And now it’s time for a commercial break, because I have another new release to announce today.
Today’s new release is another story to come out of the 2017 July short story challenge, where the idea was to write a short story per day in July 2017. The inspiration in this case was one of Chuck Wendig‘s flash fiction writing prompts. The prompt in this case was a list of several five word titles. One of the titles, “Time for Tea and Treachery”, jumped out at me. And since I was doing the July short story anyway, I decided to borrow the title, though I lobbed the first two words off.
The associations “Tea and Treachery” evoked were of civility with dark undercurrents, of two people sharing a civilised cup of tea in a situation where nothing is quite as it seems. It also has a certain Victorian feel about it. The Victorian era suggests Steampunk. And since I’ve always loved Steampunk, even if I don’t write it all that often, I thought, “Okay, I’ll write a Steampunk story about two people having a cup of tea in a situation where nothing is quite as it seems.”
So I got two characters, Lady Violetta Chesterfield and Count Danilo Danilovich Ostrowsky, together in a room over a cup of tea to see what happened. And what happened was that the two quickly engaged in a high stakes game of cat and mouse.
I initially intended Violetta only as a one-off character, but I quickly became fond of her. And I’d certainly love to see more of Captain Nicholas Blackstone and his airship, the Renegade. After all, who doesn’t love airship pirates? What is more, I’m pretty sure Ostrowsky will want revenge eventually.
So what was intended as a one-off adventure might well have series potential (yeah, because I need another series).
But for now, get yourself a nice cup of tea and some biscuits (Violetta recommends shortbread fingers, ginger nuts or spiced tea biscuits – just don’t let her make the tea) and enjoy…
Tea and Treachery
Lady Violetta Chesterfield travels to the Kingdom of Dragomir on a mission. For her fiancé, Nicholas Blackstone, Captain of the airship Renegade, has been captured and sentenced to death as a pirate and spy.
Violetta is determined to save her beloved from the gallows. Therefore, she arranges a meeting with Count Ostrowsky, prime minister of Dragomir, to beg for her fiancé’s life. The Count agrees to meet with Violetta, even though he has no intention of letting Blackstone walk free. However, he has no idea to what lengths Violetta is willing to go to save the man she loves…
More information.
Length: 4650 words
List price: 0.99 USD, EUR or GBP
Buy it at Amazon US, Amazon UK, Amazon Germany, Amazon France, Amazon Netherlands, Amazon Spain, Amazon Italy, Amazon Canada, Amazon Australia, Amazon Brazil, Amazon Japan, Amazon India, Amazon Mexico, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple iTunes, Scribd, Smashwords, Inktera, Playster, Thalia, Weltbild, Hugendubel, Buecher.de, DriveThruFiction, Casa del Libro, e-Sentral, 24symbols and XinXii.
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