First, thank the blogs for having me on this Ink and Shadows tour! Thank you so so much! Secondly, this next part will be the same across the blogs but I wanted to give a bit of a soundbite about the whys of this book.

In the Beginning, there was urban fantasy. Okay to be fair, the urban fantasy genre didn’t exist when I began to read. Back then, it was pretty much either sci-fi or high fantasy. There were murmurs of urban fantasy—Mercedes Lackey’s elves / bard series, Gael Baudino’s Gossamer Axe, to name a few—but it caught and began gaining traction, a bastard stepchild of magic and an alternative universe.

Urban fantasy was always a playground for experimentation and I wanted to go off the rails a bit with Ink and Shadows. There had to be a solid footing in the contemporary world and the underbelly of humanity. Or rather, the expression of humanity. When I wrote this book, it was to explore the possibilities of personalities and okay, play around with the world.

I chose to write about the Horsemen of the Apocalypse and Kismet, the human who changes their world, because I wanted to delve into their being a necessary part of humanity’s existence. Over the course of the tour, I’ll touch on the main characters and components of the Horsemen’s world.

I hope you all like Ink and Shadows, my foray past the shadows.

Oh! And as a giveaway! Enter to win Pestilence’s Horse! That’s right! A black pony of your very own!

GIVEAWAY INSTRUCTIONS! Please comment below (email would be nice so I can contact you) and be entered to win Mal’s iconic Dark Horse.
One per Blog Tour Site! CONTEST ENDS JULY 8, 2015!

 

The Veil.

The Veil is a critical piece of the Ink and Shadows world. It separates the real world from the shadow world where The Four Horsemen and other Manifestations exist. I played with the idea of Death, War, Pestilence and Famine being actual people whose presence behind the Veil is necessary for mankind to grow as a species. Same goes with Faith and Peace, the Seven Deadly Sins and as well as those Virtues. They are bound to answer the call of humanity’s needs, brought back into existence following a very human life and tasked to influence mankind for the better.

Even if it seems like they’re bringing mankind to the brink of destruction.

None of the Manifestations know about their past lives. They know they’ve lived before but they don’t know when they came from or where. Instead, they are born with the knowledge of their new existence and assigned place in the scheme of things.

Since the Veil is a tangible thing but yet something like a membrane around reality, I had to come up with certain rules. All urban fantasy needs rules. In this case, it was pretty simple. First, the Veil exists in the same space as reality, it’s just a bit out of sync, a step to the side of reality—sort of like a bubble of alternate reality. Humans can’t see anything existing behind the Veil. There are caveats because there are always caveats.

In this case, only the mad can see through the Veil. And a certain young man named Kismet.

Other creatures live behind the Veil—other than the Manifestations—trolls, goblins, red caps, pixies and the most insidious of beings, wraiths. These creatures plague the insane, feeding off of their flesh and minds while the “normal” world continues on its way, ignoring the mad and their rantings.

Since the beginning of existence, the Veil was solely for those who lived behind it or the insane who could see through it.

That is, until Kismet.

Ink and Shadows

Kismet Andreas lives in fear of the shadows.

For the young tattoo artist, the shadows hold more than darkness. He is certain of his insanity because the dark holds creatures and crawling things only he can see—monsters who hunt out the weak to eat their minds and souls, leaving behind only empty husks and despair.

And if there’s one thing Kismet fears more than being hunted—it’s the madness left in its wake.

The shadowy Veil is Mal’s home. As Pestilence, he is the youngest—and most inexperienced—of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, immortal manifestations resurrected to serve—and cull—mankind. Invisible to all but the dead and insane, the Four exist between the Veil and the mortal world, bound to their nearly eternal fate. Feared by other immortals, the Horsemen live in near solitude but Mal longs to know more than Death, War and Famine.

Mal longs to be… more human. To interact with someone other than lunatics or the deceased.

When Kismet rescues Mal from a shadowy attack, Pestilence is suddenly thrust into a vicious war—where mankind is the prize, and the only one who has faith in Mal is the human the other Horsemen believe is destined to die.

Purchase Ink and Shadows at DSP Publications: http://www.dsppublications.com/books/ink-and-shadows-by-rhys-ford-135-b

Or Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Ink-Shadows-Rhys-Ford-ebook/dp/B010OLTBJU/

As well as B&N and ARe.

Blog Tour

July 2: Love Bytes: https://lovebytesreviews.com/

July 3: It’s About the Book: http://itsaboutthebook.com/

July 6: Sinfully Sexy: http://sinfullysexybooks.blogspot.com/

July 7: RELEASE DAY! WOOOOT

July 8: Prism Alliance: http://www.prismbookalliance.com/

July 9: Joyfully Jay: http://joyfullyjay.com/

July 10: GGR: http://www.ggr-review.com/

July 11: The Blogger Girls: http://thebloggergirls.com/
The Novel Approach: http://thenovelapproachreviews.com/

About Rhys Ford

Rhys Ford was born and raised in Hawai’i then wandered off to see the world. After chewing through a pile of books, a lot of odd food, and a stray boyfriend or two, Rhys eventually landed in San Diego, which is a very nice place but seriously needs more rain.

Rhys admits to sharing the house with three cats of varying degrees of black fur and a ginger cairn terrorist. Rhys is also enslaved to the upkeep a 1979 Pontiac Firebird, a Toshiba laptop, and an overworked red coffee maker.

My Blog: www.rhysford.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rhys.ford.author

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Rhys_Ford

And at the Starbucks down the street. No really, they’re 24/7. And a drive-thru. It’s like heaven.

My books can be purchased, folded and first chapters read at Dreamspinner Press. http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com