proposed cover art
Length of Novel:
118,670 words
Keywords and Market Focus:
Fiction, curse, sith, fae, fairy, seelie, unseelie, Sherwood Forest, Britain, United Kingdom, MI6, covert, spy, goddess, Dagda, military, training; will fascinate anyone interested in covert operations, enchantment, and the fae—will appeal particularly to those who enjoy spy, mystery, and suspense novels.
Sorcha: Enchantment
and the Curse
is a unique novel with nothing very similar—it is an idea and a theme wholly
unto itself.
Genre:
Historical Fantasy
Synopsis:
Shiggaion Tash is a
screw-up. Not your run of the
mill screw-up, rather, she is a truly royal screw-up.
From the botched experiment in her graduate class at Oxford, where
she exposed all her students to a radionuclide, to blowing the kneecap off
her pistol range instructor at Sandhurst, Shiggaion is a screw-up.
What’s worse is Sandhurst, sent her to Military Intelligence (MI)
science where she released nerve gas and sent an entire floor to hospital.
From there science sent her to section VIII, Clandestine
Communications where she broadcast
classified operational codes to Britain’s enemies.
Section VIII sent her to Section V, counter-espionage reports, where
she designed an organizational database system that lost all the reports.
Section V moved her on to Section VII, Economic Intelligence.
There, she dumped a load of contraband in the Thames.
Section VII pushed her into Section N, a section that exploits the
contents of foreign diplomatic bags.
Shiggaion accidentally lost her identification badge inside a
diplomatic pouch and caused an international incident.
Section N passed her to Section D, Political Covert Actions and
Paramilitary Operations. There,
she wrecked an SUV and sent her teammates to hospital.
Finally, Section D gave her over to Hostage Rescue.
During a hostage recovery exercise Shiggaion accidently shot a
hostage. It was a laser scored
exercise, but she did make a mark—someone else did too.
One of the instructors shot Shiggaion in the left buttocks with a
tranq round.
Shaggaion woke strapped
to a medical table with a pain in her left cheek and a drug induced
headache. She also has to
go--badly. Shiggaion can’t
imagine such treatment.
Shiggaion’s cries finally provoke a response.
Sorcha Davis throws open the door, threatens Shiggaion with bodily
harm, and christens her—Shiggy.
To survive, indeed to be able to relieve her bladder, and to prevent bodily
harm, Shiggy must acquiesce to Sorcha’s demands and accept her new name.
She must do much more than that.
Shiggy must acknowledge and admit to all her previous lapses of
judgement and take responsibility for them.
Thus begins the training
of Shiggy Tash. Sorcha dresses
her, arms her (simulated weapons at first), trains her, punishes her,
demeans her, and fashions her into a lady.
All for the purpose, so says Sorcha, to make Shiggy a sensual and
sexy spy who can woo the hearts of men and woman.
Shiggy looks like a ditz—a very beautiful ditz after Sorcha is done,
but a ditz. Sorcha needs an
intelligent ditz who doesn’t look like a dangerous person or a spy at all.
Shiggy isn’t so sure, plus there is much more to this business than
simple or not so simple spying.
Sorcha tells her that they are part of Stela, an organization in British Intelligence that protects the UK from supernatural beings and events. Shiggy doesn’t believe in the supernatural and now she must work with it—she even meets some supernatural beings. What’s to become of Shiggy now?
Author's reviewer’s quotes:
No one would expect
Shiggy Tash to be anything more than a ditz.
She’s even blond, but she may be the most dangerous person in British
Intelligence—particularly to British intelligence.
Shiggy doesn’t believe in the supernatural.
She’s living in a supernatural house with supernatural guardians, and
meets all kinds of supernatural beings.
Perhaps she needs to make a second appraisal.
What fun. A failed British agent with poor judgement who happens to be a cursed warrior. Is there any hope for Shiggy?
Short descriptive teasers:
Shiggy Tash finally
meets her match in Sorcha Davis—Sorcha has a large stick, knows Shiggy’s
every thought, and has convinced the village that Shiggy is recovering from
a brain injury.
The world of
British Intelligence meets the supernatural in an entertaining tale of
rehabilitation, love, and spying.
