Excerpt and Giveaway Damselfly (Damselfly #1) by Jennie Bates Bozic

Published: November 11th, 2013

Description:

In 2065, the Lilliput Project created Lina - the first six-inch-tall winged girl - as the solution to a worldwide energy and food crisis. Isolated in a compound amidst the forests of Denmark, Lina has grown up aware of only one purpose: learn how to survive in a world filled with hawks, bumblebees, and loneliness. However, on the eve of her sixteenth birthday, she discovers that she’s not the only teenager her size. Six 'Toms' were created shortly after Lina, and now her creators need to prove to the world that tiny people are the next logical step in human evolution. In other words, they need to prove that reproduction is possible.

Um. No thanks. Lina's already fallen in love with a boy she met online named Jack. Only he has no idea that thumbelina1847 could literally fit inside his heart.

When her creators threaten to hurt Jack unless she chooses a husband from among the ‘Toms’, Lina agrees to star in a reality TV series. Once the episodes begin to air, the secret of her size is out. Cut off from any contact with the outside world, Lina assumes Jack is no longer interested. After all, what guy would want to date a girl he can’t even kiss?

Slowly, very slowly, she befriends the six young men who see her as their only ticket to happiness. Perhaps she can make just one guy’s dream of love and companionship come true. But her creators have a few more twists in store for her that she never thought possible.

She’s not the only one playing to the cameras.

EXCERPT:

When I was a little girl, about five or six years old, Mr. Coxworth gave me several pop-up children’s books. He propped them up on the kitchen counter in his house, and I would play in the paper castles and oceans. I’d never heard the stories my “forts” belonged to, so I made up my own instead. 

Cinderella’s castle became the home of my “real parents,” who would come and rescue me someday and break the curse keeping me so tiny. We would ride away in a gilded carriage, and I would never have to return to Lilliput ever again. 

Hansel and Gretel became my brother and sister. Together we would bury the evil witch in candy and then live in her gingerbread house forever. In my reimagining, Hansel was my protective older brother and Gretel much younger, the baby of the family. And I was smack in the middle. Normal. And I didn’t have to go to school or have tutors or learn old, dead languages.

The Snow Queen looked so very much like Dr. Christiansen in the illustrations that I imagined they were one and the same. Hansel and Gretel would come and spring me from her icy castle, and we would escape to our gingerbread house on the next page.

As I grew out of the pop-up books, I began to write my own stories in a little notebook. I called them my “True Tales,” and they were my dreams for what my life would have been if I’d been born under different circumstances. Tales of my first day at school, getting a poor grade in English, first crush, first kiss… 

When I met Jack, I stopped writing them.

Today I write a new one. Not on paper. Not for anyone to find. I write it on my soul.

The heat of the morning sun and the man lying next to me draw me from slumber. Light wraps around his bare arm, setting the tiny hairs aglow, then comes to rest on the sheet as a perfect triangle of white. 

The man is Jack, but he’s a few years older now, as am I. We have both grown into our faces and wear them with confidence. We know the landscape of the other’s body better than our own. 

Still, I hesitate to touch him. The featherweight blanket of quiet has settled upon us. I watch him sleeping, but staring and even touching is an intrusion into his space, a violation of his trust. And his trust is my most priceless treasure. I have fought to keep it with sweat and tears.

Somehow, now, we are nearly the same size. I’m not sure how it happened. I don’t know how he forgave me for lying to him or what he said when he discovered the truth. I don’t know why he loves me, why he stays.

But he does. And I do. I always will.

I seal up my story within myself. I seal up my body, heart, and soul so they will remain safe. I seal myself inside of my bedcovers to block it all out.

Prequel #0,5)

At six inches tall with gorgeous purple wings, seventeen-year-old Sugar is the spitting image of a fairy - and that makes her the perfect spy. 

It’s the year 2081 and the USA hasn’t been united for five years. Now it’s divided into three bitterly feuding sections - the West, the East, and the Mids, and thousands of families have been separated by the conflict. In order to figure out how spies are crossing from the right coast, the West is targeting caravans of families crossing the Mids illegally. Trouble is, the crossers are hard to track, and that’s where Sugar comes in.

Every week, she and hundreds of others like her are packaged as Christmas tree ornaments and “donated” to poor children. If they’re lucky, they’ll end up with a crosser kid and dig up valuable information about the clandestine caravans while their wings serve as a tracking device. If not, they fly back to the Candy Factory for reassignment. Wash, Rinse, Repeat until they’ve served enough missions to earn their freedom.

When Sugar is placed with a crosser kid named Clara, she quickly discovers that the conflict is more complicated than she thought. Clara’s uncle and his family were assassinated and now her parents are running for their lives. Every second that Sugar remains with the family, she puts them in danger. If she leaves, she’ll surely be caught and lose any chance at freedom. If she stays, she might lose everything

Sugar Plum is free now on Smashwords

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About the author:

I'm a visual effects artist for film and television by day, and at night I don my author cape and pen stories for the YA crowd. I love a good fairy tale, especially if there's a creepy twist, so that's what I write.

I met my husband in the World of Warcraft and we live in Los Angeles with our cat. We spend our time playing video games, reading, hiking, sweeping up cat hair, and cursing the terrible traffic.

I have a bachelor's degree in Religion and Philosophy from Hillsdale College, and some of my past jobs have included: swimming lessons teacher, lifeguard, furniture salesperson, barista, and loan officer. I was especially terrible at the loan officer bit and that's what prompted me to make a major change and go off to Canada to get a diploma in 3D Animation and Visual Effects. After that, I moved to Los Angeles by myself and roomed with two crazy sisters I found on Craigslist. But that's another tale.

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Author's Giveaway
1-$50 Amazon Gift Card (INT)
1-Damselfly Necklace (US only)

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