Tag Archives: Dreadful Poetry

Dreadful Poetry Book Launch Party Ends

Thank you for stopping by, Gentle Reader, and joining us aboard Wizard Kadmeion’s airship here at the zeppelin yards near Lita’s castle in the northern realms.

Previously:

Fresh-Baked this Morning by Wizard Kadmeion

We had so much fun today during the Dreadful Poetry book launch party, hobnobbing with the wizards and talking with the naughty woodland fairies that made us blush. Bright’s cake that he made from magical powders was tasty, and the champagne tickled our noses.

Kadmeion’s Auntie Em has summoned her pumpkin coach. See it waiting for her over there, by the forest’s edge?

Here are some cookies to take with you, Gentle Reader, fresh-baked just this morning by Wizard Kadmeion. Not to worry, he went out early and bought some proper flour. He put a gentle spell on their box that will keep them warm all the way home. Tuck your hands around the box, and the spell will keep your fingers warm, too.

Marty has your cloak right here. Bundle up. The snow is falling again outside.

Don’t forget your Dreadful Poetry book. Curl up tonight in front of your fireplace, and join the boys on their adventures at the university. We told Auntie Em that you would read about her part in the story. And be sure to think of Bright the next time you see a butterfly.

To all, Lita wishes you a magical goodnight.

The Dreadful Poetry Cake

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During the Dreadful Poetry book launch party, Sir Bright asks us to join him and view the buffet table. He prepared a special cake for the occasion. We admire the confection, and chat a bit with him.

Previously:

Bright Made the Cake

Brighton M’Choakenchilde is the seventh son of a seventh son elf prince. He came into his magical ability after meeting Wizardling Kadmeion in Dreadful Poetry.

In addition to being Kadmeion’s assistant, Bright is their airship mechanic. He has his father’s handsome elf features. Bright’s magic is scented with sweet pine, and the gentle aroma of violets.

Lita: The cake for the Dreadful Poetry book release party is lovely. It looks just like the book cover. Did you start with a cake and make it look like a book, or did you do it the other way around?

Bright: I started with a cake. Sort of.

Bright Used Magical Powder Instead of Flour

Lita: Explain?

Bright: We were all out of flour, and Kadmeion told me last night that the party was today. I improvised by using some of our magical powder stock instead of flour. I found it difficult to change the bright colors into a presentable cake, but I tasted the batter before baking. It came out fine.

Lita: What magical flavor is the cake?

Bright: Chocolate.

Lita: Will eating the cake turn your guests into something, um, unnatural?

Bright: It will make everyone unnaturally happy to read a story about our college days.

Bright’s First Spell Was a Butterfly

Lita: We each will have a piece of cake please, and some of the champagne. While you’re serving, tell us about the significance of the butterflies on the book cover.

Bright: [The elf-kind serves us chocolate cake, and glasses of chilled champagne.] My first high magic enchantment was to create a butterfly. I could not have done it without Kadmeion. He took on my case when no other wizard or sorceress would work with me.

Lita: Will you show us the spell?

Sir Bright cups his hands, and sings a short wizardry spell. A dot of his magic glows like a candle’s flame within the shelter of his palms, then morphs into a blue-and-green butterfly. The magical creature flutters about, and perches on Gentle Reader’s champagne glass. The butterfly is lovely, and the cake is delicious. We thank Bright for his Glamour-filled elf-kind magic.

Next time: Dreadful Poetry Book Launch Party Ends

Searching for Auntie Em in Dreadful Poetry

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Wizard Kadmeion has just brought his Auntie Em over to say hello to us at the Dreadful Poetry book release party.

Previously: Welcome to the Dreadful Poetry Book Release Party

Auntie Em Wears Fine Fescue Today

Wizard Kadmeion’s aunt, Sorceress Emily (“Em”), is a renowned magical horticulture practitioner. Her specialty is growing root vegetables into human shapes. Magicians seek out her wares so they can animate the tubers with minor demons. These flora homunculi are popular as garden workers.

Lita: Em, we are so pleased you could join us today at Kadmeion’s affair.

Auntie Em: I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Who is this lovely person you’re with, Lita?

Lita: This is Gentle Reader.

Auntie Em: Enchanted to meet you. Did you two hear that Kadmeion searched for me during much of his Dreadful Poetry story? I was quite the star, and I wasn’t even there.

Lita: I know all about it, Em. Remember that I am Kadmeion’s scribe, and he natters at me using mind voice. The wizard and I have coffee together in the early morning, and I transcribe what he says while we chat. Gentle Reader will learn about your part in the story the normal way by reading the book.

As Daft as Sitting on Stilts While Knitting

Gentle Reader: [Methinks Auntie Em is as daft as sitting on stilts while doing some knitting. Ask her why she has grass for hair.]

Lita: Love your new hair style, darling. Usually, you wear mushrooms and leaves on your head. Is that Kentucky Bluegrass you have on today?

Auntie Em: This is Fine Fescue. [Auntie Em pats her head with a manicured hand. The elegant long fingernails are painted pine-tree green.] I don’t need as much water now when I shampoo, because the grass is drought resistant.

Kadmeion and his Auntie Em excuse themselves. They step away to talk with the other guests. Sir Bright comes over, and invites us to join him. We follow him across the room to the buffet table. Hungry? Time to eat something.

Next time: The Dreadful Poetry Cake

Welcome to the Dreadful Poetry Book Release Party

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Watch your step on the gangplank as you come aboard Wizard Kadmeion’s airship.

Disregard the Somewhat Frightful Face

Glad You Came

Love your beautiful hair and outfit, my dear. Is that big purple and white flower on your dress enchanted? Oh, it giggles, and smells like good luck. Yes then, it’s the perfect thing to wear today to the wizard’s affair.

See that homunculus with the three legs standing just inside the door? That is one of Sir Bright’s clockworks creations. Disregard Marty’s somewhat frightful face that looks like a metal triangle. Hand your cloak to him. Marty will remove the snow with a brush made of dragon eyelashes, and hold your garment in the atrium until it is time to go.

The rest of the guests are gathering in the forward lounge. Kadmeion, his elf assistant Bright, and the wizard’s cynanthrope familiar Furgo are here. The woodland fairies flit about, are always ready to perch on your hand, and talk about their naughty ways. Wizard Morton from the university arrived earlier, along with a few Magic Guild cronies.

Before you go inside, take a moment please, and step to the display table over here. This will take only a moment.

Spells Transport Your Copy to You

Get your very own copy of our wizard’s latest story, Dreadful Poetry. Today is release day!

Dreadful Poetry tells about the wee bit of trouble the boys had while at the university. Bright was not always a mage, and Kadmeion had quite the time of it with his field study. For a while, it seemed that both of them would land in magician’s prison.

Thank you for the small amount it takes for the wizards at Amazon to fuel the transport spells that whisk an eBook immediately to you. Their clever enchantments will deliver your book to these magical locations around the world: US, UK, CA, AU, and IN.

Look Who Just Arrived

Kadmeion’s Auntie Em just stepped in. Let’s give her a few minutes to greet her favorite nephew. Oh, look. The wizard is bringing her over to say hello to us.

Next post: Searching for Auntie Em in Dreadful Poetry

You Are Invited to the Dreadful Poetry Book Release Party

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Burr. Come in out of the snow. Drop by Lita’s castle here in the northern realms and hobnob with wizards, the son of an elf prince, and a sorceress who grows daisies on her hat.

The affair will be this Saturday, the 17th of December, starting at sunrise, here on Lita’s blog.

Wands, broomsticks, and pointy hats are not required. Refreshments will be served. A splendid time is guaranteed for all.

Don’t miss out on the clockpunk fun. Pre-order Dreadful Poetry now.

Cover Reveal for Lita Burke’s Dreadful Poetry

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Welcome aboard Wizard Kadmeion’s airship, the AS Patsy Nottle, for today’s Dreadful Poetry book cover reveal.

Uncover Your Eyes Now

Take a deep breath, remove your blindfolds, and look over here. This is the book cover for Lita Burke’s latest story, Dreadful Poetry.

In Dreadful Poetry, an elf prince’s son teams up with a disgraced wizardling to clear their names with the Magic Guild. Read more about the story in the back-cover blurb.

You Are Invited

Join Lita here on her blog for the Dreadful Poetry book launch party on December 17, 2016. The lads will be around to talk about their adventures. Kadmeion will explain who his Auntie Em is, and Bright will tell us about the life of a clockworks mechanic on an airship. Come as you are. Refreshments will be served. A splendid time is guaranteed for all.

Next Airship Departs Soon

Reserve your spot on the wizard’s airship for the next trip to the plate-shaped ocean world where islands float far above the sea. Seats are available by pre-ordering Dreadful Poetry now on Amazon US, UK, CA, AU, and IN.

The Pleasure of Your Company is Requested

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Now is the time for a few good Gentle Readers to join our ranks aboard the AS Patsy Nottle for the Dreadful Poetry cover reveal party!

December the 7th at early morning

Berth #1 – Pier A at the Lita Burke Aerodrome

Hosted by Wizard Kadmeion, Sir Bright & Their Crew

Dreadful Poetry is available now for pre-order on Amazon.

Draft Done: Dreadful Poetry

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My, how time flies–like a snail. Wish it was butterflies. Lita just had to take some time to get to the bottom of the matter concerning Wizard’s Madness, and butterflies.

Time Flies Like a Snail

Lita hid in her writer’s room these past many weeks, working on the first draft of Dreadful Poetry. She is delighted to say that the first draft is now done.

In this next installment of the Clockpunk Wizard series, an elf prince’s son teams up with a disgraced wizardling to clear their names with the Magic Guild.

This story goes back to when Kadmeion was a wizardling student at the Agatha University of Magical Arts and Sciences. He gets into a bind with the deadly end of his year of field study. His faculty mentor, Wizard Morton, introduces the wizardling to a clockworks graduate named Bright who recently had an out-of-control magical episode. After a lifelong inability to work spells, Bright all but leveled the merchant’s quarter. Now the soon-to-be airship mechanic needs wizardly help to sort things out.

Together, the lads must untangle matters before their messes land them in magician’s prison. Even worse, they must pass a class called Dreadful Poetry, which is not as easy as it seems. And, there is the matter about the butterflies.

Read more with the back cover blurb for Dreadful Poetry.

Halfway: Dreadful Poetry

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Welcome to Lita’s castle here in the Northern Realms. Step into her magical laboratory and see what’s on the slab.

Wizardling Kadmeion at the University

Lita has reached the midpoint of the draft for her next story, Dreadful Poetry.

In this Clockpunk Wizard tale, an elf prince’s son teams up with a disgraced wizardling to clear their names with the Magic Guild.

This story is about Kadmeion and Bright in their college days, and the odd circumstances of how they met. Both are in big trouble, and as a result, Wizard Morton of the Agatha University of Magical Arts and Sciences introduces the boys. The elder wizard gives them an impossible task, with an absurd deadline, and horribly inadequate resources for the two college boys. Even worse, they face the most difficult challenge of their college days: pass a course called Dreadful Poetry, before madness and a court hearing ruin their futures.

Bright’s lifelong absent magical ability comes to him, and his lack of experience with magic craft causes a swath of destruction. His enchantments leave as quickly as they arrived, but the aftermath puts him in dire circumstances with the Magic Guild.

Wizard Butterfly

Wizard’s Madness is a sickness that all wizardlings must survive before they can graduate. Kadmeion’s case is especially bothersome. Not only does it hamper his ability to work meaningful spells, it is quite fun.

Kadmeion’s madness compels him to perfect enchantments that produce beautiful, but useless butterflies. The sickness makes the wizardling seek out the tiny magical things in the world, instead of fixing the big mess he is in.

Things get worse. Kadmeion develops a fondness for coffee, but for the wrong reasons. Above all, his bout of Wizard’s Madness sends the wizardling off at inconvenient times on misguided searches for his mysterious Auntie Em.

If successful despite these distractions, the lads regain more than their reputation. If they fail, then Kadmeion and Bright will languish the rest of their days in a magician’s prison.

Read the Dreadful Poetry back cover blurb.

RJL Evans Highlights Lita Burke’s Forever Boy

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Lita takes Gentle Reader out on the web today to see what R.J.L. Evans, the author of ‘Mr Pimplesnack and the Flying Moon Bus’ has to say about Forever Boy.

Forever Boy by Lita Burke

“Life is dirty, difficult, and all too short for the dogs digging up the deadly mandrake roots that wizards animate with minor demons. A pup named Go Fer has an odd magical talent. He does not die from the fatal screams of newly unearthed mandrakes. Go Fer’s master, a prideful minor magician, sees Go Fer’s talent as a fluke saving him the cost of replacing dogs killed by the mandrakes’ cries.

“Check out this wonderful title by Lita Burke…”

One morning, a young Wizard Kadmeion and his half-elf assistant Bright watch Go Fer at work. This mandrake extraction goes horribly wrong, and Go Fer runs away during the hubbub. After seeking out the wizard, the dog’s life is not the same. In fact, Kadmeion discovers Go Fer is not a dog after all. More…“

Read more about Lita’s Clockpunk Wizard world: