His Fair Assassin

As I wrote Dark Triumph, I wanted to be sure and populate the book with some of the colorful characters from the Middle Ages that I had come across in my research, and yet it had to feel organic to the story and not wedged in there.

As Sybella and the wounded knight were racing through the countryside, trying to escape pursuit, I had to do some serious thinking as to who they would actually run in to, and of those people, who would help, who would hinder, and who would turn them in in a heartbeat for a reward. Since they would need to slip into the forest to evade capture, I decided to draw from those who lived in the forests or obtained their livelihood from the woods, and settled upon a group of charcoal burners.

Oddly, it is often the outcasts in society who are most accepting of other outcasts. Their very disenfranchisement sometimes makes them more willing to challenge the status quo or thumb their nose at rigid authority. While charcoal burners were not (probably) true outcasts, they did keep to themselves somewhat, confined by their livelihood to dwelling in forests and tending their charcoal fires rather than living in cities or villages.

In the middle ages, one of the most efficient fuels at the time was charcoal. Coal itself was rare and difficult to mine with their technology, but charcoal could be made through the slow burning of wood, then stopping the process before the wood was fully burned to ash. Charcoal burning was a tricky thing, requiring fairly esoteric knowledge of how to build the fire pits just so, how to pile the wood so it wouldn’t burn too quickly, and how to read the smoke to discern when the charcoal was ready. There were a number of occupational hazards, primarily involving collapsed fire pits and burns. It was also an occupation full of hazard, for a stray spark or ember could start a conflagration in minutes.

As I continued to research charcoal burners, I came across a curious mention of the Carbonnari, a branch of Italian charcoal burners. They started off as a guild, as many medieval trades did, and developed into an organization or brotherhood similar to Freemansons, only with their charcoal burning trade being at the center of their rituals and organizations. While their organization and political involvement was most evident in 19th century Italy, it is believed the groups’ origins began in the middle ages. When I learned they had a French counterpart called the Charbonnerie, I knew I’d found my outcasts.

As a writer, a dozen questions immediately went off in my mind. Who were they? What would compel them to become political and engage themselves in the affairs of the kingdom? How would they make those decisions? And, most importantly in a world populated with patron saints, whom would they worship?

Any deviation from normal church doctrine in the middle ages was rigorously opposed, so it made sense to me that they would worship someone not approved by the church, one of the older gods who’d not make the transition to patron saint.

Dovetailing nicely with this was my personal fascination with the concept of the Black Madonna. There are various theories for the origin of the Black Madonna, whether it was simply the color of Jesus and Mary’s skin before Renaissance artists reimagined them as fair skinned and blonde, or an origin that spoke to possible African roots. There is some speculation that the huge popularity of the cult of the Virgin Mary in the middle ages was a redirecting of earlier earth/mother goddess worship.

But interestingly, over the years I’d also run into mentions of the Black Artemis, rumored to have been worshipped by the Amazons, or Black Demeter, the aspect of the earth goddess when she was in deep mourning for her daughter Persephone. I took all those threads and swirled them around until I had the Dark Matrona, the unsanctioned aspect of Dea Matrona, the former earth goddess now patron saint. I decided that her darkness would be of a more spiritual nature, not unlike the Egyptian god Osiris, for in the Egyptian pantheon, black was not only the color of the underworld, but regeneration as the rich dark silt from the Nile river allowed them to grow their crops each year, and so black was also the color of regeneration, which dovetailed nicely with the book’s themes of finding hope in the darkness.

 

Exclusive Fall Fantasy Tour Swag

Thursday, November 1

Hello! I’m so sorry I’ve been so quiet for so long. But I have been working on some very cool things that I can finally share with you all!

Fall Fantasy Tour

 

Remember the Fall Fantasy Book Tour I mentioned a while ago? Well now I can share the tour exclusive swag for all who come to the events! Every person who buys a book at one of the tour stops will receive: a His Fair Assassin bookmark, a Courting Darkness bookmark, a crow feather tattoo (which plays a big role in Courting Darkness!) and an enamel Wolf not Sheep pin!

 

HFA Tour Swag

(I cannot even tell you how much I love this pin–designed by the amazing Icey Designs.)

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However, I realize that not everyone can make it to these tour stops, and it’s a short tour, so, if you’d like to ‘participate’ in the tour and be able to have the tour exclusive swag, if you order the His Fair Assassin paperbacks from any of the three stores on the tour stop (Square Books, Parnassus, or Book People) I will personalize your books AND send you the swag.

I know this is tough because some of you have already bought the books. However, it’s really NOT a preorder, but tour specific swag. But I also completely get that tours can be hard for readers to get to and hate for them to be shut out altogether, so this is kind of the compromise. And there will be a couple of tour swag package random giveaways—mostly because I apparently suck at the concept of ‘exclusive’. 🙂

Oh! oh! AND, one lucky winner at each tour stop will win a copy of this amazing, exclusive Grave Mercy Poster created by the amazing Phroilan Gardner!

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Anyway, I hope you are as excited about this cool stuff as I am. BUT MOSTLY I WILL GET TO SEE SOME OF YOUR LOVELY FACES.

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you order the personalized book from the book stores you will likely need to choose a DIFFERENT mailing option than MEDIA because they cannot put anything but the book in a media mail package. Please check the booksellers’ website or call them to be certain of mailing requirements.

New Covers and New Tour!

Tuesday, October 2

They’re here!

 

His Fair Assassin

The new paperback editions of the His Fair Assassin trilogy publish today! The new covers are so gorgeous, I’ve been staring at them all week. In celebration of the new covers, I’m also having a giveaway over on Instagram. If you’d like a chance to win a set of the trilogy with the new covers, pop on over there (I’m @rllafevers) and check it out.

There is also some fun new material included in the new editions! For all of you who felt Dark Triumph ended too soon, you’ll be happy to know there is a new epilogue in this new edition. Grave Mercy also has a new epilogue as well as an additional scene. Mortal Heart includes a Q and A with yours truly.

BUT! That’s not all! In case you missed it on Twitter, I’ll be attending YALLFEST this year! I’m so excited to finally have a chance to participate in this amazing book festival and hope I will see some of you there.

BUT! Even that is not all the good news! Right after YALLFEST, I will be going on a short book tour to celebrate the publication of the new paperbacks. It won’t just be me–there will be three other amazing Houghton Mifflin Harcourt authors on tour as well, including the incredibly talented Megan Shepard, Rebecca Schaeffer, and Emiko Jean.

We’ll be at Square Books in Oxford, Mississipi on Monday November 12, Parnassus Books in Nashville on Tuesday, November 12, and the final stop will be at Book People in Austin on Wednesday, November 13! I’ll post the times and more details when I have them. And be sure to check back to learn about some exclusive tour swag I’ll be giving away!

Fall Fantasy Tour

New Mortal Heart Cover!

Tuesday, July 10

And at last, the final redesigned cover is revealed! I present you with Mortal Heart’s newest cover!

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I love this new cover SO MUCH. It captures the ferocity of the book and evokes so many elements of the followers of Arduinna as well as Mortain. The extra material in the new paperback edition includes some fun Q and A that I had a lot of fun answering.

Here’s a link if you’d like to add it on GOODREADS.

As well as preorder links for those who want them.

IndieBound        Powells        BN      BAM        Amazon

Also! I had forgotten I had a couple of Pinterest boards I made while writing Mortal Heart that I never got around to making public. There’s one for Mortal Heart and one for Hellequin!

Also, also! I neglected to put up a GOODREADS button for COURTING DARKNESS. (Picture my publicist giving me a HARD side-eye!) If you’d like to add it now, feel free. 🙂 Maybe if we get enough adds, I can share something fun.

D’oh! And COURTING DARKNESS pre-order buttons! (Can you picture said publicist banging her head on the wall? Because yeah, I’m SO BAD at this.)  But save receipts because there WILL be a pre-order campaign–with cool stuff!

IndieBound        Powells        BN      BAM        Amazon

And lastly, don’t forget to sign up for my newsletter if you’d like to be the first to see covers, read deleted scenes, and be in the know about all things His Fair Assassin!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I meant to reveal it last week, but we were slammed with record breaking heat–107 degrees with no air conditions and a power outage. So yeah. Best laid plans evaporated.

New Dark Triumph Cover!

Wednesday, June 27

I’m so excited to share with you yet ANOTHER aMaZiNG cover created by the uber talented billellis! To be honest, the original Dark Triumph cover went through many trials and tribulations (maybe I’ll detail them for you all in an upcoming newsletter!) but this one makes up for that tenfold!

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I love the richness of it, the beauty of the jeweled dagger feels like such a corollary for Sybella. Then of course the vipers swirling in the shadows pretty much sums up Sybella’s life. And really, it feels like we could all use a little of Sybella in our life right now, no?

The paperback reprint will also have extra content in the form of a new epilogue. A lot of you wanted just a teensy bit more at the end of the book, so we are happy to accommodate that wish. (I will put up a pre-order link as soon as the book goes live on bookseller sights!) And if you haven’t signed up for my newsletter–do! I have lots of deleted scenes from DARK TRIUMPH that I will be sharing in the coming months!)

Also, in case you missed it, there is more Dark Triumph content on the website, with an article on the charbonnerie, and the strong influences of some of my favorite fairy tales. If you haven’t seen them already, you might want to take a look.

Can’t wait to show you Mortal Heart’s new cover SOON! (Again, subscribers to my newsletter will see it in all its glory later this week, along with a deleted scene with Annith and Balthazaar.)

New Grave Mercy Cover!

May 9, 2018

Hard to believe its been SIX YEARS since Grave Mercy first came out! And in honor of the release of Courting Darkness, my publisher is issuing new paperback reprints of the entire His Fair Assassin trilogy! Like the Courting Darkness cover, they were designed by Billelis. They are wildly different from the original covers, and […]

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It’s FINISHED!!

April 11, 2018

Yes, yes! The new book is finally DONE. Not just first draft done, but DONE DONE. It is the longest book I have ever written. It originally clocked in at 195,000 words–but I KNEW that wasn’t working. So with only eight weeks before our DROP DEAD deadline, I began a major restructuring/revision and got it […]

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Mortal Heart Cover!

March 16, 2014

For those of you who didn’t catch the Mortal Heart cover reveal a couple of weeks ago, here it is!   Annith has watched her gifted sisters at the convent come and go, carrying out their dark dealings in the name of St. Mortain, patiently awaiting her own turn to serve Death. But her worst […]

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Mortal Heart Update

February 9, 2014

So first of all, so sorry to have disappeared for so very long. Writing Mortal Heart in thirteen months is probably the single hardest writing thing I have ever done. Sadly, it required me to withdraw from just about every other thing in my life, including socializing (whether through social media or in real life) […]

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DARK TRIUMPH Cover

September 7, 2012

  The fierce look on her face is SO Sybella! Also, I just learned that I hadn’t actually mentioned it before, but the His Fair Assassin books are a trilogy, so there is a third book planned after this one. It will tell Annith’s story.

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