Release Day Blitz- WINTERDREAM by Chantal Gadoury With An Excerpt & Giveaway!

I am so excited that WINTERDREAM by Chantal Gadoury is available now and that I get to share the news!

If you haven’t yet heard about this wonderful book by Author Chantal Gadoury, be sure to check out all the details below.

This blitz also includes a giveaway for a signed copy of the book, US Only, courtesy of Chantal, Parliament House Publishing, and Rockstar Book Tours. So if you’d like a chance to win, enter in the Rafflecopter at the bottom of this post.

About the Book:

Title: WINTERDREAM

Author: Chantal Gadoury

Pub. Date: November 27, 2018

Publisher: Parliament House Publishing

Formats: Paperback, eBook

Pages: 290

Find it: Goodreads, Amazon, Kindle Link, B&N

This Christmas Eve… no creature was stirring…
Except, maybe, a mouse. 
At long last, can true love break the Nutcracker’s curse? 
For Clara Stahlbaum, this Christmas means the end of her youth. A daughter of the aristocracy, Clara is expected to give up her dreams of adventures and the extraordinary for more normal days as the wife of a cruel Viscount. 
But when magical Uncle Drosselmeyer returns with his wondrous, dancing contraptions, and one...special gift for Clara, she is beckoned to the land of Winter Dream, where she is thrust into the greatest adventure of her wildest dreams. But will she be able to break the Nutcracker's curse? 
Uncle Drosselmeyer’s apprentice, Anton, is handsome as he is mysterious. But what is it about him Clara finds so alluring? 
Winter Dream is a phenomenal retelling of The Nutcracker from the eyes of Clara Stahlbaum with all the magic of the Holiday season. If you loved S. Jae-Jones’ Wintersong, you’ll fall in love with this stunning tale of love, war, redemption, and Christmas magic. 

Excerpt:

PROLOGUE

Large, white puffs floated all around me. Sinking into my flesh with their cold, yet light kisses. Every snowflake was different, specially crafted before it fell from the sky. They were beautiful, even as they melted. I tipped my head back to catch the snow as it fell. I felt as though I was floating through air, caught in a haze of ice flakes as sugary and sweet as the icing on the gingerbread house my governess and I had made together.

I stretched my arms out to my sides, spinning in place.

The green forest turned with me, a wood full of large spruces perfect for Christmas trees. They were decorated as such, lighted with white candles and draped in silver tinsel. On some, icicles hung on the tips of the limbs. It was a world in which the snow was like sugar and the air smelled delicious, like freshly baked cookies. It was perfect—a world of my own making, if I was capable of crafting something so… wonderful.

“Clara…”

The sound of my name trilled from a distance, carried on the cool, winter wind.

Turning slowly, I peered over my shoulder, catching a glimpse of a young boy my age. He was dressed in a bright red suit, adorned with golden epaulettes. His blond hair was brushed away from his face, revealing two bright blue eyes. His lips, pink as his cheeks, curved into a smile.

“Clara…”

“Yes?” I asked curiously, turning to face him. As I slid my hands over my cream and ivory lace nightgown, I suddenly felt quite foolish. My mama had always insisted I never wear my bedclothes in front of guests or visitors. And yet, here, in this strange and beautiful world, such things hardly seemed to matter. He took my hand and flashed another warm smile as he led me to a large, white carriage.

“Where are we going?” I asked softly, pausing before the door. The panels were solid ivory, adorned with a golden handle and step.

“Winter Dream,” the boy said with a relieved expression. “Home. Home to Winter Dream.”

“Winter Dream?”

“I’ve come to take you back, Clara. To where I am—to where all the people who love you live.”

“But I don’t know where this Winter Dream is. I’ve never been there…”

“Come with me,” he beckoned, squeezing my hand gently. “Come. . .”

The snow fell all around us; small flakes clung to the tips of our hair and eyelashes. As much as I longed to go . . . there was something holding me back. Something. . .

As I peered behind me, a small, dark shadow began to form. It started out small, like the size of a mouse, and it grew—or was I shrinking? The boy beside me held my hand, and his eyes grew wide with fear.

“No!” I screamed, tucking myself into his shoulder. Whatever it was, I didn’t want to see. I didn’t want to know.

“Clara, wait!” I heard him beg, his urgent tone tugging at my heartstrings. “Come with me, please.”

“No! I want to go home!”

As soon as the words poured from my lips, I woke with a start.

Here, there was only me and the four walls of my bedroom. A sheer sliver of light crept through the space of an open curtain, sparkling with the bright white of the snow outside. It was quiet, as if the world had not yet woken. As if I was the only one no longer dreaming sweet things. Instead, while everyone else slept, I contained the chill of my own strange dream.

I buried myself beneath the duvet and hugged my knees to my chest. I was alone, completely and utterly alone.

I closed my eyes tight, not wishing to face that Christmas morning. I wished only for the chance to slip back into my dream. To return back to that magical world, where a boy with bright blue eyes was waiting for me. Back to the place where an enchanting land called ‘Winter Dream’ existed.

About Chantal:

Amazon Best Selling Author, Chantal Gadoury, is a 2011 graduate from Susquehanna University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Creative Writing.

Since graduation, she has published "The Songs in Our Hearts" with 48Fourteen Publishing, and “Allerleirauh” with Parliament House Press, with future titles to follow. Chantal first started writing stories at the age of seven and continues with that love of writing today.

Writing novels for Chantal has become a life-long dream come true! When she’s not writing, she enjoys painting, drinking lots of DD Iced Coffee, and watching Disney classics. Chantal lives in Muncy, Pennsylvania with her Mom, Sister and furry-‘brother’ (aka, puppy) Taran.

Subscribe to Chantal’s Newsletter! https://www.chantalgadoury.com/newsletter

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Giveaway Details:

1 winner will win a signed finished copy of WINTERDREAM, US Only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Blog Tour- WINTERSPELL by Claire Legrand and a Giveaway!!!!

Hey y'all! I am so excited for this tour stop! WINTERSPELL by Claire Legrand is one of my favorite books of 2014! It's a Nutcracker retelling with magic, steampunk, and fae. It's dark and heart-wrenching and very sexy for a YA book, and I loved every page! I'm also really excited because Claire said yes to my crazy idea. I asked her to write a scene from the swoonworthy but damaged Nicholas who is the "Nutcracker" in the book while he was cursed and locked away in his prison and it's AWESOME. Oh and make sure to stick around and enter the giveaway! You're going to want to get your hands on this book ASAP!
Haven't heard of WINTERSPELL? Check it out!

Title: WINTERSPELL

Author: Claire Legrand

Release Date: September 30, 2014

Hardcover: 464 pages

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers 

ISBN: 978-1442465985

Formats: Hardcover, eBook

Goodreads/Amazon/Barnes& Noble

The clock chimes midnight, a curse breaks, and a girl meets a prince . . . but what follows is not all sweetness and sugarplums.

New York City, 1899. Clara Stole, the mayor's ever-proper daughter, leads a double life. Since her mother's murder, she has secretly trained in self-defense with the mysterious Drosselmeyer.

Then, on Christmas Eve, disaster strikes.

Her home is destroyed, her father abducted--by beings distinctly not human. To find him, Clara journeys to the war-ravaged land of Cane. Her only companion is the dethroned prince Nicholas, bound by a wicked curse. If they're to survive, Clara has no choice but to trust him, but his haunted eyes burn with secrets--and a need she can't define. With the dangerous, seductive faery queen Anise hunting them, Clara soon realizes she won't leave Cane unscathed--if she leaves at all.

Inspired by The Nutcracker, Winterspell is a dark, timeless fairy tale about love and war, longing and loneliness, and a girl who must learn to live without fear.

Now on to the post!

Hi everyone! I’m so excited to be at Two Chicks on Books today—first of all because Jaime is one rad lady, and second of all because, well, what I’m sharing with you today has me crazy excited.

What you’ll read below is new Winterspell-related material, exclusive to this stop on the blog tour! It’s a scene from the point-of-view of Nicholas, the cursed prince of the story. I don’t want to say too much else because the scene is pretty self-explanatory, but I will say this was tremendously fun for me to write. It’s always a blast getting into the heads of non-narrating characters, and seeing what the same story world looks like through their eyes.

I hope you enjoy reading! And keep an eye out for this same scene when you read Winterspell—there, told from Clara’s point-of-view.

*

From his prison in the corner, Nicholas watched the door and waited.

He had just awoken from one of his halfway-dreams. The magic imprisoning him never let him sleep fully; instead he slept in fits, all of them polluted with dreams that felt manufactured to torment him—and probably were.

Most of his dreams were of long ago—that first moment, eighteen years past, when he had regained consciousness in this place he now knew to be New York City, and realized he would never move again.

He hadn’t been injured, nor had he been dead, although he would soon begin to wish for the latter.

No, he had been encased. Trapped. Bound in a magic so foul he could feel it writhing against him, as though his bindings were made of thick serpents rather than metal and iron.

Understanding had come swiftly, followed by fear, then despair, and then, when he heard that familiar delicate laughter in his ear, rage.

He had then remembered everything—the last night in Wahlkraft, the castle glittering with decorations for the winter festival. Blood spattering the walls. His parents’ cries.

Escaping through the brutal night, Drosselmeyer at his side. Doors. The smell of singed magic in the air. Hulking shapes. A woman wearing a helmet like a crown.

Pain. Encroaching, smothering pain. A vise gripping him. Laughter winding into his ears and nose, down his throat, seizing his heart.

And then . . . waking up here, Drosselmeyer hovering over him.

“Your Highness?” the old man had croaked, and at the sound of his voice, something inside Nicholas had snapped.

He screamed. He pounded on the walls of his new prison. He tore at his arms to free himself of bindings he could not manage to find.

At least, he had tried to scream.

He tried for hours, days, until his throat ached from silent screams and his head pounded with the strain of trying to force his way past the magic that bound him.

He had been vaguely aware of things happening around him—Drosselmeyer struggling to move him; a road full of motion, beasts, and people; a softer presence, a familiar voice. Eventually, lamplit dimness—they had made their way indoors, into a space that slowly became crowded with shelves of toys, a wall of clocks, perches of sleeping birds.

Time had passed. Hours? Months? It had been a haze to Nicholas, punctuated by hated appearances from Drosselmeyer, trying in vain to free him.

And then . . . she came.

A child, at first. Tiny, perhaps two years old. A bundle of lace-trimmed blankets and soft red hair in her mother’s arms.

Later, four years old, noticing him for the first time. Eyes widening, she had tiptoed near to touch his spiked metal hand.

At first, he felt nothing at the press of her tiny gloved fingers; the magic imprisoning him was too complete. He had in fact begun to forget what it felt like to be touched at all.

But then she came, and something about her curious eyes and careful touch made him want to remember.

Years passed. She began to visit more regularly, helping the old man craft his toys. At first she was shy; her gaze flitted often to the corner, but she seldom came close.

As she grew older, however, things began to change.

Sometimes, when Drosselmeyer left the room, she would creep over to the corner, place her hands on Nicholas’s rough metal arm, and whisper to him of how things were getting worse at home. Sometimes she would say hello, and nothing more. Other times she would simply watch him, eyes narrowed and searching, as if trying to understand him.

Once, those eyes had inspected the markings covering his chest, as they so often did, and then, hesitantly, she had begun tracing those same lines with her bare fingers.

The look of intense concentration on her face had made Nicholas hold his breath. He had strained to feel something, anything, a faint hint of warmth where her fingers were touching him. His focus had been so complete that he had forgotten everything else—his anger, his unraveling thoughts, the ever-present hint of cruel laughter that buzzed in his mind like an insect.

In that moment, he had known only Clara.

“Clara? I need your assistance,” Drosselmeyer had called, bustling out of the back room with his arms full of supplies. The connection broken, Clara had hurried away, and for the rest of her visit, she had not looked back at Nicholas’s corner.

But those few stolen moments had been enough for him—enough to sustain him, to keep him whole for at least one more day.

Clara.

Her name became his constant companion. He fell asleep thinking about her, and his dreams were not so cruel with traces of her in his mind. He woke up thinking about her, and waited impatiently each morning for the shop’s door to open.

When it did not admit her, he spent the day stewing, and his dark thoughts left him afraid of himself.

Would she visit today?

The wall of clocks opposite his corner struck ten o’ clock. Eleven. Noon. He took great pleasure in the idea of taking a mallet to the lot of them.

Then, four o’clock. Four chimes, a hundred times over.

The door opened, its tiny tarnished bell ringing, and in came a gust of icy wind—and her.

Clara.

Even trapped as he was, ruined as he was, Nicholas could still recognize his racing heartbeat, his flushed skin, the pull he felt toward the young woman unwinding the scarf from her head and shaking snow from her blue velvet coat. Somewhere within the twists of this cruel magic, he—Nicholas—still existed.

He wasn’t sure he would have been able to say that, after so many years, had it not been for her. Without her visits, what was there to live for? The hope that Drosselmeyer would successfully break the curse? There wasn’t much chance of that; each attempt diminished him. It was almost enough to make Nicholas pity the old man.

Almost.

No, it was only Clara that kept him alive. He had long been convinced of that.

He only wished he could tell her as much. It was his greatest desire, to thank her.

To fold her into his arms—his real, flesh-and-blood arms—and tell her that she was saving him. To remove the pins from her hair, let it fall free, bury his face in those unruly red curls and breathe deep.

To love her as she deserved to be loved.

Darkness fell, shaking him free of his thoughts. Drosselmeyer had doused the lamps, and Nicholas searched the shadows for Clara. How long had he been daydreaming?

“. . . You must move as though through water.”

Drosselmeyer’s voice. Ah. They were practicing. It was the one thing about the old man that Nicholas did not hate—that he taught Clara how to defend herself, how to sneak silently out of impossible situations, how to move through darkness with the certainty of a warrior. She would need such tools, if she were to survive this city.

And if, someday, she were to—

But he couldn’t think about that. It was a possibility too dangerously full of hope.

“The room is yours to know, to possess,” Drosselmeyer went on. “The energy within you subsumes its energy. You are the room. You are the shadows. Try it.”         

Nicholas found her darkened form moving slowly through the room’s chaos. Occasionally Drosselmeyer encouraged her; other times, he attacked her, forcing her to stay prepared as she moved through the shadows. Once, she knocked into a table and cursed. Once, she hit Drosselmeyer so hard Nicholas could have sworn he heard tears in the old man’s voice.

Nicholas smiled as much as his prison allowed him to. He loved when Clara cursed, or laughed, or sang to herself as she practiced lock picking. He especially loved when she bested the old man during one of their spars.

These were the moments when the fear that had overtaken her life faded away, and she was most truly herself.

Long minutes passed. The wall of clocks ticked on.

And then, as if in one of his fevered dreams, she was there.

Her foot must have caught on his large, spiked one. She stumbled, fell—and then, slowly, took hold of his arms and pulled herself up. 

She could have moved away immediately, but she didn’t.

Instead she slid up his metal body, her hands moving up his arms and settling on the broad, hard planes of his chest.

Once, Nicholas had not been able to feel her touch. But years of yearning for it had made him so attuned to her that he now felt everything—the fabric of her thin chemise snagging on the rough plates of metal that made up his outer shell. The soft puffs of air against his chest as her breath started to come more quickly.

The warmth of her, pressed so intimately against him.

Even though he knew it wouldn’t be possible, he tried to move toward her. This wasn’t nearly close enough, and he felt like growling with frustration. He needed to pull her into his body, thread his fingers through her hair.

He needed to kiss every one of the freckles dotting her cheeks, and then kiss her neck, her mouth. He needed to kiss her until all she knew was his lips on her skin.

He needed to tell her . . . so many things. The words would no doubt crowd and catch in his throat, but he would try.

Clara. Clara . . .

He burned with the effort to say her name, but the magic choked him. Its grip tightened, punishing him.

The delicate laughter in his mind turned louder, mocking.

Little prince, little prince, it hissed, you’re not strong enough. You never were.

But Clara was there, curling against him, and so the laughter was unimportant, and faded. Clara sighed, cupped his face, tenderly caressed the lines of his iron jaw.

He would say her name. He would, magic or no. He would tell her what she meant to him.

Clara. Clara. You have saved me.

The swipe of a match. The hiss of flame.

“That’s enough,” the old man growled, from across the room.

Clara stepped away, flushed, and Drosselmeyer was standing there in the fresh lamplight looking murderously at him, as if he knew—but Nicholas didn’t care.

He could still feel the warmth of her against him. He could still sense her gentle hands on his body, touching him as if weren’t a statue, but a young man once more—and that would be enough to keep his dreams kind.

It would be enough to keep him alive and himself, even if only for another day.

         

          

Thanks for stopping by Claire I loved this sooooo much!!!!

About Claire:

Claire Legrand is the author of books for children and teens, including The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls, The Year of Shadows, the upcoming Winterspell, and its prequel, Summerfall. She is also one of the four authors of The Cabinet of Curiosities.

When not writing books, she can be found obsessing over DVD commentaries, going on long walks (or trying to go on long runs), and speaking with a poor English accent to random passersby. She thinks musicians and librarians are the loveliest of folks (having been each of those herself) and, while she loves living in central New Jersey, she dearly misses her big, brash, beautiful home state of Texas.

Her work is represented by Diana Fox of Fox Literary, LLC.  

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Giveaway Details: 10 Prize Packs

10 prize packs/10 winners! The prize packs = finished copy of Winterspell + swag (bookmark, bookplate, character postcards) + map of Cane + Winterspell-themed jewelry.US only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Check out the Tour Schedule for more awesome posts!

Week One

9/22/2014- Alice Marvels- Review

9/23/2014- The Midnight Garden- Guest Post

9/24/2014- Magical Urban Fantasy Reads- Interview 

9/25/2014- Cuddlebuggery- Guest Post

9/26/2014- Fiktshun- Guest Post

Week Two

9/29/2014- Novel Sounds- Guest Post

9/30/2014- Parajunkee- Interview 

10/1/2014- Mundie Moms- Interview 

10/2/2014- Two Chicks on Books- Guest Post

10/3/2014- Dark Faerie Tales- Review