The Elf Queen, a paranormal romance from Lyndi Alexander

Today we are excited to share Lyndi Alexander’s The Elf Queen. The Elf Queen is the first book in Lyndi’s The Clan Elves of the Bitterroot series. Welcome, Lyndi! We are excited to have you join us again and we all can not wait to hear more about The Elf Queen.

Mystery in the Mountains—the Clan Elves of the Bitterroot

When I was first married, and expecting, back in the late 1970s, my then-husband decided we should move to Missoula, Montana, to live near his sister, where he could find work. I didn’t have anything going that would contradict the move, so there we went. And thus began my love for the Bitterroot Mountains.

I have since written five books set in the area around Missoula and Kalispell, one a romantic suspense titled TENDER MISDEMEANORS, and the Clan Elves of the Bitterroot series. The mountains are beautiful and mysterious, while the local area is comprised of an interesting mix of college folk, independent ranchers, granola-loving, tree-hugging types, and even militia/Second Amendment wavers.

The Clan Elves of the Bitterroot series begins with The Elf Queen, which tells the story of Jelani Marsh, a college dropout and barista who finds a glass slipper on the sidewalk. On a friend’s dare, she tries it on. It breaks and from the edges of the broken glass, mixed with her blood, a horde of small men appear and run off into the shadows. This begins a tale of Jelani’s unraveling a mystery about her forester father, her absent mother and a clandestine clan of wood elves who live in the Bitterroot forests. Her close friends—a counselor, a computer geek invested in World of Warcraft and his roommate, an agoraphobic former foster child—help her solve the mystery and find her destiny, as well as her true love.

About The Elf Queen:

Jelani Marsh finds a glass slipper on the city sidewalk and tries it on for laughs. The slipper shatters, slicing her foot, and dozens of tiny men scatter from the bloody remains. A moment later, her foot is miraculously healed and they’re gone.
This is the first in a series of meetings that will unravel everything she knows. In the following weeks, the sassy barista from Missoula, Montana, will learn she is not an orphan, as she’d been taught to believe, and that her life story has been a deception, right down to the circumstances of her birth. A menace arises from her family’s past that could threaten everything she holds dear, including her own life.

Two groups help untangle the mystery: her human friends—life skills coach Iris Pallaton, computer geek and gamer extraordinaire Lane Donatelli, and “Crispy” Mendell, an agoraphobic abuse survivor—and her new-found elf companions, Daven Talvi and Astan Hawk. Can she learn about her true roots and absorb the implications of her new life in time to save her friends, her family, herself?

This urban fantasy, released in July 2010 by Dragonfly Publishing, Inc., can be ordered in hardback and paperback from your local bookstore, or in ebook format online.

The Elf Queen Amazon Buy Link:

Excerpt from The Elf Queen:

Jelani climbed the narrow wooden stairs of the old storefront, frowning as the bare light bulb overhead flashed and threatened to go out. The air held faint traces of the smell of a cooked dish that teased her mind, not clear enough to identify. Or maybe she was just too distracted. The scene from the sidewalk that morning remained a blur in her head, even when she’d watched it again on Iris’ cell. What the hell had happened? Where did those….people…go? Why did her foot heal? And…?
Maybe now she’d get some answers.
The light flickered, intermittently illuminating cobwebs along the ceiling, thick with dust. She knocked once, paused, knocked two times, paused and then knocked once more. Though she could hear noise inside, she knew no one would answer without the Code. When no one answered anyway, she leaned close to the unmarked wooden door, its paint tiredly starting to peel. “Come on, you guys, it’s Jelani! Open up!”
The door opened a crack; a narrow slice of pale face appeared between the door and frame.
“About time, Crispy.” Jelani waited with annoyance as the chain slid back, then stepped inside when the door creaked open. The door was shut close behind her.
“You can never be too careful,” said the skinny little man. He brushed thick, dark bangs out of his face and shuffled past her up the hallway. One foot dragged a little as he walked, Jelani had never heard why. They just all knew that Ron “Crispy” Mendell had done too many drugs in his misguided youth.
Jelani followed him through the hall’s dim light toward the main room, from whence the sound of heavy metal music emanated. Peering around the corner into the living room, she eyed the Cave.
Built from computer towers, monitors, data storage bins, file cabinets and dozens of empty Twinkie cartons, the Cave was the place from which Crispy’s roommate Delano Donatelli viewed the world. He currently had four computer screens active, rotating on his wheeled desk chair to access them in random order.
Crispy retreated into the kitchen. Jelani followed him. He mumbled something and she leaned close to hear what he was saying. “Watch out for the camera,” he muttered.
“What camera?”
“He got a webcam. The government can hear us now.” Crispy scowled.
“The government can’t hear us just because I have a webcam,” the man everyone called Lane scolded from the other room. His tone made it clear it was not the first time he’d said it, and it wouldn’t be the last.
Crispy shook his head as he placed the tea kettle on the fire. “We’re doomed.”

Lyndi Alexander’s Social Media Links:

Lyndi Alexander always dreamed of faraway worlds and interesting alien contacts. She lives as a post-modern hippie in Asheville, North Carolina, a single mother of her last child of seven, a daughter on the autism spectrum, finding that every day feels a lot like first contact with a new species.

 

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