Author Guest Post with Dan Rice: The Blood of Faeries

Allison Lee wilts under the bright light of celebrity after being exposed as a shape-shifting monster.

Welcome to one of the February 1st stops on the blog tour for The Blood of Faeries by Dan Rice with Silver Dagger Book Tours (schedule linked.) Be sure to follow the rest of the tour for spotlights, reviews, more author guest posts, and a giveaway! More on that at the end of this post.

Please note that this post contains affiliate links, which means there is no additional cost to you if you shop using my links, but I will earn a small percentage in commission. A program-specific disclaimer is at the bottom of this post.

Author Guest Post

Authors I Admire

Since I am a fantasy author, it will probably come as no surprise one of my favorite writers is George R.R. Martin. I fell in love with his writing when I first read A Game of Thrones. The novel was unlike any other fantasy I had read and featured plot twists that left me gaping. What other authors do I admire? Read on to discover a few whose speculative fiction you might enjoy.

Rachel Hartman
Hartman writes stories in a secondary world reminiscent of Victorian England. In this immersive world, humans, dragons, and other creatures live side-by-side. However, the different species do not always get along. Hartman deftly explores social justice issues, especially how minorities and first peoples are mistreated by those in power over generations. As she details these injustices, she eschews easy solutions. Her messages are clear and moving without being pedantic.

Her protagonists are idealistic young women who refuse to be pigeonholed into society’s predefined roles for them. These young women are not always the easiest to like but have incredible character arcs demonstrating tremendous growth. They learn hard lessons that they can’t solve all the world’s ills, even with magic, while never sacrificing the idealism that makes them special.

Peter Tieryas
Peter Tieryas is best known for his series United States of Japan. His books are a wild ride, a mash-up of Peter K. Dick’s alternate history and anime-style giant mecha. Think Man in the High Castle with gun-toting, sword-wielding robots bigger than buildings.

The United States of Japan books are fun, with compelling characters, riotous action, and exciting plot twists. Each book is better than its predecessors, and I sincerely hope Tieryas has a few more tales from this world up his sleeve.

Readers looking for battle robots torn from the pages of manga and mature storylines will likely find Tieryas’s yarns hard to put down.

Scott Westerfeld
I absolutely love Westerfeld’s Leviathan series. Such imagination—whale airships, jellyfish hot air balloons, and steam-powered mechas inhabit an alternate history version of World War I! On top of that, he writes fantastic YA protagonists who pull the reader’s heartstrings in all the right ways.

He has also written several series based in his Uglies universe, where upon reaching sixteen years of age, people undergo radical cosmetic surgery to go from ugly to pretty. These are disturbing dystopian tales sure to entertain YA readers.

Westerfeld is a fantastic author because he has produced multiple series to appeal to many YA readers. Want something full of fantastical whimsy? Read the Leviathan series. For an edgier read, try the Uglies.

About the Books

The Blood of Faeries
The Allison Lee Chronicles Book Two
by Dan Rice

Published 1 February 2023
The Wild Rose Press, Inc

Genre: YA Urban Fantasy
Page Count: 314
Add it to your Goodreads TBR!

Allison Lee wilts under the bright light of celebrity after being exposed as a shape-shifting monster. She’d rather be behind the camera than in front of it. Being under the tooth and claw of her monstrous mother is even less enjoyable. All she desires is for everything to go back to the way things were before she discovered her true nature. But, after she accidentally kills a mysterious man sent to kidnap her, she realizes piecing her old life back together is one gnarly jigsaw puzzle.
When Allison’s sometimes boyfriend Haji goes missing, Allison and her squad suspect his unhealthy interest in magic led to his disappearance. Their quest to find Haji brings them face-to-face with beings thought long ago extinct whose agenda remains an enigma.

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Excerpt

My bedroom of the last seventeen years should be a safe place, but instead, I’m a stranger. I have my mother to thank for this liminal feeling. After abandoning me at birth, she’s back and doing her damnedest to ruin my life. You’d think she’d take her time putting her stamp on the household, having just rejoined the family.

But that’s not her style.

My mother is a juggernaut. As if it’s not enough I’m a monster because of her, she’s turned my bedroom into a hotel room. I like everything out where I can see it. Mother believes order will break down if anything is even one millimeter out of place. My clothes are folded with military precision inside icky plastic drawers stashed in the closet. Even my camera, my lifeline to sanity, is hidden away. I prefer to have my camera out on the desk next to my laptop where I can see it.

Most bizarre of all, the room even smells clean. I can probably detect cancer with my sense of smell, but I have to admit my room doesn’t stink. All I can smell are the outdoor scents coming in from the open window. How does Mother do it––magic, maybe? I wish I possessed magic capable of rendering the chanting from the street inaudible. As it is, I have to keep reminding myself the racket is the soundtrack of my life; it’s just white noise. I’m tempted to close the window, although I’ll still hear the crowd with it closed.

Dragons Walk Among Us
The Allison Lee Chronicles Book One
by Dan Rice

Published 19 July 2021
The Wild Rose Press, Inc

Genre: YA Urban Fantasy
Page Count: 321
Add it to your Goodreads TBR!

Shutterbug Allison Lee is trying to survive high school while suffering the popular girl’s abuse. Her life is often abysmal, but at least her green hair is savage. Her talent for photography is recognized by the school paper and the judges of a photo contest. While visiting her friend Joe, a homeless vet, Allison’s life irrevocably changes after an attack leaves her blind. All her dreams as a photojournalist are dashed as she realizes she’ll never see again. Despair sets in until she is offered an experimental procedure to restore her vision. But there are side effects, or are they hallucinations? She now sees dragons accompanying some of the people she meets. Can she trust her eyes, or has the procedure affected her more than she can see?

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Excerpt

We head for the Chapel Library off the quad to study with Haji. Over an inch of snow hides the red bricks of the quad. The snow falls dry and thick, quickly filling in our footprints. We enter the library and walk to a chamber like a cathedral with a high vaulted ceiling, book-lined walls, and long tables. The room is only sparsely populated with studying students, so we easily find an empty table and sit across from each other.

We decide to work on algebra while we wait for Haji. We’re deep into working quadratic equations when someone loudly clearing their throat makes me nearly jump out of my seat. We both look up, searching for the disturbance. I half expect the culprit to be Haji.

It’s a tall and absurdly thin man standing just inside the entrance to the reading room. I recognize him as Dr. Radcliffe from the many faculty functions I’ve attended with Dad over the years. I stare at him, entranced, not believing what I’m seeing.

“Allison, is something wrong?” Dalia whispers.

“No,” I say and drag my gaze back to the quadratic equation written in my notebook.

Dalia resumes talking about strategies to solve the equation, but I barely register a word. My gaze is lured back to Dr. Radcliffe like a particle inexorably pulled into a black hole. My eyes widen, and my jaw slackens. Furrowing my brow, I blink, desperate to clear the mind-boggling absurdity from my vision.

About the Author

Dan Rice pens the young adult urban fantasy series The Allison Lee Chronicles in the wee hours of the morning. The series kicks off with his award-winning debut, Dragons Walk Among Us, which Kirkus Reviews calls, “An inspirational and socially relevant fantasy.”

While not pulling down the 9 to 5 or chauffeuring his soccer fanatic sons to practices and games, Dan enjoys photography and hiking through the wilderness.

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