Love Bytes says hello and welcome to author Annabelle Jay who joins us to talk about her new release for Harmony Ink , “Caden’s Comet”.

A Prophesy Gone…Straight?

In Caden’s Comet: Book Four in The Sun Dragon Series, a Sun Dragon named Grian is sent to Earth to find his soulmate, an Earth Dragon named Caden who has been reborn in a new body. While there Grian gets help from Merlin, who takes him to a special land called Little Earth where the Earth Dragons all play out of sight of human eyes. He also helps Grian sneak into the EDPS, or Earth Dragon Protection Society, where the two hope to find some clue as to who this “Caden” person is. Eventually, the two do find someone who goes by the name “Caden,” but there’s only one problem…Grian is attracted to men, and when he finally finds Caden, “he” is a she.

Even before Grian finds out Blair Caden is his soulmate—or so says the prophesy—Grian ends up kissing her after he finds out about his mother’s death while on a diplomatic mission. Here is that scene:

Blair took a tissue out of her dress pocket and used it to help pat my eyes. For a second I felt like a child again, being comforted by Skelly after a fall or a harsh word from the other boys. There was something so soothing about this Earth Dragon, something that I could not explain—like beams of sun warming my skin. I didn’t want it to ever go away, though I knew that all suns must disappear when night falls.

So I kissed her.

It felt nothing like kissing Sren or any of the other boys from Draman. Firstly, though she smelled like the sun, her lips tasted like the earth. There was a sweet floweriness to them, unlike the colder touch of a Bone Dragon’s kiss. Secondly, there was no aggression in her touch. With Sren and the others a kiss had always been a hungry, grasping thing, but with Blair, the act was softer and gentler.

I ran my hands through her hair, feeling the strange length of it between my fingers, and she touched my neck, sending a warm glow down my spine. We kissed again, and again, until a sound startled us.

“Ahem.”

“Oh. Merlin.” I moved back as far as I could on the rock, putting about two feet between Blair and I. “Blair was just… uh….”

“Comforting him,” she added. “Which I think I did successfully. So… great. I’ll be going now.”

 

In books one and two in the series, the characters fell in love very quickly. In book three, two of the characters were secretly in love but both denied it for a very long time for both societal and personal reasons. In Caden’s Comet, I wanted to explore a more complicated situation: what happens when the “soulmate” you’re destined to love just isn’t right for you?

Grian has more riding on his relationship than his personal happiness; the whole planet of Draman, where Grian is from, is relying on him to reunite the clans, as are many half-dragon people he hasn’t even encountered yet. How can someone make the choice between their own romantic interests and the good of everyone else?

In addition to the question of true love and romance, Caden’s Comet also explores the idea of lasting friendships. Those friendships will prove much stronger than any “true love,” and they will help Grian finally figure out how to save himself and his friends when the EDPS turns out to be an evil organization.

Finally, this isn’t the last you’ll see of King Grian and his soulmate. They will also carry readers through to the fifth book, where all of the characters in Caden’s Comet join a new character in the final epic battle to save the universe before all of the generations of people—dragons, wizards, sorceresses, and Igreefee—who readers have come to know and love are destroyed.

Blurb:

Long ago, in the days before King Roland, the four dragon kingdoms—Ice, Sun, Earth, and Bone—battled for dominion over the bountiful planet Earth. Prince Grian, a young dragon, hid aboard a Sun Dragon ship, traveled to Earth, and met Caden, an Earth Dragon who’d run away from his village. Despite falling in love, destiny’s plans for them turned cruel, and both perished in the war.

The Artists who created the universe could not let this tragic loss of true love go unpunished. They wiped out the race of Sun Dragons, exiled the Bone Dragons to Draman, and banished the Ice Dragons to the North Pole, safely away from the Earth Dragons. Only the rebirth of Grian and Caden could break the curse. One day, the return of their love would usher in an age of peace and prosperity for all dragons.

But when Prince Grian is reborn, he finds reuniting with his soulmate on Earth will be no easy feat. As he searches for his lost love, the Earth Dragon Protection Society, or EDPS, searches for him, ready to kill him when they find him. If Grian can elude the EDPS, he might find that the true love he once had isn’t guaranteed to bloom a second time.

Cover Artist: Stef Masciandaro

Buy Links:

 

If there’s one thing author Annabelle Jay believes with all her heart, it’s that there is no such thing as too many dragons in a book. As fantasy writer with few other hobbies—does being bribed to run with her partner or dancing awkwardly in the kitchen count?—she spends every day following her imagination wherever it leads her.

A hippie born in the wrong decade, Annabelle has a peace sign tattoo and a penchant for hugging trees. Occasionally she takes breaks from her novels to play with her pets: Jon Snow, the albino rabbit who is constantly trying to escape; Stevie, the crested gecko that climbs glass with the hairs on its toes; and Luigi, the green tree python that lives at the foot of her bed despite her best efforts to talk her partner out of the idea.

During her day job as a professor of English, Annabelle is often assumed to be a fellow student playing a prank on the class—that is, until she hands out the syllabus. When people stop mistaking her for a recent high school graduate, she will probably be very sad.

 

Links:

Author’s Website: www.annabellejay.com

Twitter: @AnnabelleAuthor

Instagram: @AnnabelleAuthor

Publisher’s book page: https://www.harmonyinkpress.com/books/cadens-comet-by-annabelle-jay-483-b

Goodreads author page: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14191901.Annabelle_Jay

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Annabelle-Jay-376249719245415