Happy Thursday, friend! Today I am chatting with author E. L. Lyons about her novel, Starlight Jewel, the first book in the Gifts of the Auldtree series. It’s been on my TBR for almost a year now and I am getting pumped to get to it in the coming year! Let’s welcome El and learn about this story.
Get to know the author: E. L. Lyons
Hi El! Welcome back to Armed with A Book. Tell me and my readers a bit about yourself!
I’m a bit of a hermit who lives on the edge of the Great Dismal Swamp. In addition to reading and writing, my favorite pastimes include backyard TV (watching the raccoons and possums from my window), cooking, gardening (I don’t really grow much, mostly I just battle the encroaching swamp with a chainsaw and pull weeds), and hanging out with my cats.
What inspired you to write this book?
A lot of things inspired Starlight Jewel, and it’s hard to pin down just one inspiration point. I suppose at the forefront of things is my dad, which may sound odd to anyone who reads the series, where the MC’s dad is sort of a low-key villain. My own dad didn’t have a villainous bone in his body, literally wouldn’t kill a spider if you paid him. To be clear, Roarik is not based on my dad anymore than my MC is based on me. Nor do I have any tendencies toward matricide.
My father took his life when I was 19, and it spurred a desire to capture in a book all that he gave to me. His gifts, if you will, of loving fantasy worlds and the forest. It took me over a decade to feel I’d done that with a book, and while I didn’t think it was salvageable after finishing the first draft, I do feel I was finally able to flesh it out and trim it down in such a way that I could really feel I’d expressed what I’d meant to.
Somewhere in my upbringing, those two things (the forest and fantasy) became deeply connected for me as they were deeply connected for my dad. I spent an exorbitant amount of time reading in the woods. We lived in the middle of nowhere on top of a hill in the middle of 24 acres of woods with a creek. The forest has always been a place of both majesty and fear for me. A great respect for all the dangerous things that live there combined with how beautiful it is makes for a sort of dark majesty that I’ll never outgrow.
When in need of inspiration, I go out to the edge of the woods at night and just sit in silence for a while. I can close my eyes and feel my dad there with me—not in a ghostly sense, just in the sense that this part of me is from him.
So it follows that the crux of the Gifts of the Auldtree world occurs at the forest’s edge, where humanity meets all the wild and dark things beyond. Where fear meets wonder and instinct meets sense. I’ve long wanted to capture that in the fantasy I’ve written, and failed time and again.
It was quite a surprise when this particular story ended up being the place to do that. The story itself was quite distinct from the world when I started. I simply wanted to rewrite the Cinderella fairytale in a way that actually made sense but carried the dark tone of how the Grimm tale went—just in epic fantasy form. I also had a strong desire to ruin the story with grit, in a sense. I like to ruin pretty things. Somewhere early in the process of test drafts, I heard the song Roots by In This Moment, it fit the main character perfectly, a scene came to mind, and the world rolled out of me and into the story pretty rapidly from there.
How long did it take you to write this book, from the first idea to the last edit?
Somewhere around 2.5-3 years total, though to be fair, I just did another few edits not two weeks ago… so maybe 4 years.
What makes your story unique?
A lot of the character development I did was based in the brain anatomy of predatory animals and migratory birds.
Imagine an overlay of the human brain and the associated personality traits there, over animal brains and the behaviors associated with those same areas. The various sprygan gifts that the hybrids have are associated with different brain areas, and whichever gifts a hybrid has, determines what behavioral and personality traits they have. That idea penetrates not only the main character, but all the hybrid characters and the society they live in and how it operates.
I’d like to feel that this unusual group of characters and their strange society makes for a story that simply reads different in subtle ways. I don’t expect all readers to really notice it, but perhaps subconsciously it’ll create a different experience.
I’ve been told by a few readers that they enjoyed the lack of drama in the book, which is due to these differences. There’s little drama in the world outside human societies in the real world, and I tried to capture some of that sense of “well that’s just how the world/society works” animal mentality in my human-sprygan hybrids.
The non-brain anatomy of sprygans and hybrids was also quite fun to think up. Everything from their diet to how they heal is based on trees. Salt and vinegar being deadly, roots sprouting during injuries, sprygan speech, ocular differences, blood differences. A book is referenced in the book, “Variations of Hybrid Anatomy,” which is meant to hint at the genetic lottery with each hybrid. Getting half human and half sprygan genes results in every hybrid being both anatomically and mentally a little different from every other hybrid.
Who would enjoy reading your book?
Dark epic fantasy readers are the most likely I feel to appreciate Starlight Jewel. Especially those who have appreciation for the darker side of human and animal nature. Readers who enjoy subtlety are also probably the best audience for Starlight Jewel, as I use a light hand with implications and foreshadowing.
I would caution away readers who are seeking a happily ever after ending, a happy for now ending, or dramatic professions of love.
What’s something you hope readers would take away from it?
My only hope is that readers take something away from it. Themes are woven in, yes, but even in the book just provides a bit of escape, that’s well enough for me.
Do you have a favourite quote or scene in the book that you find yourself going back to?
When I’m here at this window, I get to be more than a shadow, seen in the day and lost to the night. Fancied and forgotten, melted and reforged.
A great deal of Starlight Jewel revolves around Axly’s struggle with her identity, as someone who is selfless in the worst of ways, and as someone who desperately wishes she could grasp a sense of self without losing everything she’s worked for.
This is the first book of the Gifts of the Auldtree series. Can you tell me more about the series? How many books do you have planned?
There’ll be three books in the series, and all are planned out pretty well. I’m on chapter 37/48 of the sequel’s first draft. Things don’t always go as planned, but it’s working out better than expected. The series definitely gets darker and grittier as it progresses. I plan to write a number of novellas in the same world, and have snippets of those written.
What is something you have learned on your author journey so far?
I’ve learned an immense amount about a lot of things, but mostly I’ve learned that it’s very hard to convince people to read a book that looks like YA romantasy when it’s actually dark adult fantasy.
What’s the best piece of advice you have received related to writing?
I don’t remember the exact wording, but when my writing mentor was trying to help me in making a scene suspenseful, he taught me that to write a suspenseful scene, you have to weave the suspense in long before that scene. The stakes and other things that make that scene suspenseful have to already be in place when you get there, otherwise the suspense—or whatever emotion it is you’re trying to create—will fall flat.
If you could give a shout out to someone(s) who has helped in your writer journey, please feel free to mention them below!
My writing mentor, Mark Terribile, without a doubt has helped me the most on my writing journey. His input continues to be invaluable in diagnosing and resolving my many writing struggles, and I’ll be forever grateful that he decided to stick with the book after reading the disaster of a beginning he initially beta read.
Starlight Jewel
Gifts of the Auldtree is a world of mythology, glamor, mud, blood, civilizations in conflict, and hints of distant powers. In the center of this is the mysterious Starlight Jewel of Minalav.
Axly, the Starlight Company’s premier seductress-thief and assassin, will do whatever it takes to keep her human brother hidden. The secrets of his origin could tear their world apart, and keeping them has driven her to lies and murder. Her people, the sprygan-human hybrids that live under the city of Minalav, aren’t keen on allowing their most skilled asset to roam free. A job with a human offers a chance to get her brother out of danger, but it comes at a price. Divided loyalties, duty, romance, and the twisted hands of fate intertwine in this epic fantasy adventure.
Content Notes: This book contains some graphic violence and many elements that readers may find disturbing, including a bit of torture. There are no graphic descriptions of sex or sexual assault, but there are allusions to prostitution, a couple of steamy scenes, some sexually disturbing implications, classism, ableism, the death of a nameless dog, murder, cannibalism, matricide, and suicidal ideation. It has been described as having a “splash of grimdark.”
Other information: 493 pages, 173k words, 3rd person PoV, Past Tense, Multiple PoV, Medieval Alternate World, Female Main Character, Spiceless/Fade-to-Black, No AI was used in the writing of this book or the making of its cover.
Book Excerpt from
Starlight Jewel
Axly stood. “No. I don’t need an accomplice. I already have two of those.”
Cami chuckled and followed as she made her way to the girl. Some of the children and instructors took notice of them, giving confused and nervous stares. The girl with the book, now hidden in the waistband of her pants, noticed their trajectory and set off at a run.
Axly pushed herself to a sprint and grabbed the girl’s hair, which was tied up with a leather band. The girl’s arm flew back and loosed a dagger from Axly’s sleeve, then sliced her hair off at the band. She took a few running steps, then turned to face her pursuer.
Axly looked down at the mousy brown bundle of hair in her hand, then at the girl. “So you know I’m faster. That’s smart enough of you. But you really think you can best me with my own blade?”
“Don’t know until I try,” the girl retorted.
“What’s that book about?”
The girl tilted her head but didn’t lower the blade. “Nothing that would interest a High Bird like you.”
A woman’s voice chimed in from behind Axly. “It’s a book on the variations of hybrid anatomy. She asked me to train her, but I already have enough students.”
Axly noted the girl’s aura, not bad for her age, but certainly nothing to brag about. “Give me the book or try to kill me. Those are your options. Pick quick.”
“What…? If I kill you, they’ll kill me. I just don’t want you to kill me. I’m defending myself,” the girl said indignantly.
Axly chuckled. “Camille, you wouldn’t kill her if she killed me, would you?”
Camille was twirling a lock of her blonde hair absently as she shrugged. “No. I’d take her to Tarley. Tarley’d kill her.”
“See there? If you killed me, you’d just have to give Cami here the slip before she got you upstairs. The rest of these birds don’t care about me. Do you really think they’d kill you? The people who actually know you and have never met me?”
The girl looked about nervously and tightened her grip on the blade, her knuckles going white. “I don’t want to kill anyone. I just want to train in medicine.”
Axly took a step forward and pulled a blade from her boot. “Train then. I didn’t need a book to teach me anatomy. You’ll learn it faster with a blade. Cut me open and see for yourself. Or else I’ll learn about yours. Compare your left lung to your right to see if the inside’s a reflection of the out.”
Axly lunged forward with the blade. Steel clattered on stone and Axly’s blade sunk in—to the book, now held out like a shield in front of the girl.
The room was silent for a moment before Camille broke the silence with laughter and clapping. “The little Apprentice is smart after all!”
Axly took the book from the small trembling hands and tossed it back to the instructor without bothering to remove the knife. “Have Baj bring my knives back to my room. I’ll take the thief off your hands.” She would have been your best student. Fool of you to let her go.
The girl looked down at the ground as Axly led her out of the room. “I’m sor—”
“I don’t care. It’s a book. It’s not even a good book. If you’re going to steal a book, steal one worth stealing.”
Axly led the girl up the stairs and down two halls to the library.
The librarian, Nishley, nodded to Axly, then bristled when she saw the girl, her eyes darting to the ringless hand. “No Nameless in the library. These are Company books.”
“Noted,” Axly said as she pulled the girl in the rest of the way, not stopping ’til she got to the shelf on hybrid anatomy and physiology. “Pick one.”
The Nameless girl shifted nervously, eyeing Nishley. “I’ll pass…”
Axly assessed the girl more carefully. A piney scented, Norgan-colored child with one barkskin hand. Long sleeves and pants covered the rest of her, concealing how much barkskin she had. Probably a lot by the smell of her.
“You’ll not pass. You’ll do as I tell you or I’ll cut out your eyes and sell them. I know a few Ashites who think they’re worth more out of your head than in it. Now pick a book.”
“Why?”
“Because you want to learn. Now you’re going to.” The girl shook her head and Axly sighed, looking to Camille. “Cami, can you go draw a bath in the cabochon and have Fria—well, whoever’s making dresses now come up?” Camille tilted her head, then shrugged and left.
Axly continued once she was out of earshot. “I was younger than you when I got these two stains. Do you know how I got them?” The girl shook her head. “I got them because I made a decision. I decided to choose safety and obligation over freedom. I had the chance to be my own person, and instead I chose to become Tarley’s. This is your chance. Not to be your own person—not yet—but to be mine instead of his.
“You decide now and there’s no going back. You can choose to live down there and eventually die of dark rot, or you do as I say, everything I say, without question, and the next time I leave, I take you with me.”
“To where?”
“To somewhere where you can study whatever you want and see the sun whenever you please.”
The girl pursed her lips and looked back to the shelf. After a few moments of deliberation, she slowly selected a book and pulled it to her chest.
“Good. Think up a name for yourself by morning.”
Interested?
Find Starlight Jewel on Draft2Digital, GoodReads, Amazon, IndieStoryGeek, and StoryGraph . This one is on my TBR!
Thanks for taking the time to join us for this interview! Connect with El on Twitter, Instagram, her author website, Goodreads, and Amazon.
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Ohhh, the absence of an HEA ending is very promising!!
Right?! I really need to make time for this book!