Just off the Path
by Weston
Sullivan
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
GENRE: Fantasy
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
BLURB:
Hansel never asked to be a
hero. He never wanted to fall in love with Rapunzel, Queen of the East. He
didn’t ask to be raised by Gothel the Wretch, and he certainly never wanted to
be credited for her arrest. But more than any of that, Hansel never wanted to
lie: but he did. He lied about everything. He thought that he was done with it
all when he and his sister Gretel retreated into the woods to reclaim their land,
but he should have known better.
Hansel needs to find a way to fix this, otherwise
he will be responsible for Grimm’s destruction, or that is what he thinks. As
Hansel isn’t the only liar in Grimm.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
EXCERPT
Looking Glass Upon The Wall
The oval mirror stood
against the stone wall—antique, but broken all the same. A once small crack
grew, until it split it in two from a century of misuse. It had belonged to a
queen who loved it almost as much as she loved herself, and as each year passed
the crack deepened. Unlike the queen—who lay only three flights down in her
chamber—the mirror was awake and had been since the curse was placed.
It remembered a time when
the queen would stare at herself, and even though she looked past it, somehow
it felt lucky to have her so close. Hours would pass before she left the mirror
alone in the tower. It watched her as she moved through the castle, cooing. She
didn’t know it, but the mirror saw everything, from the beauty of her face to
the darkness inside her. When it looked at her, it could see the envy emanating
from within. The queen was a dragon who’d yet to learn how to breathe fire, and
it was through that rage that the mirror accidentally destroyed the entire
world.
There was no one the queen
hated more than her stepdaughter. The girl was fresh snow—gentle, welcomed, and
beautiful. She knew that her husband would have stayed married to the girl’s
mother had she not died during childbirth. The mirror could feel the queen’s
rage at the thought of the girl—or any of the king’s other children—inheriting
the throne rather than her own unborn heir.
The mirror watched as the
queen brushed her hair, carefully and meticulously as to the placement of each
tantalizing strand. She trusted the mirror to always know what she was
thinking, to reflect the light at just the right angle so that her cheekbones
made a diamond of her face, so that her jawline was sharp, and her collarbone
protruded from her neck.
It lied to her every day.
One morning, as the queen
emerged from the bath, steam filled the room and covered the glass with thick
condensation. Sitting opposite the mirror, she combed the moisture from her
hair. The mirror was elated. It swooned at the sight of her. The steam turned
to droplets of misty water and slid slowly, smoothly down its surface. The
mirror knew all. It tried not to eavesdrop on the thoughts of its mistress, but
sometimes it was necessary.
“Mirror, if not me, then
who?” The queen pulled on her robe to cover her chest. She bit her bottom lip
and examined herself closely. “I am queen. No one is fairer than I. If not I,
then who?”
She trusted the mirror.
At that moment—perhaps due
to a trick of the light, or perhaps a test of the mind—the queen saw it all the
same, a woman appeared in the mirror in place of her own reflection; a
beautiful, pale face with pink lips and small eyes. It was the queen’s
stepdaughter, bloomed and ripened. The queen jerked backward in her chair, stood,
then crossed the room to stand in front of the mirror.
The mirror lied to her every
day.
It saw what Snow White would
become. Her life would span a century, she would tame the dwarves, become rich,
and start a war. Never would she be known for her beauty more than her cunning.
Crying out, the queen struck
the mirror, leaving a crack in the glass, and blood on her hands. She sobbed,
fingers over her mouth, then fell to her knees, screaming. A chambermaid soon
rushed into the room and led the queen out. Shortly after, the door was bolted,
the sound of metal against wood echoing throughout the room. The mist cleared
from the room, and the mirror waited for the queen to return. It waited for
days…weeks.
The queen was locked away in
the royal quarters, fearful of her own sanity. The servants spent those weeks
covering each and every mirror in the castle with bedsheets, all except for the
one that showed the fateful image. No one dared enter the room it presided over
for fear the mirror was evil. When the queen emerged from her chambers, she
intended never to see her reflection again.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
AUTHOR Bio and
Links:
After graduating
with a BA in Creative Writing from the University of South Florida in 2017,
Weston Sullivan moved to New York City to live and write in the heart of the
industry. In late 2016, he began working as an intern in the submissions
department of BookFish Books. His short story, "On the Hillside", won
the Anspaugh Award for Fiction in February of 2017, and his novel, JUST OFF THE
PATH, is due for release in early September.
He likes to believe that he is
in charge of his own destiny, but at the end of the day, he knows that he was
born to serve his two beloved cats.
Purchasing LINKS
UNIVERSAL LINK (B&N,
iBOOKS, Kobo,)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
GIVEAWAY INFORMATION
Weston Sullivan will be awarding a $10 Amazon or Barnes and Noble
GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Be sure to visit the other blogs on the tour:
October 2: T's Stuff
October 3: Straight From the Library
October 4: Long and Short Reviews
October 5: Up 'Til Dawn Book Blog
October 6: Sapphyria's Book Reviews
October 9: Angels With Attitude Book Reviews
October 10: Must Read Faster
October 11: Jazzy Book Reviews
October 12: Readeropolis
October 13: Fabulous and Brunette
October 16: Hearts and Scribbles
October 17: Author Deborah A Bailey
October 18: The Avid Reader
October 19: Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer
October 20: Mixed Book Bag
October 23: Mello and June, It's a Book Thang!
October 24: Christine Young
October 25: Kit 'N Kabookle
October 25: Read Your Writes Book Reviews
October 26: Illuminite Caliginosus
October 27: This and That Book Blog
6 comments:
Thanks for hosting!
I enjoyed reading about your book; congrats on the tour and thanks for the chance to win :)
Enjoyed your excerpt. Great to have you here today.
Happy Friday! Thanks for sharing the great post – I enjoyed reading it.
Loved this excerpt. I'm adding the book to my reading list.
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