Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Spark Rizing by Kate Corcino Book Blitz and Giveaway


Book & Author Details:
 
Spark Rising by Kate Corcino
Publication date: December 15th 2014
Genres: New Adult, Post-Apocalyptic, Science Fiction

Synopsis:
All that’s required to ignite a revolution is a single spark rising.
Two hundred years after the cataclysm that annihilated fossil fuels, Sparks keep electricity flowing through their control of energy-giving Dust. The Council of Nine rebuilt civilization on the backs of Sparks, offering citizens a comfortable life in a relo-city in exchange for power, particularly over the children able to fuel the future. The strongest of the boys are taken as Wards and raised to become elite agents, the Council’s enforcers and spies. Strong girls—those who could advance the rapidly-evolving matrilineal power—don’t exist. Not according to the Council.
Lena Gracey died as a child, mourned publicly by parents desperate to keep her from the Council. She was raised in hiding until she fled the relo-city for solitary freedom in the desert. Lena lives off the grid, selling her power on the black market.
Agent Alex Reyes was honed into a calculating weapon at the Ward School to do the Council’s dirty work. But Alex lives a double life. He’s leading the next generation of agents in a secret revolution to destroy those in power from within.
The life Lena built to escape her past ends the day Alex arrives looking for a renegade Spark.
 
 
 
Purchase:
Will be found here come release day: Amazon
 
AUTHOR BIO:
Kate Corcino is a reformed shy girl who found her voice (and uses it…a lot). She believes in magic, coffee, Starburst candies, genre fiction, descriptive profanity, and cackling over wine with good friends. A recovering Dr. Pepper addict, she knows the only addiction worth feeding is the one that follows the “click-whooooosh” of a new story settling into her brain.

She also believes in the transformative power of screwing up and second chances. Cheers to works-in-progress of the literary and lifelong variety!

She is currently gearing up for publication of Ignition Point and Spark Rising , the first books in the Progenitor Saga, a near future dystopian adventure series with romantic elements, science, magic, and plenty of action.
 
Author links:
https://twitter.com/katecorcino


Tell us about Spark Rising.
Spark Rising is a post-apocalyptic adventure set in the southwestern United States of the future. It’s the story of Magdalena Gracey, a young woman with the power to create and manipulate the only form of electricity left in the world, and Agent Alejandro Reyes, a man trained from childhood to be an elite soldier for the ruling government. He’s sent to investigate a report of an illegal Spark living in the desert. But Alex has his own agenda. And if the two of them can learn to work together instead of killing each other, they might have a chance at sparking a revolution…and love.
 

What gave you the idea for your main character in Spark Rising?

I’m not sure I ever really have ideas of characters. I sort of get lost in a daydream that just comes to me, and they are there, fully formed. Some are more vocal than others. Some daydreams I jot down. Some I let go. Lena and Alex grabbed hold of me when I was supposed to be writing something else and wouldn’t let me let go—which isn’t surprising, considering the characters of Lena and Alex are two very driven, stubborn, obsessive characters. They wouldn’t let me forget them even if I tried.

Would you say you know your characters well?

 I’d like to think I do, although they do surprise me sometimes. They’ve also been known to fight back. If I’m not true to a character, they stop cooperating and the story flow stops until I get back on track. Alex, my male MC, is a huge pain in the ass and is very, very good at doing this to me (which should surprise no one who reads Spark Rising!).

Where did you get the idea for Spark Rising?

It just came. I actually sat down with an old, unfinished classic fantasy manuscript. I was determined to finish it. But when it came time to write, I found I was jotting notes about a completely different story—it wasn’t even the same genre. Lena and Alex wanted their story told.

What was the most difficult part of the writing process for you?  

Editing. Absolutely. I had done beta rounds. I had revised it five times—heavy revisions where I cut thirty thousand words. I felt pretty confident. Ha HA! My editor, who is amazing, sent me a ten-page email shredding it. Having never been through the process, I was devastated. I printed it out and read it and cried and swore up a storm. And then I put it away for a week. Once I’d calmed down, I was ready to look at it objectively and make my revision list and go through it very methodically. But that first look—oh, that was brutal! It’s also the most important part. You’ve got to have an editor you trust, and one who is willing to make you cry if it means your manuscript is better at the end. Someone who tells you what you want to hear or is afraid to tell you what you need to hear is doing you ZERO favors.

What inspired Spark Rising?

In the days before the story came, I’d seen two sets of photos online. The first was an abandoned town in the desert that was being buried by sand. The second was a series of various city skylines from around the world showing what the night sky would look like if there were no lights, no electricity. I was blown away. Because yes, they’re both gorgeous. But the devastation of that loss of civilization…wow. Even in devastation, there would be beauty so long as we are the kind of people who have the capacity to see it. That’s the big "what if?” What kind of people are able to see the beauty?

Do you see yourself in any of the characters of Spark Rising?  

Hmm. Not much, no. I think Lena has some of my negative qualities—the bossiness, the tendency to jump to conclusions. As her story moves on through the greater arc of the series, I think she’ll reflect a little more of me, as she discovers and fights with her maternal instinct. Alex has my extreme pragmatism and love of profanity, also not necessarily good qualities. Jackson? He has too much light in him to be a reflection of me!

What made you decide to end Spark Rising the way you did?

*laugh* It originally had a very different ending. By the time I'd made other changes that really were very necessary, the ending I wrote originally didn’t work. The ending it has now is actually the third ending written, I think. Those last two chapters changed A LOT.

 
How many books long will the Progenitor Saga be?
Originally, I’d planned five main novel-length books. It may stretch slightly longer, but no more than seven. But they’re long, and it takes a while to write them, so I also plan to release collections of related short stories and novellas in between the novels. The shorts are about secondary characters, or side events, or past events and will all stand alone. The first collection, Ignition Point, is already out. In fact, readers responded so well to one of the characters in Ignition Point that I’ve written him into the second book. So, if you read it…yes, Ghost does return!
 

 
 
a Rafflecopter giveaway


1 comment:

Subscribe

Popular Posts

About Me

My photo
Favorite quote: Eew a box!
email: analaskangirl@gmail.com

Goodreads

Monica Millard's books on Goodreads
Children of the Gods Children of the Gods (Chosen, #1)
reviews: 34
ratings: 44 (avg rating 3.91)

Chosen - A Children of the Gods Short Story Chosen - A Children of the Gods Short Story
reviews: 4
ratings: 17 (avg rating 3.47)

The Fall The Fall
reviews: 7
ratings: 6 (avg rating 4.83)

Monica's bookshelf: read

Darkhouse
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
Rebellion
Blood and Feathers
The Rithmatist
Forbidden Blood
Last Blood
Out for Blood
Bad Blood
Flesh and Blood
Blood Rights
Girl Parts


Monica Millard's favorite books »

Search This Blog

Followers

Follow Me with bloglovin

Follow on Bloglovin

Networked blog