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Showing posts with label Clay Gilbert. Show all posts

Character Missions,Guest post by Clay Gilbert

Around the time I first started working on the project that ultimately became Annah and the Exiles and Annah and the Gates of Grace, the second and third books of my Children of Evohe science-fiction series, I had an idea for a story about a young man stationed aboard a starship, whose job it was to monitor transmissions from space and respond to it, and about the habit he had of collecting conversations; a confluence of event and habit that would lead first to a series of conversations with, and eventually to a relationship with, a young woman named Rynn Handel, aboard another ship, somewhere.

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The “twist”, as they say, would be that Rynn was a cyborg—a being comprised both of human tissue and cybernetic parts—but in Rynn’s case, without a humanoid body, or really a body of any kind beyond a kind of mechanical casing. I thought the story would be an interesting metaphor both for online communication and the relationships that develop online in the current Internet age, as well as a commentary on the challenges of life with a disability, especially as the story developed, and I ‘discovered’ that the young man, named Northrop Wynn, had a disability of his own—a (fictional) neurological condition called thalamic hypercognition. North’s condition allows for accelerated cognitive function, but this acceleration takes a toll on other functions of the body, to the point that by the time he’s in his late twenties, at the beginning of the story, he can’t walk on his own, having to use either a wheelchair or a cybernetic brace which enables him to walk, but cuts off his hypercognitive functions. Ultimately, North’s condition also promises to cut short his lifespan, leaving him with a life expectancy of around fifty years at best. These challenges give North a unique perspective from which to understand Rynn’s struggle with her own condition, one that she didn’t ask for any more than he did.

As I said, I conceived The Conversationalist with only the basics of the situation and the names of my two characters in place, and I didn’t start writing it when I first had the idea, for a couple of reasons. First, I was deep into writing the Annah sequel, which later turned into two sequels, and I’m not a fan of veering off-course into another project just because I have a neat idea one day. Secondly, I had no idea what Rynn was doing on board the ship she was on, or what would cause Rynn and North to ultimately meet ‘in real life’ so to speak. So I took a few notes in a MS Word file, titled it “The Conversationalist”, and set it aside.

Later on, when one Children of Evohe book had become two, and I was midway through writing the second of those, Annah and the Gates of Grace, I had a situation in the book where Annah and her friends found themselves in a prison underneath the surface of a planet called Holdfast; a prison which, it turned out, was run by a cyborg intelligence installed for that purpose by the prison’s administrators because they wanted someone to run the prison who wouldn’t die, and they didn’t want a simple computer, because computers can’t truly reason or feel. When I arrived at this point in the story, it was clear that the cyborg in charge of Gracegate Prison had to be Rynn Handel, even though I hadn’t planned it that way to begin with. Rynn’s part in Gates of Grace both fleshed out her backstory, established her motivations and personality, and also explained what she’s doing on the ship called the Broken Road, where readers of The Conversationalist will find her, whether they’ve read Gates of Grace or not.

Once I began writing the story, I discovered things about both Rynn and North that I had neither thought of, nor planned on. I didn’t know about North’s hypercognition until I sat down to write, and I had no idea about Rynn’s quirky sense of humor or her obsession with the twentieth-century Earth rock group ELO until I started working in earnest on the book, either. I also didn’t know about North’s friendship with Connor Reynolds, a man who was the head of the Earth government in the first Children of Evohe novel before he is assassinated, or the role that friendship would play in North’s being on the run in space when The Conversationalist begins. All of these things became important aspects of a project that would once again turn into two novels: The Conversationalist: Out of the Blue and The Conversationalist: Mission on Mercy Prime.

Fundamentally, I hope The Conversationalist, like most of my novels do to one extent or another, makes the case for the outsider, and particularly for the disabled person. Like Annah, Rynn and North are disabled people, or, to put it a better way, differently-abled people, who have vital things to offer to their culture and to each other. I think the genres of imaginative fiction stand in a unique position to model a vision in which the marginalized are no longer so, because the margins of society will be widened and adjusted to shape a world that reflects all the unique things they can bring to it. If my fiction has a mission, that’s it. Rynn Handel’s story is one more step along the road of that particular mission.

Clay Gilbert says he’s always liked stories, and that from the time he knew there were people who told them for a living, that’s what he wanted to do. Clay’s work in various genres has been in print since his first short science fiction story, “The Computer Conspiracy,” was published in Scholastic magazine when he was just thirteen. Clay is the author of the science fiction series Children of Evohe, including the novels Annah and the Children of Evohe, Annah and the Exiles, and Annah and the Gates of Grace. He is also the author of the YA dystopian novel Eternity, as well as the vampire novel Dark Road to Paradise. He lives and works in Knoxville, TN.

PLACES TO FIND ME:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/claygil2015

Author blog: https://portalsandpathways.wordpress.com/

Official “Children of Evohe” site: https://childrenofevohe.com/

Email: claygil1971@yahoo.com

What genre do you write and why?

I write science fiction, horror, and urban fantasy.

Tell us about your latest book.

My latest two published novels are “Annah and the Exiles” and “Annah and the Gates of Grace.” They were published simultaneously this year by my new publisher, Dark Moon Press. They’re the second and third books in my science-fiction series “Children of Evohe” which tells the story of a young woman named Annah, from a distant world called Evohe, her human mate Gary Holder, and her search to overcome a life of disabilities and adversity—a search that leads, eventually, into political intrigue, war, and a destiny as the An-Rhyel, “the Restorer”, a figure from her people’s legends who is meant to reconcile the divided people of Evohe to the wholeness of their past. On the whole, I’d say the series combines the coming-of-age drama, cultural struggle and romance of a classic novel like “Jane Eyre” with the mysticism, interstellar intrigue and politics of Frank Herbert’s “Dune”.

What did you edit out of this book?

Well, I’m not sure if it exactly qualifies as editing out, but originally, I had conceived books Two and Three as a single novel, “Annah’s Exile”, and I eventually decided there was too much story for a single volume, and edited and refashioned the narrative into two books.

How was this book published? (traditional, small press, self pub, etcc...) Why did you choose that particular publishing route?

I’m currently signed with a small press publisher, Dark Moon Press, out of Ft. Wayne, Indiana. I personally don’t have any interest in self-publishing at this stage in my career, so when my previous publisher, PDMI Publishing, LLC, announced last February that they were ceasing operations, I began looking for another publisher. Fairly quickly, my thoughts turned in the direction of my good friend Eric Vernor, who I’ve known a number of years through our mutual association with the DragonCon science fiction convention. I approached Eric about the possibility of becoming one of Dark Moon Press’ stable of authors, and he was happy to welcome me on board. And I’m very happy to be there.

How do you select the names of your characters?

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Usually, they tell me their own names. Which is to say, I trust in the operations of the subconscious a lot. Usually, I’ll find that the name a character has ‘picked’ corresponds in some way to a quality that I intended that character to have, or which they end up having. ‘Listen to your characters’ is something I tell beginning writers, a lot. In the case of Annah, the protagonist of my Children of Evohe science fiction series, I ended up finding out that the name she’d ‘picked’ meant ‘favored by God’, and given Annah’s eventual role as a savior/messiah figure for her people, that made a lot of sense. But I had no idea at first.

What marketing methods are you using to promote your book?

Podcast interviews, online articles (such as the recent spotlight article done by scifipulse.net), website interviews such as this one, Facebook posts, and public appearances. I’m always looking for new ways to promote, and you yourself have been a big help in offering ideas in that regard!

Do you read your book reviews? How do you deal with the bad or good ones?

Honestly, to be in this business, you’ve got to develop a thick skin. Reviewers, good or bad, mostly don’t know you. Before I was a published author, I worked on one of my novels, my vampire book Dark Road to Paradise, as a project in a grad school seminar on Writing the Novel. When I got my first chapter back, the professor had written THIS SUCKS in huge capital letters on page one. What can I say? It was a draft. I knew it wasn’t perfect. So I revised. In the end, that same professor not only agreed to accept that novel as a thesis project, but to be my thesis director. And ultimately, the book got published. Most of the people who’ll review your book haven’t, and couldn’t, write one themselves. That wasn’t the case with this professor—she’d published six, and been well-reviewed. But if you can steel yourself enough to withstand the disapproval of someone like that, and turn it around, you’ll be able to withstand any bad review. Remember: it’s about the work, not you, personally. They don’t know you.

Do you Google yourself?

At least every couple of months. Helps to make sure that I’m who’s coming up when people Google me, and helps me know what people are reading about me. Funny story about that. On one of my recent self-Google sessions, the results turned up what appeared to be, of all things, a science fiction story with a protagonist whose name was Clay Gilbert. I went to the site, and found the blog of a writer and teacher named Paul J. Gies, from Maine, who had indeed not only written one novel about a man named Clay Gilbert, but a series of them. I messaged Paul, and when he wrote back, one of the first things he said was, “I wondered how long it would take you to get in touch with me.” He had apparently come up with my name as a character name quite by accident. He was looking for a first name that was ‘elemental, and Earth-based’—Clay, check, as well as a last name with French roots. “Gilbert” qualifies there, too. He told me he’d been writing the book for several months before he became aware that there was, indeed, a science-fiction novelist with that very name. He asked me if I wanted him to change it, and I said no. Later, he submitted his first novel featuring his “Clay Gilbert” to PDMI Publishing, LLC, the publisher I was then Chief Editor for. We accepted it, but as PDMI went out of business in August of last year, it was never published. Paul’s a talented writer, and I know he’ll get published eventually. And now I have a new friend.

What formats is the book available in?

All of my work is available in paperback, and can be ordered online from Amazon and Barnes and Noble. My newest work—the Dark Moon Press editions of my YA dystopian novel “Eternity”, and the first three books in my science fiction series “Children of Evohe”—“Annah and the Children of Evohe”, “Annah and the Exiles,” and “Annah and the Gates of Grace”—are all available in paperback from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and direct from my publisher at darkmoonpress.com. All of my upcoming releases will also be available from Dark Moon Press. “Eternity” is also available on Kindle, and the “Annah” novels will soon be available in that format as well.

Who are your favourite authors?

Stephen King, Clive Barker, Ray Bradbury, J.R.R. Tolkien, Robert Jordan, Anne Rice, Tad Williams, Dan Simmons, Walt Whitman, Herman Melville, E. B. White, C.S. Lewis—and that just starts to scratch the surface.

What advice do you have for other writers?

Read a lot. It provides raw fuel for your craft. Also, write a lot. Write every day, without fail. Finish what you start. You can’t revise what you don’t finish, and everything is going to need revision.

Where can people find out more about you and your writing?

The official site for my Children of Evohe science fiction series is at www.childrenofevohe.com. My author blog is at https://portalsandpathways.wordpress.com/.

How long did it take you to write your book?

My two newest releases in the “Children of Evohe” series took about two years combined. My other new release this year, the YA dystopian book, “Eternity”, took a year for the initial draft and a longer and more roundabout journey through editing and revision to eventual publication.

Who designed the cover?

The CEO of Dark Moon Press, Eric Vernor, designs all my covers, and I think he does a fabulous job.

Who inspires you?

God, my parents, other authors; friends and relatives. I guess there are different kinds of inspiration. Other authors can be a tremendous inspiration specifically in how I do my work. My publisher, Eric Vernor, has a tireless work ethic that’s certainly inspiring. My personal tastes and life experiences inspire certain facets of my stories. And my family and friends are a constant source of sustenance and inspiration. Also the music I listen to, movies or TV shows I watch, and books I read.

When and where do you write?

‘When’ is 8-10 hours a day; ‘where’ is at my desk in my apartment. I always tell people that regularity in writing, meaning doing it in the same place at the same time daily, is important. I do the same myself.

Are you a plotter or a pantser?

I’m not overly fond of either of those terms, although I guess if I have to define myself, I’d use the latter of those two p-words. I wish someone would do the writing community at large a great service, and popularize a less-condescending-sounding term than ‘pantser.’ (Laughs) But yes, I’m in the category of writers who, by and large, don’t outline. I can’t say I don’t plot at all, because I start with a main character or two, and I usually have an idea of the general journey those characters are going on. But I let them take me there. ‘Controlling’ the story is something that, for me, leads to boring and unsuccessful writing. Stephen King wrote once, “I write to find out what I think.” King, like me, doesn’t plot or outline. I like the idea of writing as a journey, but it’s NOT the only way. The best way is the way that works for you, and I know plenty of writers who get good stuff out of outlining and plotting. I just wish some of those folks wouldn’t call me a ‘pantser.’

Do you believe in writer’s block?

Not a bit. I think the non-writing world over-mystifies and over-romanticizes the creative process, to the point where some creative folks actually buy into the concept and expect to be blocked. I’ve been writing since I was four, and writing seriously since my teens (I was first paid for publication of a story when I was thirteen). I’ve never been ‘blocked.’ Regularity and repetition lead to a mindset that allows writing to occur anytime. Revision can always fix whether what comes out is any good or not—and a first draft rarely is. But you can’t revise a blank page.

If you could tell your younger writing self anything, what would it be?

Stick with it. Don’t worry about a ‘fall-back plan.’ It will all pay off.

How do you research your books?

Most of my stories take place far enough in time and space from the ‘real world’ of today that research isn’t necessary, but when it is, Google and the Internet are amazing resources. During my grad school years, I learned enough about finding credible sources that I don’t end up dragging bad facts into my fiction. Fortunately. Readers tend to catch things like that.

What is your work in progress? Tell us about it.

“The Conversationalist” is a science-fantasy novel set in the universe of my “Children of Evohe” books, although, since Annah’s not in it, it’s not technically a part of that series. It’s about a guy, Northrop Wynn, who is a data analyst stationed on board a starship whose job is to monitor signals from passing ships and respond to them if necessary. North comes in contact and eventually develops an ongoing conversation with a girl on another starship whose name is Rynn Handel. Rynn and North are headed to a common destination, a world called Holdfast that’s a hub for intergalactic travel. On their way there, they get to know each other a little bit at a time. But each of them has a secret. For North, it’s that he has a somewhat-debilitating condition which causes his brain to work faster than normal humans, which is good, but it deteriorates his motor functions to some extent. Rynn has an even more isolating disability—she’s a cyborg, a being comprised of part human tissue, including human DNA, and part mechanical technology. She doesn’t even have a body—she’s going from Holdfast to Mercy Prime, a planet known for building cyborg bodies, to fix that problem. So in a sense, North’s mind is like a computer, and part of Rynn IS a computer, and they have to decide whether they’re going to accept each other—whether ‘human’ is a condition more complex than either of them may have been willing to accept before. Rynn was a character who first appeared in the third Children of Evohe novel, “Annah and the Gates of Grace”, and I wanted to do more with her. It's a sci-fi romance like most of my other stuff, but this one, I think, has a little more humor in it, although the questions it asks are serious. “The Conversationalist” should be out from Dark Moon Press sometime in 2018.

Does your family support you in your writing career? How?

They’ve encouraged me in my writing since I first started doing it at the age of four, but these days they support me by reading the books, of course, and by helping me with book signings and convention appearances, and getting the word out about new releases/. They’re the best ‘ground crew’ I could want.

What are you currently reading?

“ThePassage” by Justin Cronin

What are some of your all time favourite books?

Moby-Dick by Herman Melville, The Stand by Stephen King, Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury, Prince Ombra by Roderick MacLeish, Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman, Dune by Frank Herbert, Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein, and the Bible.

What is your favourite book you've read this year so far?

“Prince Lestat and the Realms of Atlantis” byAnne Rice

What books or authors have most influenced your life?

Stephen King, Ray Bradbury, Robert Jordan, Clive Barker, Anne Rice, Frank Herbert, Robert A. Heinlein.

When you’re not writing, how do you spend your time?

Watching movies, listening to music, reading, hanging out with friends and family, and my cat and snake.

When my first novel was published in 2013, all I knew was that I wanted to tell stories for a living. I’d grown up seeing Stephen King, Ray Bradbury and Anne Rice do it, and, having gotten paid $25 for the publication of a short story in Scholastic magazine when I was still in middle school, I’d had a little taste of doing it myself. But I had the idea that what my readers were most interested in was the story I was telling, and that they didn’t really care about ‘the man behind the curtain.’

In today’s literary world, that kind of thinking is wrong.

Readers today are inundated with choices and competition for their attention, and for their money. If you’re a new author today, taking your first steps into the publishing marketplace, you’re competing not only with thousands of already-established authors, many of whom have best-selling reputations, but also with word-of-mouth and Internet buzz about other new writers as well.

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How do you, as the new kid on the writing block, get noticed amidst the crowd? The answer ties back into my realization that readers want to connect with an author as much as they want to connect with the story that author is telling. And if an author can find a way to connect his or her individual narrative as a person with the narratives he or she puts down on paper, so much the better.

As my career as a novelist evolved, I began to look at the connecting thematic tissue between my life and the lives and challenges of the people in my stories. Annah, the young woman from a distant world who is the heroine of the Children of Evohe books, shares both my upbringing as an only child and the social situation I grew up with: she is a young person with both disabilities and ideas that many people in her community see as strange. Annah’s struggle for identity and her discovery of a special purpose for her life mirror my own adolescence and early adulthood, and it was, in many ways, my discovery of my abilities as a writer that allowed me to forge that identity for myself, in the same way Annah’s discovery of her particular gifts allows her to do the same. Annah’s human mate, Gary Holder, shares my own disability, having been born hydrocephalic. A number of other characters in the series have challenges of their own.

Now, I’ve realized that nearly all of my stories draw on the experience of someone who comes at life from a perspective on the fringes, either because of worldview or disability or both. I’ve also used my own experiences and relationships in my life to inform and inspire my stories, but the ‘hook’ of overcoming challenges and disabilities—a very real and human struggle many people can relate to—against the fantastical background of other worlds or supernatural situations is what seems to make a story a ‘Clay Gilbert’ story. My stories are about forging understanding between people with differences, and achieving victory over personal obstacles and setbacks. It’s something genuine from my own life that blends well with my also-genuine love for genre fiction to make what I hope is a successful literary blend.

It’s a pattern, but not a formula, because the people in my stories—forgive me if I don’t really like to call them ‘characters’—are distinct from one another. Annah is not the same girl as Cassie Edwards, the young woman who contracts the HIV virus from a blood transfusion in my novel Dark Road to Paradise, only to be offered a way out of certain death when she discovers the young English teacher, Martin Cabot, whom she’s been dating is in fact a vampire. And yet the outsider perspective remains, for both Martin and Cassie, and Martin’s vampiric nature is, in some ways, as much of a ‘disease of the blood’ as Cassie’s own condition.

Find a way to tell your story through the lives of your characters, and also to reach out to your readers through blogs, interviews, and personal appearances. If you can make your stories personal to the people who read them, they’ll feel connected to you—and that will separate you from every other name on every other book they might pick up.

Clay Gilbert has been hearing the voices of aliens, vampires, and people from the future since about the age of four. It wasn't long before he started to think taking notes on what they said might be a good idea. This has led him many places—through the halls and classrooms of many schools, where he's been both in front of the teacher's desk and behind it, himself—to presenter's podiums at conventions, and, most often, to the comfortable chair behind his writing desk at home, where he uses his Dell computer as both a beacon and a translator for the voices that still find their way through from countless worlds and planes of existence. Clay’s work in various genres has been in print since his first short science fiction story, “The Computer Conspiracy,” was published in Scholastic magazine when he was just thirteen. He holds an M.A. in English literature from Auburn University, and an M.F.A. in Fiction Writing from the University of South Carolina. Clay is the author of the science fiction series Children of Evohe, including the novels Annah and the Children of Evohe, Annah and the Exiles, and Annah and the Gates of Grace. He is also the author of the YA dystopian novel Eternity, as well as the vampire novel Dark Road to Paradise. His works are published by Dark Moon Press. His current projects include an urban fantasy novel called The Kind, as well as Cassie’s Song, a sequel to Dark Road to Paradise, and a standalone science fiction novel set in the universe of the Children of Evohe series, called The Conversationalist. He has also served as the Chief Editor for PDMI Publishing, and has been a member of the volunteer staff for DragonCon in Atlanta, Georgia for the past decade, where he’s frequently shared panel space with Dark Moon Press’ own Eric Vernor. He lives and works in Knoxville, TN. His author blog can be found at https://portalsandpathways.wordpress.com/, and the official website for his Children of Evohe novels resides at https://childrenofevohe.com/.

Title: Annah: Children of Evohe

Author: Clay Gilbert

Excerpt: Annah: Children of Evohe by Clay Gilbert

I’ve been asked why I feel my novel Annah: Children of Evohe, Book One is important, in a literary landscape crowded with stories of otherworldly beings and distant worlds. It’s a tricky question to answer, but the answer lies in character and situation. "Annah" is a story focusing on an important and timely message--people are people, whether they differ by gender, race, age, or culture; whether they are seen as normal or are viewed as 'outsiders' in their culture. Annah, the young alien girl who is the book's title character, has disabilities both social and physical--her appearance is seen by her people as a birth defect, and her questioning mind and desire to see the worlds beyond her planet, handicaps her as well. Gary Holder, the Earth man she meets and falls in love with, shares her desire to be more than his station in life, and also has a physical disability, being hydrocephalic. I was born with hydrocephalus myself, like Holder, and like Annah, I found myself on the receiving end of misunderstanding and bullying for a number of years in my youth. I feel that "Annah" is important because, like many classic science fiction novels, it uses the storytelling power of the genre to emphasize a truth about the human condition: that the 'alien' is an illusion--that we are each 'the other' until we have a reason to care and connect.

Here’s a short but pivotal scene from the book, when Holder has only been on Annah’s homeworld of Evohe for a short time, and she and Holder are still getting to know each other.

Excerpt from Annah: Children of Evohe, Book One, available now in hardcover, paperback and ebook from Rara Avis, an imprint of PDMI Publishing, LLC.

* * *

“Do you care that I am not of your kind?” Holder asked Annah.

“I do not. We are creatures of the same Spirit. But there may be those who will care.”

“Do you care that I am, strictly speaking, older than you are?”

I do not. But--”

“I know. There may be those who will. Do you really care what they think?”

“I do not,” she said. “But I do care about you. I do not want to cause trouble for you, Holder. If something happened to you because of me--if you were hurt, or something worse--I could not bear it. I have never wanted to hurt anyone.”

“Nothing's going to happen, Annah.” It was the sort of lie he'd heard a lot of soldiers tell loved ones as they left for the wars. No. It wasn't a lie. It was a hope. “And, if you're ‘trouble’, I'll take you anyway. You're the best 'trouble' I've ever gotten myself into.”

“If you say so, Holder,” Annah said, and she was smiling as she said it. “Come and lie down by the fire. Come and lie down with me.”

He did as she asked. It was not the first night that he'd slept outside the ship--he'd been doing that now for nearly a week--but he usually made a bed for himself a little farther off from where she rested. He stripped out of his clothes as he usually did, leaving on only the boxer-shorts he slept in, and lay down just behind her. He kept his hands at his sides, although doing so felt awkward and uncomfortable.

“You do not have to be afraid to touch me,” Annah said after a moment.

Holder was startled at the simplicity of the statement, but he knew that was her way. It's a lot better than trying to hide things all the time, he thought. He put his arms around her, barely touching her at first, and then she slid back against him, and he felt the strange waves of heat that always emanated from her body. The sensation was calming--as it always was.

“I am not afraid of you, Holder. Do not be afraid of me. So many people have been. Do not be like them. Please.”

“I'm not.”

She shifted in his arms, turning so that she was facing him. She remembered how his skin had felt beneath her fingers at first, when he was still healing; thought of a question she had had, and reached up to touch his head, caressing it, feeling its shape and size with her fingers. There was a--strangeness--about it that she had wondered about before; something that did not seem to be the way she remembered from what she had learned from his ship's computer.

“No, it's not the way it's supposed to be. It's a condition I have. I was born with it. Hydrocephalus, they call it. Means the fluid from my brain wouldn't drain off like it's supposed to, without the tube--the shunt--that's there.”

“Oh.” Annah stared harder at the place where he'd said the tube was; felt it with her fingers. She thought she could feel it, but she was not sure. “Do your people--do they think you are strange because of this? Are they--afraid of you because of it?”

Holder thought about it. “When I was little, they were. Even when I was a--seed-youth. They just didn't understand it. When I tried to get into the Homesec Space Corps, they wouldn't pass me on the physical. Those goons knew that shunts are built for g's these days; they just don't give a shit. So I went into Recon, because they don't have a physical to fail. It's dirty work, hardly anyone wants it--and I wanted to see the Sea of Stars.” He looked at the shape of Annah's own head; reached out and stroked it. She made a sudden sound, like the surprised purr of a cat more used to being kicked than comforted, and pressed against his hand. “What about you?” he asked. “You said you look odd, too.”

Annah rubbed her face against his. “I do. My head--it is different too--but there is no fluid in it that is not meant to be there. As I said, I am different in a number of ways. I was born the way I am, too, though--and unlike you, no one can tell me why. My parents never knew, either.”

“And your people--they're scared of you?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Well, I'm not,” Holder said.

She rubbed her face against his again and pressed close to him. And then, without really thinking about it, she kissed him. A quick kiss, but a kiss nonetheless.

His eyes widened in surprise. There was the same sensation of humming energy to her lips as there was to the touch of her fingers. He returned the kiss, seeing the same wonder and surprise mirrored in Annah's strange blue eyes that he knew she had seen in his own.

“Holder, please do not go back to your ship tonight. Sleep here with me.”

Links:

http://childrenofevohe.com/

https://portalsandpathways.wordpress.com/

http://www.amazon.com/Clay-Gilbert/e/B00BS1N1W4

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