Good morning everyone! Please welcome author P.J. Braley to Full Moon Dreaming today! She is here to tell us about her new release, Finding Persephone. PJ will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to one randomly drawn commenter via Rafflecopter during the tour. The more you comment, the better your chances of winning. To find the other stops on her tour, go here. Don't forget to look for the Rafflecopter at the end of this post!
Finding Persephone
by P.J. Braley
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
GENRE: Science Fiction, Romance
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
BLURB:
Caroline
Taylor is very good at pretending.
The polished surface
of her life appears perfect until the morning a smitten grad student brings the
cracks in her illusions into sharp focus. No longer willing to live a lie,
Caroline’s journey of transformation sets her on a collision course with Dr.
Grant Gates. Blinded by his quiet power, good looks, and impressive
credentials, Caroline fails to see that Grant is also very good at pretending.
Created from flesh
and fire, Grant has a past he would like to forget, an assignment he cannot
reveal, and a forbidden obsession with his newest client whose beautiful eyes
miss nothing. As the enforcer of an underground brotherhood, he must protect
their secrets at any cost, but Grant is determined that Caroline will not
become his latest victim. Striking a devil’s bargain to keep the woman he has
been searching for safe from his brothers’ plans, Grant struggles to hide
who–and what–he is until he becomes her only hope of escape...but will he let
her go?
There’s not a chance
in Hell.
A contemporary
retelling of the Greek myth of Hades and Persephone, Finding Persephone is a
compelling tale of an alien assassin's search for absolution and the human
woman who becomes the catalyst and heart of his redemption.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
EXCERPT:
“Grant, will you do me a favor?”
“If I can.”
“Tell me when it’s okay to love you,” she said softly, “I
don’t want to miss one moment of you.”
He pulled away a bit and looked into her eyes. “Caroline,
you love me?”
“Oh, yes.”
“And our child,” he said hesitantly, “do you…could you
ever…love him, too?”
Grant grew very still; so much depended on her next words.
“I’ve loved him since the beginning. Even before I knew he
existed, he was part of the dream of you.”
As if she were a bubble that if pressed too hard would
burst, his hands began to tremble.
Speaking barely above a whisper, he asked humbly,
“Caroline…may I touch you?”
She stood up and locked the door.
“Yes, Grant.”
After she left, he held the quilt to his face.
She
loved him.
Not as a Lyostian loves from necessity and gratitude, but as
a human loves: freely from desire and choice. His analytical side felt vindicated;
the experiment worked and now she would obey him—but everything that was human
in him rejoiced. For the first time in twenty–eight years, a small sliver of
light entered a dark and dusty room that Grant thought was closed to him
forever.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Deciding that
copyediting other writers’ manuscripts was not enough, PJ decided to do
something about it. Purchasing a new laptop because new beginnings require new
tools, she began transitioning from copy editor to author. Her debut novel, The
Fire Slayers, blended science fiction with love, friendship, and horror. Her
newest book, Finding Persephone, takes all those genres a step further when an
alien assassin charged with keeping the secrets of their underground
brotherhood at all costs risks everything when he falls in love.
When PJ isn’t
writing novels about aliens saving the planet, you can find her sitting on the
sun deck with her husband, Jim, and their rescue corgi, Nymeria. She will be
the one with a book in one hand and a glass of sangria in the other. More of
her work can be found at http://pjbraley.com/.
Social Media
Links
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pjbraley/ -and-
https://www.facebook.com/ItsAllAboutTheWords
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/20873208.P_J_Braley
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/PJBraley
Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/pjbraley/
LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/pjbraley/
All Author: https://allauthor.com/author/pjbraley/
Book
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVfDPWZ5E00
https://btwnthelines.com/product/findingpersephone/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/finding-persephone-pj-braley/1141577982
https://www.amazon.com/Finding-Persephone-PJ-Braley-ebook/dp/B0B28CP3MZ
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1) You’re marooned on a small island with one
person and one item of your choice—who is that person and what item do you
have?
Well, I
would like to be marooned on an island with someone who is unbelievably resourceful
with fantastic survival (and cooking) skills like Daniel Boone (I could eat a
bear if I had to) or someone funny and smart like Tom Hanks who can talk about
anything and, besides still being alive, he was marooned on a small island
in “Cast Away” and would have picked up some survival skills from the movie.
For the
item, it would depend on the possibility of internet service. If it had access
to Wi-Fi, then, of course, a computer or cell phone with a fully charged battery.
If there was no internet service, then a large cooler filled with food and drink,
leaving just enough room for a blanket and one of those big Swiss Army knives –
the one with all the mini tools – so we would have a fighting chance to still
be alive when someone finds us.
3) Take these three words and give me a 100 word or less scene using them:
hammer, saucer, traffic lights
The
crash rattled the windows.
Miss Lindy carefully set her
teacup and saucer on the table and called from the parlor, “Ellie, what’s all
that racket?”
White-aproned,
Ellie walked in, shaking her head with dismay. “They’re tearing down the Pritchard
place,” she said, “going at it with hammer and tongs blazin’! Why, they’ve knocked
out half the traffic lights from here to the courthouse.”
Visibly shaken, Miss Lindy
asked, “They’re tearing down Agnes Pritchard’s house?”
“Why,
yes’m. It was in the paper.”
Taking
her handkerchief from her pocket, Miss Lindy sat back down on the Victorian
settee and cried.
99 words
4) What is your idea of how to spend romantic time with your significant
other?
In my new
novel, Finding Persephone, Caroline describes to Grant her fondness for “dreaming
time.”
“Early
evening, it’s my favorite time of the day…I call it dreaming time. The day
hasn’t quite surrendered the light; the night hasn’t quite conquered the day.
It’s best in summer, when it lasts for hours, lots of dreaming time.”
While I do
not personify Caroline, we do occasionally share similar characteristics and this
time of day is also my favorite. This is how I would describe my quintessential
dreaming time:
It’s
always early summer, late afternoon between 6 and 8 when the breeze starts to
pick up, and the sun begins to set. We sit in an open courtyard near the shore
where the soft thunder of waves cascading over the sand mingles with the gentle
chords of the Spanish guitar from the young musician sitting in the corner, an
open guitar case at his feet.
Ice cold sangria fills our oversized wine glasses where oranges
settle at the bottom and specks of cinnamon float on top. An untouched basket of
cheese, crackers, and olives sits on the table between us. We sit next to each
other, saying everything without saying anything as we gaze at the sea. Our
hands touch, time drifts, the sharp cries of seagulls punctuate the sounds of
the music and waves swirling around us. Perfectly timed with the setting of the
sun, our empty glasses reflect the fading light. Standing, he takes my hand, and
we walk toward the beach. Passing the musician, he pauses in front of the almost
empty guitar case.
“See you here again tomorrow?”
I
smile at his words; he always asks the same question as he tosses a folded bill
into the case.
“Of course,” the young man answers.
He pulls my hand to his lips and looks down at me, “Well,
then, I guess we will have to come back tomorrow.”
And wherever the sun changes from gold to amethyst, the
sea thunders, and the music lifts and swirls, we will return to dream again.
5) When you start a new story, do you begin with a character, or a plot?
Given the choice of
beginning with either character or plot, I begin with the plot. Still, as a
speculative fiction writer, I usually start with a series of “what if”
questions that lead to a storyline that leads to characters to support my
answers. For instance, the plot of my new book, Finding Persephone,
began about ten years ago with a news report about the discovery of the body of
a young woman by two police detectives in a park. Now, as a plot, that isn’t
much to go on, but I start asking myself questions…Who is she? Why is she
there? How did she die? Did the detectives have anything to do with her death? Trying
to answer these questions as imaginatively as possible, I prewrite the
narrative in my mind. Then formulate the plot within the context of all the
answers, adding characters as needed. Sometimes, however, I find myself in a blind
alley and have to back up and change direction. When I finally have a general
outline of what will happen, I sit down and start writing the story…but it
rarely stays on track.
For instance, the plot of Finding
Persephone was all set until a character – whose only reason for being created
was to introduce Caroline to the health facility – suddenly becomes much more critical
to the narrative because of their reaction to each other when the first meet. It
caught me completely by surprise. My carefully planned plot went into the trash,
and the story suddenly became character driven. Once I turned the narrative over
to my characters, everything started coming together. There were times when I
could not type fast enough. This tangle of plot and characters is subtly described
when Carolina says to Grant:
“We knew it wasn’t going to be
perfect when we started. That we found perfection along the way just meant we
were going in the right direction.”
So, in my experience, it
doesn’t matter whether you start with plot or character; they are interwoven
and inseparable. What matters is that you write.
6) If they were to make the story of your life into a movie, who should play
you?
I would
be honored if it was Kate Winslet. She is intelligent, creative, and also a
Libra (so she understands what motivates me). She seems naturally kind and
vulnerable on the outside, but under all that sweetness and light is a woman
who knows what she wants and is willing to work hard to get it.
8) Do you have an historical crush and if so, who is it?
Oh, my
yes. When I was in college a few years ago, I took a class about the Renaissance.
While learning about art, philosophy, astronomy, and politics, we also studied
religion, especially Luther and the protestant reformation. Somewhere between DaVinci,
Michelangelo, Chaucer, and Shakespeare, I became enamored of Desiderius
Erasmus. At the height of his influence, Desiderius Erasmus, an Augustinian
monk, was known as the heart, soul, and pen of the intellectual renaissance
that swept through Europe in the early 16th century. One of the
greatest humanists of his time, sought after in his capacity as a teacher, writer
of satire, and political persuasion, he also translated original biblical scriptures
into the first New Testament written in Greek in the hopes of making it more
accessible for translation into common languages so that everyone could understand
it.
Why the
crush? In the 1500s, Europe was a conglomeration of warring states (not countries
like today) under the control of the Holy Roman Empire. But Erasmus wanted
something different. Centuries ahead of the European Union, he envisioned a
pan-European entity with a common language, government, and religion. He
lobbied for education for all and, as a linguist, wrote eloquently and long to
bring about the changes he believed would benefit all the peoples of Europe.
Born
just 25 years after the invention of the printing press, Erasmus used the only
thing he had to bring about change in Europe – his words.
So, is it a real crush? Well,
he has his own page on my website, and I have written two essays, a play, a poem,
and two short stories about his life and accomplishments. So yes, I am a fan.
“When I get a little money,
I buy books; and if any is left, I buy food and clothes.” – Desiderius Erasmus
(1466-1536)
9) Is there a story that you’d like to tell but you think the world isn’t
ready to receive it?
I always
say that I write for myself, but I edit for my readers; there are just some thoughts
you believe you cannot share openly
without your own naked anxieties becoming too obvious.
In the subtext of Finding Persephone,
the aliens represent any of the 6.5 million known species on our planet who may
also be concerned that their survival is at risk in the midst of climate change
and nuclear war. Despite the human belief that we are the only species capable
of this awareness or fixing what may soon become unfixable, it is always
possible that another species - possibly hiding in plain sight - or the planet
itself, may destroy us in self-defense.
As I
mentioned earlier, I am a speculative fiction writer, and if we are going down
the rabbit hole of “what ifs” then what if there is something captured in the melting
ice that will be much more catastrophic than a virus? What if there is an
unknown but deliberate failsafe point when the Earth will defend itself and say,
“Enough.”
This is
the point where the genre of speculative/science fiction becomes horror.
Why do I
think the world is not ready to receive this story? Because it has been ignoring
far more important voices than mine. Also, I am not sure I am brave enough to write
it. I am reasonably confident that the frustration arising from trying to formulate
a narrative sufficient to change the world would be the last book I would ever
write.
After
all, I’m a writer, not an immortal.
Kurt
Vonnegut, an immortal of sorts, wrote a poem called “Requiem” that describes the
kind of sloughing off of humans by the Earth that may become far too real.
Requiem by Kurt Vonnegut
The crucified planet Earth,
should it find a voice
and a sense of irony,
might now well say
of our abuse of it,
“Forgive them, Father,
They know not what they do.”
The irony would be
that we know what
we are doing.
When the last living thing
has died on account of us,
how poetical it would be
if Earth could say,
in a voice floating up
perhaps
from the floor
of the Grand Canyon,
“It is done.”
People did not like it here.
###
Thank you so much for presenting Finding Persephone on your beautiful website. I hope your readers enjoy the excerpt - it's one of my favorites! I also want to thank you for the opportunity to explore several writing opportunities with your insightful questions. I would like to hear about your readers' writing processes and where they go for inspiration.
ReplyDeleteI think this is going to be a wonderful day!
Thank you again, PJ