Zeus rewrote her laws. Now, Themis, Goddess of Justice will extract her revenge.
She is Themis goddess of Justice, only she can write the rules that govern men. Zeus, king of the gods, has other ideas. Not only did he cheat on her, but he changed her laws. Horrified that Zeus has doomed an innocent man to be fed to a Titan god, Themis must descend into the depths of hades to save the damned soul- without Zeus’s knowledge.
But an omnipotent being guards the prison of Typhoeus. One with blood pulsing through his veins. He’s neither god nor demon and he refuses her entry into Tartarus. With no way around him, she must go through him- and step directly into his arms.
In a race against time, Zeus and the Titan god’s hunger, Themis is willing to sacrifice everything to save an innocent soul. But is she willing to destroy her own soul by opening her heart again?
Themis may not be one of the goddesses you remember from mythology in school, but she won’t be forgotten once you read Themis’s Revenge: Book 4 of the Queens of the Underworld series, by RA Winter. As the frosty, but fiesty Goddess of Justice, Themis rebels against the all-controlling powers of Zues and his pig-headed male ego, and finds herself heating up in the underworld with boiling rage and fiery sexual energy, as she first realizes that she doesn’t have a clue when it comes to Zues’ activities or intentions, and things get even hotter, as she begins to figure it out and learns that there is no one she can trust.
Her path in the underworld leads her to the one whose name must not be spoken, and in trying to unravel the mystery of who he is, Themis finds that even unspoken prophecies are no less true, as she becomes a part of a prophecy uttered from her own lips. Zues is not one to tolerate disobedience, but the tell-tale runes she acquires are a dead giveaway, pun intended, that she has visit the forbidden realm and lived to tell about it, and he’ll be even less forgiving if he learns that the prophecy of his destruction now rests on Themis’s hands.
Themis’s Revenge brings mythology to life, or death, as the case may be. A well-crafted and skillfully told story. I give it five quills.
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Kaye Lynne Booth does honest book reviews on Writing to be Read in exchange for ARCs. Have a book you’d like reviewed? You can request a review here.
Today is the last day that you can show your support for Delilah and the Women in the West adventure series. Tomorrow is the last day of the campaign, and it doesn’t look as if it will reach my $500 funding goal. The project is currently only (63%) funded, but there’s still time for you to show your support and get some of the cool rewards and add-ons offered. With your support, we could still fund the project. So please, back my Kickstarter for Delilah, if you will.
When the campaign ends, you will still be able to pre-order the book, for a higher price, and get it on its March 21st release date, but if you support the Kickstarter campaign, you can get an early digital copy, a signed print copy, and even a chance to name a character in Sarah: Book 2. There’s also short stories, audio stories and an interview with Delilah available as add-ons. So click on the link below and drop in to see what you can get, and support me and Delilah.
Thanks to those who are already backing the campaign. Thanks to all of you who maybe couldn’t back the campaign, but still shared the link around on social media in an effort to help. All support is greatly appreciated.
If you miss the Kickstarter, you can still pre-order the book from your favorite book distributor here: https://books2read.com/DelilahWIW
Open submissions call
2023 WordCrafter Short Fiction Contest is open to submissions with an April 30 deadline. The theme is scary stuff in paranormal, dark fantasy or horror, and the winning story will have a guaranteed spot in this year’s anthology, alongside all the stories by invitation. You can find the full submission guidelines here.
Poetry Treasures 3 in 2023
The edition of Poetry Treasures 3 is currently in the works. We will be aiming for an April release date. It will feature the author/post guests from the 2022 Treasuring Poetry blog series and it will be compiled and edited by Robbie Cheadle and myself. The 2023 theme will be Passions, and I think it will turn out to be an impressive volume.
Want exclusive content? Join Kaye Lynne Booth & WordCrafter Press Readers’ Group for WordCrafter Press book & event news, including the awesome releases of author Kaye Lynne Booth. She won’t flood your inbox, she NEVER will sells her list, and you might get a freebie occasionally. Get a free digital copy of her short story collection, Last Call and Other Short Fiction, just for joining.
I want your scariest paranormal, dark fiction and horror stories for the 2023 WordCrafter Short Fiction Contest. Make my skin crawl, my spine tingle, and my heart race. Keep me up at night. Make me leave the light on, just in case. Show mw your deepest, darkest fears. See submissions guidelines below.
Submission Entry Fee
Please submit entry fee here for your 2023 WordCrafter Short Fiction Contest submission here.
$5.00
Submission Guidelines
Genres: Paranormal, Dark Fantasy, Horror or any combination there of.
Length: up to 5000 words
Submission Deadline: April 30, 2023
Pay: Royalty share
Rights: First Anthology Rights and audio rights as part of the anthology; rights revert to author one month after publication; publisher retains non-exclusive right to include in the anthology as a whole.
Open to submissions from January 1 through April 30, 2023.
Submit: A Microsoft Word or RTF file in standard manuscript format to KLBWordCrafter@gmail.com.
Join Kaye Lynne Booth & WordCrafter Press Readers’ Group for WordCrafter Press book & event news, including the awesome releases of author Kaye Lynne Booth. Get a free digital copy of her short story collection, Last Call and Other Short Fiction, as a sampling of her works just for joining
The cover for The Necromancer’s Daughter, by D. Wallace Peach is what first caught my eye. It promised an intriguing world, perhaps a winter wonderland, and at least one interesting character and of course, I just had to read the book. And I was glad that I did. This story is a skillfully chrafter hero’s journey, the protagonist thrown into an unfamiliar role which she hadn’t asked for with an objective that seems impossible to achieve.
Denied a living heir, the widowed king spies from a distance. But he heeds the claims of the fiery Vicar of the Red Order—in the eyes of the Blessed One, Aster is an abomination, and to embrace the evil of resurrection will doom his rule.
As the king’s life nears its end, he defies the vicar’s warning and summons the necromancer’s daughter. For his boldness, he falls to an assassin’s blade. Armed with righteousness and iron-clad conviction, the Order’s brothers ride into the leas to cleanse the land of evil.
To save her father’s life, Aster leads them beyond Verdane’s wall into the Forest of Silvern Cats, a wilderness of dragons and barbarian tribes. Unprepared for a world rife with danger and unchecked power, a world divided by those who practice magic and those who hunt them, she must choose whether to trust the one man offering her aid, the one man most likely to betray her—her enemy’s son.
The Necromancer’s Daughter, by D. Wallace Peach, is an exceptionally well crafted dark fantasy story, with well developed characters and a wonderfully crafted world of haves and have nots, with most fearing what they don’t understand. Peach has constructed a segregated world, where those of like kind are seperated and sadly, misunderstood. Into this world, she injects Aster, a reborn princess, raised as the necromancer’s daughter, since those who have been healed of death are not widely accepted in the mountains of Blackrock.
But when the King Aldring is murdered, leaving no other heir, the Vicar of the Red Order will do anything he can to prevent Aster from claiming the throne, including blaming the necromancer for the King’s murder, and sending she and her father into hiding. Her father is all she has in the world, and she flees to her mother’s people in the neighboring kingdom, in order to save him. In the strange land of Catticut’s forrest, with foes on all sides, Aster makes new friends in unlikely places, as she makes her way to her uncle, the King of Blackrock to make her plea, and hopes beyoond hope that he will aide her in rescuing her father.
I was totally engaged with Peach’s characters and completely emmersed in her world. I give The Necromancer’s Daughter five quills.
Thanks to contributing author Joseph Carrabis giving us a taste of the stories in the new Visions anthology from WordCrafter Press. Follow the link to learn more.
Today is the release! And Day 2 of the WordCrafter Visions Book Blog Tour finds us over at Patty’s World, with a guest post by contributing author Michaele Jordan about the inspiration for her story, “Farewell, My Miko” and a review of her story by Patty Fletcher. Won’t you join us? And don’t forget to leave a comment so I know you were there and get a chance to win a copy of this totally awesome anthology!
Thanks to contributing author Joseph Carrabis giving us a taste of the stories in the new Visions anthology from WordCrafter Press. Follow the link to learn more.
Thanks to contributing author Joseph Carrabis giving us a taste of the stories in the new Visions anthology from WordCrafter Press. Follow the link to learn more.
Gilded Glass is scheduled for release on July 19th. This is a fantastic anthology of Twisted Myths & Shattered Fairy Tales which will stay with you long after the cover closes.
A mirror is far more than meets the eye. When you gaze into the gilded glass, what do you see—and what looks back at you?
A beautiful woman hiding an ugly secret?
A malevolent king who delivers a fate worse than death?
An urban legend who will becomes an unlikely ally?
An alien gladiator with reflective armor?
A monster to the rescue?
A goddess?
A distorted version of yourself?
Dare to gaze into these 24 original tales of sweet deceptions and cursed truths by Sherrilyn Kenyon, Jonathan Maberry, Alan Dean Foster, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Michaelbrent Collings, and more.
Edited by international bestseller Kevin J. Anderson and Allyson Longueira and their Publishing graduate students at Western Colorado University, Gilded Glass: Twisted Myths and Shattered Fairy Tales offers stories with diverse roots, characters, and cultures, from frightening to funny, from once upon a time to far-flung futures and back to the modern day.
Deals are made and wishes granted. Friendships forged and enemies vanquished. You’ll love this anthology of modern myths, lore, and fairy tales, because everyone enjoys a happily ever after…
…or do they?
Stare deep into the gilded glass.
What you find might haunt you.
You can pre-order a copy of your own on the WordFire Press website here: wordfirepress.com/gpcw
Virtual Release Party
Join us on July 20th, at 6 p.m. MT, for the virtual book launch and help us send this exceptional anthology of modern myths and fairy tales off right. Meet the editors of Gilded Glass, and special author guests as we celebrate the release of this collection of science fiction and fantasy stories from both new and established writing talents.
In addition, there will be opportunity to learn more about all of the Western publishing cohort’s exciting solo projects. See how we’ve revived the classic works of masters of the past to be enjoyed in the future.
Well July is finally here and the time I’ve been waiting for, when I will have completed all the requirements for my master’s degree in publishing, is fast approaching. I’ve worked long and hard to earn this M.A. in publishing and now comes the time for the payoff. There’s a few really cool things about earning this degree that I’m really excited about – one of which, is that this time, I actually get to walk commencement in cap and gown. Although this was offered at the time I earned my M.F.A. in Creative Writing, they held commencement in May and it would have required an additional trip to Gunnison, Colorado which I was unable to make at that time, so I had to decline. But, this time around, they are having commencement at the end of the summer residency, which makes a whole lot more sense, and makes it possible for me to graduate proper.
I’m also excited about the release parties which are associated with the books released by our cohort. This includes the release of our class project, Gilded Glass: Twisted Myths & Shattered Fairy Tales, and my solo project, Wired Tales: The Best of the Early Years 1926-27. The first is a virtual release party on July 20 and you are all invited to join us. The second release party will be in person the following week, on July 27, which will be weird after two years of pandemic precautions which have kept most interactions with the public virtual. Wierd, but exciting, too. If you happen to be in the Gunnison area, it would be great to see you there, too.
So now, let me tell you about the two fabulous books which I had a hand in publishing.
Gilded Glass: Twisted Myths & Shattered Fairy Tales was our class project. We ran a call for submissions, which you may have seen right here on Writing to be Read, and then read through a slush pile of over 600 submissions to choose eighteen to twenty of the best ones to include in the anthology. And thanks to a grant from Draft2Digital, we were able to pay professional rates for the chosen stories, create and send out contracts, and handle all the edits for assigned stories. I was assigned a story which I fought for, during the selection process and it was great to get to work with the author I had championed. I was also assigned one of the big name authors KJA solicited stories from for this anthology. I admit, it was a little scary to edit the story of an award winning and best selling author, but it was also exciting. We all collaborated on the cover image and back cover copy, and the final result is the Gilded Glass anthology.
A mirror is far more than meets the eye. When you gaze into the gilded glass, what do you see – and what looks back at you?
A beautiful woman hiding an ugly secret?
A malevolent king who delivers a fate worse than death?
An urban legend who will become an unlikely ally?
An alien gladiator with reflective armor?
A monster to the rescue?
A goddess?
A distorted version of yourself?
Dare to gaze into these 24 original tales of sweet deceptions and cursed truths by Sherrilyn Kenyon & Madaug Hishinuma, Jonathan Maberry, Alan Dean Foster, Kristine Katheryn Rusch, Michaelbrent Collins, and more.
Edited by international bestseller Kevin J. Anderson and Allyson Longueira and their Publishing graduate students at Western Colorado University. Gilded Glass: Twisted Myths & Shattered Fairy Tales offers stories with diverse roots, characters, and cultures, from frightening to funny, from once upon a time to far-flung futures and back to modern day.
Deals are made and wishes granted. Friendships are forged and enemies vanquished. You’ll love this anthology of modern myths, lore and fairy tales, because everyone enjoys a happily ever after…
…or do they?
Stare deep into the gilded glass.
What you find might haunt you.
Gilded Glass will be released on July 19, 2022 and is now available for preorder through your favorite book distributor here: https://books2read.com/u/bwKZ8Y
Weird Tales: Best of the Early Years 1926-27 was my solo project, which I compiled and edited in collaboration with Weird Tales editor and award-winning author, Jonathan Maberry. For this project, I read through all issues of the iconic Weird Tales magazine for 1926 & 27 and chose the stories I felt were the best ones, or at least representative of the magazine for those years. Then I compiled and edited them, (or at least proofread them, you don’t really edit the classics), and set the book up for publishing. I didn’t have choice of cover design, as this was one of two volumes published this year and they wanted them to be consistent in design, but I did get to choose the three covers to be featured, as well as original illustrations for the header images, and I got to write the back cover copy myself. The result was the republication of some classic short fiction by some of the early masters of science fiction, horror and fantasy, from before genre fiction was a ‘thing’.
Founded in 1922, Weird Tales is an iconic publication of fantasy, science fiction, and horror stories. Weird Tales is the forerunner to today’s pulp and speculative fiction genres.
Within these pages you’ll find some of the best of the classic stories originally published in Weird Tales during the years 1926 and 1927, collected into a single volume. Featuring stories by legendary authors such as Seabury Quinn, E. Hoffman Price, Greye La Spina, Edward Hamilton, Frank Belknap Long Jr., H. Warner Munn, August W. Derleth, A. Merritt, and H.P. Lovecraft.
Weird Tales: Best of the Early Years 1926-27 is scheduled for July 12, 2022 and is available at your favorite book distributor here: https://books2read.com/u/bx1e8k
For Kaye Lynne Booth, writing is a passion. Kaye Lynne is an author with published short fiction and poetry, both online and in print, including her short story collection, Last Call and Other Short Fiction; and her paranormal mystery novella, Hidden Secrets. Kaye holds a dual M.F.A. degree in Creative Writing with emphasis in genre fiction and screenwriting, and an M.A. in publishing. Kaye Lynne is the founder of WordCrafter Quality Writing & Author Services and WordCrafter Press. She also maintains an authors’ blog and website, Writing to be Read, where she publishes content of interest in the literary world.
Join Kaye Lynne Booth & WordCrafter Press Readers’ Group for WordCrafter Press book & event news, including the awesome releases of author Kaye Lynne Booth. Get a free digital copy of her short story collection, Last Call and Other Short Fiction, as a sampling of her works just for joining.
Writing to be Read 