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My #atozchallenge Theme : Featuring Indie Authors this April

What is Your #atozchallenge Theme ?

What is Your #atozchallenge Theme ?

Mina Lobo and David Macaulay have come up with The Big Reveal bloghop to celebrate the mother of all bloghops, the Blogging from A to Z April Challenge, and as a co-host of said challenge, I’m thrilled to take part.

This bloghop is for participants in the challenge, and if you haven’t signed up yet, what are you waiting for? This challenge will change your blog for the better, for all years to come. I should know, because that is what the A to Z Challenge did for this blog and Amlokiblogs.

As readers of this blog will tell you, I’m not a prolific blogger, and not that great at commenting either. Apart from the fact that our blogging community is very generous, the fact that I have blog-friends who visit both this blog and Amlokiblogs is due to the A to Z Challenge, and the awesome people I got to know through it.

For my A to Z Challenge on this blog I’ll feature mostly indie-published book excerpts for the 26 days of April. I love reading, and supporting author-friends, and this is a good way to do both.

Today, as a precursor, or foretaste, of my A to Z Challenge posts in April, I give you The Fall of Onagros, Book 1 of SAGE by Marian Allen.

The Fall of Ongaros Sage Marian Allen

The Fall of Ongaros by Marian Allen

Blurb (since this is a series): Usurper. Lost Heir. Runaway bride. Land on the brink of civil war. All so familiar, until Tortoise — the Divine Creature who ignores the rules of right and wrong — challenges his fellow divinities to meddle.

Suddenly, children targeted for murder are adopted, swordsmen turn into blacksmiths, and none are reliably who or what they seem. The four Divine Animals are afoot: Tortoise, Dragon, Unicorn, and Phoenix. Hold on tight.
Book 1: The Fall of Onagros
In the first book of the SAGE trilogy, a legacy is lost, a woman vanishes into thin air, wisdom is found in unexpected places, and a man hopes to defeat a tyrant with tall tales and gossip.
—–
Excerpt: They were shouting, intent upon it, so they heard no one approach. The door was only on the latch. It opened softly, and three armed Swords came in. Without a word, they drew their weapons.
“Put up your swords,” Karol commanded. “What do you want? How dare you walk –”
Cameron blocked the first cut with a chair, and knocked the second aside with a fist to the Sword’s forearm.
“Put up your weapons!” Karol shouted. “This man is not to be harmed!”
“We don’t answer to you,” said one of the Swords, “but to Landry Oliva, Kinninger by right of merit.”
“Go back to Landry Oliva and tell him I’m coming. I expect a thorough explanation – Stand back! What are you doing?”
“They’re assassins, you fool!” cried Cameron. “Run!”

Buy the The Fall of Onagros, Book 1 of SAGE on Smashwords and Amazon. I’ve already got my copy and am losing myself in Allen’s wonderful world.

Marian Allen

Marian Allen

Marian Allen‘s writing reflects her love of network. She tries to remember, in her books and stories, that no one exists in total isolation, but in a web of connections to family, friends, colleagues, self at former stages of maturity, perceptions and self-images. Most of her work is fantasy, science fiction and/or mystery, though she writes horror, humor, romance, mainstream or anything else that suits the story and character. Feel free to connect her on her Twitter feed or her Facebook Author Page.

Are you taking part in the A to Z Challenge this April? What is Your A to Z April Blogging Challenge Theme? What work by Indie Authors have you read? Any favorites?

Damyanti Biswas

Damyanti Biswas is the author of You Beneath Your Skin and numerous short stories that have been published in magazines and anthologies in the US, the UK, and Asia. She has been shortlisted for Best Small Fictions and Bath Novel Awards and is co-editor of the Forge Literary Magazine. Her literary crime thriller series, the Blue Mumbai, is represented by Lucienne Diver from The Knight Agency. Both The Blue Bar and The Blue Monsoon were published in 2023.

I appreciate comments, and I always visit back. If you're having trouble commenting, let me know via the contact form, or tweet me up @damyantig !

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27 Comments

  • Ida says:

    Yay an A-Z of independent writers. I have really enjoyed reading indy books on my kindle this year. This is my first A-Z challenge, but I’m beginning to see the real challenge is going to be resting my eyes between reading all these fabulous posts.

  • cariwiese says:

    Great idea, I like it! Thank you for following my blog!

  • KayEm says:

    Visited the sneak peak blog expecting the themes to be revealed and all in one place. Great idea but right now they haven’t been revealed although we have links to participants’ blogs.

    Marian Allen’s tortoise is right to dare us to meddle. So many of us have sat on the fence for too long. Should be an interesting read.

  • A great theme as well as a wonderful way in which to support fellow bloggers!

  • minalobo says:

    I’m pretty sure I told you before how cool it is that you’re using A to Z to promote others’ work, but I’ll add to that: YOU’RE THE COOLEST!!! 🙂

  • Jai says:

    What a wonderful idea. The TBR pile will be growing.

  • Sweet! I’m looking forward to finding some new books to read. (This logged me on through wordpress which leads to my website, but I’ll be blogging A to Z on my blog– charitywrites.blogspot.)

    • marianallen says:

      Thanks, Lyndi! Hope you enjoy the book. I know you’ll enjoy Damyanti’s posts. She’s one of my favorite people!

    • marianallen says:

      Sorry, Charity — I replied to Lyndi’s comment under yours. I’m a writer, man, not a … comment replier…. Okay, that’s nonsense. ANYWAY, I know Damyanti will recommend some wonderful books. I’m just grateful she let me come visit. 🙂

  • Bought this book last weekend and am itching to get at it through deadlines! Congrats, Marian and Damyanti!

  • marianallen says:

    Thank you so much for letting me be a part of your challenge theme! I’m looking forward to discovering new writers and new works. I’m so glad we “met” at a prior A-to-Z Challenge. 🙂 I hope you enjoy the book — the other two books of the series will be out as soon as the covers are finalized.

  • Sounds like a great way to go! I decided to post my long list of promised reviews and have been busy depleting my TBR pile. Both positives!

  • What a great idea! That is such a nice thing and also a great theme. See you at the challenge!

  • Julie says:

    What a wonderful theme for A to Z! See you at the challenge!

  • Vidya Sury says:

    Damyanti – I am so tempted to borrow your theme! I simply love reading random excerpts from books. Mmm. I just wrote my happy-promo post for the A to Z Challenge and I am totally charged over writing the posts. As my head whirls with ideas, I writing everything down – seems like I’ll have blog post ideas for a long long time to come – and that’s what I love about this.

    I look forward to your A to Z posts, Damyanti – I enjoy your writing very much!

  • Jemima Pett says:

    This book looks great! I’ll add it straight to my to-read list! And thank you for honouring me with inclusion in your Challenge for P, Damyanti.

    Jemima at Jemima’s blog

  • You have a cool theme, Damy!