This is my stop during the blog tour for The Lily Singer Adventures by Lydia Sherrer. This blog tour is organized by Lola's Blog Tours. The blog tour runs from 28 April till 14 May, you can view the tour schedule
here.
This series contains 4 books at this moment with more planned. On 28 April 2017 the latest two books released: Love, Lies and Hocus Pocus Allies and Love, Lies and Hocus Pocus Legends.
Love, Lies and Hocus Pocus: Beginnings (The Lily Singer Adventures #1)
By Lydia Sherrer
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Age category: Young Adult/ New Adult/ Adult
Blurb:
Saving the world is such a bother when it makes you late for tea.
By day, book-loving wizard Lily Singer manages library archives. By night? She sleeps, of course. In between, she studies magic and tries to keep her witch friend Sebastian out of trouble. Much to her displeasure, he finds it anyway and drags her along with him.
From unmaking ancient curses to rescuing a town lost in time, Lily and Sebastian fight to avert magical mayhem. Meanwhile, Lily's mysterious past begins to unfold--a past hidden from her by those she trusts most. Will she be able to discover the truth despite them?
Beginnings is the first installment of the Lily Singer Adventures urban fantasy series. Full of unexpected twists and snarky humor, this story has been known to cause: loud snorts of laughter, inexplicable craving for tea, and loss of work productivity. If you enjoy magic-filled adventures like Harry Potter and Sabrina the Teenage Witch then you'll love Lydia Sherrer's delightful new series.
You can find Love, Lies and Hocus Pocus: Beginnings on
Goodreads
You can buy Love, Lies and Hocus Pocus: Beginnings on
Amazon
Love, Lies and Hocus Pocus: Beginnings is part of Kindle Unlimited.
Later Books in this series
Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus: Revelations (The Lily Singer Adventures #2)
Modern-day wizard Lily Singer prefers to stay in her library, studying magic and drinking tea. But when her cat starts talking back and she discovers a plot to steal a powerful artifact, Lily’s chances of peace and quiet are slim. Her past is riddled with dangerous secrets. Will discovering the truth reveal her future, or doom it?
Links:
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Goodreads
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Amazon
Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus: Allies (The Lily Singer Adventures #3)
What’s worse than fighting with allies? Fighting without them. To stop her father’s evil plans, wizard and archivist Lily Singer must reconcile old grudges, make questionable allies, and bend the law to fix a problem that's not even her fault. Can she and her friends work together to save the day? Or will they let their differences divide them?
Links:
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Goodreads
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Amazon
Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus: Legends (The Lily Singer Adventures #4)
Troublemaking witch friend and talking cat in tow, Lily Singer must pursue her father to England as he seeks to discover an ancient evil and steal its power for himself. But with a queen of the fae after the same thing, Sebastian’s past comes back to haunt him and the three friends have to think fast and act faster to defeat legends that are, unfortunately, no longer in the past.
Links:
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Goodreads
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Amazon
All four books in
The Lily Singer Adventures series are part of Kindle Unlimited.
Episode 2, Chapter 1: The Uses of Moldy Pizza
Though not the most aesthetically pleasing or comfortable place to read, the Basement was nonetheless Lily Singer’s favorite. Hidden beneath the McCain Library of Agnes Scott College, this secret archive of wizardry and occult books lacked beams of sunlight to bask in, warm, fuzzy cats to pet, and a kitchen in which to make scones and tea—all delightful things, but distracting nonetheless. The Basement was silent as a grave and blessedly cool in the heat of the Atlanta summer. This peace and quiet, not to mention the plethora of magical wards, made it an ideal location for reading, studying, and practicing magic undisturbed.
She’d filled it with the comforts of home, of course. Being the archives manager of the library above and curator of the Basement’s secrets, she had exclusive authority over its interior decoration. When her predecessor, Madam Barrington, had been its keeper, it had contained minimal decoration and only a few hardwood chairs—a reflection of her mentor’s austere nature. Nothing had changed when Madam Barrington took on Lily as a student to teach her wizardry. That had been seven years ago during Lily’s freshman year at Agnes Scott. It wasn’t until her mentor had retired last year and left the Basement in her care that Lily took steps to make it a bit more welcoming.
First, she’d brightened the place up by renewing the light spells on the dozen dimmu-engraved glass balls hanging from the ceiling. No outlets or electrical wiring graced the Basement, since the whole thing had been magically created from a broom closet during the original 1936 construction of McCain Library—known then as the Carnegie Library. It had the advantage of being accessible only to wizards, and only to those who knew the access spell. Not that the Basement was much of a secret. Madam Barrington had said the Basement was frequented by numerous wizards at one point in time. But that must have been long ago, since Lily had only ever seen one other person there besides herself and her mentor. It seemed the Basement was protected by simple virtue of being forgotten.
With that in mind, she doubted anyone would ever see, or care, about her improvements, from hanging art on the walls to enchanting the dull ceiling to resemble the rib-vaulted heights of the library above. She’d added several small tables to display various magical knickknacks previously hidden away in drawers. There were items like a delicate antique engraver made entirely of spun lead except for its diamond tip, used to carve magical runes of power—dimmu runes—into any surface. Then there were the all-speak glasses, enchanted to translate any text into English for whoever was wearing them. Though quite useful, their creator must have had coprolalia, because the glasses had an annoying tendency to add random swear words to the translation.
As for other furniture, she’d left the large oak worktable, but the hardwood chairs had been relegated to stepping stools and replaced by several tastefully upholstered chintz chairs. How she’d managed to single-handedly maneuver those things down the archive steps, through the broom closet, and into the Basement, she had no idea. But she’d done it. Overall, the room’s ambiance was much improved. It had become an island of peace in a world annoyingly full of people who, oddly enough, wanted to interact with her.
Thus it was quite shocking when her cell phone rang that Saturday afternoon. She was ensconced in a chintz chair, studying one of the books Sebastian had given her from Francis Jackson’s estate. Not only was she underground—her cell barely got signal in the archive room next door—but the magical nature of the Basement completely scrambled electronic signals of any kind. After the first few seconds of shock wore off, she recognized the jaunty jingle of the 1960s theme song from Bewitched.
Lily rolled her eyes and sighed. If anyone could manage to call her underground in a signal blackout zone, it would be Sebastian. Leave it to him to disturb her peace. Being a witch, and a good one at that, he usually found a way.
About the Author:
Author of the Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus magical adventure series, Lydia Sherrer is a fantasy author whose goal is to leave this world a better place than when she found it. With an urban fantasy series, multiple short stories and a novella under her belt, Lydia has been writing for over a decade and enjoys nothing more than a good book, a cup of tea, and a comfy chair in the sunshine. When not writing she loves to play her ocarina (think Zelda), and also enjoys traditional archery, cosplay, larping, and art.
Growing up in rural Kentucky, she was thoroughly corrupted by a deep love for its rolling countryside, despite the mosquitoes and hay fever. She was instilled with a craving for literature early on, and her parents had to wrestle books away from her at the dinner table. Though she graduated with a dual BA in Chinese and Arabic, having traveled the world she came home and decided to stay there. She currently resides in Louisville, KY with her loving and supportive husband, and their very vocal cat.
You can find and contact Lydia Sherrer here:
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Website
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Facebook
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Twitter
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Goodreads
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Amazon
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Youtube
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Instagram
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Newsletter
Interview with Lydia Sherrer
I'm going to pick the most recent book, Book 4: Legends for these questions
1. What is your favorite part of this book and why?
My favorite part was the interlude where my characters finally get to go to Melthalin, the fae realm. It was such a joy and challenge to create this part of my world, and I only wish I could make appear in my readers' minds the beautiful scenes and majesty of that world that I saw in my mind. I don't want to spoil it, but I'll say one word: bioluminesence.
2. If you could spend time with a character from your book whom would it be? And what would you do during that day?
So even though I would like to pretend otherwise, I am just going to have to admit it and say I am a sucker for Sebastian, and would love to hang out with the reprobate. I think I would ask him what HE considered a good time, and then decide if it was legal enough for me to do in good conscience, and then go have an adventure for the day! Who knows what we would get up to.
3. If you could have been the author of any book ever written, which book would you choose?
Now that is a dangerous question. After all, don't we all wish we were our heroes, that we were famous? Rather, I'll say what author I hope to equal someday, or perhaps not equal, because I don't even though if that is possible, but perhaps impact and bring joy to as many people. I have such a mad respect for Tolkien and his work, the decades upon decades he spent building his world with such love and imagination. It is something I hope I can one day manage, in my own unique way. We shall see.
4. Are your characters based off real people or did they all come entirely from your imagination?
All of my characters contain elements of the people I know and love, because those are the personalities, the quirks, the loves and hates and emotional maps that I know best, and can write about most authentically. None of them are any one person, though some of them are more heavily and purposefully like people I know than others. Writers write best what they know, and any book you read, there is some part of it that is connected to something the author knows and loves.
5. What made you want to become a writer?
The books that I've read have made me want to write (Tolkien, Lewis, Rowling, Pratchett, Robin McKinley, Orson Scott Card, Tamora Pierce, among many others). The joy, inspiration, hope, tragedy, and meaning I've found in countless stories has made me want to do my small part to add to that great cloud of witnesses. They testify to the beauty in our world and the glory we have, and are, as children made in the image of a storytelling creator.
Giveaway
There is a tour wide giveaway for the blog tour of The Lily Singer Adventures. These are the prizes you can win:
- 1st place is signed paperback copies of The Lily Singer Adventures Books 1 & 2 and ebook copies of Books 3 & 4 (US only)
- 2nd place is ebook copies of The Lily Singer Adventures Books 1-4 (open world-wide)
- 3rd place is ebook copies of The Lily Singer Adventures Books 1-2 (open world-wide)
For a chance to win, enter the rafflecopter below:
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Eric Schumacher was born in Los Angeles in 1968 and currently resides in Santa Barbara, CA with his wife, two children and dog. He is the author of two historical fiction novels, God’s Hammer and its sequel, Raven’s Feast. Both tell the story of the first Christian king of Viking Norway, Hakon Haraldsson, and his struggles to gain and hold the High Seat of his realm.
