Penelope and Prince Charming (Nvengaria #1)(122)
Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed this introduction to Nvengaria, where magic happens, shapeshifters are real, and fairy tales come true.
I first conceived of the Nvengarian series when I had a vivid dream of visiting an opulent castle in a beautiful country and meeting its most handsome prince. I woke up, knowing I had to write the story of this prince and his kingdom. Nvengaria was born.
The imaginary country of Nvengaria is located southeast of Hungary, in what is now Romania, in a mountain valley near the Transylvanian Alps. In the early nineteenth century, the area was squeezed by the Austrian Empire to the west, the Ottoman Empire to the southwest, and Russia to the north and west. A precarious place to be at the time.
With my imaginary country came its history, people, and the fact that magic is real—at least in Nvengaria. I had been wanting to write paranormal romance, and I love historical romance, so I thought—why not combine the two?
Since fairy tales are a theme in the first book, I decided to base the series very loosely around the fairy tales they resembled. Thus, we have:
Penelope and Prince Charming—Cinderella
The Mad, Bad Duke—Beauty and the Beast
Highlander Ever After—Snow White and the Seven … Highlanders
The Longest Night—Little Red Riding Hood (and the Big, Bad Wolf)
As I wrote and plotted, the people of Nvengaria took life. I enjoyed making up the flags (red, gold, and blue); the banner of the princes (two snarling wolves on deep blue), the silver rings, the crazy dances, the rituals, the volatile nature of its people.
The tales of Nvengaria continue in The Mad, Bad Duke, which begins with Alexander in London, on assignment for Damien. It is not long before Nvengarian magic catches up to him and entwines him inextricably with Penelope’s best friend, Meagan.
Egan MacDonald, the Mad Highlander, has his tale told in Highlander Ever After, when he is asked to protect Damien’s cousin Zarabeth from danger in his Highland castle.
I wrote another story, The Longest Night, about characters introduced in Highlander Ever After—the hero, Valentin, is a logosh shapeshifts into the form of a wolf. Egan’s widowed, very proper sister, Mary, finds herself falling madly in love with the dangerous Valentin.
Publication note
These books, and The Longest Night (a novella in the print collection A Christmas Ball) were originally published by Dorchester Publishing. When Dorchester went out of business, the books went out of print and the rights returned to me. I spent some time revising all the books for writing smoothness, though I have not changed the plots or characters.
The books were briefly published as e-books by Dorchester before they were pulled down, but all the books have been thoroughly re-edited and re-formatted under my JA / AG Publishing imprint. These are brand new editions.
I hope you enjoy my offering of paranormal historicals, which I am happy to be able to bring to life once more!
Excerpt: The Mad, Bad Duke
Nvengaria, Book 2
March 1820
Alexander woke in the middle of his garish sitting room, naked and alone. The pointed arches nailed over rectangular windows, the pillars carved to resemble palm trees, seemed to mock him. False things, covering the real.
Alexander Octavien Laurent Maximilien, Grand Duke of Nvengaria, exiled to rainy England to watch over its new portly king, was slowly going insane.
This was the dozenth time he’d had the memory lapse—this one, he realized as he glanced at the carved ivory clock, the longest. The last thing he remembered was sitting at his desk in his study upstairs, three hours ago. Alexander stretched out his scratched and bloody hands, noting that the abrasions were deeper this time.
It wasn’t drink that caused the memory gaps, because Alexander drank only small amounts of wine and brandy and never let himself become inebriated. He’d ruled out poison as well. His valet, Nikolai, fanatically devoted to keeping Alexander alive, had insisted on hiring a food taster and supervised the preparation of every dish.
Nikolai was the only one of the staff in on the secret of Alexander’s strange malady. The other servants in this house in Berkeley Square, both English and Nvengarian, so far had not noticed. Most of the lapses lasted mere minutes, a few as long as a half hour, but this one of several hours was sure to have caused questions.
Alexander gave a brief, mirthless laugh, imagining his worried English staff carting him off to Bedlam. Not enough that Alexander was darkly lonely, far from the home he fiercely loved, and irritated by his task of keeping England on the side of Nvengaria. Alexander was like a ruthless sword, honed and fixed for one purpose. These memory losses and the strange new awareness inside him distracted him, and Alexander hated to be distracted.
As he turned to leave the room he caught sight of himself in an overly gilded mirror, his bare body slick with perspiration. His black hair, tangled from whatever had happened in the last three hours, touched wide shoulders on his tall frame, and his blue eyes were a bit wild.
Alexander was the second most powerful man in Nvengaria, and that power wrapped him like a second skin. He knew how to find things out, how to bend others to his will. He would discover who was doing this, and then he would show that person just what happened when someone tried to manipulate Grand Duke Alexander, leader of the Council of Dukes of Nvengaria. The result would not be pretty.
He left the room, his blood burning.