’s now 12:01 in Redmond, which it means it’s a Saturday snippet after all. Oh well, I did try…
Monica La Porta 