Top Ten, Guest Post and Giveaway: Through the Oracle's Mist by Aedan Byrnes

Description:

In the blackest night, with the moon and stars to guide him, she would always be there waiting…

Cyrenna thought she died the day she watched Tynan and his brothers jump through the banishment portal in an act of solidarity with Rigor. Little did she know, it would be the first of many deaths she would experience in her quest to claim his heart. She would surrender not only her immortal soul, but a mortal one repeatedly. Through a deal with the great Oracle, she has multiple mortal lifetimes to change the direction of her future and have a chance with Tynan.

Her journey spans the ages from the GenPei War in Japan and the Silk Road west, to Cromwell, the Three Kingdoms and modern times, bringing her one step closer to forever until she makes a misstep. Then, the burden falls to Tynan. The only thing that is absolute is her fervent hope that he will come, but there’s one big problem.

Through it all, he doesn’t so much as know her name.

Top ten love stories in history.

This is such a hard question and my knee jerk is to expound all the different types of ‘love’ in my answer….I’ll throw a couple in there, but try to stay to what I believe you are asking.

1. George Burns & Gracie Allen

2. Guinevere & Lancelot

3. Paris & Helen

4. Jane Eyre & Edward

5. Tristan & Isolde

6. Katherine Hepburn & Spencer Tracy

7. Robin Hood & Maid Marian

8. Winnie the Pooh & Christopher Robin

9. Frog & Toad

10. Of course…Tynan & Cyrenna. J

GUEST POST

The most important characteristics of a Romantic Suspense

I’m not entirely convinced I am the best person to answer this as I don’t consider myself a romantic suspense writer. Maybe I’m wrong, but I write not thinking of the categories until the publisher asks what genre the book falls in and then I have to think about it. 

For me, plain and simple, part and parcel the most important thing in any writing is realism and believability. I know there are genres that are pure escapism, but they too have to have some element that makes them feasible for me as a reader. If I cannot find a grain to latch onto that makes me feel a connection and a possibility, the book is a tough sell for me. That is partly what makes the incorporation of the historical elements into the Vengelys books a good pairing for me. Though the series is considered fantasy paranormal romance, there are pieces that are spot on to things that have happened, and as time seems to be cyclic, can happen again. It makes the story feel real, though it isn’t.

For romantic suspense to work, I would think that there has to be a possibility that it won’t work, won’t resolve, or that the obstacles are too insurmountable to reach the happily ever after moment. I would say that there have to be moments that make your heart race with fear as well as moments that steal your breath for the brushes with possibility until the end. I would think that, like a good suspense or mystery, there would need to also be twists and turns that are unexpected and either pleasant surprises for the readers, or detested changes, which is then the other thing that I want to see in writing, any writing, and that is emotional triggers.

For a story to work for me, I think it has to incorporate things that make me love, hate, loathe, and cling to every word. I think romantic suspense is not different from other genres this way. Reading should be an experience beyond what your head says as you see the words. I want to be pulled in, jerked to realizations, succumb to emotional outbursts, and stifle unexpected rages. In short, I want to experience the book, not just read it.

Romantic suspense for me is not an exception to the elements that make good writing, but an extrapolation in that it brings affairs of the heart to the fore as the fodder for the emotional triggers. The writer that does it well is my new favorite, every time. Pull me in, wring me emotionally to dry and leave me hanging, begging for more or replete with satisfaction at the moment of the HEA…that is successful writing in this category to my thinking.

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About the author:

There is no simple description for Aedan Byrnes. Obsessive, dreamer, reclusive, compulsive, outdoorsman and wordsmith would be among the list if one were started. The displaced Gael lives in the upper Midwest with family between jaunts wherever the road takes him. A frequent traveler, he is as likely to be found rock climbing or spelunking as sitting fireside dreaming or aimlessly floating away.

A lifelong lover of words and writing, he claims a diverse reading appetite and his writing reflects the myriad influences. A self-proclaimed 'reader's writer', he looks for the emotional and the sensory in word combinations, not just the visceral comprehension of phrases in the stories he crafts and his love of all things literary shines through.

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