Nest Pitch JK5: THE KING’S ASSASSIN

Category/Genre: NA Historical Fantasy

Word Count: 60,000

Pitch:

Kathryn is a killer, a king’s assassin. Only the king and the guild know her secret.  She must face an unlikely enemy who wants to control the kingdom or die at the hands of the manipulative would-be tyrant.

If the MC was an Easter egg…

Lady Kathryn would be a smooth chocolate and caramel swirled filled egg.

Excerpt: 300 words

The stiff bodice squeezed my rib cage and the petticoats hung heavy on my hips. I tugged at the clothing trying to breathe a little better.

“Stop fussing, Kathryn,” mother said sternly watching from the wing backed chair across the room.

“I shall stop fussing once I can breathe.” I winced as the housemaid pulled the strings tighter. I grabbed the table in front of me to steady myself so as not to fall over with each tug.

“The dress is not meant to make breathing easy. It is meant to give you a smaller waist and a higher bosom.”

“Yes, that is just what I want,” I replied tugging at the skirts.

“How else do you expect to attract a respectable husband?”

I rolled my eyes and sighed heavily. If only you knew what I really had to do. “Mother, I am eighteen-years-old. I am not thinking about marriage at the moment. I have plenty of time.”

“You should. I was married and…”

I cut her off before she could finish. “And pregnant with me by time you were eighteen. Yes. You have reminded me daily since I returned.” I am an assassin! I kill people, mother! Husbands and children will not be my life. Get used to it. I thought bitterly to myself.

“Yes. Well you should be engaged by now at least. Everyone else’s daughters of marriageable age are engaged or married. Imagine how your father must feel when he goes to court. Why do you think we sent you to France for so long?” she asked shaking her head.

“Honestly mother, I find it hard to believe everyone in King Aldrich ’s court whispers about the Duke of Suffolk’s unwed daughter.”

“You are one of the most eligible women in all of England. Do you honestly thing people do not speak of it?”

Nest Pitch JK4: VIRTUAL REBEL

Category/Genre: NA Science-Fiction

Word Count: 90,000

Pitch: Winning. Nothing else matters to 18-year-old Kali. But when the gaming league whitewashes her teammate’s death for ratings, she fights to expose the mind-warping corruption behind virtual sports before it’s game over for her too.

If the MC was an Easter egg…

Whiskey because straight shots can be rough and coffee makes me milder — sort of.

Excerpt: 300 words.

This wasn’t the first time I’d died. Sure as hell wouldn’t be the last either. But while most eighteen-year-old girls studied, gossiped, and swooned over boys, there was no other way I’d rather spend my Saturday night.

Crouched high on the tower’s parapet, I overlooked a sea of wheat fields. The scent of lavender and the taste wheatgrass wove together in the air, drifting alongside the breeze that swept through my hair. I took a deep breath and smiled at the irony, as thick as the mountain air filling my lungs. Lavender. Wheat fields. Tranquility.

Peace, in a place anything but peaceful.

Movement in the fields caught my eye, down and right. A zigzag carved its way through the ten-foot tall stocks, heading straight for the tower. My smile pulled wider. Maybe this sucker had the balls to take on Kali Ling.

The warrior.

I stilled inside. Even breaths. No fear. At the field’s edge, the stocks trembled violently. The air filled with the rainstick rustling of brush and dry grass. Yes. Someone would emerge. I gripped the sword sheathed across my back and waited, muscles tight, mouth watering. Come on. Give me something. A brute. Six — no — seven feet tall, wielding a mace. Or an axe.

Give me anything.

A rabbit scurried out from the field. Nothing followed. The grass fluttered in the breeze. Birds chirped, nestled in the nearby sycamore trees. It was the rabbit, and only the rabbit.

For now.

I punched the parapet’s brick wall, but instead of frustration, irony reverberated through me again. In 2054, most my age hid behind a barricade — of textbooks. Engineering. Art history. Pffft. Meanwhile, I strapped on battle gear, sword and all, and headed into these fields.

Fields I now frowned at, which had stilled just to spit on my excitement.

Nest Pitch JK3: BIOHUNTER

Category/Genre: Adult science fiction

Word Count: 82,000

Pitch:

A ballsy attitude won’t save rogue biohunter Niobe’s neck when she’s falsely accused as the source of deadly new bioweapons wreaking havoc across a resource-starved North America, and must track down the real killers.

If the MC was an Easter egg…

Screw Easter Eggs. I’m fine whisky poured from a long, steel-capped red leather boot.

Excerpt: 300 words. 

Barton’s wheat beer was second to none, Niobe thought, as she took a long pull of cool brew. You had to hand it to the guy – he could tickle a good beer out of just about any crop but his wheat beer was a mouthful of farm girl and sunshine. Shame about the company, but she could sit with nomads, scavengers and other human flotsam if it meant a good drink.

Barton’s saloon/charge station/brothel, built conveniently just a day from the abandoned riches of Pittsburgh, attracted the best quality low-life. It was run by the brawny, hirsute publican Terry Barton – one of a long line of Bartons who had steered the establishment through the upheavals of climate change and, to all appearances, continued to serve alcohol, food, and sex to locals and travelers in much the same fashion for nearly two centuries.

Niobe figured the Bartons must have married their sisters to preserve a bloodline that delivered menfolk built like mastodons, as evidenced by the row of Barton portraits lined up above the bar. She found herself glaring back at the bushy-eyebrowed, block-jawed faces that stared down, unsmiling, at the dusty rabble occupying the room.

The brew cooled its way down her throat as she cast her eyes around the bar, stifling a belch with the back of her hand. The dark wood-paneled room featured the expected bar paraphernalia – the obligatory Texas longhorn skull, battered road signs, moth-eaten national flags, and Barton’s prized collection of street signs salvaged from the decaying, flooded streets of New York.

The establishment was set up with the aim of keeping Barton’s customers comfortable, contained, and feeling groovy. Ceiling fans kept the air moving, a deep cellar kept the beer cold, a creative cook kept the food interesting, and Barton’s resident musician rotated drunkenly from piano to guitar to fiddle to keep the patrons entertained.  

Nest Pitch JK2: SONGS OF CHANGE

Category/Genre: Adult Fantasy

Word Count: 87,000

Pitch: A millennium ago a technology-driven Cataclysm shattered the continent. Now Erissa and Radha must bridge distrust between wielders of living magic and seekers of ancient technology to stop an invading army from a forgotten realm.

If the MC was an Easter egg…

Peppermint for her frozen heart, Chocolate for her daughter, Serrano pepper for her warrior’s spirit. 

Excerpt: 300 words. 

Legend says, powerful mechanisms protected ancient Galdor until the Cataclysm shattered the land a thousand years ago, creating a hundred islands.  My mother’s vision showed an invasion force sweeping across the Isles. Then she saw a weapon that could stop it. Is it ancient technology?

– Erissa Filidh, 899 years After Cataclysm (yAC)

When I was fifteen and still learning the bard’s craft, I believed my future held no surprises. That was before I learned that the old tales about lost technologies understated the truth.

– Radha Darkstone, 1046 yAC

I. Song of Silence 

Erissa Filidh glided through the pattern of her sword exercise. After four centuries, each movement was precise, automatic. She finished the sequence, her sword in a guard position, ready to transition to the next. Her muscular curves dripped with sweat despite the winter chill pervading her practice room. A frown crossed her sun-bronzed face. Radha’s harp should fill the house this time of day.

She relaxed as the first notes wafted through the doorway, then froze when she realized they were not from her daughter’s harp, but hers. Her lips flattened. She marched up the stairway to the sunroom, halting a foot from the harp. Her leaf-colored eyes looked like they could cut through flesh. 

Radha’s hands fell from the crystalline strings. Her eyes locked with her mother’s as she rose, nearly toppling her stool. She preempted the expected lecture. 

“Yes, I touched your precious harp. Someone should.” She’d inherited Erissa’s pointed ears and compact form, but her human father’s dark skin and fiery temper.

Erissa froze. She required every ounce of the self-control gained during centuries of practice to keep her sword at her side.

“You know my rule.” Her words flew like lances of ice to penetrate her target. “Nobody. Touches. That. Harp.”

Nest Pitch JK1: WØLFF: RISE OF THE VALDYR

Category/Genre: Adult Paranormal Romance
Word Count: 105,000
Pitch: Ages past, Odin created shape-shifting wolves to guard his enemy
 Fenrir. Now Fenrir’s escape looms, and Alpha wolf Erik must rely on a
 woman he wants but doesn’t trust or the Norse gods will die.

If the MC was an Easter egg...

Caramel - because I'm golden, baby.
Excerpt: 300 words. 

Leave it to Gina to kill her before she even got to the compound.
 
 Kristin sucked back air and grabbed the sides of her seat as the big,
 black SUV barreled toward them, horn blaring. Her foster-sister, long
 red nails flashing on the wheel, swerved left, throwing Kristin against
 the passenger door with a bang. She squeezed her eyes shut and waited
 for her world to end for the second time in her life – tossing the gods
 a quick prayer for good measure.
 
 When the car slowed then came to an abrupt halt without the death blow
 she’d anticipated, she unclenched her teeth and took a deep breath. “I
 said ‘pull-over’, not ‘kill us now’.” 
 
 Gina snorted as she cut the Mini’s engine. “Technicalities.”
 
 Opening her eyes to a bright, summer day and gorgeous mountain view,
 Kristin’s relief evaporated and she once again resisted the urge to
 curse. The Mini was parked sideways a foot away from a steep drop off –
 and no guard rail. Anxiety snaked through her belly and twisted it. 
 
 “Not funny,” she muttered. 
 “Consider it behavioral therapy. I’m helping you face your fears.”
 “Uh-huh. Cause that’s what you’re all about. The helping.” 
 
 Gina stepped out of the car and sauntered to the edge of the cliff. Her
 gauzy, white skirt revealed shapely legs, and her crocheted, pink halter
 top exposed way too much boob. 
 
 Although if Kristin had a rack like that she’d probably flaunt it, too. 
 
 After glaring at her sister, she jutted her chin up and climbed from the
 car, her booted feet as far as possible from the edge as she
 side-stepped toward the hood. All the while telling herself her fear of
 cliffs wasn’t real. 
 
 Below her, Wolf Ridge Industries, AKA the Valdyr compound, nestled in a
 wide, rocky valley. A thrill shot through her, and she released her
 breath with a loud ‘whoosh’.