Category: fantasy
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channeling our inner Picasso
I had the extraordinary opportunity last week to visit the Picasso Museum in Barcelona. The museum houses one of the largest collections of his early works, and gives the visitor an excellent chronicle of Picasso’s development as an artist, from his teenage years all the way up through his later masterpieces. I’ve had…
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Kirkus Reviews ‘Daughter of Aithne’
I was excited (and nervous) last week to receive Kirkus Reviews’ assessment of Daughter of Aithne, the third and final installment of The Silver Web Trilogy. Nervous before I read it, excited afterwards. All three novels of The Silver Web have received positive reviews from Kirkus, but Kirkus seemed to like Daughter of Aithne best of all: “Thankfully,” the reviewer writes, “[Gastreich] ends her series with the…
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Cover Reveal: Daughter of Aithne
I’m delighted to announce that Daughter of Aithne will be released this spring in Kindle and print editions! Cover art and design for this third and final installment of The Silver Web is by Thomas Vandenberg, who also did the covers for the first two books in the series, Eolyn and Sword of Shadows. The image shows Princess Briana’s first encounter with…
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Getting to Know the Bees
I’m spending my week at a bee identification workshop, learning about the diversity of Missouri bees and how to identify representative species. Mike Arduser, Missouri bee expert, is teaching the workshop. I spent a day collecting with Mike last summer, when he completed a survey of wild bees at two of Kansas City Missouri’s…
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Living in A Time of Giants
2016 was a hard year for a lot of people, myself included, but despite the general wailing and gnashing of teeth out there in the interverse, I can’t help but feel that 2016 was, on the whole, no better or worse than 2015. To be fair, 2015 was a pretty bad year for me.…
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Midwinter’s Eve
Happy Winter Solstice, Everyone! To accompany your midnight meditations, here’s an excerpt from one of my favorite scenes in Eolyn; a glimpse into the revelry of Winter Solstice, as traditionally celebrated by the mages and magas of Eolyn’s world: AS MIDNIGHT APPROACHED, the musicians quieted their instruments. Mage Corey’s guests convened in a circle at…
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The Witch
“She cannot be a witch, he tells himself. Witches do not study philosophy; witches do not practice scientia nova. She belongs to a new age, a future he longs to be a part of.” – The Witch of Cologne, Tobsha Learner This week’s post has a double purpose. It’s a continuation of my Halloween reflections inspired by Tobsha Learner’s…
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FROM ASHES INTO LIGHT by Gudrun Mouw
I am so delighted today to welcome author Gudrun Mouw to my blog. I met Gudrun through her editor, Erika Lunder at Raincloud Press. Erika contacted me about a year ago, wondering if I would be willing to beta read one of the titles they were preparing for release. The book was From Ashes Into Light, and I fell…
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Spring is Coming
Yesterday, during a lengthy walk along Tomahawk Creek, I came across these daffodils, among the first green buds to emerge this spring. The season is changing; we all can feel it, even the plants. Especially the plants. Spring is coming. I’m celebrating this year’s spring in a special way, with the release of the second…
K. R. Gastreich, Author 