Monday, October 5, 2015

Cover reveal: The Passion of Dolssa, coming April 12, 2016

I'm excited to share the exquisite cover of my upcoming young adult novel, The Passion of Dolssa, coming April 12, 2016 from Viking Children's Books in North America. Isn't it pretty? My thanks to the talented design team at Penguin Young Readers Group.

This has been my most engrossing, challenging, and heart-rending project to date. It's a historical drama and romance, and I'm thrilled (and a little nervous!) to share it with the world. Set in medieval France, it tells the story of Dolssa, a mystic girl whose tales of her visions earn her a sentence of execution for the crime of heresy. When she manages to escape her burning and flee across southern France as a fugitive from the friar obsessed with finding her, she encounters Botille, a peasant girl whose desire to help a poor stranger brings peril down upon her entire village and family.

I'll be posting more about the book and my travel schedule soon. Meanwhile, anyone interested can add it to their Goodreads to-read shelf, pre-order it from their favorite bookseller, or request it from their local library.

Enjoy!

Here's the copy available online:

I must write this account, and when I have finished, I will burn it. 
 Buried deep within the archives of a convent in medieval France is an untold story of love, loss, and wonder and the two girls at the heart of it all. 

Dolssa is an upper-crust city girl with a secret lover and an uncanny gift. Branded a heretic, she’s on the run from the friar who condemned her mother to death by fire, and wants Dolssa executed, too.

Botille is a matchmaker and a tavern-keeper, struggling to keep herself and her sisters on the right side of the law in their seaside town of Bajas.

When their lives collide by a dark riverside, Botille rescues a dying Dolssa and conceals her in the tavern, where an unlikely friendship blooms. Aided by her sisters and Symo, her surly but loyal neighbor, Botille nurses Dolssa back to health and hides her from her pursuers.  But all of Botille’s tricks, tales, and cleverness can’t protect them forever, and when the full wrath of the Church bears down upon Bajas, Dolssa’s passion and Botille’s good intentions could destroy the entire village. 

From the author of the award-winning All the Truth That's in Me comes a spellbinding thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat until the final page and make you wonder if miracles really are possible.
ISBN: 0451469925