The Black Shard and giveaway

The Black Shard by Victoria Simcox

A little about the book; it is 255 pages long with 1-2 pictures per chapter. It's listed a middle-grade read, ages 9-13.

The Black Shard, Victoria Simcox’s fast-paced, intricately woven sequel to The Magic Warble, takes Kristina Kingsly and her schoolmates back to Bernovem … and into a thrilling, often dangerous adventure.

Kristina’s stay at summer horse camp is horrible to say the least, and it’s all because Hester and Davina are there as well, making her life miserable. When Hester’s cruel prank goes terribly wrong, it’s actually what sends the three girls back to the magical land of Bernovem. In Bernovem, Kristina is very excited to see her former friend, Prince Werrien. When he invites her to sail with him on his ship to his homeland Tezerel, putting it simply, Kristina can’t refuse.

Reunited with her gnome, dwarf, animal, fairy friends … and best of all, Werrien, things seem like they couldn’t get any better for Kristina. But when Werrien becomes fascinated with an unusual seeing stone, the “Black Shard”, Kristina is haunted by a ghostlike old hag. Struggling against suspicion, guilt, illness, and ultimately the one who wants to possess her soul, Kristina will see it’s in her weakest moment that she will encounter more strength than she has ever known.

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Victoria Simcox Bio

Victoria was born in Scarborough, Ontario, Canada, to an Austrian immigrant mother, and a Dutch immigrant father. She now lives in Western Washington with her husband, Russ and their three children, Toby, Kristina, and William. Her other family members are a Chihuahua, named Pipsy and two cats, named Frodo and Fritz. Besides being an author, Victoria is a home-schooling mother of twelve years and an elementary school art teacher of eleven years. In her spare time, Victoria enjoys managing her two older children's Celtic band. She also loves writing, reading, painting watercolors, hiking, good movies, and just simply hanging out with her family and friends. 

I picked Victoria's brain with a few questions, for all you readers, here are her answers:

SBB: What gave you the idea for a fantasy book like The Magic Warble and The Black Shard?

     VS: I remember I was sitting in the movie theater watching the first Harry Potter movie when I envisioned my main character Kristina walking down a snowy sidewalk. At the time that was all of story I had. I went home that night and wrote my first page not knowing where the story would go.

SBB: If/When you have writers block what do you do?

   VS: I used to get writer's block, but then I realized it came to me when I got too stressed out and felt like I was pressured to write. I had to remind myself why I started writing to begin with—because I enjoyed it, not because I had to; then I relaxed. If you are an aspiring author and going through writer's block and feeling like there's nothing you can come up with to write about, or your imagination has run dry, then take a day off—go see a flick, or do something you enjoy to relax. You'll be surprised how ideas come to you when you're in a happy relaxed state of mind.

SBB: Are some characters harder to write than others?

   VS: No, I have a vivid picture of my characters in my head which makes it not to difficult for me to form their personalities. I think I draw a lot from people in my life. But I create a character from different character traits of more than 1 person.

SBB: If you could meet any person dead or alive...who would it be?

    VS: C.S Lewis: His Chronicles of Narnia have been such an inspiration to me. It would be so cool, say for instance to have lunch with him and pick his brain on how he came up with his beloved stories.

SBB: What do you prefer coffee, tea, soda, water...

    VS: I prefer coffee to tea and I admit I'm pretty religious about having my coffee each morning and afternoon. I try not to drink soda other than when I go out to eat or to a movie, then I always have a diet coke. Eight glasses of water is my daily goal though I rarely meet that goal it's more like 4 if that.

The Black Shard website

~*~*~*~Check out Victoria's Blog ~*~*~*~

Victoria is giving away the ebook copies of The Black Shard 

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Read the first book The Magic Warble

The Magic Warble website