Thursday, October 1, 2026

Cold Hands by Daniela Alibrandi



This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Daniela Alibrandi will be awarding a $15 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.



In Rome, the past never stays buried for long. When a dangerous man, Cold Hands, is released from psychiatric detention and quietly returns to the city, Commissioner Rosco and his team are drawn into a shadowy investigation where old crimes, hidden grudges, and new threats begin to intertwine. Beneath the surface of ordinary lives, secrets fester in hospital wards, along the Tiber, and in the darkest corners of the capital. Seemingly unrelated crimes gradually intertwine within a hypnotic, subterranean world of hidden Rome, mysterious lakes and ancient legends, revealing a larger pattern that is difficult to recognize. As tensions rise, Rosco must protect the fragile happiness he has finally found while facing a menace that knows how to wait, watch, and strike. Atmospheric, gripping, and rich in psychological tension, Cold Hands is a suspense novel set in a Rome of buried memories and lurking danger.

***


Who will read the novel will discover the unbelievable seductive settings, on the shores of Rome’s underground lakes, in which a disturbed mind stalks its prey. They will enjoy this important step in the overall journey of the work, which intertwines serial crimes with murders of a different nature, even with the ancient legends that abound in the Eternal City.

Through the MultiDimensionCrime approach, the novel invites readers to enter a world where atmosphere, emotions, and events become almost tangible, entering the mind of the killer, the desperation of the victims, while investigating with the squad in increasing twists and suspense. The novel, set in the Eighties, is also published as an Extended Book, an innovative publishing format experienced by Morellini Editore, that enhances the reading experience. By scanning the QR code printed on the back cover, readers can explore the locations featured in the story, immerse themselves in its atmospheric world, and listen to a curated soundtrack of 1980s music that brings the novel’s setting to life. A journey that doesn’t end with the last page!


Read an Excerpt

Rome in early spring—there’s nothing more enchanting, even for Rosco, who slid behind the wheel, still heavy with sleep, having skipped breakfast yet again. Another night spent with the little one waking up over and over, until he’d earned his rightful place in the big bed. And yet, for Rosco, there was nothing sweeter than feeling that warm little body pressed close, so bossy and so tender—a tiny tyrant to whom he gladly surrendered.

But by morning, Marilena had reached her limit. With gentle hands, she’d scooped up the boy and, for the umpteenth time, tucked him back into his crib. Then she’d slipped back under the covers—a mistake, as it turned out, because now Rosco could smell her, and it had been ages since he’d been this close to her. The child was sleeping soundly now, dawn’s timid light beginning to seep through the shutters, and Rosco could make out the outline of Marilena’s body as she breathed deeply, on the verge of drifting off again. He couldn’t resist the urge to caress her hips, and when she turned toward him, he kissed her lips, then her neck, and finally began to suckle her nipple. She wasn’t nursing anymore, and the scent of her skin had returned to what it once was, before— a whiff of stale caciotta cheese, during those endless months of round-the-clock feedings.

About the Author



Daniela Alibrandi is the author of successful thrillers and noirs in Italy and abroad. She was born in Rome, and lived and studied in the United States. In her professional life, she has been involved in cultural exchanges within the Council of Europe and the European Union. With her seventeen published novels, a Trilogy, an Anthology of short stories and seven English editions she is a prominent figure in the Italian literary scene. Her writings have often been featured in national newspapers and literary columns on RAI Italian television and radio broadcasts. The author, always present with her novels in the most important national bookfairs, has also won several national literary awards and the 2022 Women Art Week Award for her literary career. Some of her Italian editions are present in Harvard and Yale libraries as well as in New York Public Library.

For years and from various sources, such as literary critics and reviewers, this author’s style has been defined as multidimensional, until it was officialized as MultiDimensionCrime (Acronym MDCrime). A reading experience that forges imagination in a multi-dimensional way. In the complex and intertwined plots of her novels, which lead to sudden and unexpected twists, the characteristics of different strands are harmoniously blended. The reader follows the investigation to solve a murder and at the same time he amazingly enters the mind of the killer, reasoning alongside him, preparing the crime with him, and even partaking in the victims’ despair and terror. All in a growing suspense, both during the narration and in the final pages, when the reader often has to question all the beliefs he has developed during the reading. The settings the author chooses as well as the atmospheres are always amazing and palpable.

English website: https://danielaenglishwebsite.wordpress.com/
Italian website: https://danielaalibrandi.com/
Facebook Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100056951476831
Twitter: https://x.com/danielaalibrand
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielaalibrandi/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danielaalibrandi/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/DanielaAlibrandi

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Cold-hands-murders-romes-underground-ebook/dp/B0H6GPXC4M/ref=sr_1_1

Tuesday, September 8, 2026

Unladylike by Regina Louise



This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Regina Louise will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner. Click on a tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.



Unladylike: A Mythopoetic Reclamation of Love is a lyrical collection of poetry and prose exploring love, survival, embodiment, and the journey of returning to the self. Blending literary poetry with personal reflection, Regina Louise examines relationships, identity, trauma, healing, and the process of reclaiming one's voice after loss and betrayal.

Through intimate poems and essays, Unladylike maps the emotional terrain between heartbreak and self-discovery, inviting readers into a deeply human exploration of resilience, self-love, and personal transformation. Her work speaks to readers interested in emotional healing, spiritual growth, women's voices, and the reclamation of dignity through storytelling and creative expression.

Rooted in mythopoetic inquiry and lived experience, this collection moves through memory, desire, grief, and repair, offering language for those navigating change, recovery, and the search for meaning. Unladylike is both an artistic work and an invitation-to witness oneself honestly and to return to what was always there.


Read an Excerpt

Teeth Jewelry

I didn’t take it lying down—
my legs spread eagle, leaking,
like a broke-back Aphrodite,
or Erzulie Freda dispossessed of her longing.

The way you uninvited me
to the wedding—
I’d planned for two months to attend.

Fresh out of a group home,
I was certain I would arrive.
I showed up at your front door.
My hair set in Jada curls—
edges swooped in,
baby hairs laid down—
two hours under a hot-ass dryer
to get them right.

Your brother answered,
fraudulence jutting from his eyes,
said you weren’t home. Yet.
What about the black and champagne
Bentley in your driveway?
Your hubcapped feet, your only wheels.
It belonged to the girl from Baldwin Hills.
Eyes same color as mine.
Her daddy was a doctor.
Yours ran a dojo.

I took my financial aid money,
got myself a crepe de chine
Norma Kamali mini dress—
on sale, sale, sale at I. Magnin.
Fishnet pantyhose.

My first manicure—
to dig desolation from beneath
my dirty fingernails,
just to look respectable.

In pointed-toe flats,

I kicked and scratched my way
through the door,
two stairs at a time.

I followed my knowing into your lair.
My right hook, a javelin.
I threw a punch at your face—
a black belt trophy, barely missed.
You were fifth degree.

My jaw dislocated instantly
from the butt of your palm.

She ran for her life.
I ran into your fury.
And then—
my skin tore
you bit my face,
my arms,
the tops of my hands,
my wrists
my neck,
my bicep,

my shoulders,
the soles of my hands.

Clad in a blusa campesina,
a peasant shirt, off-the-shoulder,
in technicolor—my flesh on parade
fresh with the imprint of your
Central, lateral incisors.
Canines.

I returned to my social work theory seminar.

I wore your teeth jewelry
like a queen.

A gypsy skirt sashayed my hips.

I wore ankle bracelets
with fake gold coins
and fabricated seashells.

Everyone heard me coming.

I returned from Spring Break
baptized in a pain so exquisite,
one might mistake it
or all of who I was.

No matter.

I got my licks in, too.
Not just for me—
but for Tina Turner.
And all the rest of us
who stayed—
wired to do so.

About the Author:



Regina Louise is a poet, writer, teacher, speaker, executive coach, whose work explores the intersection of memory, belonging, identity, and emotional liberation. The author of three books—two of which have been adapted for film: Somebody’s Someone, Someone Has Led This Child to Believe and Permission Granted: Kick Ass Strategies to Bootstrap your Way to Unconditional Self-Love—she has spent more than three decades helping people transform adversity into authorship through story, self-inquiry, and radical compassion.

A senior teacher with the Hoffman Process, Regina is known for guiding profound conversations about restoring dignity, resilience, attachment, and the art of becoming fully oneself. Whether on stage, in classrooms, behind a microphone, or in intimate workshop settings, she invites audiences to reimagine the stories that have shaped their lives and discover the freedom that awaits beyond them.

Her forthcoming collection, Unladylike: A Mythopoetic Reclamation of Love (September 2026), marks her debut poetry collection. Blending poetry, lyrical prose, and aphoristic reflections, it is a fearless meditation on love, loss, self-possession, and the sacred work of returning home to oneself.

Regina Louise lives in California, where she continues to write, teach, and create work that honors the transformative power of language to restore dignity, deepen connection, and reclaim what has always belonged to us.

Website: http://www.therealreginalouise.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/therealreginalouise
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/regina.louise.5/
Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/p/books/unladylike-a-mythopoetic-reclamation-of-love-regina-louise/b4379cc65cf1293b
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B001IQXN7M

Wednesday, September 2, 2026

Duke du Jour by Petie McCarty



This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Petie McCarty will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.



She’s waiting in the past . . . He belongs in the future.

Jared Langley, present-day Duke of Reston, tumbles into an abandoned fountain on his ducal estate and is pelted back in time to the year 1816. There, Reston servants and local villagers think him a dead ringer for his namesake and rakehell ancestor—the seventh Duke of Reston, gone missing at the Battle of Waterloo. Unfortunately, Seven got mixed up with French spies out to assassinate the Duke of Wellington, and an unwary Jared ends up in their crosshairs.

Lady Ariana Hart has loved Jared Langley, the seventh Duke of Reston, since she was twelve years old, until the night the rogue broke her heart. Given up for dead, her rakish neighbor makes a miraculous return from Waterloo. Only Jared shows up a changed man and reignites all the feelings Ariana had long ago buried.

Jared is in a race against time.
His tasks?

Waylay the suspicions of his quirky servants and neighbors
Get to Wellington before the French spies do
Fix his fountain–before Seven shows up–so Jared has a way home
And definitely do not fall in love with the irresistible Lady Ariana . . .

Second Edition


Read an Excerpt

The sound of hoofbeats and wheels churning came from the path to the old stone stable. Seconds later, what looked to be a perfectly restored nineteenth-century curricle pulled up with a magnificent pair of spirited blacks in harness. The young man driving tied off the reins and jumped down, and Jared could only stare in stunned disbelief.

Curricle Man matched Jared’s height and build and wore scuffed knee-high boots, what appeared to be knickers, and a woolen waistcoat over a loose, long-sleeved white shirt with a linen scarf stuffed in the collar. A wave of dizziness struck Jared again. Curricle Man strode over and bowed.

Bowed?


“Chappy said you were back, Master Jared. So I took the liberty of bringing round your curricle, so you could take straight off to see Lady Wilder.”

This tableau had quickly turned into a nightmare.

“I do this often,” Jared said. The words came out sounding like a question, and he received two incredulous looks.

“As soon as you arrive, Mast—uh, Your Grace. At least, you did on the last few visits before you left for the continent,” Curricle Man offered. “I only thought―”

“Well, do not think. Maybe this visit I choose to be different. I can change.”

Jared got the you-must-be-daft look again. Truth be told, he felt a bit daft since he had not known he owned a curricle and had no intention of driving this one until he learned how. Harness-racing sulkies he knew.

Restored curricles, not at all.

“Begging your pardon, Your Grace,” Curricle Man persisted, “but you always said if you did not go there, Lady Wilder would come here. And you hate that.” The man gave him a wary stare. “Of course, that was more than two years ago.”

Jared’s head pounded in earnest, and he fought off a wave of nausea brought on by the accompanying dizziness. He did not know these people, he had no idea what or whom they were talking about, and he feared a climactic ending to this delusional scene.

“Yes, but this year is—” He had meant to say different, but Cook—who had been strangely silent throughout their discourse—beat him to the punch.

“—Eighteen sixteen, of course,” she said, looking worried. “Are ye sure ye didn’t hit yer head back at the fountain, Master Jared?”

“Eighteen sixteen?” he asked weakly.

“Right,” the two strangers agreed in unison.

Oh, dear Lord in heaven! I am not just named after Jared Langley. I am Jared Langley, seventh Duke of Reston.

Then everything went black.

About the Author:




Petie spent a large part of her career working at Walt Disney World—"The Most Magical Place on Earth"—where she enjoyed working in the land of fairy tales by day and creating her own romantic fairy tales by night, including her new series, The Cinderella Romances. She eventually said goodbye to her "day" job to write her stories full-time.

These days, Petie spends her time writing new tales for her Cinderella series, her new The Watchers series, sequels to her Regency time-travel series, Lords in Time, and more contemporary romance standalones, along with her two previous releases—Any Fin For Love and Ambush in the Everglades.

Petie shares her home on the Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee with her horticulturist husband and an opinionated Nanday conure named Sassy who makes a cameo appearance in Christmas Watch, Book 2 of The Watchers series.

Visit Petie at her website, www.petiemccarty.com, to get to know her, learn about her current projects, and discover her other published works.

Website: http://www.petiemccarty.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/petie.mccarty
Twitter: https://x.com/authorpetie
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6094579.Petie_McCarty
BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/petie-mccarty
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/author/petiemccarty

Buy Link: https://www.amazon.com/Duke-Du-Jour-Petie-McCarty-ebook/dp/B0H99Y9Z2Z.

Monday, August 17, 2026

The Call to Authorship by Tim W. Lindsay

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Tim W. Lindsay will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tours.



Embrace the call to authorship: 10 steps to leverage the power of a book!

Books help people—they inform, inspire, and engage. Books are also a powerful force for those who write them. Publishing a book builds your authority, sharpens your thinking, and opens doors to media exposure, speaking engagements, partnerships, and more.

Despite the greater accessibility of publishing than ever before, many would-be authors hesitate. They get stuck with self-doubt or believe producing a book is incompatible with a busy life. They may start writing but don't finish. Or they finish but don't publish or market their books.

The truth? With a little dedicated time, consistent effort, and the right guidance, anyone can publish a book that changes lives for the better. And they should.

Put down your phone. Take the leap from consumer to creator!

This step-by-step guide will show you how to:
- Use a one-page tool to clarify your goals, target audience and plan.
- Craft an outline that drives your manuscript forward.
- Overcome mental roadblocks and craft habits to finish your first draft in months, not years—even with a busy schedule.
- Select a publishing model, refine your manuscript, and make informed design and distribution decisions.
- Employ promotional strategies to achieve goals that transcend royalties.

Become more than you are. Have courage. Commit to growth by authoring a book, strengthening your ability to serve. Write with purpose. Publish for impact!

Bonus for book professionals: Special content for book coaches, editors, and ghostwriters—those helping ordinary people become extraordinary authors.


Read an Excerpt

The first step outlined in this book is to get clarity on your purpose and goals: your motivation for writing the book in the first place. This includes your strategic why and any business goals you may have, like generating leads, new clients, speaking opportunities, or partners. It also includes your journey why: enjoying the process, learning, being active rather than passive, stretching yourself, and getting outside your comfort zone.

Your purpose also relates to your readers, your service why. How are you helping them? If one reader studies your book closely and follows through on everything you advise in your book, how will it change their life? The impact you have on others can be profound, even if only a small number of people experience it. Your impact expands the more you effectively promote your book to grow your audience base.

The impact you have isn’t just on those who read your book, it also includes people who hear your interviews or see you speaking at an event, take your course, or decide to work with you and use your services after learning about you through your book marketing efforts, whether they read the book in full or not. And there is always a ripple effect: the people you reach will go on to influence and inspire others in their own circles.

But your book won’t just change your readers’ lives—it will change you. Publishing a book is a journey that leaves you transformed. You may start with a vague idea about publishing and a rough concept for your book. At first mental hangups and fears may hold you back. But if you follow the steps in this book, you’ll move through them.

About the Author:


Tim Lindsay founded Tellwell in 2015. Since then, he and his team have guided some 5,000 authors including entrepreneurs, professional speakers, coaches, consultants, experts, course creators, community builders, religious and nonprofit leaders, Indigenous organizations, athletes, influencers, and everyday citizens.

Website: http://www.Tellwellpublishing.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tellwellpublishing/
Tellwell - YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@tellwellpublishing
Amazon: https://amazon.com/dp/1834180422

Thursday, August 13, 2026

Heidenröslein: The Little Rose on the Heath by Christopher Whittaker

 



This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Christopher Whittaker will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.



Two men. Two worlds.

One war that will remake them both.

Peter Schiller, a disciplined officer from privilege, is trained to lead—but not for what war truly demands.

Günther Klein, a working-class recruit, is thrown into the trenches and forced to learn fast or die.

In the mud and ruin of the Great War, rank and class begin to dissolve. Orders blur into instinct. Honour bends under necessity. What remains is survival—and the thin, unspoken bond forged between two men who should never have met.

But war does not end when the guns fall silent.

Heidenröslein is a powerful, unflinching story of war, brotherhood, and the quiet, irreversible cost of becoming what the battlefield demands.


Read an Excerpt

The von Schiller estate sat upon a gentle rise overlooking the town, separated from the noise and smoke of industry by iron gates, trimmed hedges, and the unspoken certainty that families like theirs did not belong amongst ordinary life.

The house itself was not ancient enough to be called ancestral in the medieval sense, yet age clung to it all the same. Three stories of pale stone and dark timber stood behind carefully shaped gardens, its tall windows reflecting the morning light like polished glass. Ivy crept deliberately across portions of the outer walls, restrained rather than wild, allowed to grow only where it improved the appearance of age and permanence.

Nothing about the home was accidental.

Even the gravel upon the drive had been chosen for the sound it made beneath carriage wheels.

The front doors opened into a grand receiving hall floored in black-and-white marble tiles imported decades earlier from Italy. The ceilings rose high overhead, crossed with dark wooden beams stained almost black with polish and age. Portraits of Von Schillers long dead stared down from the walls in oils darkened by time—military officers, industrialists, stiff-backed women in lace collars and jewels.

Men who had built.

Men who had commanded.

Men who had expected obedience from the world and usually received it.

The air carried faint scents of furniture wax, old paper, polished silver, and the lingering aroma of Ernst von Schiller’s pipe tobacco.

About the Author: Chris lives in Perth, Western Australia with his wife Dianne.

Amazon: https://amazon.com/dp/183454193X

Monday, August 10, 2026

The Tale of the Prince and the Spider by Sasha Hopkins



This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Sasha Hopkins will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

Prince Alexander is a boy filled with courage, laughter, and light, until a chance encounter with a mysterious new "friend" changes everything. Trapped in a web of fear and silence, he must find the strength to fight back against a dark trickster who wants to steal his voice, his joy, and his future.

The Tale of the Prince and the Spider is a modern fairytale for children, parents, and anyone who has faced fear in silence. Told with warmth, honesty, and hope, it reveals how secrets can poison, how love protects, and how even the smallest voice can grow into a roar.

Through Alexander's journey, readers discover that pain does not define us—courage does. His story is both a thrilling adventure and a gentle reminder that you are stronger than your fears, your voice matters, and you are never alone.

This is more than a tale of princes and monsters. It is a story for every family who longs for healing, resilience, and light in dark times. Beautifully written to spark conversations between children and adults, it invites readers to talk openly about bravery, truth, and the power of standing tall.


Read an Excerpt

One sunny morning, Alexander started an adventure. The sun shone bright like a golden bell, lighting up hills covered in green grass, and wildflowers—yellow, purple, red—spread out like a painter’s canvas. The wind carried scents of dirt and sweet clover, tickling his nose as he rode Menace, his brown horse, whose fur coat gleamed like a soldier’s sword. Menace’s hooves thumped the dirt road, kicking up dust that sparkled. Alexander held the reins tight, feeling them rub his hands, the breeze messing up his hair as his saddle creaked along with the swaying trees above.

Bushes shook—a rabbit darted past; a hawk’s shadow soared overhead. The road stretched on, but where trees grew thick, shadows moved, hinting at a forest full of secrets. Menace huffed, ears twitching, and Alexander patted his warm, scratchy neck. “Keep going, boy,” he said quietly, his heart beating with excitement.

Through the kingdom he went, past roads busy with familiar smiling people who stopped to cheer, their voices lifting him up. But farther out, it got quiet, the land wide and free. With a lion’s bravery, a fire’s strength, and a heart full of love, he rode into the unknown.

About the Author

Sasha Hopkins is a father of five and a storyteller from Melbourne, Australia. His journey has been shaped by both love and hardship. As a child, Sasha endured trauma that left deep scars, yet he chose not to remain silent or let those experiences define him. Instead, he transformed his pain into a story of courage, resilience, and hope.

He wrote The Tale of the Prince and the Spider during a period of recovery in Western Australia, creating it as a gift for his children, Winter, Hunter, Hudson, Navy, and Orion. What began as a father's offering of love became a timeless fairytale for families everywhere: a reminder that even in life's darkest moments, light can be found, voices can be heard, and healing is always possible.

Through his writing, Sasha shares a powerful message: your past does not diminish you, and speaking out is an act of bravery that can inspire others. When he isn't writing, Sasha is adventuring with his kids, encouraging them to embrace adventure, laughter, and the strength within themselves.

Amazon: https://amazon.com/dp/0228892406
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/251865138-the-tale-of-the-prince-and-the-spider



Tuesday, July 28, 2026

Whispers of the Elixir by C.P. Silver



This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. C.P. Silver will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.



A matriarchal empire. A princess with forbidden magic. A mother who would kill to protect her own legacy.

As heir to the Min empire, Tori has spent her life under the iron will of her mother, Empress Zinchen—a sovereign determined to shape the world in her own image. But Tori has been hiding a dangerous secret: a forbidden elemental power tied to the world’s mythic past. If Zinchen discovers the truth, it will cost Tori her life.

Haunted by this threat, Tori flees into the hidden lands—an ancient realm of ghost-flowers, sentient forests, and immortals from a half-remembered age. But magic here is neither blessing nor curse—it is a reflection, a test, a force that shapes as much as it destroys. And as her trials progress, Tori is stripped of certainty and pride. To survive her mother’s ambition, she must use what she learns to suppress the power that could doom her—but in doing so, she risks losing the very future she was born to inherit.

Whispers of the Elixir begins the Order of the Ember series—a character-driven epic of legacy, sacrifice, and the strength of a princess destined to rise from the shadows and claim her place in legend.

In Whispers of the Elixir, you will find the political intrigue of Andrea Stewart, the mythic worldbuilding of Ken Liu, and the emotional resonance of M.L. Wang.

Read an Excerpt

Tori fought the feeling of being on a leash. She raised a hand halfway to the feathers fastened around her neck, hesitated, then let it fall.

“Is it itching, Princess?” Lady Elnora said, watching her.

“Like all insanity, but no point fiddling with it.”

Her gentlewoman adjusted the feathered ruff anyway, providing no relief whatsoever. It didn’t matter. Collared or not, today she would prove she was not her mother’s lapdog.

She struggled to see above the red filigree rail of the Imperial Observation Pavilion—where the royal family sat, far above the masses—the weight of her ceremonial robes resisting her every effort. Imperial decorum, it seemed, had not been designed with mobility in mind. It was times like these that she regretted her small stature; her mother, no doubt, could see perfectly.

Once she finally shifted forward, however, her three-story vantage point allowed her a perfect view of the float parade winding through the city of Silver Fox Springs in a ribbon of color and sound.

“I still don’t see them,” Tori said, craning her neck forward.

Elnora’s smooth brown finger pointed the way. Blending seamlessly with the sculptures of giant mythical creatures adorning the streets, Tori’s pantomimists balanced on their stilts, waist pouches packed so tight with skades that the little stones stretched the seams. Pantomimists had never been seen before at the Tailu Spring Festival—and would remain hidden, until her plan required it.

About the Author:


C.P. Silver writes fantasy set in a world where matriarchy is absolute, with immersive worldbuilding, evocative prose, and emotionally complex characters. A former lawyer who also briefly studied Chinese medicine, her experiences shape the nuance and depth of her debut novel, Whispers of the Elixir, a slow-burn epic centered on legacy, inheritance, and the dangerous cost of power.

Raised in the Cayman Islands, she now lives in Europe. When not writing, she’s usually reading in a quiet nook or walking somewhere green, listening for the next story.

Buy Links:

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F9YVK3NG
All Other Retailers: https://books2read.com/Whispers-of-the-Elixir

Social Media:

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/cpsilver_author
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cpsilverauthor/
BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/cpsilver-author.bsky.social
Goodreads profile: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/56899835.C_P_Silver
Author website: https://www.cpsilver.com/