GtPGKogPYT4p61R1biicqBXsUzo" /> Google+ Character Confessions: Kate Pierce-Keller (Time's Twisted Arrow-YA sci-fi) + giveaway | I Smell Sheep

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Character Confessions: Kate Pierce-Keller (Time's Twisted Arrow-YA sci-fi) + giveaway

Poor Rysa Walker! She has written a time traveling science fiction YA story called Times Twisted Arrow (CHRONOS Files book one), but her main character is a 17 year old named Kate Pierce-Keller. If you know anything about teenage girls then you understand Rysa's pain. Kate is hear today to complain talk about her treatment in Time's Twisted Arrow by Rysa. 


I'm Kate Pierce-Keller and I am delighted to have an opportunity to express myself without Rysa Walker butting in. And no, Rysa, I'm not going to let you in on this conversation, so you can just sit down and shut up. For a change. Go get some coffee. Do your yoga or take a nap. This is my forum. And we both know you aren't going to kill me off in the sequel, so don't even bother with that tired old threat. 

Okay, she's gone. Don't get me wrong. I'm really grateful to Rysa for creating me. But…you're probably grateful to your parents for creating you, right? Does that mean you've never considered throttling them when they do something to totally screw up your life? I mean, I could have been born into a nice, steamy romance with one of the guys over at the Alpha Male Diner. Some of them might bark and bite and howl at the moon, but those are obstacles that a couple can work around as long as they're willing to make a few lifestyle adjustments. Time travel, on the other hand, is wreaking major havoc with my love life. And it makes my head hurt.

You've probably never thought about how complicated things would be if your grandparents were time travelers. I mean, grandparents should be born *before* you are, right? And they should stay put in one timeline, baking brownies or crocheting doilies or something. You shouldn't have to worry about keeping them safe long enough to create mom or dad. (If you're like me, you don't even want to think about them creating mom or dad.) I should be stressing over trig finals or getting ready to go to the prom with Trey. (I'm definitely biased, but I think he gives the guys on the menu at the Alpha Male Diner a run for their money.) But , no. Instead of doing the things a normal seventeen year old girl does, I'm getting ready to go the 1893 World's Fair so that I can keep someone from bumping off Grandma.

The thing that bugs me the most is that there are these other versions of me. There might even be infinite versions – but I can't begin to wrap my head around that, so I'll just focus on the one I know about. The one who doesn't exist any longer, just as I'll cease to exist if anyone separates me from this weird blue CHRONOS medallion.

At any rate, this Other-Kate, Alter-Kate, Kate-Past – whatever you want to call her—was a busy girl. She was apparently hot and heavy with Kiernan, who has a CHRONOS medallion of his own. I'll give kudos to Rysa on this one. Kiernan is gorgeous and he has these dark haunted eyes that are clearly replaying all of the things that he did with Other-Me –things I can't even remember –every time he looks my way. And, even though I'm really, really crazy about Trey, my mind keeps drifting over to the Land of What-If and I have to yank it back to keep it from going there. And weight it down with chains and heavy cement blocks.

And another thing—just because someone creates you doesn't mean she can take stupid chances with your life, does it? I mean, I can take care of myself. I have a brown belt in karate. In fact, I'm pretty close to the black belt. But I'm not a thrill-seeker. To give you an example, my friend Charlayne talked me into going on this carnival ride. I think it's called Zero-G. The one shaped like a giant, hollow doughnut where everyone lines up against the cushions along the edges? Anyway, the circle spins faster and faster, smashing your body flat against the wall, and then the floor drops from beneath your feet and it's just the motion holding you in place as the wheel spins and tips from side to side.

Daredevil Charlayne whooped and wriggled her bottom upward so that her legs dangled several feet above where the floor should have been. Not me. I had to close my eyes to block out the whirling lights and fragmented images. Even with my eyes closed, the corn dog and funnel cake I'd eaten were threatening to jump ship by the time the ride ended. So, to get to the point, these temporal shifts that Rysa puts me through? They are a hundred times worse than Zero-G. Closing your eyes doesn't help one bit when the swirling images are inside your head.

I don't go out of my way to court death or dismemberment. I don't even like scary movies. I've only been to one in my entire life, and that's because Charlayne set me up on yet another blind date. I kept my eyes glued to the popcorn bucket most of the night to avoid seeing the spewing arteries and mangled body parts. So where do you think Ms. Rysa sends me? With thousands of beautiful sights to see at the 1893 World's Fair, she sticks me in the historical version of Hotel Hell, with a serial killer hot on my heels.

What really worries me is that I don't think that situation is going to change in the next book, Pendulum Past. I've seen her initial sketches for the cover. There's this silhouette of a body hanging from a noose. And Rysa keeps playing that old Billie Holiday song, "Strange Fruit" while she's writing. I really wish she'd go back to her Alt Rock channel on Pandora, because that is one seriously creepy tune.

I'd be so much happier if Rysa could just assure me that I get a happy ending. I'm pretty sure she knows. But every time I ask that perfectly reasonable question, she just gives me this smug little smile and says I'll have to wait and see like everyone else.

I'm going to spit in her coffee next time she takes a bathroom break. Don't tell, okay?


*eyes Kate and covers cup of Kool-Aid with hand*

Be sure to check out book one Time's Twisted Arrow (I've got a copy for review!). Book two Pendulum Past should come out at the end of the year. Plus a CHRONOS short over the summer. 

Time's Twisted Arrow: Book One of the CHRONOS Files 
Genre: YA/Science Fiction
Print Length: 351 pages
Publisher: Gypsy Moon Books Released: October 29, 2012


They weren't panic attacks. Of that, seventeen year old Kate is certain, no matter what the shrink told her parents. But it's even harder to accept the explanation offered by her terminally ill grandmother - that Kate has inherited designer DNA from the time-traveling historians of CHRONOS, who were stranded in the past by a saboteur. Kate knows that her grandmother's story could easily be the brain tumor talking, but that doesn't explain the odd medallion or the two young men - one of them hauntingly familiar -- who simply vanish before her eyes on the subway. It doesn't explain Trey, the handsome stranger who now occupies Kate's assigned seat in trig class. And it definitely doesn't explain why Kate is now in an alternate timeline, where leaders of a previously unknown cult hold great power and are planning a rather drastic form of environmental defense. 


In this new reality, Kate's grandmother was murdered at age twenty-two on a research trip to the past, which means that Kate's mother was never born, her father doesn't know her and, for all intents and purposes, she doesn't exist. The only thing keeping her from disappearing entirely is the strange blue medallion around her neck, and the only thing keeping her sane is her burgeoning relationship with Trey. To restore the time line, Kate must travel back to 1893 and keep herself and her grandmother clear of H.H. Holmes, the serial killer who is stalking young women at the Chicago World's Fair. But that choice comes at a price - she'll remember the past few months with Trey, but when he looks at her, he'll see a total stranger


About the Author:
CHRONOS Files blog-fb-twitter
Rysa Walker grew up on a cattle ranch in the South. Her options for entertainment were talking to cows and reading books. (Occasionally, she would mix things up a bit and read books to cows.) On the rare occasion that she gained control of the television, she watched Star Trek and imagined living in the future, on distant planets, or at least in a town big enough to have a stop light.

When not writing, she teaches history and government in North Carolina, where she shares an office with her husband, who heroically pays the mortgage each month, and a golden retriever named Lucy. She still doesn't get control of the TV very often, thanks to two sports-obsessed kids.


Update!

I found out two weeks back that Time's Twisted Arrow is in the semifinals for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. It's down from 2000 YA novels to just five of us, and I'll find out sometime next week if I'm the lucky one who gets a $15K contract and then goes on to compete with the other genres for a $50K contract. That last stage is determined by readers checking out the excerpt and voting (the last week of May).
GIVEAWAY

one winner will get an ecopy of Time's Twisted Arrow.
1. leave contact info
2. if you could time travel when would you go?

only $2.99

3 comments:

  1. crystalwoodmancy AT gmail DOT com

    I think that I'd travel back to the Victorian era. IT just intrigues me that we moved so slowly back then. It wasn't rush rush rush all the time to get things done.

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  2. Oh if I were a time traveler there would be so many possibilities, I would not go just one place or time, first stop would be back to the 1980s for a little disco and after I've had my fill of polyester, big hair, dancing and rollerskating under the disco ball just keep on going to the next adventure :) Thank you for sharing with us, I'm looking forward to meeting Kate.
    dz59001[at]gmail[dot]com

    ReplyDelete
  3. contest closed. Denise Z won an ecopy of Time's Twisted Arrow! I sent an email :)

    ReplyDelete