Splintered Realms
L.A. Myles
(Doorways, #1)
Publication date: July 20th 2024
Genres: Fantasy, New Adult
College is everything art student Taylen dreamed it would be. But her first trip home doesn’t end with her mom’s homemade brownies. Instead, she’s hurled into a strange medieval land where a woman without family has no say. Desperate to get back to her world, she’ll have to find others she can trust if she hopes to find a way home.
But trust isn’t easy to find. Surrounded by accusations of espionage, kidnapping, murder, and refusing to become chattel, Taylen discovers she has the unique ability to see the doorways between realms. Leaving the Realm of Men behind, she enters the land of the fae-like Ays Shee. They can get her home, but first she must help them solve the mystery of what’s dissolving the barrier between realms before it rips the world apart, and Taylen with it.
—
EXCERPT:
A curve in the road revealed hills covered with vineyards. The vines were mid-transformation, changing from their summer green to fall’s stunning array of deep golds and burnt reds.
“Now I’m in the vineyards.” Taylen sighed.
The road opened out, the trees moving away from the asphalt and stench of exhaust to perch atop hills or slip down their sides. They hovered in sparse clusters among the vineyards, distant reflections of the road-scape she’d just left.
“If you keep your pace,” Mom said, her voice warm with delight, “you’ll arrive the same time the brownies are coming out of the oven.”
“You made brownies?”
“Of course.” Mom laughed. “It’s been two months. You must be going through brownie withdrawal by now.”
“How’d you guess?” Taylen grinned.
The sun sank toward the hills on her left, coloring the few clouds in the sky with luminescent oranges and reds. Sunsets, like sunrises, were the best parts of the day. They were magical, a time in flux in which one thing merged into the next.
She glanced down to switch on her headlights. The glint of sunlight off the chrome trim running along the edge of her windshield caught her eye.
“Well—” The line in her ears went dead.
“Mom?” Her gaze flicked back up. The lights clicked on first in the dash, then on the tree ahead of her.
Tree!
She swerved right. More trees blocked her path. She flung the steering wheel left to avoid another, veering between tree after tree while careening through a brightly lit forest. Bushes broke and cracked under and against her car, creating a cacophony of breaking wood and screeching metal. The car bounced and jarred her to either side, the seatbelt catching her with bruising force.
Another tree appeared in her path, this one fallen over. She cursed and stomped on the brakes. The car spun left. A jarring thump and a loud bang signaled a back tire blowing out. A branch slammed into her windshield, cracking it.
She screamed as another branch shattered her passenger window when the car lurched sideways. A clearing in the trees beckoned ahead of her, then it was behind her, and a sickening weightlessness lifted her off the seat.
She had a moment to take in the view. A forest stretched out in all directions from around a large pear-shaped lake, its surface a dark reflective gray sheet. Gravity reclaimed her and her car, and she plunged toward the water below. Her shriek ripped through the air.
Author Bio:
L.A. is a fantasy fiction author. She scribes epic fantasies filled with adventure, mythical creatures, struggle, and the magic that can come from strong friendships, especially between females. Characters going through proverbial hell as they come into their personal power resonate the most with her and are what she writes.
For her, stories always arrive first as a single clear snapshot. Usually, the image is of a pivotal moment. After that, it’s like a portal has opened and L.A. is the conduit the story flows through, as opposed to the conductor of the tale. It often makes writing as exciting as reading.
After decades of migrating from one US coast to another and then abroad, L.A. has settled in the Pacific Northwest, U.S.A. with a couple of high-powered kids, a husband, two cats, chickens, and a flock of wild turkeys that have decided to make the family’s property theirs.
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