I get a lot of emails from friends and family and people-I-once-met-at-the-grocery-store that ask: How do I get published?

I get the impression most people want me to hand them a website, or give a quick and simple answer, but there’s really no instant-response to that question. Publishing is a big giant industry, and getting published isn’t a ( Read more... )

Anastasia.
She’s everyone’s favorite Romanov. In fact, she’s usually the only Romanov people know by name. If you’ve been reading the other posts in this blog tour, you already know that the animated Anastasia movie is basically all lies. Why?

Because she’s the one who supposedly escaped and survived the executions.

Before I go on, I have to tell ( Read more... )

In the last post, I told you guys about Faberge eggs. In this post, I want to talk about the egg that’s at the very center of TSARINA.

It’s the Constellation Egg!


( Read more... )

In TSARINA, Natalya is on a quest to find a magical Faberge egg. The egg was enchanted by Rasputin for the Romanov family- with it, the Romanovs will always control Russia. The egg also keeps the Romanovs healthy, cures them when they’re sick, binds them to the land…it’s why Alexei Romanov’s hemophilia is no longer a problem, why it snows when the ( Read more... )

In TSARINA, Rasputin is a major character- even though he never actually appears on screen. Rasputin is the one who created the Faberge egg that Natalya is so desperate to find. He’s one of those historical figures who, even in his lifetime, was something of an enigma. I mean, look at him. Does this look like someone you want in your house?


( Read more... )

The main character of TSARINA, Natalya, has a beautiful love story with none other than Alexei Romanov, the heir to the Russian throne. The sad truth is, Alexei was a little young (he died when he was about 13) to have a love story of his own. BUT…his older sister Tatiana had a beautiful one.

Tatiana was the second oldest sister- born after Olga ( Read more... )

I won’t lie-I adore that animated Anastasia movie from the 90s. It’s got wonderful music, a lovely story, the animal sidekick is a Russian bat…what more could you want?

Click to view

Here’s the downside to a movie like that though-people think that movie represents what really happened. I mean, sure, they know that the magic bits were probably fake, but they ( Read more... )

This post was part of my TSARINA blog tour, and originally appeared over at YA Reads.

These are not the best moments. They’re not the worst moments. They’re just some MOMENTS that are totally worthy of being shared because WHOA.

1) Peter the Great is your Dental Nightmare
They didn’t call this guy The Great for kicks. He was great at a lot of things ( Read more... )

One of the best things about writing a historical is the clothes.

I know. That’s a little embarrassing to say. They’re just clothes, right?

But, to be very honest, not only are clothes fun and fabulous and exciting to write about, but they’re incredible symbolic of what was happening culturally at the time. We can make fun of fashion all day, every ( Read more... )

This is a blog post from my TSARINA blog tour. It originally appeared on Birth Of A New Witch.

There’s a scene in TSARINA where Natalya sort of accidentally calls a wild Russian elk to her using the powers she’s inherited via the Romanov family’s magical Faberge egg. Sadly, I do not actually own a magical Faberge egg, and I’m going to go out on a ( Read more... )