Afterimage
J. Kowallis
(The Enertia Trials #1)
Publication date: May 7th 2015
Genres: Dystopian, New Adult
Reggie’s dreams . . .
aren’t dreams.
Visions of the future flood her mind like shards of broken puzzles. Caged in her cell, every morning begins the same. She’s drugged, tortured, and images are torn from her memory by Public One.
Until the morning everything changes. The vision is different. The future’s never been about her, and now she knows they’re coming for her:
Nomads.
How will she convince them to keep her alive when Nate, their leader, doesn’t like or even trust her? To him, she’s a science experiment. A machine.
When Public One will do anything to keep her, Reggie must make a decision: remain a slave to her past, or risk her future to venture into a world more terrifying than she’s ever known.
Encender
J. Kowallis
(The Enertia Trials #2)
Publication date: February 29th 2016
Genres: Dystopian, New Adult
They say you feel cold when you die.
The people I’ve killed would beg to differ.
For twenty-something Ransley, the adopted daughter of famed street fighter Estevan Benitez, fighting is all she knows. One hidden detail separates her from the endless string of her pathetic opponents: she can craft and influence heat and fire.
When she’s pitted against the strongest fighters at the infamous Argolla, Ransley faces something she never expected:
A man like her.
Roydon can duplicate himself. When the two collide in the ring, a chain of deals turns Roydon over to Public Four and he’s taken away to undergo the disturbing process of the Nexis. What it is, or what it does, no one outside of The Public knows.
Driven by guilt and a desire to release the only person she’s ever met who’s like her, Ransley isn’t about to leave him for dead—not when he might hold the answers to her missing past. Now she must trust a pair of strangers: a former military man out to collapse the system, and a woman whose premonitions could tear them all apart.
Excerpt
Dirt floated
around in the air and the explosions of yells and horns echoed
through the city. Caspar and his men took a position near the side of
the ring and watched little Pedro grab the communicator and step into
the center with his sloppy madre beater and torn khakis.
“HOLAAAAA . . .
DAMAS Y CABALLEROS.” He laughed over the com with a rough cackle.
“WE HAVE A TREAT FOR YOU TONIGHT! IN FACT, NOT JUST A TREAT, BUT A
BOUNTIFUL DESSERT PLATERRRR. WE HAVE FOR YOUR BETTING PLEASURE, THE
CHAMPION FROM HONDURAS, THE GIANT, THE KONG AMONG MEN.
YACOOOOOOOOOOOO!” He howled into the com and the crowd cheered and
screeched with both excitement and hate.
Caspar’s crooked
smile played on his face. He watched Yaco push the rope down and step
over it. Yaco’s head sat on the top of his shoulders like a pumpkin
on a horse saddle. His floppy fat-sagging pectorals hung down and
rested on his protruding stomach. Caspar never saw the fight that
caused it, but a long diagonal scar ran across Yaco’s left eye and
into his hair.
“AND LAST, BUT
SURELY NOT THE LEAST OF THESE, MY BRETHEREN.” He laughed
again, “THE STUDENT OF THE MASTER, THE SON OF THE LOS ÁNGELES
FIGHTING CHAMPION, ESTEVAN “THE GOD”… RANSLEY BENITEZ!”
Whatever sense of
confidence Caspar had before the fight dropped from his soul. A
woman, perhaps shy of twenty-five with boyish hair stepped into the
ring, and pulled off the zipped-up hooded sweatshirt she wore.
Wearing a dirty tank and utility pants, she popped her neck and threw
a few practice hits in the air. Caspar started to shake his head,
waving his arms to get Pedro to stop the fight. Estevan must have
been out of his mind. Caspar took back everything he’d said to
Faron about Estevan—it wasn’t guilt that tore the old man away
from the ring all those years ago, it was insanity.
“OOOOOOO, WHAT’S
THIS? A WOMAN?!”
The crowd split
into raucous laughter, and cans and bottles flew from the bleachers
into the ring at the girl. She ducked and kicked them away. A flash
of fury ran through Caspar. He pushed his way around the ring,
searching for Estevan and signaling Pedro to stop the fight. Finally,
Pedro raised his arms in defense, laughing all the while looking at
the hard body of the woman up and down. A man on the sidelines
reached for her and she immediately twisted his arm around, breaking
his wrist.
“Benitez!”
Caspar yelled. Estevan Benitez, unflinching, turned his head and
looked down on him. Even though the legend was twice his size, Caspar
still cursed at him, jabbing his pointer finger into Estevan’s
shoulder. “Listen, hombre. I don’t know if you’re stupid
or lost your freaking mind, but there’s no women in the Argolla.
You got that? You wanna get a chick to fight, take her to The Public
hair salon! This is a men’s only fighting ring. No hoo-has, no
boobies. All right?”
Estevan’s
nostrils flared with each word he spoke. His voice noticeably harsher
and more grated than before. “She’s in the ring, Caspar. What are
you going to do? Give everyone their money back? Miss out on all
those pesos?”
He’d lose
everything. No matter what he did. If he canceled the fight and put
another fighter in, the crowd wouldn’t put up with that. If the
fight moved forward . . . and then he paused . . . if the girl
fought, she’d lose. Everyone was betting on her. Anything lost
would go directly to himself. The little throb in his neck started to
dissipate and he looked at Estevan coolly, his words frosted with
disgust and greed.
“Fine. She
fights. It’ll be fun to watch a woman pounded into a bloody mess.
Especially since she’s your deserting ass’s daughter. It’ll be
a shame, though. I would have liked my own chance to, uh . . .”
Caspar slithered his eyes over to Ransley in the ring while she
leaned over the rope cursing at the people yelling obscenities at her
and licked his lips, “take her down.”
Estevan’s hand
lashed out, gripping Caspar’s vest and pulling him forward. The
hard clicks of Faron and Adelmo’s handguns snapped at Caspar’s
sides, raising the barrels to the old fighter.
“I dare you,”
Caspar sneered, his face only inches away from, what he knew, would
have been death under any other circumstance.
Estevan’s eyes
darted between the two barrels and loosened his grip on Caspar’s
clothing.
“Like I said . .
.” Caspar brushed himself off and pulled out his own gun, waving it
in front of Estevan’s knotted and scarred face. “Coward.”
With a wave of his
hand to signal Pedro, Caspar turned on his heel. The crowd went
insane. Pedro called into the com again, his face split into a grin.
“AND THE FIGHT IS ON! FOR THE FIRST TIME IN LOS ÁNGELES HISTORY, A
WOMAN IS FIGHTING IN THE ARGOLLA!”
Caspar motioned
Pedro toward him and the stumpy man waddled toward him.
“Remind
everyone,” he whispered, “all bets are final.”
Author Bio:
J. Kowallis, the only girl of four children, grew up in northern Utah with a head full of wild stories (most often unreal). At the age of 9, she wrote her first poem, a dedication to E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web. It was so intriguing, her third grade teacher requested to keep the original. Between living in various fictional worlds, and spending time on her studies, she managed to graduate from Weber State University’s creative writing program. She now lives in Utah with her Mini Schnauzer, Etta, and spends most of her time still bouncing between this world and the fantastical while enjoying delectable über-dark chocolate and lavender baths. She enjoys dreaming about, flying to, and writing about distant lands (real or unreal).
Thanks for hosting today, Jolanda! :)
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