The Christmas Dragon/ Strings by Ruthanne Reid

When I asked Ruthanne Reid to write a post sharing her most gratifying experience as a writer, some mythology, or her inspiration, I expected her to pick just one subject. Imagine my delight when she graced us with all three.

Thank you Ruthanne and I’m sorry for causing you so much work.


Her most gratifying experience as a writer.

This is a tricky one! I find it repeatedly gratifying to open a box of my own books, or run into someone online who’s read them. However, I think if I were to pick one moment, it would be when I realized I had fanart. See, I got into writing via fanfiction; I loved other people’s worlds so much that I just had to play in them, and I honestly believe that’s the best compliment a writer can receive. Finding out that really talented folks had drawn fanart of my world just sent me onto cloud 9.

Her work is based in mythology - so an insight into her mythical world.

In sum: everything is real, but humans didn’t get any of it right. That’s okay. The People of the Mythos don’t really understand humans well, either.
My goal was to create a world that covered everything from history to mythology to most religions. In the world of the Mythos, here’s a place for every single weird thing humans have ever dreamed up, including aliens.
Combining science and magic into something internally consistent was a challenge, but loads of fun. Real-life history and archeology and science are so weird that they just lend themselves to storytelling. Crypto-archeology is one of my favorite things to study, in fact. I mean, who wouldn’t be fascinated by the Voynich Manuscript, or the Antikythera mechanism, or megalithic jars of Laos? The world is utterly strange and wonderful, and I’m thrilled to be able to incorporate that into my storytelling.

Inspiration for her favorite character.

I have to pick a favorite? Hmmm. 
Fun fact: I haven’t published my favorite character yet. His name is Alex, and he’s half human, half something else – he doesn’t know what, which is kind of an issue. I’ve had him in my head since I was fourteen, and while he as a character grew with me, the only thing that’s really changed was the identity of his father. I like him because he chooses to be good even when it costs him; because he retains his sense of humor regardless of the horrors the world drops on his head. I like him because at the end of the day, he maintains a tender heart, which means he can forgive the most monstrous people – even as he is forced to defeat them. Alex is somebody I’d like to be, in many ways, and of the many characters in my books, he’s one I wouldn’t be afraid to meet.

The Christmas Dragon

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All Katie Lin wants is to get away from her family: from the magic, from the mayhem, and from the never-ending war.

Unfortunately, someone has other ideas, and sends her a box. A box that jumps.

The tiny fire hazard inside may just force her back to Wales - and right into the path of a dragon war, the Crow King, and at least one reluctant elf prince. Sometimes, running away just doesn't work as planned.

Buy Links for Strings:

Kindle  
Nook  
Kobo  
Google
iTunes  
Scribd  
Oyster  
Flipkart  
Txtr
Smashwords  
Paperback  
IndieBound  
Bookfinder  
Powell’s  

 

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Strings

Need help? You probably shouldn't ask Grey.

A runaway Unseelie prince, Grey feeds on love -  a commodity he conjures via music and magic in late-night Manhattan. It's a sweet gig, if lonely, and Grey is almost sure the dire warnings he was given about New York in December won't come true.

Then a monster from his childhood attacks in the middle of the night, and everything changes. 

He survived, but he's marked, and more monsters are coming for him and everyone who survived. Grey has no plans to be a hero but fate doesn't care what he wants. Sometimes, no matter what you do, you aren't the one pulling the strings.


Excerpt from Strings
My music made a lovely magic. It was tiny magic, sure, but effective: it thickened the air and deepened the candles’ warm light, caressed the listener like intimate fingertips and teased sleeping nerve-endings toward a gently quivering wakefulness.

Go, me. I made it all happen.

Generally speaking, humans suck at love. They go into it selfishly, thinking of themselves and not the needs of the other, already planning in their little heads what they’ll do when it doesn’t work out. Idiots. Does anything else work that way? Can you learn art or become a mechanic without devoting yourself to those crafts? Can you graduate from college without paying attention to a coursework’s needs, without being willing to spend time feeding it what it requires?

Well, yes, you can, but not well. And yes, colleges have needs, too. Every living thing does.

I could help the lovelorn attendees of tonight’s bar-hop, and I had every reason to. Helping them helped me. The more they loved, the more I fed—and while humans do suck at getting love started, once it takes root in them, it grows like Kudzu. (That Kudzu-thing was one of my cousin’s ideas, by the way. Don’t look at me. I’m not a plant-wizard.)

AUTHOR Bio and Links:


Indie author Ruthanne Reid writes about elves, aliens, vampires, and space-travel with equal abandon. She is the author of the series Among the Mythos, and believes good stories should be shared. Subscribe to her free email newsletter for free books and more at http://amongthemythos.com. You can connect with her on Twitter (http://twitter.com/ruthannereid), Facebook (http://facebook.com/mythos), or Tumblr (http://ruthannereid.tumblr.com), where she looks at too many kittens and Avengers blogs.

Ruthanne’s love of magic, urban environments, and deep space birthed a strange world with undercurrents of faith, magic, villainy, and heroism (along with swords and lasers, on occasion). Among the Mythos showcases aliens with all-too-human feelings, entire societies on the decline due to greed and fear, protagonists who might actually be the bad guys (or vice-versa), and endings every bit as messy as the world that creates them.

Ruthanne knows from experience that endings are messy. No matter how exotic the setting, how many limbs the characters have or what (if any) genders, the problems and questions addressed by a good story are very real, and that’s why they have power. If she has a theme, it is this: keep fighting, and keep pushing toward hope, because the struggle is worth the finish-line.

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Ruthanne will be awarding a $50 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.


Follow the tour and comment; the more you comment, the better your chances of winning. The tour dates can be found here: 

http://goddessfishpromotions.blogspot.com/2014/12/nbtm-tour-christmas-dragon-strings-by.html

a Rafflecopter giveaway