NATIONAL FELT HAT DAY

Winners of the Natl. Hat Day Blog Contest are Yadkny and Niko. Congratulations!

I love hats and it's one of the reasons I'm drawn to the Victorian period. Both men and women were not dressed if there head was bare, they had to wear hats. To celebrate NATIONAL HAT DAY and my Steampunk Romance set in 1830 Parris France, where everyone wore the latest fashion in hats I'm giving away a PDF download, a free ebook, of AS TIMELESS AS STONE. To enter the contest for today just post a comment or question and one winner will be drawn.

ABOUT AS TIMELESS AS STONE:

I have a lifelong passion for history, I am thrilled with the latest cross genre of romance, Steampunk. It’s a yummy genre based on alternative history, on the premise that the industrial age and the technological age occur together. For the most part Steampunk/Romance is set in the 19th century during the Victorian age, sometimes in the American West. My love of ancient history influenced me to set my Steampunk/Romance As Timeless As Stone, in 1830 Paris France. This way I was able to include one of my favorite historical figures, Jean François Champollion, founder of Scientific Egyptology. His work on deciphering the Rosetta stone gave voice to the ancient Egyptians. Though I am not an archeologist, I feel a deep kinship with them, for I strive in my writing to bring the ancient past alive for my readers. Jean François Champollion was also the first conservator of the Egyptian collection at the Louvre. Most of my story is set in the Louvre, as my hero, a fictional character, Ricard, is also an egyptologist and the assistant of Jean François Champollion.

My heroine, a fictional character, Seshat, is an ancient Egyptian Priestess of the temple of Horus, who in peril for her life turned herself to stone thousands of years before. By bringing her in to the story, I got to include fascinating details on the history and mythology of ancient Egypt. She was in peril for her life because Egypt’s enemies at the time, the Hyksos, invented a new weapon…the chariot. When the Hykos soldiers goaded their chariot horses into a dirt kicking gallop, charging the temple of Horus, Seshat, in a panic to prevent rape and capture by the enemy, cast a spell and turned into stone, to wait for someone in Pharaoh’s army to read the papyrus sheet in her hands and magically transform her back to flesh and blood. But a ransacking Hyksos soldier, mistook her for a statue and chopped off her head. Pharaoh’s army arrived, but no one recognized the priestess. She wass nothing more than a headless statue.

Back in 1830 Paris, Ricard uncovered a room full of artifacts Napoleon Bonaparte brought back from his Egyptian campaign and expedition. They were hidden away from the English all this time. As Ricard examined the relics, he uncovered an ancient Egyptian statue with the head broken off. When he set the head back in place and used his linguistic skills to read the incantation she held in her stone fingers, the statue came to life. Seshat, a gorgeous flesh and blood woman appeared where a stone image stood just moments before. And that is where my Steampunk/Romance, As Timeless As Stone begins.

Here is the blurb:

Though society stands in their way, can love transcend time with the aid of robotics and ritual?

In peril for her life, the Priestess Seshat turns herself to stone in ancient Egypt. Centuries later, Ricard, a dashing nineteenth century Frenchman, repairs a broken statue and reads its incantation--unprepared for the gorgeous flesh and blood woman who steps forth.

Seshat is drawn to the brass robots Ricard creates and the glamor of the Victorian age, and most of all to Ricard himself. But the society of his day cannot accept a woman like her. How far will Ricard go to secure her happiness? Is their love strong enough to transcend time itself?

http://maevealpin.com/