The Last Breath of Spring

Spring, a time of new beginnings. That early green still clinging to winter’s chill. The rise of the sun, its shining rays waking us up after months of snow and darkness.
Winter is a time for thinking, for drawing inwards, circling ourselves in warmth, making equally warm memories to replace the fullness of those hotter months in all their bustling glory.
Here in spring, we start again.
But, for me this year, spring wasn’t about greeting the new. This was a season of endings.
There’s a version of me frozen in the winter of 2024, who I’ll never meet again.
I wouldn’t want to.
The first buds of new life have bloomed from her ashes. Like a phoenix burned in an icy fire, I have risen again.
Now, I look at the world and see it happening everywhere.
Tiny fires. Large ones. Destruction… endings.
Right now, so many sift through the ashes, but, given enough time, they too will rise again.
Until then, we’ll drink down our last breaths of this year’s spring as we patiently wait to bloom.

I love a fruit tart.
If you don’t, I’m giving you a bombastic side-eye right now.
I can’t trust a person who doesn’t like a fruit tart. That’s like hating fun, if fun had a buttery crust and a tart, fruity center. Only crazy people wouldn’t want that.
Are you crazy?
Better try my recipe then :-p
In all seriousness, though, dessert? It’s good for the soul.
I don’t eat sweets very often, but when I do, the smells and flavors take me back to childhood, to a time when something as simple as a sugary treat made all the difference.
Funny thing is, it still does.

Through streaming showers come spring flowers, or something like that. Point is, now you can bloom them in your bathtub too, minus all the gross dirt, bugs and stuff.
Really, it’s just the smell you’re getting here, and that’s the main thing we want in our bathtub, right?
Go outside, if you want to look at a flower. Touch grass. Good grief.
The recipe is below, on a cute little printable card, and don’t blame me when honey bees and butterflies flutter in through your bathroom window, I’m just the blogger.

Flowerheart by Catherine Bakewell
If you love cozy fantasy novels, fairytales and family drama, this book is for you. Bonus points if you love a damaged heroine with a deep thirst to prove herself.

The Girl Who Chased the Moon by Sarah Addison Allen
This one’s giving spring nights lit by fireflies and moonlight; a multigenerational family saga; strange folklore elements. An age old secret keeping a town sick sits at the heart of this magical realism read. This novel sets out to show us that starting fresh can’t happen until we let go of the past.

Secretly Yours by Tessa Bailey
A free-spirited virgin becomes a secret admirer to wine baron’s long-lost son in Napa Valley setting.
The son is a grumpy rule follower.
She is a cheerful rule breaker.
Between destroyed routines, drunken love letters and a rather epic case of stolen cheese, this couple brings a whole new meaning to the word: mismatched.
If you like quirky characters, lush romantic settings, funny dialogue and some serious spice, this one’s for you.

Towards the end of spring, after exerting so much effort I could barely keep myself upright anymore, I quietly released Racing Starfall, the sequel to Snatching Starlight, my debut.
I watched that time come with a grimace, rather than a cheer, as I felt the growing pains of creation. It hurt this time, to birth something new.
This is the first announcement made on my website. The final bugle after a long battle through winter and spring, announcing summer.

The Summer of The Heart light Series.

Toot-toot-hooray!

Racing Starfall is a fast-paced, enemies-to-lovers romantasy novel with psychological elements.

Flick entered a bargain to save Evie’s life. He would do anything to keep her safe, up to and including sacrificing his whole life and everything in it.
Who knew fate was going to call his bluff?
Evie just wanted to forget about Josh, preferably with a drink the size of her head. Now she’s stuck with an elf who reminds her of the dark past she’s trying to forget, all while he clouds a future she may never live to see.
That is, if Rhea, the Faerie Queene and her Goblin henchman, Hemlock, have anything to say about it.

Flick was the hero she thought she didn’t need.
Evie was the woman his heart couldn’t escape.
Together, they agreed to a bargain they were sure they’d survive.
But that was before their heart lights started shuttering in their chests.

Elves and magic, am I right?

Now they both feel it… the weight of their inauspicious stars.

They both want it… the soul bound partner promised by fate.

And neither will admit it.
Not with their hearts on the line, a dark bargain guiding their hand, and a Faerie cavalcade that’s out for their blood.

They need to get to The Ivories, the halfway point between human and Fae.
The boundary line is the only safe place for Evie and Flick. A place where magic is weak, where coin and potion hold the most power.

But with a recalcitrant Evie who’s too haunted by her past to accept help, and a desperate Flick whose hero complex won’t allow Evie out of his sight, even for a second, the pair are as likely to drive each other to the brink of insanity as they are to reveal their respective feelings for each other.

Elves and magic, am I right?

Meet Evie. She’s an orphaned daughter with a smart mouth, dark thoughts, and a sarcastic streak that shows itself in the most inopportune moments.
(Hello foot, have you met mouth?)
But that doesn’t stop this scrappy character from fighting… well, pretty much everything, her thoughts, her past, even her dominatrix best friend Sascha, and that woman is a gem in black ice pick heels. Honestly.
Point is, the entire world’s on her shit list, and she’s had enough already.
Evie is a soldier without a sworn king. She’s had to be. It’s in her bones, all she’s ever known.
So, what happens when it’s time to lower her sword, stop the fighting, and let love in?
Turns out, there’s a dragon to slay even with the weapons sheathed, the battlefield clear, and it’s guarding Evie’s heart like a treasure trove.
Too bad, nobody told Flick.

Meet Flick. He’s an elven assassin from Faerie-land, banished by the Queene for failing to carry out murderous order; to slaughter a girl-child, barely out of her crib.
Before he spared her, there was no one the dark elf wouldn’t have cut down, no head too valuable that it couldn’t be severed.
Now he’s got a hero complex, a chip on his shoulder the size of Faerie, and two hundred souls to collect, but the only soul he wants, the only soul he craves, is hers. Evie’s. His soulbound partner.
Now they’ve entered a bargain.
And he has thrown away everything he once held dear just for a chance to be near her.
Too bad the object of his affection can’t stand his nearness. Though it would surprise him to know why and how deep those feelings run.
Will he find out in Racing Starfall?

You’ll have to read it to find out! 🙂

Racing Starfall is available on Amazon for purchase. For anyone interested in Flick and Evie’s story, I’ve included a link below for the Canadian website.

For Canadian Customers: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0F8BZQT68

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