Happy Release Day to “Our Hungering Hearts: A Four-Course Short Story Collection”!
On the Menu:
“Two Spoons, the Devil’s Son” = A little girl’s soul meets its match in the family diner’s most mysterious patron…
“A Mind Prone to Wander” = An assassin princess and an incognito madman brave a monster’s mechanized fortress and the pasts that left them broken…
“Reality As We Know It” = Where otherworldly magic fails, is Row’s friendship enough to mend Singer’s grieving heart?
“Date Due” = A magic library’s guardian determines to protect her treasured books, whether their authors elect to do things the easy way … or the fatal one.
Two servings of paranormal, a taste of fantasy, and a side order of steampunk – first released in various anthologies, now served up all together in one delicious combo deal. Bon appétit!
If you haven’t already ordered your copy(ies) of the e-book edition, you can do so HERE (via Amazon, for Kindle and other mobi file readers) and HERE (via Barnes & Noble, for Nook and other epub file readers) – and/or get the paperback HERE!
Because I’m so pleased about my solo anthology’s launch into the world, I am concurrently launching four new designs in my Society6 shop – one for each of the “Hungering Hearts” short stories. Observe!
1 = #Like An Escaped Convict
Again, the Black Man did not smile. Nor did he frown. His thin mouth was straight, his slender brows at rest, his eyes resetting to narrow after their flare of surprise. Measured and silky, he asked, “Where are your people?”
Eyes and thumb still fixed in place, Tidbit half-turned her body toward the swinging double door to the kitchen at the dining room’s far end.
“I see,” he said, flicking a glance where she’d directed, then back down to her. “And do they allow you out here to creep upon their clientele’s tables, or are you an escaped convict?”
– from “Two Spoons, the Devil’s Son”
I don’t expect ol’ Two Spoons to shop my little e-store any time soon, but just in case, I made sure this design inspired by his story included his favorite colors: Red and (most obviously) black.
2 = #Mad Pretty #Pretty Mad
The monarchs would have had yet another catastrophe on their hands if they couldn’t both keep their promise /and/ satisfy the Lord of Wings’ demand. And there was I, an amnesiac orphan. Unclaimed. Unwanted. Unhinged, though no one seemed to notice. And most importantly, a boy pretty enough to pass for a girl.
– from “A Mind Prone to Wander”
A tastefully fractured design for the beautifully insane among you, or, whatever, for the princess looking back at you from the mirror. I don’t know your life.
3 = #Real World Problems
As do we all, he knows of the Réalis — the world alongside our own. We are that world’s dreams, they are this world’s stories. And some of us, I’m told, exist in both places at once, having been born there only to be conjured here at the judges’ whim.
We call the world real — not because it is any /truer/ than ours, for it’s not, but because it is fixed, its base rules inflexible, unaffected by the merest wish of its inhabitants. Heartsinger rasps, “Why would anyone want to go there?”
– from “Reality As We Know It”
Why indeed? But hey, if you’re gonna be stuck in this reality of ours, why not weep your tears of adulting exhaustion in an Ever On Word throw pillow that gets you?
4 = #Word Wizard
“Shall I be honest with you, Elizabeth?” I asked.
She said, “I wish you would.”
“Well, the truth of it is, I deeply love your work. You have a talent like no other I’ve seen.”
“Thank you,” she said, with the merest dip of her head. Not flattered, not scornful. Simply acknowledging. “I have been called something of a wizard with words. You could say it’s in my blood.”
– from “Date Due”
Whether on a mug that holds your writing beverage of choice, the notebook that holds your brainstorming notes, or the bag that totes your laptop full of story documents, this is a design for all of us who claim the pen as our magic sword. …And for any dragons who crave swaggy book merch for their hoard.
So! That’s what’s new from your gal DEShipley. If you’re in a place to do so, feel free to support my artistic endeavors with your dollars and/or – also of great importance!!! – book reviews. (Go on, don’t be shy about sharing your readerly opinions with Amazon; the Merry Men showed you how easy-peasy it can be!)
‘Til next time, dearies,
~ Danielle
Item One (News of the Most Excellent Kind) = I am VERY excited to announce that I will be one of the authors featured at the 
As you may by now have heard, I’ve crossed a dream off my bucket list and designed a journal, inspired by (appropriately enough) “
As lately announced, I have crossed a dream off my bucket list and designed a journal, inspired by (appropriately enough) “
Ever On Word 