Virtual Tour + #Giveaway: Blood's Force by Ellis Morning @EllisMorning @GoddessFish

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Blood’s Force

by Ellis Morning

GENRE: Sci-fi/Fantasy

BLURB:

Where superstition is law, there is no order!

Dame Jessamine is a knight errant with a spaceship for a steed, a pupil of ancient science and technology who quests on behalf of the downtrodden. She's accustomed to forging her own path through the galaxy—until she's hijacked at sword-point and sent to investigate Nidaros, a remote barony known for bursts of rebellion.

In Nidaros, Jessamine finds a populace short on food and patience, innocents detained for torture, and a court trapped in a web of delusion. The Baron considers her a distraction. The magicians, convinced of a "curse," dismiss her pleas for rational action. Even as Jessamine forges an alliance with the soldiers, an unknown foe seeks to frame her as an agitator.

Stuck amid murderous intrigue and cut off from her mentors, Jessamine must figure out how to save Nidaros from starvation. But the only people who understand the true "curse" have been accused of witchcraft—and if Jessamine's not careful with her ancient knowledge, she'll join them in the dungeon!

Blood’s Force is Book 1 of the Sword and Starship series of science fiction/fantasy adventure.

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EXCERPT:

Adrenaline allowed me to ignore pain and push myself up to my knees. Whatever was going on, I had to reach my feet, take measures to defend myself. They’d left me with my weapons, after all. I’d also take stock of my surroundings. Maybe there was still some way out.

My confines remained plunged in darkness. Straining my ears brought me no closer to abandoning the heavy silence. I retrieved my stick lighter from my pocket; the tiny bead of light revealed dungeon floor and nothing else. No immediate danger, at least. I resolved to scout the room, or cell, more likely.

Something flashed in my peripherals: the glow of lantern light, newly revealed by a door sliding open about ten feet away. Soon after, a burgundy-robed arm lobbed a hand-sized ceramic pot with a lit fuse into the cell.

Grenade!

Without another thought, I threw myself in the opposite direction. Unfortunately, the cell’s dimensions were stingy. I hit a wall well before I wanted to.

A boom like thunder rattled my eardrums. Tongues of fire splattered around my feet. Turning, I found knee-high flames covering the floor behind me, surviving on the fuel from the grenade. Some version of Greek fire, it looked like. Radiant heat seared my exposed skin, while a thick smoke stung my eyes and clawed at my throat.

Forget questioning or detaining. Someone was trying to kill me. Either fire or smoke would finish the job in minutes. Ironically, my pockets held plenty of fire-making implements and things to burn, but nothing for smothering flames. Escape was my only hope. I knew of only one option: the door on the other side of the room, the one the grenade had been launched from.

Guest post:

Pick a favorite event in time that you would like to visit. Example: Salem Witch Trials, Civil War, The shooting of Abraham Lincoln ect….. Tell us why you would like to visit them and/or would you like to visit them just to see and know what really happened or would you like to visit as a participate in the event?

I'd be tempted to visit the burning of the Royal Library of Alexandria in Egypt. There's disagreement on when it took place, but no one debates that it was a great cultural and scientific tragedy.

For those not familiar with the library, it was established in the 3rd century BC in Alexandria, Egypt. The library was part of a larger facility that contained space for scientific research, lectures, and even a zoo.  The library was dedicated to containing all the world's knowledge. Ships docking in Alexandria were required to surrender any books on board. An acquisitions department would copy the books, then return the copies while keeping the originals. At its height, the library was said to contain anywhere from 40,000 to half a million scrolls.

There are many legends as to how the library was destroyed. The most famous is that Julius Caesar accidentally destroyed it in 48 BC while setting fire to his own ships. In truth, though, there might have been many fires or other destructive acts that led to the library's final demise.

We'll never know what we lost forever. Plays, literature, mathematical and scientific treatises? If ancient artists and scientists hadn't suffered such a blow, just imagine how much more advanced humanity would be today! If I had the chance to go back, I'd certainly try to prevent the burning, but I'm not sure it would've been a one-woman job. Political, religious, and military pressures were all in play, and even if one threat were thwarted, several more might've surfaced later.

The Library of Alexandria has directly and indirectly influenced my fiction. I wrote a short story once where I imagined a new Alexandrian library on the Moon. And in Blood's Force, the Enduring Flame beguinage acts as curators and educators of the Shipbuilder era. They're the ones who teach Dame Jessamine to embrace science and reject superstition.

Thanks for letting me share today—and thanks for reading!

AUTHOR BIO:

Ellis has always loved staging adventures in her head before going to sleep each night. When she was twelve, she started putting these adventures on paper.

For the next twenty years, she wrote with varying degrees of seriousness, but always as a hobby. In that time, she fell in love with Mark Twain and Kurt Vonnegut, the original Star Trek series, and Mystery Science Theater 3000. Science fiction became her favorite domain to work in, but she also enjoyed reading fantasy, horror, Western, and detective stories, and incorporating their elements into her work. One of her favorite things to do was make people laugh.

Ellis denied being a writer for decades. But then she sold articles to The Daily WTF, and a short story to Analog Science Fiction and Fact. After quitting her full-time job to finish her first novel, it was time to own up to writing as her calling. She's currently an editor at The Daily WTF, and having the time of her life penning novels and short stories.

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