Friday, October 14, 2011

Hello, Marva Dasef

Thanks for joining us today, Marva. tell us about your Witches of Galdorheim Series..

Bad Spelling - Book 1 of The Witches of Galdorheim Series
A klutzy witch, a shaman's curse, a quest to save her family. Can Kat find her magic in time?

by Marva Dasef http://marvadasef.com

MuseItUp Buy Link: http://tinyurl.com/3daem4r
Cover Blurb

If you’re a witch living on a remote arctic island, and the entire island runs on magic, lacking magical skills is not just an inconvenience, it can be a matter of life and death–or, at least, a darn good reason to run away from home. 

Katrina’s spells don’t just fizzle; they backfire with spectacular results, oftentimes involving green goo.  A failure as a witch, Kat decides to run away and find her dead father’s non-magical family. But before she can, she stumbles onto why her magic is out of whack: a curse from a Siberian shaman.

The young witch, accompanied by her half-vampire brother, must travel to the Hall of the Mountain King and the farthest reaches of Siberia to regain her magic, dodging attacks by the shaman along the way.

Book 2: Midnight Oil - January 2012
Shipwrecked on a legendary island, how can a witch rescue her boyfriend if she can’t even phone home?

Book 3: Scotch Broom - April 2012
A magical trip to Stonehenge lands a witch in the Otherworld where an ancient goddess is up to no good.

Andy the Troll/Human

 Hi! My name is Ander, but everybody calls me Andy. I lived in the Troll Kingdom with my brothers Inder and Ender for fifteen years. As far as I was concerned, I was a troll and proud of it. Trolls don't look as bad as that picture, but we don't have cameras or cellphones in the caverns, so we don't take many photos. Let's just say we're not handsome, but we do have a certain drollish charm.

However, on her deathbed, my mother Gorm confessed that I was bortbyting, a changeling. When her triplets were born, one of the babies was weak and sickly. Mother Gorm knew that a child like this would never survive in the harsh conditions of the troll caverns, so she snuck into a Sami nomad camp one night and swapped out the sick baby for me. I was plenty healthy, but less than one day old. I imagine that the Sami parents might have wondered about the baby, but accepted the troll child as their own.

Now, this is how it works. If anyone, including humans, live long enough in the troll world, they become trollish over time. The same is true in reverse, so the troll baby who lived with the Samis would have appeared more human as he grew. At least I hoped he'd grow up strong and healthy. I certainly did. By the time the triplets could begin crawling through the caverns, I'd converted entirely into troll form. As a matter of fact, I even took on the looks of my brothers. Very few could tell us one from another. We wore different colored suspenders to identify us.

When Katrina and her brother, Rune, showed up at King Ole's, my brothers and I greeted them. Well, kind of greeted. We actually attacked them with knives. But it was an honest mistake. Rune (we didn't know he was Rune at the time) spoke to us in a strange language. We knew to expect somebody to come visiting, but thought it might be Thor's warriors. Again, honest mistake. Kat's aunt is named Thordis (like Thor, get it?) and the message to the three of us guarding the bridge into the Troll Kingdom...well, we screwed up, okay?

We took Kat and Rune to the King as we were supposed to do in the first place. It was only then that I found out that Kat was half Sami! Those are my birth people as Gorm had told me on her deathbed (sniff, I do miss my mother). Anyway, when Kat said she was searching for the nomadic Sami tribe, I spoke up. King Ole said I had a right to meet my birth parents, so I could go along on the search for them. But I had to return to the Troll Kingdom if the troll baby would not, or he was dead. It's all about a balance of nature.

So, that's how I got together with Kat and Rune. It's also how I changed from troll to human boy. Quite a difference a few days in the land of humans makes, eh? I thought I turned out to be a pretty handsome human. I'm glad that Kat thinks so too.

Here's an excerpt where I tell King Ole that I was human, not troll.

“Yes, yes. That’s what happened. Mother Gorm told me the truth just before she died last year.” Andy bowed his head. A tear rolled down the rough skin of his cheek. He took a deep breath and continued. “She told me where to find my human family. She thought I should know.”

Endy and Indy wrapped their arms around their brother, hugging him tightly, murmured something to him, and then stepped away. Andy nodded. “Thank you. That means a lot to me. You’ll always be my brothers, no matter what.”

The king’s advisor stepped forward. “Perhaps, Your Majesty, this troll should return to the Sami,” he said, his lips twisted with distaste. “And have the real troll returned to us.”

“Jtte, you really need to do something about your anti-human bias. Just because one tricked you—”

“Those humans cheated, Sire!” Jtte retorted, with a sneer. “I had that woman’s child within my grasp; then she went and guessed my name. What’s worse, she kept saying I was a dwarf!”

“Well, Rumpelstiltskin isn’t too common a name, Jtte, even for a troll.”

“That’s why I’ve changed my name to Jtte Finn.” The troll huffed, standing taller and sticking his nose in the air.

“And why you hate humans so much,” the king finished for the troll. “You really need to put that behind you and live in the now.”

The king turned back to Andy. “It seems to me you are the reason the fates sent these children here. Not to get my advice but to return you to your people and, in turn, find Katrina’s family.”

Shaking off his sulk, Jtte stepped forward. “I can test whether this human,” he said, pointing at Andy, “might be related to the girl.”

The king rubbed his chin. “Well, Andy’s mother told him she swapped him in Siberia, not in Norway or Sweden. I don’t doubt the lady’s word.”

“Still, Your Highness, I can easily test the human and the girl.”

“Why would it matter?” King Ole asked.

“I’ve recently discovered a means of comparing certain aspects of blood to test family ties. If they are related, then it is proof they come from the same tribe.”

King Ole pondered. “I don’t want either of them harmed.”

“It’s simply a pinprick, Highness. Nothing dangerous at all.”



MuseItUp Author Page: http://tinyurl.com/MIU-MarvaDasef
Twitter Handle: @Gurina


7 comments:

Penny's Tales said...

Hi Marva....You must have an unbelievable imagination! Your books sound really good! I hope you make a million!

Heather Haven said...

Marva, sounds like you've got a great book, so it's only fitting you're on one of the best blogs! Bad Spelling is so clever! I know it will do well!

Cellophane Queen said...

Thanks for having me on, Rosanne. I do hope others will like my characters as much as I do. Andy makes great changes in the book. Hopefully, you'll like him before and after.

Charlie said...

Hey Marva,
Am reading the book and really loving the characters. Great job. What an imaginitive story!
C.K. Volnek

gail roughton branan said...

Marva, that sounds awesome! Some seriously funny, fantasical adventure.

Sue Perkins said...

Great excerpt. You have such wonderful characters in your books. I'm going to read this soon.

Morgan Mandel said...

Love the great sense of humor! I can see this as a TV series. What fun!

Morgan Mandel
http://www.morganmandel.com
http://morganmandel.blogspot.com