Thank you for joining us on the Virtual Book Tour for Emerald Bound, an Urban Fantasy by Teresa Richards (25 September 2015, Evernight Teen, 254 pages). PREVIEW: Check out the book's synopsis and excerpt below. Read the first four chapters with Amazon Look Inside.
Author Teresa Richards also shared her Music Playlist for Emerald Bound - enjoy it!
Finally don't forget to enter the giveaway for a chance to win one signed copy of Emerald Bound. Please do take part: comment on our post and follow the tour where you will be able to read other excerpts (☀), interviews (ℚ), reviews (✍) and guest blog posts (✉).
Synopsis | Music Playlist | Teaser | About the Author | Giveaway & Tour Stops
Synopsis
A princess, a pea, and a tower of mattresses. This is the sliver that survives of a story more nightmare than fairytale...Maggie Rhodes, high school junior and semi-reformed stalker, learns the tale’s true roots after a spying attempt goes awry and her best friend Kate ends up as the victim of an ancient curse.
At the center of the curse lies an enchanted emerald that has been residing quietly in a museum for the past fifty years. Admirers of the gem have no idea that it feeds on life. Or that it’s found its next victim in Kate.
Enter Lindy, a school acquaintance who knows more than she’s letting on, and Garon, a handsome stranger claiming he knows how to help, and Maggie is left wondering who to trust and how to save her best friend before it’s too late.
If only Maggie knew her connection to the fairy tale was rooted far deeper than an endangered best friend.
Music Playlist
"Music doesn’t play much of a role in Emerald Bound, but it’s a large part of my own life. There are definitely songs that embody the way my characters are feeling or acting throughout the book, even if those songs aren’t specifically mentioned. Here’s a list I put together of my favorite moments in the book and what songs might be going through my characters’ heads during those scenes. I’d love to hear what songs you associate with Emerald Bound as you’ve read it."
Teresa Richards
Without You – David Guetta
Maggie, Kate and Piper listen to this song when they need a study break.
You Belong With Me – Taylor Swift
This is the song that plays in the car when the girls are heading out for their spy-by.
Sk8er Boi – Avril Lavigne
This has been Piper’s favorite song ever since she started dating her skater boy.
Alias theme song – J.J. Abrams
This is what’s playing on a loop in Maggie’s head when she’s attempting her Smithsonian break-in.
I Love It – Icono Pop
This is what plays when Piper calls Maggie during the Smithsonian break-in and alerts the guards to her presence.
World Spins Madly On – The Weepies
When everything goes south.
Stand By You – Rachel Platten
The way Maggie feels about the people she loves.
Angels Fall – Breaking Benjamin
This is the climax scene of the book.
Bright – Echosmith
The way Maggie feels about Garon by the end of the book.
Dawn – Dario Marinelli
When Maggie thinks of Lindy at the end of Emerald Bound, this song embodies what she hopes Lindy’s life is now like.
Maggie, Kate and Piper listen to this song when they need a study break.
You Belong With Me – Taylor Swift
This is the song that plays in the car when the girls are heading out for their spy-by.
Sk8er Boi – Avril Lavigne
This has been Piper’s favorite song ever since she started dating her skater boy.
Alias theme song – J.J. Abrams
This is what’s playing on a loop in Maggie’s head when she’s attempting her Smithsonian break-in.
I Love It – Icono Pop
This is what plays when Piper calls Maggie during the Smithsonian break-in and alerts the guards to her presence.
World Spins Madly On – The Weepies
When everything goes south.
Stand By You – Rachel Platten
The way Maggie feels about the people she loves.
Angels Fall – Breaking Benjamin
This is the climax scene of the book.
Bright – Echosmith
The way Maggie feels about Garon by the end of the book.
Dawn – Dario Marinelli
When Maggie thinks of Lindy at the end of Emerald Bound, this song embodies what she hopes Lindy’s life is now like.
Teaser: Excerpt
A part of me died long ago.
It was the part of me that feels, and it was Calista’s fault.
What happened tonight was nothing new—innocent victims welcomed into our home, not knowing they would never leave. I learned long ago I could not help them, so I stopped trying.
But this time something was different. This time I was awake, burning with a gut-wrenching guilt, as the next victims slept downstairs. This time I knew the victims. And they didn’t deserve what was coming.
It had always been hard for me to make friends. I’d been called loner, loser, outcast, and freak. Even still, I remembered Maggie offering to show me around when I first transferred to their school. Through her, I met Kate and Piper. The three of them were always nice to me, while other kids kept their distance and spread rumors behind my back. I told myself I didn’t care—I wasn’t like them.
But being a loner was lonely.
So tonight when I saw Maggie and her friends here, something inside me snapped. Or, perhaps it was the dead piece of me coming back to life. Now I cared desperately about what was happening in the room below mine.
But there was still nothing I could do.
Calista usually lured in victims from out of town to avoid arousing suspicion. Pregnant ones were a particular favorite—easy prey, she called them. But Maggie and her friends came here all on their own. The opportunity was too good for Calista to pass up.
Everyone thought Calista was my mother, but she wasn’t.
Back in my day, almost four centuries ago, Calista had an alternate method of luring in victims. She and her husband, Theodore, advertised for hired help with their inn. The number of parents willing to sell their daughters into a life of servitude in exchange for a forgiven debt or a clean slate was staggering.
My father was one of them.
By the time my mother found out what he’d done, it was too late. There was no escape. I was bound.
My story was well known in this land, whispered as a bedtime tale to ease children into sleep. But, just like any other story passed down through time by rumors and idle gossip, the fragment that survived was woefully incomplete. It began something like this:
There is rumored to have been (once upon a time, of course) a princess, a pea, and a tower of mattresses.
That much was true, though in actuality it was only one mattress, not twenty. The pea was also real, though most would call it a precious stone—an emerald, to be precise.
The gem that sealed my fate was now in the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C. Calista was furious when she found it missing. She thought I’d stolen it until she remembered my limits. The identity of the true thief remains unknown.
Even though the emerald is no longer in our possession, we are still bound to it, as it is bound to us. Admirers of the opulent necklace where it rests don’t understand it. Like me, the gem is a prisoner, struggling against its fate.
Even now, centuries later, I don’t understand all the details of what happened to me that night. But it began with a troubled slumber on a bed of enchanted emeralds.
It was the part of me that feels, and it was Calista’s fault.
What happened tonight was nothing new—innocent victims welcomed into our home, not knowing they would never leave. I learned long ago I could not help them, so I stopped trying.
But this time something was different. This time I was awake, burning with a gut-wrenching guilt, as the next victims slept downstairs. This time I knew the victims. And they didn’t deserve what was coming.
It had always been hard for me to make friends. I’d been called loner, loser, outcast, and freak. Even still, I remembered Maggie offering to show me around when I first transferred to their school. Through her, I met Kate and Piper. The three of them were always nice to me, while other kids kept their distance and spread rumors behind my back. I told myself I didn’t care—I wasn’t like them.
But being a loner was lonely.
So tonight when I saw Maggie and her friends here, something inside me snapped. Or, perhaps it was the dead piece of me coming back to life. Now I cared desperately about what was happening in the room below mine.
But there was still nothing I could do.
Calista usually lured in victims from out of town to avoid arousing suspicion. Pregnant ones were a particular favorite—easy prey, she called them. But Maggie and her friends came here all on their own. The opportunity was too good for Calista to pass up.
Everyone thought Calista was my mother, but she wasn’t.
Back in my day, almost four centuries ago, Calista had an alternate method of luring in victims. She and her husband, Theodore, advertised for hired help with their inn. The number of parents willing to sell their daughters into a life of servitude in exchange for a forgiven debt or a clean slate was staggering.
My father was one of them.
By the time my mother found out what he’d done, it was too late. There was no escape. I was bound.
My story was well known in this land, whispered as a bedtime tale to ease children into sleep. But, just like any other story passed down through time by rumors and idle gossip, the fragment that survived was woefully incomplete. It began something like this:
There is rumored to have been (once upon a time, of course) a princess, a pea, and a tower of mattresses.
That much was true, though in actuality it was only one mattress, not twenty. The pea was also real, though most would call it a precious stone—an emerald, to be precise.
The gem that sealed my fate was now in the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C. Calista was furious when she found it missing. She thought I’d stolen it until she remembered my limits. The identity of the true thief remains unknown.
Even though the emerald is no longer in our possession, we are still bound to it, as it is bound to us. Admirers of the opulent necklace where it rests don’t understand it. Like me, the gem is a prisoner, struggling against its fate.
Even now, centuries later, I don’t understand all the details of what happened to me that night. But it began with a troubled slumber on a bed of enchanted emeralds.
Emerald Bound
Available NOW!
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About the Author
Teresa Richards writes YA, but loves anything that can be given a unique twist. Her zombie stories 'Are You My Mombie?' and 'The Zombie Code' can be found in Z Tales: Stories from the Zombieverse by The Fairfield Scribes.
When Teresa’s not writing, she can be found either chasing after one of her five kids, or hiding someplace in the house with a treat her children overlooked. Emerald Bound is her debut novel.
Follow Teresa Richards:
Follow Emerald Bound's tour at:
Dec 9Tantilising Tidbits ☀
Stormy Nights Reviewing and Blogin' ☀
Wonderful Things ✉/✍ Jan 20
Dec 10
Librarian Lavendar ✉
Dec 11
A Writer Reads ✉
Kimber Leigh Writes ✉ /✍ Last Week of Dec
Cindy's Treasury of Good Tales ℚ
Dec 12
BooksChatter ☀♫
Dec 13
Reading in Sarah's Corner ☀
Cover2Cover ✉
Book -o- Craze ☀
Dec 14
Reviews by Crystal ℚ
Dec 15
The Naughty Librarians Playground ☀/✍pending
Bitten, Shifted...the not so Normal ℚ
Dec 16
A Passion for Romance ℚ
Great song choices!!
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