Moontangled: Stephanie Burgis on Inspirations & Influences (and a Giveaway)

Today, we’re delighted to have Stephanie Burgis over as our guest to celebrate the release of Moontangled her new f/f fantasy romance novella, and the inspirations and influences behind the book. Plus, an awesome giveaway!

When I was a kid, my parents took me and my brothers every year to the Stratford festival in Canada. We watched at least one Shakespeare play every year – but the one that grabbed me most (unsurprisingly, as a kid who would turn out to be a fantasy author!) was A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

The magic! The fairies! The romances turned on their heads! The humor! I loved it all, and I’ve continued to love it all my life in all the different versions that I’ve seen, from the Kevin Kline/Michelle Pfeiffer Hollywood film to Russell T. Davies’s far more radical (and fabulous!) recent BBC interpretation.

I love the fairies’ magic – and I love the very real threat that they present, as the humans are all helpless against their magic. I love the way those human couples find every certainty turned upside down as soon as they venture into those wild woods…

So of course, when it came time to write a starring story for the long-time couple who’ve already appeared as side-characters in two of my Harwood Spellbook stories, I knew exactly where I wanted to send them: the enchanted, fey-ruled woods on the Harwoods’ estate.

Juliana Banks is a brilliant magician, and Caroline Fennell is a politician with a spine of steel. Alone, each of them would be a formidable opponent, and together, they’ve hoped to accomplish astonishing things. But they’ve both been under unbearable pressure in the past year, and their loving relationship—conducted only by letters throughout that time—is starting to show treacherous cracks.

The night of the Thornfell College of Magic’s first outdoor ball, they may be doomed to lose each other forever…until they’re tricked off the safe paths of those woods and into the realm of the dangerous fey. There, they both find themselves hopelessly far out of their depth and fighting for their survival – and it’s exactly what their relationship needs to reshape itself with every stifling old certainty kicked out of its way.

I loved getting to play with that magic and that inspiration—all reconceived within my Harwood Spellbook world of 19^th-century Angland, ruled by a Boudiccate of hard-headed women (in fabulous gowns)—and I really hope you’ll enjoy playing there, too!

About the book:

Take one ambitious politician and one determined magician with wildly different aims for their next meeting.

Add a secret betrothal, a family scandal, and a heaping of dangerous fey magic in an enchanted wood…and watch the sparks fly!

For just one moonlit, memorable night, Thornfell College of Magic has flung open its doors, inviting guests from around the nation to an outdoor ball intended to introduce the first-ever class of women magicians to society…but one magician and one invited guest have far more pressing goals of their own for the night.

Quietly brilliant Juliana Banks is determined to win back the affections of her secret fiancée, rising politician Caroline Fennell, who has become inexplicably distant. If Juliana needs to use magic to get her stubborn fiancée to pay her attention…well, then, as the top student in her class, she is more than ready to take on that challenge!

Unbeknownst to Juliana, though, Caroline plans to nobly sacrifice their betrothal for Juliana’s own sake – and no one has ever accused iron-willed Caroline Fennell of being easy to deter from any goal.

Their path to mutual happiness may seem tangled beyond repair…but when they enter the fey-ruled woods that border Thornfell College, these two determined women will find all of their plans upended in a night of unexpected and magical possibilities.

Buy the book:

Amazon / Kobo / B&N / iBooks / Smashwords

About the author:

Stephanie Burgis was born in Michigan but now lives in Wales, surrounded by castles and coffeeshops. She writes wildly romantic adult historical fantasies, including the Harwood Spellbook Series and also Masks and Shadows. She also writes fun, funny fantasy adventures for MG readers, including the Dragon with a Chocolate Heart trilogy and the Kat, Incorrigible trilogy. You can find out more (and read excerpts from all of her books) at: www.stephanieburgis.com

The giveaway:

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Courtesy of the author, 10 readers will get free ebook copies of the first two volumes of the Harwood Spellbook (Snowspelled and Thornbound), where her heroines first appeared as side-characters. To enter please use the link below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway