You may have noticed some redecorating has happened!
The new book has a cover, as you can see. Right now everything is getting set up for pre-orders and I’ll post to let you know when that happens.
In the meantime, let me know what you think of the cover and if you are a book reviewer and want to get a digit ARC to review prior to the release, hit me up and I’ll get you the file.
Bryan Wagner is a part of Alaric’s clan, a close friend of Alaric’s father. He has been a part of Alaric’s life for a long time. As the story opens, Bryan is in his late thirties and with Alaric serves as one of Anson Lambrecht’s Keepers.
Bryan was raised with more formal training than many in the clan and he has good control of his gifts. He’s a strong reader, is good with projecting glamors to make things and people appear to different and he can project ideas/thoughts into unprotected minds. These things come in handy when you’re running from someone.
Physically, Bryan is tall, with broad shoulders and big hands. His skin is tan from hours in the sun, all but a long white scar that runs from his hair line, down over his left eye and onto his cheek. That eye is blind and white.
Bryan sometimes comes across as a bit crass because he doesn’t waste time with niceties he doesn’t mean. He’s bold and he is unafraid to voice the unpopular positions. He is, however, fiercely loyal, first to his clan, then to the clan’s leader, even when he disagrees with a decision that leader has made.
He is not a fan of getting involved in the strife tearing the country apart and he holds very little love for the other tribes, Shades in particular. Bryan was an integral part of the work to bring the scattered clan back together and institute training regimens to strengthen the tribe, though he himself doesn’t really have the patience to be a teacher.
Underlying a lot of the story in the Shades and Shadows universe, is the history of the tribes, most of which has been lost or diluted or re-written. Each tribe has an inherent “gift” that sets them apart, which is ultimately the cause for the division among them.
Human beings, as a rule, are wary of things that are different, and we can turn on those who seem to have something “more” than we have, those with power we can not understand or control. So it comes as no surprise that the tribes turned on one another, sometimes banding together to take on one tribe, sometimes all of them killing each other.
In the fallout, one tribe grew in number faster and spread further. Unlike the other four tribes, their gift wasn’t one of healing or magic or other things we would consider paranormal. Their gift, rather, was to be free of the trappings of those things; free to pursue the life they chose.
Unfortunately, they did not see that as a gift, and over time, persecuted the other tribes into hiding. Thus was the history lost, unless the tribe itself kept their own. With the tribes scattered, even to the point of losing track of their own clans, no one really knows the truth.
Okay, the 8th battalion isn’t an individual character, but throughout Through Shade and Shadow, it acts as one. It isn’t clear from the start if it is merely a name latched onto by disjointed groups that makes it seem like a huge, nationwide organization, or if all of those groups are actually one.
The 8th Battalion is born in the idea of idealized militia rising up to defend what they think is right, their way of life. When Shades are discovered to be real, the 8th Battalion paints them into their canvas of people who are responsible for their pain, alongside people of color, people of other faiths, etc.
There is a certain religiosity involved here. The 8th Battalion hangs their hatred and bigotry on a tree of religion and sets the whole thing on fire.This, of course, buys them support from certain types of people across the country. When their first acts of violence aren’t widely condemned, and in some cases, actively cheered on, they take this as approval for their agenda and their attacks escalate to include murder and bombings.
But, it should be noted that not everyone involved in the 8th Battalion are religious zealots. There is a shadowy leadership behind the whole thing that has only interest in one thing, and they will use this group to gain it.
As an author, one of the things I’m often asked is “how did you think of that” or “where did that idea come from” and to be fair, most of the time I’m not completely sure myself. I get inspired by many, many different things all the time. And that inspiration gets filed away until I need it.
Through Shade and Shadow originated with the idea of the Shade first of all. Anyone who has read my work knows I have a love of the paranormal and a big part of that is vampires. My first published novel was all vampires. I wanted to look at the mythos of blood drinking as a method of killing, but also as a need for living. I also didn’t want to create yet another vampire story.
So I started with blood drinking, but decided that it wouldn’t be the only means of living, I made them dependent on water as well. I kept the whole bit about the sun being deadly, but dialed back the severity. Then I started to think about who I wanted this character to be, what I wanted his abilities to be.
I think I actually chose the healing idea by taking the idea that a vampire could sort of “heal” someone who was dying, by turning them into a vampire and then combined that idea with the whole connection to blood and water as life givers.
That was, essentially, how the Shade was born. The history for them is based largely on what I know of our own history, how anything “other” was feared and shunned, hunted and killed, particularly when in large groups.
As a result, when we first meet Mason, Shades are scarce. So scarce in fact that he’s somewhat surprised to find that he and his grandmother are not actually the last ones on earth.
#shadeandshadow #whatisashade
Alaric Lambrecht is the second main character in Through Shade and Shadow. As the story opens, Alaric is twenty four years old and he has had a pretty charmed life. His parents are not wealthy, but they are upper middle class. He’s never wanted for anything.
At seventeen, his father tapped him to be one of his Keepers, a trio of people from the tribe of psychics, empaths and other gifted folk who help the leader of the clan function, watching out for his mental, emotional and physical well being.
Alaric’s specific gift is empathy, the ability to feel what others feel. He uses it in an attempt to help his father do his other job, that of city councilman. Alaric is his aide, does research for him, helps field phone calls and the like.
When he isn’t busy with that, he is helping his mother with re-igniting the structured teaching methods of his tribe, which have largely been abandoned due to the persecutions of the past.
He’s pretty content with his life until people begin to react to the discovery of the Shade serial killer in ways that will threaten his people. As his idyllic life begins to unravel, Alaric must make choices, all of them driving him toward Mason Jerah and beyond him, war.
Through Shade and Shadow is set in an America not very different than the one I live in. Well, maybe a little closer to America circa 2015. As the book opens in the spring, the political climate is already a little tense, with those who want to claim the Republican party nomination for president already relying heavily on morality rhetoric.
The are quick to point out that the problems that the country has are easy to blame on those “others” that they name, be they Muslims, immigrants, the poor who demand the government support them, etc.
But then, they get handed a new scapegoat when a serial killer is discovered. He is found drinking the blood of his victims which has people speculating that he’s a Shade. When medical exams conclude that he is indeed a Shade, fear skyrockets and the politicians have a new group to villainize.
Up to the moment that a doctor declares this killer a Shade, Shades were considered to be mythological beings. Little of truth is actually known about them, and even what is has been distorted from the reality. Speculation abounds and violence follows behind it.
And this is the start of a journey that will take Mason Jerah far, far from the safety of his ancestral home.
When we first meet Mason Jerah, he is just turning eighteen and watching his grandmother die. He has lived his entire life separate from modern society, but for what he can see on television.
His interaction with the outside world has mostly been with the people in the nearest town. He has been alone with just his grandmother for many years. As a result, he’s hesitant and comes across as shy upon first meeting. It isn’t so much that he is shy, but he’s thinking through everything he says.
Mason belongs to a tribe of people called Shades, one of five tribes that once upon a time coexisted peacefully. Shades are gifted healers who can use energy to help not only themselves, but others heal. It takes a lifetime of learning and practice, which Mason hasn’t had because his grandmother was too afraid to teach him.
Shades require large quantities of fluid, usually water to be able to do their work and to keep their own bodies functioning. They are also vulnerable to the affects of the sun, burning quickly and well beyond the average sunburn. The sun can kill a Shade.
With his grandmother’s death, Mason decides to embark on a traditional journey that will take him down off his mountain and out into a world that has started to fall apart.
It is always a weird transition for me, going from the writing/self-editing phase into working through the edits suggested by someone other than me who has read the manuscript. I genuinely love the notes that show confusion, because they give me a chance to see the story from a different perspective.
Obviously the passage made sense to me at the time…but now I get to re-read the scene from another point of view, and hopefully clarify whatever was unclear.
It also gives new life to characters that had become intimately familiar, making me step back and see them for not who they are to me, but who the words have created. I learn something every time.
I should mention here too that I have an AWESOME editor who isn’t afraid to tell me when things just don’t work and who gives me tools to be a better writer. I’m sure I wouldn’t be half as good at storytelling without her.
I am so very excited to share this story with readers. In the coming days I will be posting short character introductions, and not just for the characters in this book, but I will include characters that join the cast in books 2 & 3.
First up will be Mason Jerah. You’ll be meeting him this weekend. I hope to post an introduction on Saturday, between all of my last minute prep for the family holiday.