We’re celebrating the release week of Memories of Ash, the second book in the Sunbolt Chronicles by author Intisar Khanani! I absolutely love this series! It’s one of my favorite fantasy series of all time.
Read more about the book and check out a short post by the author Intisar Khanani. She shares with us a little bit about the magic system in her books. Checkitout!
Memories of Ash
Series: The Sunbolt Chronicles, Book Two
Author: Intisar Khanani
Cover Designer: Jenny Zemanek
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Release Date: May 30, 2016
Publisher: Purple Monkey PressIn the year since she cast her sunbolt, Hitomi has recovered only a handful of memories. But the truths of the past have a tendency to come calling, and an isolated mountain fastness can offer only so much shelter. When the High Council of Mages summons Brigit Stormwind to stand trial for treason, Hitomi knows her mentor won’t return—not with Arch Mage Blackflame behind the charges.
Armed only with her magic and her wits, Hitomi vows to free her mentor from unjust imprisonment. She must traverse spell-cursed lands and barren deserts, facing powerful ancient enchantments and navigating bitter enmities, as she races to reach the High Council. There, she reunites with old friends, planning a rescue equal parts magic and trickery.
If she succeeds, Hitomi will be hunted the rest of her life. If she fails, she’ll face the ultimate punishment: enslavement to the High Council, her magic slowly drained until she dies.
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Read my detailed review of Memories of Ash.
Memories of Ash
Intisar Khanani on the magic system in the Sunbolt Chronicles:
I love playing with how magic can work in a given world. For me, there are two cardinal rules for writing magic: first, it must come at a cost, and second, it must follow it’s own set of laws. Without these, magic is either too easy (I mean, I still wonder why there weren’t 200 more Voldemorts on the rise, given how easy magic was in the Harry Potter world—not that I didn’t still love the books!) or it’s unbelievable.
In The Sunbolt Chronicles, magic very much has a cost—it’s not only hard to perform, but gathering too much magic to yourself, or attempting a spell far more advanced than you can handle, has serious ramifications. Since the magic in these stories revolves around the elements, you might have a character who gathers too much fire into her core in preparation for a spell, and accidentally burns herself to a crisp from the inside out. Or a character might get caught in a backwash of magic just released from a great spell, and have that element change the natural balance within their body, impacting what they can do with magic from then on. Further, the magic follows its own laws. You can count on it working certain ways, whether you like it or not, and this also has its ramifications.
That said, it is grand fun to play with variations on how a magic system might work, and what happens when a character steps out of line.
About Intisar Khanani
Intisar Khanani grew up a nomad and world traveler. Born in Wisconsin, she has lived in five different states as well as in Jeddah on the coast of the Red Sea. She first remembers seeing snow on a wintry street in Zurich, Switzerland, and vaguely recollects having breakfast with the orangutans at the Singapore Zoo when she was five. She currently resides in Cincinnati, Ohio, with her husband and two young daughters.
Until recently, Intisar wrote grants and developed projects to address community health with the Cincinnati Health Department, which was as close as she could get to saving the world. Now she focuses her time on her two passions: raising her family and writing fantasy. Intisar’s current projects include a companion trilogy to Thorn, following the heroine introduced in her free short story The Bone Knife, and The Sunbolt Chronicles, an epic series following a street thief with a propensity to play hero when people need saving, and her nemesis, a dark mage intent on taking over the Eleven Kingdoms.
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Check out the first book of The Sunbolt Chronicles
Sunbolt (Book 1)
The winding streets and narrow alleys of Karolene hide many secrets, and Hitomi is one of them. Orphaned at a young age, Hitomi has learned to hide her magical aptitude and who her parents really were. Most of all, she must conceal her role in the Shadow League, an underground movement working to undermine the powerful and corrupt Arch Mage Wilhelm Blackflame.
When the League gets word that Blackflame intends to detain—and execute—a leading political family, Hitomi volunteers to help the family escape. But there are more secrets at play than Hitomi’s, and much worse fates than execution. When Hitomi finds herself captured along with her charges, it will take everything she can summon to escape with her life.
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Read my review of Sunbolt.
Sunbolt (Book 1)Giveaway
Kindle Fire giveaway (or $50 GC for international winners) PLUS a multi-author e-book giveaway
This sounds like a great series! I’d never heard of it before, but I’ll definitely have to check it out. :)
It’s a fun one! :)
Thanks so much for all your support, Leah! <3
:D