Tag Archives: dana claire

Love and Monsters, exploring Hunterlore with Dana Claire

October 2024

Welcome to October’s newsletter. If you showed up by accident but want to receive monthly content, please subscribe below:

In this month’s newsletter, scroll down to find:

  • Release Countdown: Le Tournoi des Reines
  • Some Lovely Updates
  • Podcast: Author Nook with Dana Claire
  • Captain’s Log: Touching the Sky
  • Review Corner

Release Countdown

In less than one week, Le Tournoi des Reines hits the shelves!
November 6th, 2024! I. Am. Buzzing!

You can preorder your copy here, and if you want to purchase a limited edition box set, you can do that here. Along with the novel, the box set includes: writing paper, envelopes, seals to close envelopes, a box-shaped necklace to hide secrets, a reading ring, and a hand-sewn book cover. It’s such a stunning gift set, and it is so perfect for my letter-writing realm-crossing lovers!

I’m beyond excited to see my baby become bilingual, and as a language nerd I adored the process of finding French words to replace some of my Queendom’s vocabulary.

Maïlys, the editor I had the privilege of working with at Lux et Nox, went above and beyond looking into French etymology and historical word usage to make sure we found all the best terms.

Here are some lovely reviews the French edition is already receiving:

Some Lovely Updates

When it rains, it certainly does pour, and I’ve had so many wonderful things happen for this series in my birth month! For starters, my silver IPPY medal arrived for Queen’s Catacombs: Fiction – Best Series.

If that wasn’t warm-fuzzy enducing enough, I was also on the front page of the Waiheke Weekender paper and featured in a three-page spread! Waiheke is where I did most of my growing up and did most of my daydreaming, so it was incredibly special to be interviewed and featured by a home-town local! Also, if you scroll across, you’ll catch a glimpse of little me.

Author Nook with Dana Claire

Welcome to my Author Nook, a monthly podcast I created where I chat with authors about their upcoming releases and we nerd out over their literary brain children. Find it on Spotify here, and Youtube here.

This month’s author nook we are embracing the spook and are well on theme with a talk all about werewolves and loving the monster (hunter). Join me with a cup of tea and some silver bullets as I talk with Dana Claire about her thrilling sequel, Hunterlore – the continuation of Hunterland.

If you haven’t read Hunterland, or haven’t seen our Hunterland chat, jump over to our previous chat:  Wayward Monsters and Loving the Hunter.

And if you missed our worldbuilding chat with Aamna Qureshi and Brandie June, you can watch that here: Who Run the Worlds Author Talk.

Get your copy here

Hunterlore

Silver bullets aren’t enough to protect your heart.

For Liam Hunter, monster hunting is a way of life—a family tradition passed down for generations. But when campers are murdered in the woods, their hearts ripped from their chests, Liam finds himself facing his most terrifying adversary yet—his own mother turned monster. Her pack of werewolves will test Liam’s limits, and his connection with the girl who still has too large a claim on his heart.

Olivia Davis is determined to uncover her own place in Hunterland and hone her newfound abilities. But when Olivia has a terrifying vision, she’s faced with a much larger uncertainty: her feelings for the boy she let slip through her fingers.

Together, Olivia and Liam must survive the deadly game of cat and mouse, or else risk becoming victims in a world where the monsters are the hunters. The clock is ticking. The game is on. And the price of failure may be their humanity.

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Captain’s Log: Touching the Sky

Airborne for my Birthday

🎈

I find myself without words for this one. If you’ve read my books, you know how important hot air balloons are in the series, and I even have one inked on my body.

Hot air balloons are magic made real. Harnessing the concept of “hot air rises” we, as a species, have found a way to float among the clouds on wind currents. With no way to steer, no way to stop, and only the hope that you have enough gas in the tank to boost you out of a pickle. It takes a certain kind of pilot with a nose for thermals to make a flight look easy.

I was in heaven. And in love, but that’s something more wonderful entirely 😉

Island Retreat

Passing through Snug Cove (real place name) on Bowen Island, my mum and I went to Nectar Yoga for a retreat all about reducing stress and avoiding burnout hosted by the wonderful Bryony White of SlowBurn Wellness. In a word: stunning. The highlights included:

  • time with my mum
  • outside shower (nothing like going buck in the wild)
  • the barn owl that supervised our last yoga session
  • the food

Also, this poem by Mollie Bylett:

And just like the moon
You will go through phases
of light
of dark
And everything in between
And though you may not always appear with the same brightness
You are always
Always
Whole

Review Corner

Reviews are so helpful in getting word of Contest of Queens and Queen’s Catacombs out there. If you have time, and if you’ve read the book, I would be eternally grateful if you could leave a star rating and/or a written review on Goodreads or Amazon.

Thank you to all the wonderful people who have left a star rating or review!

x live magically

Wayward Monsters and Loving the Hunter: an interview with Dana Claire

February 2023

It may be the shortest month, but we have a lot to cover! In this month’s newsletter, scroll down to find:

  • Join the Frean Chronicles book tour
  • Author Spotlight with Dana Claire
  • CamCat Unwrapped Podcast Interview for Contest of Queens
  • Travel Log: Castle Research and Burns Night
  • Guest Post on Madison Lawson’s Blog
  • The Frean Chronicles is going on tour (and you can join!)
  • Queen’s Catacombs Preorder
  • Contest of Queens Review Corner

Join the Frean Chronicles Book Tour!

In honor of the Queen’s Catacombs release, both books are going on tour with ireadbooktours. It will run from March 14th to April 10th 2023, and there’s still spots available, so if you are a book reviewer, have a book blog, or a bookstagram/booktok account jump aboard while you can!

Author Spotlight: Dana Claire

Grab your stakes and your rock salt. Monster hunting class is in session.

Happy love month one and all and welcome to February’s Book Nook where I have the privilege of interviewing one of my favourite humans, Dana Claire, award-winning and Amazon best-selling author of War of the Sea, The Reclaimed Kingdom, The Blood-Light Trilogy, Sideliners, and Hunterland. The topic of today’s chat is her recent release, the Supernatural/Buffy lovechild, HUNTERLAND. So pour yourself a glass of rose and leave all the lights on, we’re going to talk about love and monsters.

Get your copy here

Hunterland

Monsters? Easy. Falling in love? That could be deadly.

Liam Hunter has warded off hungry vampires, slayed monstrous beasts, and put agonized spirits to rest since he could hold a stake. When trouble comes through the Hunterland message board, alerting them that nurses are dying at high schools across Wisconsin in a string of fishy “suicides,” the Hunter family hits the road to save the day.

The trail leads to Falkville Falls, where Liam clashes with Olivia Davis, whose maddening family seems inexplicably embroiled in this haunting mess. Olivia has always mothered her little sister, Pepper. But when the Hunter family opens her eyes to the hidden underworld of real monsters prowling the dark, she realizes she can’t protect Pepper from this newest threat by herself. Can the two families work together to uncover who or what is responsible before the next murder, or will this vicious death cycle have no end?

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Podcast Feature: CamCat Unwrapped

To celebrate Contest of Queens coming out in paperback AND it’s one year anniversary, CamCat had the entire audiobook on their Spotify CamCat Unwrapped. The first two chapters remain forever more (woohoo!) so you can check those out here, as does my interview with Jess which you can listen to here:

CamCat Unwrapped

Travel Log: Castle Research and Burns Night

Short story long,

I have taken a sabbatical from my day job as a Speech Language Pathologist to live in the UK and finish the Frean Chronicles Trilogy!

  1. Contest of Queens: completed!
  2. Queen’s Catacombs: comes out March 14th 2023! (preorder here)
  3. Mysteriously Titled Finale: in progress!

If you’re interested in following along on my travel journey, I recommend following me on Instagram: @jordanhbartlett

Castle Research

Sometimes you can feel like you’re in the right place at the right time, and this time I was in the right place twice. I met the loveliest humans, Natalie and Andrea while working at the Harry Potter shop and we ended up going out for drinks after I finished my shift. They’re both from the States, so I took them to my favourite place in Edinburgh for fish ‘n’ chips- The Old Chain Pier. We had a lovely evening, said our goodbyes, exchanged Instagrams, and went on our merry way.

Two days later, I take myself on a wee field trip to Linlithgow Palace and Blackness Castle. Of all the castles in all the countries in all the world and guess who shows up in this one? Natalie and Andrea of course! So I then proceed to get willingly kidnapped for the rest of the afternoon and we visit the Kelpies and wander the graveyard in Stirling, and I even eat pidgeon for the first time for dinner.

Serendipity, I have found thy definition!

Burns Night

If you’re like me, you likely didn’t know what Burns Night is, but it’s a celebration that happens every year on January 25th in Scotland in honor of Robert Burns, a poet who contributed to Scottish culture in a rich and beautiful way. His better known works are: Auld Lang Syne, Address to a Haggis, and My Love is Like a Red Red Rose.

I was very fortunate to get to celebrate Burns night right! I kicked the evening off with a special poetry-reading tour of the Real Mary King’s Close and then had Haggis (complete with Address to a Haggis recitation).

Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face,
Great Chieftain o’ the Puddin-race!
Aboon them a’ ye tak your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm:
Weel are ye wordy of a grace
As lang ‘s my arm.

Guest Post with Madison Lawson

I wrote a feature post for Madison Lawson’s blog recently (author of The Registration). Jump on over to her page here to read it.

GUEST POST: Jordan H. Bartlett

Queen’s Catacombs Preorder

March 14th, 2023 is the date to remember not only because it is PI day, but it is ALSO the day QUEEN’S CATACOMBS officially hits the shelves. I am so excited to share this with you, so if you are the pre-ordering kind of person, you can do so now!

Pre-order your copy here

Add it to your GoodReads, add it to your Amazon wishlist, add it to your diary, add it to Santa’s list, and I know I will be hard pressed not to add it to my arm in ink… (we’ll see). Here’s a recent review:

Contest of Queens Review Corner

Reviews are so helpful in getting word of Contest of Queens out there. If you have time, and if you’ve read the book, I would be eternally grateful if you could leave a star rating and/or a written review on Goodreads or Amazon.

Thank you to all the wonderful people who have left a star rating or review. I honestly can’t believe that it’s got an average of 4.6/5 stars on Goodreads, and 4.9/5 stars on Amazon! Here’s a lovely review:

x live magically