I have wonderful news to share!
Not only is DAWN OF CHAOS, the second book in The Sapeiro Chronicles done, but it is now available for pre sale!
I’m so proud of this book, and I really hope you enjoy joining in on Sora’s adventures in Sapeiro.
Get your copy TODAY on Amazon! The eBook will automatically be sent to your kindle once the book is published on May 2!
You can get your copy on Amazon Canada or on Amazon USA.
Hi!
It’s been a while, hasn’t it?
I recognize that updates have been sparse for a while. But I promise that it was for a good reason – and now, I can explain why.
I’ve been struggling with trying to decide on what direction to bring The Sapeiro Chronicles in. Specifically, regarding book 2 in the series, Dawn of Chaos. After a lot of hesitation, peppered with moments of intense motivation, I’ve made the terrifying and exciting decision to strike it out on my own and continue the series as a self-published author!
This is the first time I’ll be responsible for every facet of a project, from beginning to end. Although daunting, the creative freedom this decision comes with is also thrilling, and I am so excited to share my vision of what Dawn of Chaos is about with you!
Stay tuned for more news about Dawn of Chaos, coming this April 2023! The blurb, cover reveal and exact publishing date will follow soon.
Now that the news is out, I am also happy to open applications for ARC readers! These readers would get an advance copy of the book, with the promise of leaving an honest review on Amazon, Kobo, Goodreads, and any other platforms they feel like.
Interested? Apply now! I’m aiming to release ARCs on Feb. 21.
I am so excited to be embarking on this journey, and I cannot wait to get this story into your hands.
Until next time, and happy reading!
Tiffany
100 Bookstagram Post Prompts To Engage Your Followers
Bookish people tend to find other likeminded bookish people. There are a few places on the internet where whole communities of story-loving booknerds can be found, one of which is Instagram. Instagram is one of the most popular image-sharing social media platforms in the world, with an estimated 1 billion active users monthly worldwide. The bookish community there is affectionately referred to as Bookstagram (cute, right?).
If you have a Bookstagram account, then you’ve probably wondered how to grow your following and reach other bookish users.
Personally, I use Bookstagram to connect with potential readers for the Young Adult High Fantasy novel, The Sapeiro Chronicles: A Forgotten Past. But I also use it to meet other authors in my genre, and have had the incredible opportunity to chat with readers and writers world-wide.
I’m not going to lie and try to pretend to understand the intricacies of how the platform’s analytics work to push content to those who are likely to enjoy it. However, one thing is certain: Instagram–and by extension, most social media platforms, value and reward engagement. The more people who engage with your content, either through liking or commenting on your posts, the more likely that your content will continue to be pushed and promoted, furthering your reach.
As content creators, it’s incredibly important to maintain an active presence on social media. However, this can be daunting and time consuming. Not to mention that sometimes, your creativity well runs dry.
What I’ve found to be helpful in driving engagement is to ask people an interesting question of the day (QOTD) to try and get your followers to interact with your post.
So here’s a list of topics/questions to ask your followers and maintain engagement!
Let’s start with the basics:
Get to know your audience:
This or that questions:
Character-related questions
General questions:
Time-related questions
Here are a few examples of engaging posts I’ve made on my Instagram page:
Question: do you set yourself a reading goal for the year?
This year, my goal is to read 25 books. I’m currently making my way through my 11th book, and I’m super stoked that I’m way ahead of the goal I set for myself!
In other fun news: I’m super thrilled to be hosting a giveaway on Instagram! This week I reached 3000 followers, and to celebrate I’m giving away one free eBook version of The Sapeiro Chronicles: A Forgotten Past!
Check out the rules here. Entering is super easy. Make sure to tag all of your bookish friends!
And hey, if you did happen to read the Sapeiro Chronicles, consider leaving a review on Goodreads and Amazon. Each review helps get my book in the hands of someone else who enjoys reading YA Fantasy!
Hurry up! Giveaway ends on April 16th!
Some good news for 2021…The Sapeiro Chronicles: A Forgotten Past has officially won Silver in the Literary Titan Book Award!
This award makes my little Author heart ever so happy. It’s a small recognition, but one I am very proud of nonetheless. Not to mention that it starts the year off wonderfully!
You can read their full review here, as well as an author interview I did here.
Have you read A Forgotten Past yet? Get your copy on Amazon today: https://amzn.to/2V79PPO
SALE ALERT! SALE ALERT!
Great news! For a limited time only, The Sapeiro Chronicles, A Forgotten Past is ON SALE at the Kindle store for $0.99. Get yourself a copy, or better yet, get a head-start on some Holiday shopping and get a copy for the Fantasy fan in your life. It is reminiscent of Lord of the Rings, with a tinge of Hunger Games and a dash of Throne of Glass. A perfect holiday read!
Here’s what readers have to say so far about A Forgotten Past:
“When I say, I was hooked… I mean, procrastinate, stay up late, could not put it down hooked! Jumping into the Sapeiro world has been one of the best highlights of quarantine life. I need to know more; Lily is an amazingly written heroine who is both strong and vulnerable. I was kept guessing the entire book and NEED THE SECOND BOOK TO COME OUT ASAP!!!!! Highly Recommend!”
“Fast-paced story with lots of twists and turns. Very exciting read. Can’t wait for book 2.”
“A very well-written novel with an intricate story and surprising, unexpected twists! The author introduces a lot of different characters in this first volume, but still manages to establish each of their distinct personalities without entirely revealing their motivations; I found myself rooting for, suspicious of, or despising certain characters before I was even halfway through. The sheer scale of the world is also impressive; I felt like we only got a small glimpse of Sapeiro in this book, even though we’re introduced to many different places. Can’t wait for the second book to come out!”
Curiosity piqued? Here’s the blurb:
Beast Whisperer – that was Lily’s special talent. Or so she thought. When she was a child, Lily had washed up on the riverbank near Basolt, with no memory of who she was. Taken in by the couple who found her, she was raised as their own, alongside their new baby. Years later she does something extraordinary. And word spreads of a new Spirit Hopper, someone who can enter into and control not only beasts, but people. Someone who can change the land of Sapeiro. Someone who is supposed to be dead. The rumors catch the attention of those who would control her power. Those who would use Lily for their own purposes, no matter how many lives it costs. They set their plots to capture her in motion. But Lily discovers there is at least one group who might hold the key to her real identity. One group who would protect her. But trust does not come easily for Lily. And her would-be saviors have secrets of their own.
Hurry, this sale won’t last forever! Get your copy now before it’s too late.
Few stories manage to fit in elements of romance, tales of myth and legend, terrifying beasts and a strong, bad-ass woman in the way that The Soft Fall by Marissa Byfield does. I’ve had the immense pleasure of reading her Young Adult Fantasy novel, which also has ever-so-slight elements of paranormal fantasy in it. It’s one of the most creative retellings of the werewolf genre I’ve seen in recent years. It will make you feel deeply for the main character, Dianna, as she navigates a whole new world of demons and beasts who’s intentions are unknown.
I could go on and on about the narrative arc and incredibly well-detailed scenes, but instead, I’ll turn it over to Marissa so she can tell you about it herself.
Marissa, over to you!
What is The Soft Fall about?
If you love Wonder Woman, Princess Mononoke, or Beauty and The Beast, then The Soft Fall is for you. Set in a fantasy world, it’s a retelling of the myths of the goddess Artemis and the imperial twins raised by wolves, Romulus and Remus.
Bitten by a wolf as a girl, the young huntress Dianna must do anything it takes to survive her oppressive village — even if that means trespassing the forbidden woods where the wolves roam. What happens next will bring the lives of five outcasts together and change the course of an empire at war.
I always joke that it basically started as an AU (alternate universe) fanfic of Greco-Roman mythology, but it is! With a twist of lycanthropy.
Why werewolves?
I’m fascinated by wolves and werewolves alike. But throughout myth and story, they haven’t exactly been represented in a positive or even neutral light. I know there are many readers who feel like once you’ve read one werewolf story you’ve read them all. And there are plenty of werewolves in romance or horror — but the fantasy genre is surprisingly lacking in them.
I always knew I wanted to write a fresh and more nuanced werewolf tale, and that started with thinking about things I didn’t like about existing ones, and how I could go about subverting them.
Instead of hierarchy, I thought, let’s depict wolf packs as they really are: dynamically structured, highly social and communal groups. What if there was a found family of werewolves who fought not for dominance, but against another territorial pack and hunters bent on exterminating them?
Instead of wolves being shown as a menace and a threat, let’s show how wolves are essential to the ecosystem. What if these werewolves had special powers over the earth?
Instead of werewolves symbolizing toxic masculine aggression, let’s explore werewolves as a symbol for the transformations of womanhood, including being caged and repressed by a society that calls you monstrous for the desire for bodily autonomy.
Dianna’s village calls the wolves “demons.” It begs the question: Who is the real monster?
What are you working on currently?
The Soft Fall is the first book in the Lunar Siege duology. I’m writing the sequel, Echelon Rising, which follows the pack as they seek to bring peace to the empire…but there are forces at play beyond their imagining.
Without spoiling you, the narrative is split between Dianna and Eccka. They’re two incredibly empowered women, and I wanted to get an even more intimate look at their thoughts, motives, and backstories. The Soft Fall was about finding agency, and Echelon is about taking control of it. There’s a war to be fought, fates of former characters to be revealed, and new characters to meet — including a warrior based on the goddess Athena, an alchemist who may hold the key to defeating the enemy, and (of course) lots more werewolves. I think there will also be more moments of humor and lightness than readers expect. Some character developments have been waiting in the wings a long time, and I’m so excited to finally visit those.
I’ve been spending a great deal of time researching battle formations and legionary strategies against the odds. Here in America we’re facing a dire political situation, and in addition to the pandemic, it’s given me a lot to process about how interconnected and volatile survival can be. My aim is to bring messages of perseverance onto the page, and hopefully bring the story to a satisfying conclusion.
Excerpt from The Soft Fall:
The first sensation was cold.
Its numbness embraced her, settled clean and raw in her lungs with her awakening breath. The sharp teeth of it needled at her nose and cheeks.
Dianna lay still, blinking. One by one, like flower buds unfurling in spring, each of her senses returned to life.
The silence was broken only by the faintest of sounds – the soft skitter of nocturnal animals, the tumble of melting snow from a tangle of branches, the wind’s dull susurration. She saw darkness above; white below.
She smelled the earthy spice of pine.
A nightmare.
She looked at her body and thought it had somehow disappeared, that she’d dissolved into the snow itself. But a bitter gust unsettled her hair, making the ends whirl about her face. A white nightgown flickered around her legs.
Dianna clenched her hand experimentally. A warm rush of blood prickled through her. She tried the other hand.
No, this is real, she thought.
“No,” she found herself saying. She rubbed the back of her head, tearing clumps of snow from her hair. “No . . .”
She sat up, squinting into the night. The farmhouse was a distant speck on the horizon. The slope below it was draped in a clean, blank canvas, smudged only by a trail of her own footprints. They stopped in a spray of powder at her stocking feet, where she’d tripped and woken. She moved her ankle away from a knotted tree root and looked up.
Snow-laced pines loomed tall and motionless as sentinels around her.
Something moved among them, half-smothered in the dark. Dianna glimpsed slivers of its lupine form. A chill slithered through her as she rose to her feet.
The demon went still, watching her.
Behind latticed branches, its molten yellow stare was unfaltering. Dianna’s heart was a bird beating its wings against the cage of her ribs. Though her instincts screamed to run, she dared not move.
Both girl and wolf stood with the impasse of strangers, each studying the other. Time seemed to suspend. The sounds of the woods calmed to a hush.
It began to snow.
The snow fell like fragments of moonlight, silver-flecked, before blinking out in the darkness. Dianna stood like a shivering fawn on feeble legs as the cold nipped at her skin, pushing its icy fingers through her hair. It touched her nose, swelled in her fingertips and toes. Snowflakes caught in her eyelashes.
The wolf’s expression seemed serene, even curious, fringed in a soft halo of fur. Its auric eyes remained fixed on hers as if waiting for something to happen.
As Dianna stayed rooted to the spot, the grip of fear began to slacken. And slowly, a profound wonder filled her.
The wolf crept forward with a tentative grace, despite its sheer mass. It loomed over her, tall as a grown man. There was a subtle deadliness in its deliberate steps, like a snake twisting through grass, like smoke curling from a slow-burning fire.
Dianna’s breath deepened. She visualized it killing her in one smooth movement – seizing her neck in its jaws, throwing her to the ground with ease.
But still she could not find the strength to move as the snow crushed under its heavy footfalls, closing the distance between them.
The wolf’s head was low, flame-eyes level with hers. Something human stared out from their depths.
The realization tingled on her skin, shivered deep into her bones.
“I see you in there,” she whispered.
It was so close she could feel its hot breath wash over her, strangely welcoming in the winter chill. For one mad second, she wanted to reach out and stroke its fur, just to know the feel of it.
Its muzzle furrowed, revealing glazed, sharp teeth.
Dart-quick, its fangs pierced the soft flesh just above her elbow, sinking in, drawing blood. The white-hot pain shattered through her arm like glass. She buckled to the ground, convulsing.
The wolf turned in a flash, vanished into the veil of snowfall and beyond the clustered pines, a memory to be forgotten.
The Soft Fall is available in paperback, audiobook, and ebook at this link!
Marissa’s blog: https://marissabyfield.wordpress.com/
Book trailer for The Soft Fall: https://youtu.be/lt2cHWxIKIw
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/moonlitmarissa/
Writing and reading books in the fantasy genre is one of my favorite things to do. Maybe it’s the limitless possibilities that come with the genre, but there’s something so intrinsically cool about building a world from the ground up and thinking about how it works. Do they have giant six-legged beasts they ride to work in the morning? Do they get bouts of rain so acidic that it melts rooftops that aren’t properly insulated? Does their monetary system revolve around singing, and those who sing best are the richest?
There’s a lot that goes into creating a story, especially a high fantasy story…but maybe that’s just my bias showing. With high fantasy, you as the writer have an opportunity to toy with language, different races, jaw-dropping geography and awe-inspiring architecture. The world you build really is only limited to how much you can imagine.
During this process of thinking and building and creating, it’s important to put an emphasis on culture. That’s because a lot of the time, culture is what will impact your story and determine your character’s reactions to the events happening around them or to them.
Pondering the importance of culture in a fantasy story is a pseudo chicken-and-egg scenario. Do you mold the story after the culture you’ve created, or do you change the culture to fit the story? Which should come first?
It’s an interesting conundrum to ponder. But I would argue that the sooner you establish your world’s culture, the sooner you can work out the kinks in your story. An arc that revolves around a girl who wants to work hard and become the first female dragon rider might not make sense in a matriarchal society. Or a boy who refuses to marry might not be a good point of conflict if marriage isn’t an important cultural ceremony.
But before delving any deeper, let’s examine what comprises culture, exactly. It’s a term often thrown around by eager travelers wanting to ‘immerse themselves in the culture of the place, you know?’, but a nation or country’s culture is an intricate knot composed of different elements.
In its broad term, culture refers to a people’s religion, art, literature, beliefs, and customs. It’s the cuisine, the language, social habits, music and customs of a subset of people. It’s the essence of a nation and defines or alters their world view. In effect, it becomes the lens through which they see the world.
Culture should be the backbone of your worldbuilding. You’ll want to think deep and hard about what your world is like, and how the culture has shaped the people who live in your story.
And don’t forget – cultures often vary by region or families. So it’s helpful to think of how to incorporate different cultures, and how they may clash or align with others included in your story. Not only does it make you look good as a writer, but it also serves as fodder for plotting and story structure.
When thinking of the story I wanted to tell with the Sapeiro Chronicles, I gave a lot of thought to the region’s politics and how it influenced or affected people’s view of their leadership. I also gave great thought to how their magic – referred to as Kerai, is part of the social fabric. This made me in turn consider how to weave it into the myths and legends of Sapeiro, and think about how the relationship with this magic differs per family. Thinking of these different worldviews was instrumental in teasing out how the different conflicts would present themselves, and made for a much more engaging story.
When done well, culture can be a driving force in a story arc. It can be the initial conflict, the resolution, or even the conclusion of your story. Culture is a powerful tool to leverage in your narrative, and you should absolutely exploit it for the purposes of your story.
Hi everyone,
The weekend is almost here! Maybe you’re looking for your next read, or maybe just keeping an eye out for an excuse to procrastinate on that thing you’re supposed to be doing.
Either way, here’s a solution for you: you can now read the first three chapters of The Sapeiro Chronicles: A Forgotten Past here!
The best part: it’s absolutely free!
I hope you enjoy those first few chapters. Full disclosure: the action gets really good soon after, and the plot thickens as of chapter 4, which introduces one of my favorite characters, Saki Stanimir.
Sakti is clever, strategic, and a total bad ass. She will absolutely beat you to a bloody pulp if she feels like it, and she’s on the verge of making a really big discovery that sets her off on a personal mission.
Here’s a quick synopsis of the story, so you know what you’re getting into:
Beast Whisperer – that was Lily’s special talent. Useful, but not as flashy as some. Or so she thought. When she was a child, Lily had washed up on the riverbank near Basolt, with no memory of who she was. Taken in by the couple who found her, she was raised as their own, alongside their new baby. Years later she does something extraordinary. And word spreads of a new Spirit Hopper, someone who can enter into and control not only beasts, but people. Someone who can change the land of Sapeiro. Someone who supposedly died years before. The rumors catch the attention of those who would control her power. Those who would use Lily for their own purposes, no matter how many lives it costs. They set their plots to capture her in motion. But Lily discovers there is at least one group who might hold the key to her real identity. One group who would protect her. But trust does not come easily for Lily. And her would-be saviors have secrets of their own.
Interested in the story? Check it out on Amazon!
It’s National Book Lovers Day today! And do you know what that means?
IT’S GIVEAWAY TIME!
Now’s your chance to own a signed copy of A Forgotten Past! I’ve got two signed copies to give away to two lucky readers! Enter the giveaway today on my Facebook page for your chance to win!
Here’s how to enter:
Winners will be announced on Sunday August 23rd!
GOOD LUCK!
tiffanylafleur.com 