BooksChatter: ☀ Lost Causes: Elements [4]

Wednesday, 23 September 2015

☀ Lost Causes: Elements [4] - Mia Marshall

Thank you for joining us on the Virtual Book Tour for Lost Causes, an Urban Fantasy by Mia Marshall (22 September 2015, Mia Marshall, 354 pages).

This is the fourth book in the Elements series. Sign up to Mia Marshall's newsletter and get a FREE prequel novelette, Strange Fires. Download book one, Broken Elements FREE!.

PREVIEW: Check out the book's synopsis and excerpt below, as well as full details of the series Read the first three chapters with Amazon Look Inside.

Author Mia Marshall will be awarding a $50 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour. Please do take part: comment on our post and follow the tour where you will be able to read other excerpts (☀), and reviews (✍).

Synopsis | Teaser | The Series | About the Author | Giveaway & Tour Stops

Synopsis

Aidan Brook has spent months living with the horror of what happened when she lost control of her magic. Now she is searching for a way to manage her immense power, but she only hits one deccad end after another.

On the run from a council intent on her death, Aidan, the bear shifter Mac, and the rest of her friends find themselves on a desperate chase across deserts and oceans in search of answers. Along the way, they encounter a living myth and a dual magic with secrets of his own—and they learn that the cure may be more deadly than the disease.

To save her own life, Aidan will need to confront the most dangerous foe she’s ever faced…herself.

LOST CAUSES is the fourth book in the award-winning Elements urban fantasy series.

Teaser: Excerpt

      “Here.” She handed it to me and returned to her seat. “Put it on your face. You should use as little magic as you can, even to heal.”
     “Is that your version of an apology?” I pressed the ice against the cheek Sera had slapped. I wasn’t bruising yet, but it was tender enough that it was only a matter of time. Sera hadn’t pulled that punch.
     “Did you hear me use either the words ‘I’m’ or ‘sorry’? Then no.”
     I made a face in her general direction, then made a second face when the movement pulled at my swelling cheek.
     “What else could I have done?”
     “Nothing! You do nothing, Aidan. Damn it. I’ve lost too many people already. Our father. Christopher. Hell, I’ve been losing people my whole life.”
     She paused, swallowing whatever she’d been about to say. Sera rarely spoke of her mother, who died when she was just thirteen. Elementals were long-lived, but we weren’t immortal. Any sudden trauma could kill us as easily as it would a human.
     When she spoke again, her words were measured. “I’m not losing anyone else. I don’t care if I have to burn those council assholes myself.”
     “You’re not a killer, Sera. You’d never be the same.”
     She held my eyes, her own so serious I barely recognized them. “But I’d be sane. Can you say the same thing?”
     She was right, and at the same time she was so very wrong. “You know who you sound like?”
     One side of her mouth quirked in the tiniest of smiles. “What can I say? Like father, like daughter.”
     “Daughters,” I corrected. “And if we’re not careful, we’re all going to die in our efforts to protect each other.”

Lost Causes - available NOW!

UK:

US:

The Series: Elements

Click on the book cover to Look Inside the book on Amazon and read an excerpt.

Strange Fires [0.5]

*FREE when you subscribe to Mia's Newsletter*

Aidan Brook and Sera Blais are just your typical college students—if your typical college student was a descendent of the earth’s original magic and had a preternatural gift for finding trouble.

In this short prequel to the Elements series, discover how Aidan and Sera’s remarkable story began. All it took was a kegger, a few shared secrets, and a megalomaniac-led cult to build a friendship that would change both their lives forever. [Published 17 December 2013, 32 pages]

Broken Elements [1]

*FREE download**

Magic, murder, and mayhem on the shores of Lake Tahoe.

For Aidan Brook, manipulating the power of water is as easy as breathing—until the awful night her magic fails, with deadly consequences.

Though Aidan tries to outrun her past, the grisly murder of an old friend draws her back to the scene of her crimes. In Lake Tahoe, she only finds more trouble. An estranged best friend, a dangerously attractive landlord, and a couple of FBI agents are determined to complicate her life…and for the first time in years, she doesn’t mind a few complications.

As the killer grows increasingly fixated on Aidan, her past and present begin to collide. To defeat the killer, she must learn to control her power—before her broken magic fails her for the final time. [Published 26 February 2013, 339 pages. First published 1 July 2012]

Shifting Selves [2]

An award-winning story of intrigue, magic, and extraordinary friendships. Aidan Brook's world was shattered when she uncovered long-buried secrets about her past. Secrets that could cost her sanity—or even her life.

Now she craves peace and quiet, but that’s not an option when local children start vanishing. Soon, Aidan is drawn deep into the shifter world…a place where elementals like herself are decidedly unwelcome. To track the missing children, these longtime enemies must work together without too many claw marks or too much fur flying. Throw in a stalled romance with an enigmatic shifter, and Aidan’s life is anything but peaceful.

As Aidan and her friends zero in on the kidnapper, they discover Aidan isn’t the only one with secrets—or the only one who will stop at nothing to keep those secrets hidden… [Published 15 April 2013, 351 pages]

Turning Tides [3]

The explosive next chapter in the award-winning Elements urban fantasy series.

Aidan Brook committed one too many magical crimes. Now, the water council insists she answer for them. Before they can deliver a verdict that will change her life, a council member is gruesomely murdered—and Aidan’s best friend is accused of the crime.

Before the body cools, Aidan is racing against the clock to prove Sera’s innocence. To make matters worse, her favorite bear shifter is struggling with the dangerous bond they now share. Aidan will do whatever it takes to save her friends…but the cost may be higher than she can pay.

A little murder, a little magic, and family and friends to help her through it all. On the outside, it looks like a typical Aidan Brook day—but she’s about to discover, when the tides start to turn, even a water elemental can’t control what happens next. [Published 6 May 2014, 346 pages]

About the Author

Mia Marshall is the award-winning author of the Elements urban fantasy series. Before she started writing about imaginary worlds, she worked as a high school teacher, script supervisor, story editor, legal secretary, and day care worker.

She has lived all along the US west coast and throughout the UK, where she collected an unnecessary number of degrees in literature, education, and film.

These days, she lives in a small house in the Sierra Nevadas, where she is surrounded by a small but deadly feline army.

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