Please join us in welcoming author Sylvia Winters to TNA today, on the tour for her new novel, Bat’s Children. Enjoy Sylvia’s guest post, and then be sure to check out the Rafflecopter giveaway below to enter for the chance to win an e-copy of the book.
Good luck!
Researching Historicals
This is the fourth and final post of my Bat’s Children mini blog tour. If you want to catch the previous posts, they’re all linked over at my blog. Yesterday Bat’s Children was finally released into the world and I’m pretty excited about it. I feel like this has been a long time coming. I started writing the story over three years ago now, and submitted it for publication approximately a year and a half ago. It’s changed a lot over that time, gone through a lot of editing and several different drafts. I’ve cut characters, added and removed scenes, frantically backspaced on historical inaccuracies.
The writing process a lot of the time had me pulling my hair out, declaring how much I hate historicals and would never write one again (of course I probably will and I’ll be saying the exact same things then, too). I knew what I wanted to do and where the story needed to go, but I kept hitting snags in the research. I had to hold off writing the second half for over a fortnight while I tried to uncover what should have been basic information about the 18th century Welsh court system.
Out of everything I’ve written, Bat’s Children is probably the book I’ve done the most research for, and also the book that’s changed the most over the editing process. Hopefully it’s all the better for that.
I’m going to leave you with one more short extract, and then perhaps you can make up your mind for yourself. Don’t forget to also check out the giveaway for the chance to win a free copy of the book.
About the Book
Publisher: Less Than Three Press
Length: 20k Words
Category: Historical
Purchase Link: Less Than Three Press
Add Bat’s Children on: Goodreads
Blurb: Arwel and his family are bad stock, everyone knows it and they’re happy to say it—but left with a towering debt and no means to pay it, survival means living on the wrong side of the law. Arwel has little doubt his life will end via the hangman’s noose, but the risk of execution is better than the alternative.
Tomi makes a living buying and selling pretty things, including those that Arwel passes along from his roadway victims. Tomi has few morals when it comes to business, and if buying stolen goods brings him closer to Arwel, so much the better.
Then one night a robbery goes wrong, and Arwel finds himself on the brink of losing everything he holds dear, including his life, and Tomi doesn’t know if he’ll ever see him again.
Excerpt
He’d slept a little, fitful and cold, lost in strange, fragmented dreams he couldn’t remember. He’d woken often, but this time was different. He found himself sitting bolt upright, listening. Something was outside.
Ceryn crept to his side, and they both turned to each other in wide-eyed horror as the sound that had woken them became apparent. It was the baying of hounds. Hearing them at all over the sound of the falls meant they were close, practically on top of them.
“Emyr,” he hissed, shaking his brother. “Wake up!”
Emyr groaned but opened his eyes. He scowled and then, hearing the hounds outside, clutched at Arwel’s shirt. “What if they find us?” he whispered, eyes wide with panic.
Arwel looked around. They were surrounded by evidence of their crimes. If the dogs found them, they’d hang.
He scrambled for the gun, reloaded it, set a fine amount of gunpowder in the flash pan, and drew it to half-cocked. He aimed it at the entrance above them and waited.
The three of them sat there for what felt like hours: Arwel armed with the pistol, Emyr with a heavy club and Ceryn with a crude knife. All had been stolen at some time or another. Arwel wished they had more guns.
A shout went up from outside, and Arwel’s insides froze. They’d found the mouth of the cave.
He cocked the pistol and pulled the trigger as soon as he saw the first man’s bulk emerge fully from the passageway. His aim was good and the man went down with a cry.
About the Author
Sylvia is a British writer with a penchant for the gothic. She currently lives in the centre of Bristol amongst shabby gay bars, massage parlours and anarchist hangouts. When she isn’t writing, she spends her time looking after her elderly rats, listening to heavy metal, watching horror films, or in the pub.
She most enjoys writing paranormal, but likes to play with other genres from time to time and has been known to dabble in contemporary, steampunk and historical.
You can keep up with Sylvia through her twitter account or her blog.
The Giveaway
a Rafflecopter giveaway
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The Novel Approach Reviews 
This sounds really interesting! Thank you for the chance of winning a copy – I’d prefer an ePub format if I win the giveaway. Thank you.
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The giveaway is now over.
Congratulations to Shirley Ann Speakman and Barbra who have both won their prize copy (:
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