Mundie Moms

Friday, October 24, 2014

TDA (The Dark Artifices) Snippet

(Image by Cassandra Jean)

JULIAN & EMMA!!!! A couple days ago Cassandra Clare snuck in a TDA snippet on Tumblr, when she was answering fan questions. Some how I totally missed this posting that on the blog. Just in case you missed it, here it is....
“I know things haven’t been exactly right between us since I got back from England,” he said. “And I don’t know if it’s because I’m a little jealous of Cristina, or a lot jealous of —“
“JULIAN,” Emma said.

UGH! That is an evil snippet. I need more from this scene....

New Details on The Mortal Instruments T.V. Series


Cassandra Clare shared some new details about The Mortal Instruments T.V. Series! Check it out below:
  • Episodes will be one hour long
  • The show will begin with City of Bones and continue into the series
  • Bob Shaye and Michael Lynne who were executive producers on the film will be producers on the show
  • Production begins in 2015 [x] [x]
There's still no word about a cast or network, but I would imagine we'll be hearing more news soon. I am so THRILLED about this being a T.V. series, and that the show will begin with City of Bones and go through the series. I think there so much more potential with a T.V. series than a movie. I'm hoping that once they start with the TMI series, they'll make a T.V. series out of The Infernal Devices.

FanArt Friday


Happy Friday! 
Check out some of the latest Shadowhunter fan-art Cassandra Clare has shared via her Tumblr page



Cassandra Jean's got some new art work featuring Clary (above) and Alec (below).


It's Wessa!!  Y'all know that whenever I get the chance to, I can't help but share new fan-art of Will and Tessa. Check out this piece below.


Cassie shared it here on Tumblr.

Have you seen any new Shadowhunter fan-art recently that you'd like us to share? Leave me a link in the comments so I can feature it here on the blog. 
If you have some favorite YA book fan-art you've recently seen, please let me know in the comments as well. I'd like to start featuring more YA book fan-art too. There are so many talented artists out there who have done an amazing job with creating pieces featuring some of our favorite characters. 

The Retribution of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin, Chapter 4 Teaser!


We're less than two weeks away from the release of The Retribution of Mara Dyer! On November 4th, fans will finally be able to get their hands on the third book in the Mara Dyer series. Today I'm thrilled to have the chance to share a sneak peak into chapter 4. Before I do, here's a little bit about the upcoming release.

Mara Dyer wants to believe there's more to the lies she’s been told.
There is.

She doesn’t stop to think about where her quest for the truth might lead.
She should.

She never had to imagine how far she would go for vengeance.
She will now.

Loyalties are betrayed, guilt and innocence tangle, and fate and chance collide in this shocking conclusion to Mara Dyer’s story.
Retribution has arrived.

Out on November 4th from Simon & Schuster, you can pre-order The Retribution of Mara Dyer from Amazon | B&N, and add it to Goodreads



4
BEFORE

India, Unknown Province

THE DAY AUNTIE DIED, OUR NEIGHBORS WATCHED warily as we walked from the village bearing her body. The air was as dead as she was; the river sickness had taken her just days after Uncle had brought me home. Auntie had been the only reason they’d tol- erated him, in his different clothes, always blue, with his dif- ferent words and different looks. She’d been special, Uncle had told me. When she would assist at a birth, the baby would rush out of its mother’s womb to meet her. Without her we were unprotected. I did not understand what he meant until he died.
Word of us spread from village to village. Wherever we went, plague and death had already struck, and we followed in its wake. Uncle did his best for the people, sharing reme- dies, making poultices, but whispers followed in our footsteps. Mara, they called us. Demons.
      One night Uncle roused us from sleep and told me and Sister to leave at once. We must not ask questions, just obey. We crept from our hut in darkness, and once we set foot in the jungle, we heard his scream.
A column of smoke rose in the air, carrying his cries with it. I wanted to go to him, to fix it, but Sister said that we’d promised not to, that we would suffer the same fate if we did. I had taken nothing but my doll. I would never leave it behind.
My long, tangled hair stuck to my neck and shoulders in the damp nighttime heat as Uncle’s screams were replaced with the sounds of the forest, rising with the moon. We did not sleep that night, and as the sun broke through the clouds and hunger gripped my belly, I thought we would have to beg for bread, like the orphans. But we did not. Sister spoke to the trees, and they gave up their fruit for her. The ground gave up its water. The earth nourished us, sustained us, until we reached the city.
Sister took me straight to the tallest building at the port to see the man with glasses. He called himself Mr. Barbary, and Sister walked straight toward him. We were dirty and tired and looked very much like we did not belong.
“Yes?” he said when we stood before his desk. “What is it you want?”

Sister told him who she was, who her father had been. He saw us with new eyes.
“I did not recognize her. She has grown.”
“Yes,” I said. “I have.”
I had never spoken to him before, or anyone except Sister

and Uncle. I had never needed to. But I knew why we were here, and I wanted to impress him.
It worked. His eyes grew wide, and his smile spread beneath the funny bow of hair above his lip. “Why, she talks!”
I could do more than that.
He asked me questions about what had happened to us, and about other things too—what I had learned since I had last seen him, what talents I had developed, whether I had fallen ill. Then he measured how much I’d grown. After, he gave Sister a pouch, and she bowed her head in gratitude.
“I must inform her benefactor of your change in circumstances, you understand,” he explained.
Sister nodded, but her face was a mask. “I understand. But her education has not yet been completed. Please inform him that I will take over for my father, if I am allowed.”
Mr. Barbary nodded and then excused us, and Sister led me out of the building by my hand. I wondered at how she knew the city so well. She had never come with Uncle and me before.
Sister paid a man to find us lodging, and then she bought us clothes, fine clothes, the sort Uncle used to wear. She purchased a meal for us to eat in our room.

It was like nothing I had ever seen, with tall beds carved
from trees that were dressed in linens as soft as feathers. Sister washed me and dressed me, and then we ate.
“We will leave after dark,” she said, scooping up fragrant yellow rice with her bread.
As my belly filled, I began to feel pleasant and drowsy. “Why not stay?”The room was solid, empty of dust and drafts, and the beds looked so clean. I longed to bury myself in one.
“It is better to go unnoticed for as long as we can, until we find a new home.”
I did not argue. I trusted Sister. She had taken care of me when I was little, as she would take care of me until she died.
It happened long after Uncle had been killed, though I don’t know how long.Time held no meaning for me—it was marked only by my visits to Mr. Barbary for inspection. Uncle kept no calendars, and neither did Sister. I did not even know my age. We moved along the outskirts of villages like ghosts, until we were driven even from the fringes.Then we moved to the next.
“Why must we keep moving?” I asked her as we walked. “Why won’t they let us stay?”
It was envy, Sister said. The people we lived among were not gifted like us. They were as ordinary as blades of grass, but we were like flowers, beautiful and rare. They suspected our differences and hated us for it. So we had to pretend to

be what we were not, so we would not be harmed for what we were.
But they harmed us anyway. No matter how hard we tried to remain unseen, someone would always recognize or sus- pect us. On our third day in the most recent village, they took Sister as night fell, the way they’d taken Uncle. The way they tried to take me.
Arms pinched my flesh and I was grabbed from my mat. Sister was screaming, begging them not to hurt me, swear- ing to our innocence, our harmlessness, but before I was even properly awake, her words were cut short. A man had smashed a rock into her head. Just once, but it had been enough.
I went slack in the arms of my captor as the same man raised the rock again to hit me with it. I wanted him to die.
His body shuddered, and something ripped inside him, sending a torrent of blood from his nose. He dropped his rock and moaned, backing away from me.
The others backed away as well. I did not speak to them. I did not scream at them. I looked at Sister, her mouth slack, her body limp, her hair glistening with blood, and I wanted.
I wanted them to feel as she felt. I wanted them to never see another sunrise, since she would not either.
I sat beside her, cradling her crushed skull in my lap. The others formed a wide circle around us. Then someone threw a stone.
It missed me. And struck someone else.

Shouts erupted, and the air filled with fear. The village emptied that night as the men—the murderers—fled, taking their women and children with them.
I saw tools but ignored them. I began to scoop dirt with my hands, and buried Sister when I finished digging her shallow grave, right where she had fallen. I slept there until the following day. Even the insects did not disturb me. When I woke, I began walking to Calcutta alone. I passed the scattered bodies of the villagers on my way. The skin above their lips was smeared with blood, but the flies did not touch them. They did not dare.
I avoided people. I bathed in my bloody, simple shift. The forest would not give up its gifts for me, so I skirted villages and stole from them to eat. I was ignorant of everything but my loneliness. I missed Sister, and Uncle, too, in my way. But they were gone now, and all I had left of them and my life with them was ash and dust and the doll Sister had made me, and the words Uncle had given me, taught me, so that I could speak with my benefactor in England someday.
Someday had arrived.
I walked to the port, to Mr. Barbary, unaccompanied for the first time in memory. He took in my stained clothes and my matted hair. I looked like a wild thing, but I spoke as cleanly and crisply as he did, and in his own tongue at that. I told him my education was complete. He sent me to an inn nearby, and would fetch me when my passage to England had been arranged, he said.

I bathed in clean water that night, and scrubbed my body with milled, formed soap, a luxury I had learned of but not experienced. I marveled at the foam on my skin, the lather in my hair, and when I was finished, I climbed into bed naked, and let the air dry my body. I felt as though I had shed my skin like a snake, and this new skin would carry me to my new life.
The next day Mr. Barbary appeared at the door to inform me that my benefactor had died the previous week, but not to worry as he had provided for me in the event of his death. His widow had been informed of my existence and had agreed to take me in, as he would have someday. Mr. Barbary had booked my passage on the first available ship. It would leave the following week, and I was to entertain myself until then.
And I did. He left me a purse with my own coins, and I bought new clothes and food I did not have to prepare. My body softened after a week in the city, after stuffing myself whenever I wanted with glistening, steaming sweet and spicy foods.
The night before I was to leave, I laid my new things in my new small trunk with great care. I took out my doll from beneath my pillow, where I hid her during the day. I ran my fingers over her seams, touched the spot of Sister’s blood that marked her wrist, and wondered what shape my new life with- out Sister would take.
“Why does the white man pay for me?” I had once asked Uncle, after a trip to Calcutta for my inspection. The coins jingled with his steps.


“Because he believes you are valuable. And when you go to him, you will be.”
I took this in. “When will I go?” “When you become,” Uncle said. “Become what?”
“Yourself.”

But if I am not myself yet, then who am I? I thought.


****************

I can't wait to pick up this book! 

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