Dear Reader:

I’ve been very busy the lastfew months writing my newest novel, Arcane Deception. This is the fifth book inthe Arcane Talents series I’m doing, set in an alternate universe where people useart, music and dance to work magic. What’s more, U.S. servicemen have psychic linksto magical lions, tigers and bears, who help them to form bulletproof magicalshells of the animals they wear like Iron Man’s armor.

My heroine, Kate Marshall,is an Arcanist – an artist who uses a combination of art and magic to workpowerful spells. My hero, Mark Delaney, has a psychic link with a magical polarbear that gives him the power of the world’s largest land predator.

But their enemies are evenmore powerful than they are…

When her grandfather wanders off, witch Kate Marshall enlists ahandsome neighbor to help find Eli, who suffers from dementia. She doesn’t knowMark Delaney is a magic-using undercover agent trying to bring down a gang ofdrug dealers with deadly spirit animals.

Soon Mark and Kate find themselves falling in love, even as hewrestles with lying to the woman he’s fallen for. Unfortunately, the drug lordwho is the gang’s leader is having them watched, so Mark can’t come clean.

When the gang kidnaps Eli and Kate to force her to collude intheir crimes, she must turn to Mark despite his lies, the risk to her heart andthe threat to her beloved grandfather’s life.

 

Buy links:

ChangelingPress    Amazon   Apple     Barnesand Noble     Kobo     Vivlio

 

Here’s an excerpt:

Kate Marshall hurried alongthe path as fast as she dared, scanning the surrounding woods for a flash ofwhite hair. Anxiety coiled in a sick knot in her belly. Good thing it was latespring. If it had been winter, she’d have to worry he’d forgotten the way homeand succumbed to hypothermia.

No sign of him. Nothing butsquirrels rustling through the leaves as courting birds sung from the pines,oaks, and maples looming around her.

Dammit, where is he?

Kate stopped in her tracks,closed her eyes, and scanned again, but nothing glowed behind her closed eyes.No sign of Eli Riley’s Talent shining through the trees. Except…

Wait. Not a glow, but something.She concentrated, focusing until the sense of power grew more acute. It seemedto be emanating from the lake.

Her eyes flew open, and shetook off in long strides just short of a run. “Granddad? Granddad, where areyou? You’re scaring me!”

Some days, Eli seemed justlike the man who’d raised her during those idyllic childhood summers, endlesslywise, skilled in art and magic and the intersection where the two met. On baddays, he became a six-foot tall three-year-old, prone toward tantrums andviolent outbursts. Even worse was the lethal combination of his raw magicalability and his failing memory, which could easily kill him if he made an errorwith a spell. Which was why she’d panicked when she’d woke up this morning tofind him gone.

Eli hadn’t been in thestudio crafting something fatal, though his backpack of magical gear wasmissing. She’d searched the rest of the old Victorian house and its extravagantgarden, but no luck.

What worried her most wasthe lake. Her childhood summer haunt was less than a mile away from the house.Way too close for comfort.

He can swim. Hell,he taught me. But what if…

Flickering light flashedthrough the trees ahead -- sunlight glinting off the water. The sense of powerwas stronger now. Splashes sounded, suggesting someone swimming.

Or drowning.Her heart shot into her throat.

“Granddad, dammit!” Katebroke into a sprint, ignoring the thin branches that whipped across her face.“Granddad!” I can’t lose him too. She burst from the trees. “Granddad!”

But when she spotted theswimmer, it was not her grandfather. Not with the long blond hair slickedaround broad, bare shoulders that gleamed in the morning sunlight. The manstopped swimming and turned, treading water, wiping a big hand down hisdripping face. “I’m sorry, what?”

“Have you seen an old man?”

“No, nothing but couple ofdeer and about a dozen squirrels.” He started back to the shore, muscular armsstroking the water, sending droplets flying through the arc of a rainbow.“What’s the problem?”

“My grandfather… He’s gotdementia. I woke up this morning to find him gone. He comes out here to paint.”Kate raked both hands through her brunette hair, absently plucking out leavesand twigs from her heedless run. “Oh God, he could be anywhere. The road -- hecould have been hit by a car. Sometimes he doesn’t remember to check before hecrosses…” She started to turn away.

“Hang on, let me get dressedand I’ll help you look.” He waded out of the lake, water streaming down a bodylike a gladiator’s, all hard, carved muscle. He wore only a pair of black swimtrunks and a glowing golden tattoo in the center of his chest, a circlesurrounded by sigils. Looked like some kind of protective spell. And he wasbig, easily six-one. On any other day in any other situation, she’d havedrooled.

“Where do you live?” He walkedover to a pile of neatly folded clothes. Picking up a towel, he started dryingoff, muscle flexing in his broad chest.

“In the Victorian a milethat way.” She jerked a thumb over her shoulder and looked away, trying not toogle.

“Oh, you must mean Eli. Ididn’t know he’d gotten that bad.” He pulled on faded jeans despite his wettrunks, then shrugged on an equally faded black T and stuffed his bare feetinto running shoes. The shirt’s white lettering read “USAC Academy.”

He was Arcane Corps. Nowonder he radiated so much power, she’d felt it a quarter mile away. Kate wastempted to close her eyes and check the glow of his magic, but that would berude.

He extended a hand, a frownof concern on his face. “Mark Delaney. I’m so sorry about your grandmother.”

A spasm of pain stabbed her,but she forced a tight smile as his long fingers enfolded hers. His skin feltcalloused and cool. “Thank you. I’m Kate Marshall.” She studied that tough,intensely masculine face. Beard stubble roughened his square jaw and broad,cleft chin, blond brows slashing over Feral gold eyes. It was hard to tell, butshe thought his hair would be honey blond when it dried. His lips were thin andmasculine, but they looked soft, kissable. Tempting, despite the nerve-wrackingsituation she was in.

After a carefully calibratedsqueeze, he let her go. “Don’t freak out, I’m going to manifest so I can trackhim. I’m a Feral.” Golden light exploded around him as his magic became visiblein a flare of sparks and whirling energy. A heartbeat later, it coalesced intoa huge shaggy figure with a long bullet-shaped head and foot-wide paws. The rawpower of the animal spirit beat at Kate’s senses as it towered over her, almostten feet tall. Mark was only dimly visible in its center, cocooned within itlike a man in armor.

Blinking, Kate suppressedthe instinct to step back.

“Don’t worry, Kola and Ihave been stable for years,” Mark said as the bear dropped to all fours. Itsshoulder was level with her chin, and she was five-six. “I’m in control.” Whichwasn’t always a given with Ferals, whose spirit animals could make them pronetoward explosions of aggression.

Feeling a bit self-consciousabout her reaction, she said, “I knew from your shirt you must be Arcane Corps,but I wasn’t expecting a polar bear.” Serving in the military was the only wayyou could legally meld with a Familiar that powerful. Ferals were the magicalequivalent of the Navy SEALs, and most Americans viewed them with awe.

Well, except for Humanists,who thought they were demon possessed.

***

I hope you’ll take a look!

Buy Links:

ChangelingPress    Amazon   Apple     Barnesand Noble     Kobo     Vivlio

 

My other big project is a class I’m teaching at SavvyAuthors.comcalledBlueprint to Book: Plotting and Writing a Novel with Angela Knight. Unlikemy previous class, this is a set of video tutorials in which I demonstrate howto write a novel. It covers everything from character creation to plotting, towriting and rewriting. I even discuss cover creation. Clickfor more information.If you’re interested, here’s the first lesson video.
I hope you’ll join me for the class.Have a great summer!Angela Knight