Welcome to our second #exploreleira tour blog tour round up! We are celebrating the (almost) one year book birthday for Songkeeper! It is the second book in the Songkeeper Chronicles, which tells the story of a girl who can hear the song that created the world. If this is your first encounter with the blog tour, we are continuing a series of alphabet posts looking at the world and characters and magical creatures of the Songkeeper Chronicles … and we have an awesome giveaway that you can enter below!
Now, the #exploreleira tour tour has been gallivanting all over the blogosphere lately, so I thought it might be handy to come back here and share some of the more recent posts, in case you might have missed one or two! (Note: If you’re confused by the fact that the links skip over a few letters of the alphabet – because I probably would be – the posts between were either posted directly to my blog or were shared in another post on my blog. You can find a complete list of posts here.)
Scroll through the list below to find out a bit about each post and then pop over to say hello to the host bloggers and enter the giveaway on their site!
N is for Nisus!
For this post, we visited the site of blogger Marrock MacIntyre. He’s a writer, artist, self-proclaimed comic geek and fellow fan of action movies! (I do love me some action movies!) He also runs a movie review site.
POST SNEAK PEEK: “Nisus is a tapestry of contradictions. He is a dwarf of the Whyndburg Mountains and has a twin brother named Jirkar. In matters of etiquette, his manners are impeccable.
In fact, if he were here right now, he would be getting on my case for not properly introducing him. (His full name is Nisus Plexipus Molineous Creegnan, Xanthen Chancellor to the Caran, just in case you were wondering …)
P is for Paddy
The incomparable Hannah Williams hosted the blog tour for a look at Paddy, Ky’s best friend from the Underground. Hannah is an incredible artist and a fellow writer, Tolkien geek, and fan of the fantasy genre. You can find out more about her work in progress here!
POST SNEAK PEEK: “Everybody needs a friend, right? And of course, every hero needs a sidekick. When I first wrote Paddy into the story, it was as a comedic friend and sidekick pal for Ky. Someone to cast a bit of humor and light into the otherwise grim situation ruling the cobblestoned streets of Kerby: abandoned kids left to fend for themselves while the Khelari soldiers wreak havoc on their town…”
R is for Renegade
For this post, we swung over to the blog of fellow writer and speculative fiction fan, Josh Hardt. I first met Josh in person at the Realm Makers conference in 2015, which (by the way) is one of the coolest conferences in the world!
POST SNEAK PEEK: “Recently, I have been suffering BIG TIME from puppy fever. I consider myself both a dog and cat person. After growing up around both, and having many canine and feline “friends,” I would be hard pressed to choose between the two. At this point, I have a cat—Finn—but am not able to keep a dog for a variety of reasons. Still, that doesn’t stop me from shamelessly borrowing my friends’ dogs or drooling over pictures of adorable puppies. (Please tell me I’m not the only one!)…”
S is for Songkeepers and Songlings
Fellow fantasy author Jennette L. Mbewe hosted this post on her blog! Like me, she hails from Texas, so she’s familiar with braving the heat, which makes her doubly cool in my book! (Terrible play on words, I know.) You can find out more about her books and read about the world of Nalu here.
POST SNEAK PEEK: “I am feverishly excited about this post because I get to tell you all a little more about the “magical” system in the world of the Songkeeper Chronicles. Whether it was reading the creation of the worlds in Tolkien’s Silmarillion and Lewis’s Magician’s Nephew, or reading spellbound about the contest between Felagund and Sauron, or listening to epic soundtracks from my favorite movies, the idea of powerful music has always intrigued me …”
U is for the Underground
We visited with the lovely Hope Ann for this post. She is a reader and fantasy writer and loves history, particularly the Greek Roman period and WWII! (Some of my favorites! I’m sensing that we have a lot of things in common.) Any other history lovers here?
POST SNEAK PEEK: “Five years before Orphan’s Song began, the Khelari occupied the city of Kerby as a part of the Takhran’s mission to conquer the Nordlands. Not long after the Khelari arrived, people started disappearing. Taken by the dark soldiers. Those left behind assumed them dead. Far too often, only the children were left abandoned, forced to the streets to fend for themselves. When the Khelari came for his father, Cade Peregrine fought his way through a burning building to get his sister Aliyah to safety …”
V is for the Vituain Desert
Fellow Enclave author Steve Rzasa hosted this post on his new website! Steve is the author of several great science fiction, steampunk – super cool! – and fantasy novels. (I’m feverishly reading one of his sci fi novels right now, so I can say that you guys should totally check out his books!)
POST SNEAK PEEK: “One of my favorite settings to write about in the Songkeeper Chronicles was the Vituain Desert. Leira is a large land with a wide variety of landscapes, including the carpeted hills of the Midlands, grass-swept dunes of the Nordlands, and the high moorland and peat bogs of the Westmark. But in the south, the hills of the Midlands give way to a more arid region, known as the Soudlands, and beyond that, all that is green and growing is swallowed by the ever-hungry maw of the desert…”
W is for Waveryders
For today’s post, we are visiting Writeratops, the super cool blog of author and filmmaker Mollie E. Reeder. I first met Mollie several years ago when she helped with filming for the book trailer for my novella, Out of Darkness Rising. We are now writer pals and chat about books, brainstorming, story ideas, and ways to stay encouraged when our creative lives get crazy! (Which is, you know, most of the time.)
POST SNEAK PEEK: “I have always been a dreamer. One of my biggest childhood dreams was learning to sail. Growing up far inland, as I did, made the likelihood of learning to sail slim, but that didn’t stop me from dreaming. Though, honestly, I would probably become woefully seasick if I ever set foot on a sailboat or a ship. I am a daughter of the earth, accustomed to spending my time with both feet firmly planted on the ground …”
Hope you enjoyed the blog tour round up! We’re coming up to the end of the tour and the announcement for the giveaway winners! In the meantime, if you’re enjoying the tour, why not share a post with a friend and invite them to #exploreleira and the Songkeeper Chronicles with you!
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