Prince Ivan, A. Wolfe & A Firebird by Eric Alan Westfall ~ Blog Tour & Excerpt
Eric Alan Westfall has a new queer fairy tale out: Prince Ivan, “A. Wolfe & A Firebird.” And there’s a giveaway!
Dear Reader,
What do you get when you combine a greedy Great Tsar, his two cheating, bullying older sons, his youngest esser (shh! no saying that aloud) son, stolen gold apples, a Firebird quest, A. Wolfe who has the power t’assume a pleasing shape, a magickal sandstorm, as well as two bands and a full Symphony of Gipsumies?
A rollicking, roisterous Russian Fairy Tale, with vigorous esser activities in tents, halls, bedrooms and alcoves, with and without the assistance of PSTs. Plus princely parades, a duel over Gus, new lyrics to an old drinking song, and the possibility of bits of blood, gobs of gore or moments of mayhem. As required by CORA (the Code of RFT Authors), should these occur, your author will give you timely warning.
Ah. Still not ready to part with your kopek-equivalent? Consider the fun you’ll have reading chapters like:
- “To Kvetch, Or Not To Kvetch? A Reader’s Choice”
- “Ivan Has A Close Encounter Of The F-Word Kind”
- “Second Direction Questers vs. The Caliph’s Sayer Of Sooths”
- “Will Sasha Succeed In Seducing Prince Ivan?”
- “Bad Prince Ivan! No Touch Cage!”
- “A Travel Pause For Gratuitous Sex In The Tent—Which Does Not Advance The Plot—At The Insistence Of The Characters”
- “A Necessary Interlude To Consider The Age-Old Questing Question: What The [Expletive Of Your Choice, Dear Reader] Do We Do Next?”
If you buy it and try it, you’ll like it, or so says your most talen…er…humble author.
p.s. If Karrie Jax and I have covered you and blurbed you to buy, look for “Dear Reader, Along The Way, Did You Happen To See The Allusion To Olivier?” in the TOC. It’s a spot-the-allusions chance at gift cards of $25, $15, or $10.
166,000 words of story fun and frolic, plus a 2160-word teaser from another MM fairytale: The Tinderbox.
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Giveaway
Eric is giving away a $20 Amazon gift card with this tour. Enter via rafflecopter:
Direct Link: http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/b60e8d47138/?
Exclusive Excerpt
Anatol Takes His Turn Tree-Watching
Anatol had no plan for preventing more apple-depredations, though he had the morning to think of one, and the afternoon to pull the pieces together, before implementing it at nightfall.
He made an Imperial choice. Stealing an idea was far easier than creating one. He would do Vlad’s plan, only right. Without flasks. Even if Father hadn’t noticed the faint flask clink-clank, Anatol had. And the Vlad-servant on Anatol’s payroll later confirmed both four and Moskvaboya.
By late afternoon, Anatol had supervised the servants in setting out a triple row of lanterns, with all the supplies necessary for three re-lightings. Which is to say, he watched them figure out how many were needed for the three around-the-tree circles, far enough out there was no risk of the tree catching fire. Plus figuring the right distance between the circles, so when one was bending, lifting, lighting, and setting down again for the middle circle, one didn’t get one’s bottom burned by the next circle out or in.
It never occurred to the servants—perhaps it never occurred to them—to base their distances on the amount of space taken up by a big-boned middle prince, as opposed to basing distances on underfed, overworked, short, skinny servants like themselves.
Ha! So there, Vlad! was a thought which might have galloped across Anatol’s mind, as he examined the lay-out immediately after all the lanterns in each of the tree-centered circles were lit. Despite having watched all those servants, doing all the work, Anatol was confident he could repeat their efforts one or two times, depending on how long the lanterns lasted, by himself. The work would keep him awake, aware, and apple-alert.
No apples would be taken while he was watching!
When Anatol woke the next morning, slumped against the trunk, he realized an apple-watching truth. A body more used to acceptable aristocratic and/or Imperial activities—including, but not limited to, wining, dining, whoring, wagering, dancing, fencing, fisticuffs, riding, racing, et cetera, plus the occasional brawl with his older brother—wasn’t up to the strain of doing all the work required for lighting and re-lighting, so many, many, many lanterns, all on its own.
Like his brother before him, four apples were missing. Like his brother, he was asleep during the red-gold-white flashes, the fluttering and the flapping. Like his brother, he was upright and fake-alert when the Great Tsar, Vlad and Ivan arrived. Anatol followed in his brother’s mouth-steps, lying with exquisite believability, and head-down humility, about having stayed awake all night.
The Great Tsar did not take it well, but not having made a spectacle of Vlad, he couldn’t very well do it to Anatol.
“Your turn, Ivan,” the Great Tsar said. His face and tone said he had no expectation of a different result from an Ivan-watch, not when the boy’s bigger, better, brighter, stronger, older brothers, had done their duty by staying awake all night and still failed. In fact, he suspected his youngest would soon fall asleep, and since he was as honest and truthful as Vlad and Anatol, Ivan would admit his fault.
And perhaps give the Great Tsar a reason to vent some of the rage over lost apples.
“Sire,” Ivan said with a deep and respectful bow, before walking away.
An authorial note of some pertinence for thaose impertinent enough to whine, whinge, or under-breath mutter or murmur about the shortness of certain things.
No, not those things. Those things, and the shortness or longness thereof, have not yet been fully, as it were, introduced in our tale, aside from the brief references above.
Thus: yes, this is a short chapter, but if you’re really interested in a lengthy description of Anatol doing his own walking, bending, et cetera, and other tree-watching activities, the author respectfully suggests the following:
1. Find a Song Mage despite being on a World Beside with no magick.
2. Mortgage all you own, or sell your soul to whatever demon desires it, to meet the Mage’s price.
3. Turn all your money and/or cash equivalents over to the Song Mage and have him Sing the Door to Prince Ivan’s World Beside all the way open.
4. Step through quickly.
5. Find me, somewhere in a strange, strange, really strange land with no one to help you grok anything.
6. Ask me politely to provide you with the longer version of this chapter.
7. Accept what happens thereafter.
Just sayin’, as someone sometimes says in your World Beside.
Author Bio
Eric is an American Midwesterner, and as Lady Glenhaven might say, “He’s old enough to have sailed with Noah.” In the real world he writes for a living, with those who would claim what he writes is fiction. His partner of thirty years—who died unexpectedly in 1995—enthusiastically encouraged him to try to get his writing published (mostly poetry back then, plus some short stories), but he didn’t have the guts to do so until 2013. At this point he’s not sure which was officially first, The Song, or Like a Mountain, Waiting.
Starting then, he’s published 13 novels and novellas, 1 poetry collection, 2 short story collections, and 3 short stories. God willin’ and the crick don’t rise, 2020 will also see The Tinderbox out and about. But since real life is, as we all know, a pain in the (anatomical site of your choice)…no guarantees.
Where to Find Eric Alan Westfall
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