I have redesigned the cover for the upcoming What is the Winter For? Book 10 in the Voice of the Wind: Shadows of Time series!
New book cover!
Coming Soon!
Read all about the Midnight Mugger in the pages of the Fayerton Daily Observer as he continues to terrorize his latest victims!
Experience the chilling and unsettling events that haunt Fayerton this winter, ranging from mysterious disappearances, ghostly apparitions, and an unsolved murder, to the complicated love affairs and illicit activities that have consumed the town.
Accompany the relentless Sheriff Longacre as he diligently investigates the gruesome murder of Flora Moss, while Jantz Fayerfield tirelessly searches for his missing son, Rojah, the prime suspect in the sheriff’s murder investigation.
Immerse yourself in the arrival of Reece Rau’s renowned theater troupe from San Bargel, as they bring their sensational production of Star-Crossed to the eerie streets of Fayerton.
Bear witness to the perplexing predicament of Noah Winterringer, as he eagerly anticipates his upcoming wedding to Jonquil Deering, only to face her apparent lack of enthusiasm.
Observe as Noah cunningly manipulates and schemes to gain control over Jonquil, her unborn child, the Cloisters, and even secures a place on the Village Council through blackmail to thwart his longtime nemesis, Jantz.
Lastly, indulge in the enchantment of the Winter Ball, the highlight of Fayerton’s Season of the Lights, but exercise utmost caution when navigating the village streets after nightfall.
Stay informed and delve deeper into these captivating stories in What is the Winter For? — Book 10 in the Voice of the Wind: Shadows of Time series.
Coming soon in the spring of 2024.
© 2024 by Elizabeth A. Monroe
What is the Winter For?
Here is the tentative cover for What is the Winter For? — Book 10 in Voice of the Wind: Shadows of Time series and the sequel to Books 4, 5, 6. Book 10 picks up at the end of Shadows and Substance, Book 6.
The Midnight Mugger on the loose terrorizes the village of Fayerton.
Disappearances, ghosts, an unsolved murder, mischief and mayhem are several of the mysteries that plague the citizens of Fayerton this winter. Read all about it in the Fayerton Daily Observer!
The Voice of the Wind: Shadows of Time series is available as an e-book on Amazon. Book 10 in the series will be available in the spring of 2024.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08B86RQBJ
Pale Imitations Excerpt
~ Chapter 101 ~
The short span of a week found the first published copies of Sir Galen’s music selling on the streets of San Bargel. Within a fortnight, Sir Galen’s reputation extended beyond the drawing room musicales. An overnight celebrity, he basked in the glory of his quickly won fame. His sheet music could not be printed or copied fast enough to satisfy the public’s demand.
Sir Galen’s newest musical was the smash of the season. Nightly, a standing-room-only crowd packed San Bargel’s opulent opera hall and filled the red velvet seats and gilded private boxes. Sir Galen was busier than he had ever dreamed possible, and Reece Rau had made friends among the theatrical cast, who nightly romped, danced, and sang to the delight and applause of the theatergoers.
Sir Galen hardly noticed Reece’s new friendships and growing independence. He was too busy to notice or care — as long as Reece was happy and content and favorably acclaimed by the theater critics as the newest rising star to grace a San Bargellian stage, then he was satisfied.
Surrounded by the laughter and applause of the theater crowd, he was too engrossed in the performance to notice his companion’s wandering attention, her lackluster laughter at the funny sections of the play, or how Jonquil’s eyes focused on a vague point in space and time somewhere above the audience.
Sir Galen was the critic of his own musical masterpiece. Even as he listened, he composed his next score. Perfection’s master, each night he heard the slightest imperfections, the out-of-tune instrument in the orchestra, or the notes that needed changing. Unlike him, the theater crowd did not notice the minuscule flaws. Rich wine and food dulled their senses. They came for the escape, the entertainment provided, the latest gossip, and to be seen — especially that night.
High King Edrick and his entourage were present. Ticket holders were left standing at the opera house’s canopied doorways, while men-at-arms stood posted around all the entrances and exits. A buzz of excitement and tingling expectation pulsed through the crowd.
***
Jonquil’s gaze swept over the central figure — Edrick, the mercenary king. He was not the man Jonquil had imagined. He was taller than most San Bargellians, and his skin was blackened by time spent in the sun. Beneath the gold circlet of his kingship, he wore his hair cropped short in the fashion of the soldier.
He did not have the physical presence she expected a king, a ruler of men, to possess. Without his gold chains of office or his fine brocade, silk, and velvet clothes, or his circle of surrounding ministers and scarlet and gold uniformed officers, he looked like any other ordinary man she might have seen or encountered on the city streets: another dark-skinned, dark-haired San Bargellian not too different in appearance from Denarri Pascale, except more muscular.
It was as well that High King Edrick’s presence commanded the audience’s attention. Jonquil heard the frequent mutters of disgust as Sir Galen grimaced at the missed notes, the missed cues, or rhythm changes made to his score.
“What is wrong with Reece tonight?” Sir Galen grumbled. “The fool has had too much to drink.”
“He is nervous.” Jonquil wondered why she even tried to defend Reece when he was nothing but antagonistic toward her.
“Nervous!” Snorting his disgust, Sir Galen slapped a rolled-up sheet of music against his knee.
“Would you not be nervous if you were the one performing and knew the high king was watching?”
Sir Galen gave High King Edrick a contemptuous glare. “Look at him. Does he have the look of a terrifying man to you?”
“If not for his crown or his circle of important men, patrons, and armed soldiers, he would seem an ordinary man.”
Sir Galen smiled. “Good. Edrick’s countenance does not deceive you. Still, he has complete authority — complete and total power.” He grimaced again. “That is not the note I scored for that passage!” He raked his long fingers through his dark mane of hair. He sat forward, vibrating in his seat, living each note, rapping the rolled sheet music against his leg in time to the music’s rhythm.
Jonquil smiled and let her gaze wander over the crowd. For all his authority and power, High King Edrick appeared as absorbed as the rest of the audience present that night to hear and watch Sir Galen of Nevarra’s amazing, spectacular musical production.
“It is a satire only a San Bargellian could appreciate and understand,” Galen had confidently announced when they had entered his private box. “It is the story of two men — star-crossed lovers — a role written to be sung and performed by Reece.”
But for all the play’s hilarity and satirical farce, Jonquil sensed the intimacy between Sir Galen and his creation and the actor performing on the stage.
With the final closing of the curtain, the house lights rose to the cheers and applause of an appreciative and well-entertained crowd. Jonquil stepped back into the shadows of the heavy red velvet drapes and Sir Galen, basking in the entire theater’s adulation.
From a narrow slit in the heavy curtain, Jonquil searched out Edrick’s swarthy face. The white flash of his dark eyes slashed up to Sir Galen’s box. She saw the slight nod of kingly approval as King Edrick inclined his gold circlet-crowned head to Sir Galen.
She glanced at Galen, standing at the balcony’s edge. He returned Edrick’s acknowledgment with a bow and, with a graceful sweep of his long fingered, slender hand, returned the audience’s attention to the stage, where the performers were taking their bows amid a cascading rain of flowers, ribbons, and confetti.
The orchestra began playing a medley of songs that she would hear hummed and sung on the city’s streets tomorrow. At the triumphant end of another night, King Edrick and his entourage of statesmen slowly departed through the space his soldiers cleared. Through the aisles, the crowd flowed into colorful streams of evening clothes and glittering jewels. Laughter and voices mixed and mingled, forming another counterflow of music.
Everything was brilliant and confusing, like a sea of sensation that flooded unleashed through Jonquil — an overwhelming sea of fierce impressions she could not contain or express, only experience.
***
“Are you coming with me to the Green Dragon?” Galen asked. “You cannot leave me at the mercy of so many strangers.” He abhorred the thought of being accosted by the appreciative crowd of theater patrons, whose drawing rooms and salons he had played for less appreciation. The same people who now boasted, “Sir Galen played in my salon! My guests adored him!”
“Tomorrow they will applaud another, and I will be reduced once again to begging for coins in their salons,” Galen muttered.
Jonquil laughed. “Enjoy your time in the spotlight, Sir Galen. Take all its splendid glory before it fades and becomes lost forever.”
Sir Galen took her arm. “Do you speak of love or life, Jonquil?” He bent his head close to her and inhaled the sweetness of her fragrance.
“Both,” Jonquil answered.
“You support me emotionally and financially, yet you refuse to share the spotlight. Without you, the sun would have never shone. I would still be tucked away in that shabby apartment, dreaming and starving. I owe you my soul, Jonquil.” He laughed softly. “You let me wax sentimental. I know you prefer a behind-the-scenes involvement.”
“Discretion is my mother’s favorite word, Sir Galen.”
He studied her exquisite profile, the wisps of burnt gold hair caressing the smooth length of her neck. If beauty had perfection, she was perfection’s embodiment, and yet not one fleeting hint of desire whispered to his heart. Instead, he heard a sea of music: notes, chords, scales, and tempos set adrift in his mind, awaiting a snare of inspiration to net and capture the incandescent sparks.
Jonquil provided the spark. She had inspired him to create something that exceeded his capabilities. He was certain there was not another in the whole of San Bargel who possessed her rareness. He attributed her refreshing difference to her upbringing. Only a woman such as Adria Gittel could have created such an exquisite daughter and such inner pain. In that single instance, he saw the fleeting glimmer in Jonquil’s luminous eyes — in the breathless parting of her lips and the proud lift of her chin.
“Yes, your mother. I sense a hint of pain when you speak about your mother, Jonquil,” Galen said.
Jonquil smiled — a brave, tender smile.
“Your smile does not deceive me, Jonquil Deering,” Galen said. “But I greatly appreciated it. Now, if you will continue smiling, we can thread our way through this crowd that awaits my exit.”
When Sir Galen appeared on the grand stairway and descended into the brilliant gilt and mirrored lobby crowded with theatergoers, the crowd surged toward him, clamoring for his attention and asking for his autograph on their programs.
High King Edrick’s slow departure delayed the exit of many waiting for their cabs or carriages. Intermingling knots of people gathered throughout the lobby, speaking and visiting with friends and acquaintances. Women laughed and gossiped; men smoked and discussed politics.
“Public performances,” Galen muttered to Jonquil. Then he grinned and waved to the crowd. “We are all actors.”
© 2023 Elizabeth A. Monroe
Happy New Year!
Back in the early, early days, when an idea for a book began niggling in the back of my brain (shortly after our house burned down after a bad electrical storm), I walked outside to listen to the wind. In far southwestern Oklahoma outside the college town of Weatherford, Oklahoma, the wind is a constant and often after a storm the departing clouds reminded me of mountains looming on the horizon.
Anyway, as I was listening to the wind in the junipers, I was struck by a “bolt out of the blue,” and the whole idea for the Voice of the Wind series was born. After being struck, I walked back inside the trailer house we were living in at that time and picked up Kahlil Gibran’s book, The Prophet. I opened the small book, opened it to a random page, and read the following:
“He alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving.”
And so, the theme of what was to become the first three books in the Voice of the Wind series was born into a full-blown reality, along with the characters and stories that continue to inspire me.
Merry Christmas!
In gratitude, I want to offer the first two books in the Voice of the Wind: Shadows of Time series to all the kind folks who have supported and followed me.
You can download Written in Omen (book 1) and Fortune’s Hostage (book 2), for free beginning on December 25th through December 29th on my Amazon author’s page. 🙂
Here’s the link to my Amazon page:
Excerpt ~ What is the Winter For?
This excerpt is a work in progress for Book 10 in the Voice of the Wind: Shadows of Time series.
Noah over imbibed that evening, but he deserved it after the trying day he had spent dealing with Grange and his two hired idiots, Burl and Jag Longnecker. Something was going on with the two laggards. The Longnecker brothers acted mighty shifty, squinting at each other, even as they handed over the evidence of having carried out his orders and bundled it all up in the filthy and bloodied shirt of their victim to present to him as if delivering a present.
He certainly paid them more than enough coin. If either brother had the temerity to demand more payment from him, or even consider blackmailing him for their silence, he would have Grange deal with the fools, preferably by tossing them off a cliff into Kilmere. It was time for the Midnight Mugger to disappear.
Plus, the winter’s frigid temperatures made his joints and hands ache, and the pain soured his temperament. The rich flavor and bouquet of the heady Cloisters’ brandy he enjoyed lessened the pain, especially after the third snifter, followed by a leisurely smoked chunk of golden hashish.
He finished his smoke and was settling into following his dreams, when a tapping at a window roused him from enjoying his late night revelries.
Ignore it, he thought. Tomorrow he would have someone trim the tree branches the wind rattled against the windowpanes of his study.
He sank deeper into his armchair and closed his eyes. He was once again on the verge of sliding into euphoria when…
Tap… tap… tap…
He cracked open one eyelid, squinted at the tall windows covered in heavy curtains. Outside, the wind whistled about the chimney and eaves. He listened for a moment, and hearing nothing, he settled deeper into his armchair and closed his eyelid.
Tap… tap… tap...
“Confound it!” he cursed and shoved out of the armchair.
He strode across the thick carpet and drew aside the drapery to reveal the dark night. He pressed his nose against the cold windowpane, his breath fogging the glass. He rubbed the fog away, clearing a small patch, and peered out through his reflection. Nothing. The trees were not even close enough to the house for the wind to knock or scratch their branches against the study windows.
He shifted his gaze farther into the yard, where he thought he saw movement among the trees, but it was only moonlight and shadows. He was about to close the curtain and turn away when a definite movement caught his attention.
Was that someone drifting across the yard, stirring up puffs of snow? Who the blazes would be outside wandering about in the snowy night? He leaned closer.
He jolted when the apparition appeared, for that was only way he could describe the otherworldly white figure floating above the snow-covered ground toward the window, doubtless drawn by the light his study lamps shed.
A snowball splattered against the glass windowpanes. He reared back as if struck, but was drawn to look out again.
There in the moonlight, the apparition hovered, surrounded by the iridescent luster of swirling snowflakes sparking in the moon’s pearl glow. In the rising wind, tendrils of long, pale hair snaked about the spectral figure. White robes as insubstantial as gossamer floated like scarves of seaweed adrift on water.
He blinked, distrusting his vision as a trick of his mind or the hashish he had smoked, but upon looking again, the wraith remained, drawing closer.
“Nooo-aaaahhhh―”
He froze, recalling another night and hearing the unearthly voice moaning his name. Who would dare haunt him?
“Nooo-aaaahhhh―”
He narrowed his eyes. “Jarutia? Is that you?”
Impossible! Jarutia Fayerfield-Tourney was dead, having drowned in Kilmere years ago.
A thump struck the window, sounding like a bird hitting the glass. Startled, he jumped. He cursed softly and chuckled at himself.
He did not believe in ghosts. Someone was playing tricks on him.
He scrubbed his hands over his face. But when he looked again, the apparition remained, floating in the night, the wind swirling its hair and robes about its transparent form.
But the wind was not blowing he noticed when he came to his senses. The night was eerily calm, except for the ice-laden clouds racing across the moon.
“Nooo-aaaahhhh!”
From the trees, the ghostly form drifted closer.
“Nooo-aaaahhhh! Where is my son?”
He swallowed hard. Shaking his head in denial, he stepped back from the window. He was having a bad dream, nothing more.
The hovering apparition lifted its diaphanous hand and beckoned to him.
“Nooo-aaaahhhh! What have you done to my son?”
He spun on his heels and dashed from his study, pausing only long enough in the foyer to retrieve the lantern on the entry table before he threw the front door open and rushed outside into the yard.
“There are no such things as ghosts!” he muttered. Just wait until he caught the culprit.
He lifted his lantern and checked the snowy ground, looking for footprints, certain that a ghost would not leave their footprints for him to track.
“Where are you? Show yourself to me!” he shouted into the night, his heart racing in his throat and pounding in his ears.
Hearing a noise behind him, he spun around. He saw no one. A preternatural silence greeted him.
“What do you want? Answer me!” he shouted.
An owl swooped from the trees, winging silently across the moon, encircled in a halo of rainbow clouds.
“Murderer! You murdered my son! Murderer! Murderer!” the apparition wailed.
“Show yourself, you coward!”
“Nooo-aaaahhhh!” A whoosh of snow hit his uplifted lantern and doused its yellow flame. He cursed and hurled the lantern toward the direction of the disembodied voice. But the apparition melted into the night, shredding into tattered wisps.
***
© 2022 E.A. Monroe
Mikuyi Moon Trilogy Available!
Mikuyi Moon, The Wind and the Wolf and Song of the Wolf in the Voice of the Wind: Shadows of Time series are available on Amazon.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08B86RQBJ
“When the war moon rises, stained crimson with the blood of the slain — I, Eridandi, Wolf Clan Chieftain of the Mikuyi — will ride again and claim my own.” ~ Ancient prophesy promising the return of the Mikuyi to their rightful place among the tribes of the Objishanda after being banished into exile.
Kieron Fayerfield, seeking adventure and romance, left home to find what he sought among the Mikuyi Wolf Clan. He marries Uriate Canavar, and together they raise five sons. Two decades later, Kieron’s peaceful life among the Mikuyi is shattered when his second-born son Althar’s lover is brutally murdered and Althar is wounded. A night of fire and vows of blood vendetta send Kieron’s and Uriate’s sons, Inali and Althar, fleeing to Fayerton and exile.
Inali and Althar’s journey from their northern home in the Unfaithful Mountains to their father’s family home in Fayerton crosses the unexpected path of the elusive Gahada, one of the tribes of the Objishanda known for their healing gifts. Fearful of Althar’s life-threatening injury, Inali makes a decision that alters his destiny. Without any regard for the consequences of his actions, Inali kidnaps a young Gahada woman to save his brother’s life.
Thus begins an epic journey that brings Mikuyi Moon to life with a diverse and unruly cast of characters and fortuitous events. From sailing regattas and midnight muggings to tavern brawls and domestic disputes, plenty of unrequited love, jealousy and obsession, deceit, and treachery abound.
eamonroe 