BooksChatter: ☀☄ Of Delicate Pieces: Of Breakable Things [2]

Thank you for joining us on the Virtual Book Tour for Of Delicate Pieces, a Young Adult Paranormal Urban Fantasy by A. Lynden Rolland (10 November 2015, Month9Books, LLC, 300 pages).

This is the second book in the Of Breakable Things series.

PREVIEW: Check out the book's synopsis and excerpt below, as well as information about the first title in the series. Also, do not miss out on our Q&A with author A. Lynden Rolland. Read various excerpts with Amazon Look Inside.

Author Rolland will be awarding five (five) digital copies of Of Delicate Pieces to randomly drawn winners 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 (☀), interviews (ℚ) and guest blog posts (✉).

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

Synopsis

Settling into her second year of death, Alex is ready to exercise a limitless mind and to explore an afterworld that changes each day, but she still isn't resting in peace.

The 'gifted' are humans who see spirits and have the same extraordinary mental powers, although they aren't considered equals. Centuries ago, Alex's family led the movement to keep the living and dead separated, but the gifted believe Alex is a reincarnation of their slain civil leader. When they begin to break down the barriers that protect the city, the afterworld becomes dangerous and vulnerable to exposure. The living and dead both want to use Alex for their own gain, but what they don't realize is that neither side will want her when they find out who she really is.

In the afterworld, nothing stays buried for long.

Teaser: Excerpt

Chapter One

In her dream, Alex was back in the desert, the one with the footprints, except this time the sky was green. The sand clung to her feet, weighing her down, and she worried how long she would have to endure it. Chase appeared and intertwined his fingers with hers, and a pleasant zap of electricity struck her palm. Alex heard a satisfactory click as their hands snapped into place. The light from the setting sun framed his silhouette, forcing Alex to blink several times, blind to his features. Warmth overcame her.
      “Chase.” His name tasted like sunlight, and the sky brightened. “Is this my dream or yours?”
      “If I had to bet on it, I’d guess yours because we’re back in this litter box again.”
      “You’ve had dreams like this before, too.”
      Chase glanced over his shoulder. “I have no footprints. Like I’m not really supposed to be here. And I’ve never had a dream that leads home to Parrish. Ready? Any minute now.” They could hear the sound of the waves before the bay materialized next to them. “We’re back.”
      The sand hardened with water, allowing them to walk without restraint. Never did the icy fingertips of the waves find a way to reach them. This world couldn’t touch them anymore.
      Chase looked out at the horizon. “What is it that you’re looking for? There has to be some reason your mind is so adamant about taking you back here. Not that I mind long walks on the beach, but it’s a little cliché.”
      He let go of her hand and instead wrapped his arm around the small of her back. In every place their bodies touched, Alex’s nerves zinged, struck by the electricity between them. The sky winced in a snapshot of lightning.
      She took a deep breath, expecting the familiar aroma of salt water and seaweed. Instead, sugar sprinkled the breeze like sweetened raindrops of comfort and home. It could be because this was where they were born, where they met and grew up together. Or it could be because Chase himself was her home no matter where the world placed them.
      He gestured to some kids playing volleyball near a bonfire: four brothers and a sickly undersized girl on the sidelines. “There we are again. Your mind is like a movie on cable. You keep rerunning the same stuff. I think I’m going to start calling you Showtime.”
      “That’s a horrible nickname.”
      “I could think of worse.”
      Alex slowed to observe the thirteen-year-old version of herself, deep in conversation by the fire. The younger version of Chase kneeled in front of her, reaching out to graze his fingertips along her temple, to tuck her unruly hair behind her ear. The surrounding children watched them, transfixed, envying them, but the dream version of Alex took no notice. It was the moment in life when Chase told her that she was perfect to him, broken and all.
      Her biggest mistake back then was assuming he would always be around to gather what was left of her in his arms, to carry her. When death had reared its ugly head and snatched Chase by the collar, he’d dropped her. She couldn’t pick up the pieces alone.
      She hoped the meaning of her dream had nothing to do with the end of the night. She’d spent plenty of time trying to forget about that. If she knew then what she knew now, she wouldn’t have questioned her sanity or the idea of spirits—now that she was one She and Chase were stuck between alive and dead, in a mental world Alex loved more and more every day.
      “I could be looking for you,” Alex suggested.
      “Impossible. I’m already yours.”
      When Alex first began to have this dream, she and Chase participated, like actors on a very lifelike stage. They knew it wasn’t real, but they went along with it anyway. Now they were spectators, strolling past the scene and continuing down the beach, hand in hand. If she allowed herself to keep sleeping, she and Chase would walk along the coast until they reached the infamous Esker woods. Wind ripped from the waves and struck them. Even the world shivered thinking of those woods. She wouldn’t allow the dream to go so far as to lead them there, not after what had happened. Their bodies were dead, and as spirits, their lives depended on the energy in their minds, something almost as fragile as the body. If that part of them died, too, where would they end up? And more importantly to Alex, would they find each other again?
      Yes, her subconscious replied. Chase will always find me.
      They had lived the entirety of their short lives together, and they found each other in death. It was hard to imagine something the two of them could not withstand between the iron vice of their grasp on one another, but this world never ceased to surprise Alex, to toy with her. She turned back for one last look at the bonfire, at the children they used to be.
      Alex dug her feet into the sand, stopping.
      “What’s the matter?”
      “Nothing.” Alex allowed Chase to pull her forward once again. She leaned into his chest where she fit and where she couldn’t look back. The light from the moon pooled around them like a spotlight.
      She could have sworn she’d seen her old friend, Liv Frank, staring in wonder right at them, eyes wide, mouth ajar. Like she’d seen a ghost.
      That was impossible, right? This was a dream. Then again, at one point, Alex might have believed that two dead kids walking down the beach hand in hand would also be impossible.
      The mind is so deceptive.

Of Delicate Pieces - available NOW!

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The Series: Of Breakable Things

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

Of Breakable Things [1]

A captivating debut about the fragility of life, love, and perspective.

When Chase dies tragically, Alex embraces her own mortality. What she didn’t expect was that she’d have to make a choice: forget the years of pain and suffering once and for all, or linger as a spirit and get another chance at life and love.

Alex doesn’t hesitate to choose; she’d follow Chase anywhere. But the spirit world is nothing like she expected, and Alex finds she's forced to fight for her life once more. For even in a world where secrets are buried much deeper than six feet under, a legacy can continue to haunt you—and in a place this dangerous, no one is resting in peace.

[Published 29 April 2014, 300 pages]

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About the Author

A. Lynden Rolland was born and raised in a picturesque town obsessed with boats and blue crabs.

She has always been intrigued by the dramatic and the broken, compiling her eccentric tales of tragic characters in a weathered notebook she began to carry in grade school.

She is a sports fanatic, a coffee addict, and a lover of Sauvignon Blanc and thunderstorms.

When she isn’t hunched behind a laptop at her local bookstore, she can be found chasing her two vivacious children.

She resides in Maryland with her husband and young sons.

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