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A collection of stories about the
magic of romance at Christmas time.
REVIEW: Once Upon a Christmas Moon
Title:
Once Upon a Christmas Moon
Author:
Christine Young, C. L. Kraemer, Genie Gabriel
Rating:
5
Reviewer:
James Charles
Three delightful short stories. Each one takes the reader
into a fantasy world, even the one set post-Civil War, and serves up a
well-rounded tale. Perfect stories for the cold months of winter. Wrap up in
your blanket and grab a warm eggnog, and settle in to three different
enchanting worlds.
EXCERPTS: Once Upon a
Christmas Moon
Twelve Days to Love
Christine Young
Near New Orleans October
2,1867
“Sam!
Close the shutters on the back landing. I’ll get the front. Hurry. There’s a
storm coming.” Calanthe Durand felt the small hairs on the back of her neck
rise and shivers run down her spine. A big storm was on its way, probably a
hurricane. Energy and fear poured through her like the pounding rain and
flooding that accompanied high winds. Closing the house to the storm was
imperative.
Cali
took a moment to smile. She’d heard Sam grunt. He didn’t talk much, but she
wouldn’t have survived the war or these last two years without Sam and his
daughter Daisy. Both sides, the North and the South, had occupied their home.
Daisy and Sam were family, the only family she had. She’d do whatever was
necessary to protect them. Even with emancipation, life wasn’t easy for blacks
in the south.
“I’ve
got them, Miss Cali.” Daisy rushed past her and out the door. Wind whipped her
hair and tugged at her dress. Branches torn from trees landed on the porch.
Cali
followed, the storm swirling around her, her hair beating against her face. Her
breath was ragged, and fast as her heart thundered. She pushed and tugged at
her skirt, trying to detangle the fabric from her legs. “Get inside!” The
tempest raging around them swallowed her voice.
“Not
until we’re finished here.” Daisy fastened a shutter before moving on to the
next one.
They
worked together to protect the windows from the storm on the raised porch which
stood five feet off the ground as wind howled around the eaves. A steady rain
poured from the black sky, and lightning slashed the darkness.
Cali
pushed dripping strands of hair that had slipped from her chignon away from her
face. “I’ll light the candles. It could get dark here pretty fast.”
“Horses
and livestock are safe for now.” Sam stepped beside her. “Hope it’s not a big
one.”
“Hello
up there. Hello, bonjour, anyone home?”
Hearing
the voice from below, Cali left the protection of the house to lean over the
porch railing. Below her a man stood, with cupped hands to his mouth and a dead
gator slung over one shoulder a quiver filled with arrows on the other. “Hello.
Can I get shelter from the hurricane?”
“Don’t
know if it’s a hurricane.” Terrified of unknown men, Cali didn’t want to do the
charitable thing. She pursed her lips, thinking, but all that came to surface
was memories of troops commandeering her home. Good lord but she’d had to
hollow out a bedpost to hide her jewelry. The soldiers had taken everything
they could see. Sometimes she felt as if the war had ripped her soul from her
body.
“Maybe
not a hurricane. Could be just a bad storm, but I don’t want to be on the swamp
right now. The water’s rising.” A loud roar and a thunderclap followed his
pause. Behind him an old Cyprus tree crashed to the ground, uprooted by the
wind.
“You
can take shelter in the stable.” Cali watched his back stiffen, while she
swallowed hard, but she wasn’t about to back down. The stable was good enough
for some wandering man who she owed nothing. Besides, there was a tack room
with a bed. No one slept there anymore, but she kept it clean and the moss in
the mattress was fresh. Daisy had rolled it out two days ago. Yet a small
niggling in the back of her head kept telling her this wasn’t a traveling man
but one of means. He was a man she should treat as a gentleman. She’d been
taught better but the war had changed all that and the lessons she learned were
not served to her with a silver spoon.
“Much
obliged.” He nodded before turning toward the barn. His natural swagger and
broad shoulders sent a different kind of sensation through her. Warmth swept
inside, swirling within and heating her frozen heart. For a moment he looked
back, a strange expression on his well-chiseled face.
Boots and Blades
C.L. Kraemer
High Desert, Central
Oregon
Killian
stared at the rise of rock from the desert floor. The emerging sun tricked the
sky into revealing pink and blue streamers across the horizon exposing the
severe lines of craggy mountains. Pine trees scented the air, and the slightest
hint of sage tickled his nose.
“Where
are they disappearing to? They’re much too young to be running away.”
“Master
Killian?”
The
young man turned his blue gray eyes from the mountain to answer. “Yes, Ms.
Luna. What can I do for you?”
“Are
you sitting out here at this early hour worrying about the young ones?” Luna’s
black hair was braided down her back and she sported a shawl bright with her
clan’s colors. She handed the young man a steaming cup of coffee. “I hope you
don’t mind black. I’ve yet to milk the goat.”
Killian
flashed her a seldom seen smile. “Ms. Luna, you make the best coffee in the
desert. Black is fine.”
Taking
up a spot next to him on the porch, she turned her attention to the mountains
admiring the soft colors of rose and tan springing to life in the morning sun. “What
is it that haunts you so?”
“The
illogicality of it all.”
“Aye,
I figured that. It is indeed illogical. The children are too responsible to
leave unannounced, yet they are snatched from their beds in the middle of the
night with no clues.”
Killian
sipped the wicked black brew and allowed the liquid to spike his taste buds.
The brilliant light of a new day was caressing the landscape and warming the
air. “The kinders disappearing are not inclined to run off. They are the eldest
and most reliable. These missings make no sense. They don’t happen in the same
area or at the same time. They’re completely arbitrary and being so—random—has
given me pause to find a method. If I were to discover a pattern, the recovery
would be simpler.”
Luna
watched the anguish distort his handsome young face. His blue eyes clouded to a
dark grey when he spoke of the missing children, and his normally full mouth
stretched to a tight slash across his face.
“I
don’t wish to sound cruel, but none of these are young ones of your own family.
Why take their absence to heart?”
Killian
relaxed his scowl a bit, and a smile began to touch his lips. “Because it is
they who will be the leaders of our clans in but a few short years. I had hoped
to retire my sword someday to warm my boots by a fire. Having a mate and young
ones around isn’t such a bad idea.”
He
automatically sipped his dark brew. It would indeed be nice to warm my feet
by a fire with a mate and children. The problem being I’ve found no person who
makes me think in such terms.
“Well,
I must admit, Master Killian, I never would have thought you to be the settling
type.” She picked up his cup, returning from the kitchen minutes later with
fresh coffee in the container.
“Neither
had I, Ms. Luna, neither had I, however, aside from our missing young ones,
there has been no conflict between the clans, nor have the Others tried to
interfere in our affairs in a very long time. It is a good thing for many but
for me, what good is a warrior without a war?”
Luna
could only agree with his forlorn assessment; what good, indeed, was a warrior
without a war? “Maybe a solution will arrive in the near future. You never
know.”
Killian
shrugged his shoulders. Who knew indeed?
Christmas Pawsibilities
Genie Gabriel
“So where is this alien craft?”
Fletcher had never completely trusted Commander Viktor Atrocitor. Since
he had taken command of GIG two years ago, the atmosphere at the agency had
become cold and suspicious, like the man himself. He seemed carved from six and
a half feet of granite, blocky and scowling.
“It has disappeared.” Fletcher knew this statement would draw Atrocitor’s
ire and disdain, but what was the use of denying the obvious?
“Fool! Can you do nothing right?” Atrocitor turned to the GIG agents
waiting at a wary distance. “Search the neighborhood. Someone must have seen
something or is hiding them.”
While Atrocitor berated Fletcher, other GIG agents spread throughout the
neighborhood, offending pretty much everyone by demanding they stay in their
houses while their property was overrun and searched.
After two hours of fruitless searching, Commander Atrocitor called a
halt. “If you want to save your career and this town, you will bring me these
aliens within twenty-four hours.”
As Fletcher watched the caravan of GIG vehicles disappear down the road
out of Watermark, he felt like a six-year-old kid again. Bullied and humiliated
for his belief that beings from distant galaxies simply wanted to explore and
build alliances. They weren’t like aliens in movies who wanted to destroy humanity.
That’s why Fletcher started working at Geeks in Green. He thought he
found other humans like himself who believed alliances with aliens could
benefit everyone. Now he was starting to believe the rumors about Commander
Atrocitor being heartless and determined to eliminate aliens were true. How
could he know for sure?
His thoughts were interrupted when Agnes staggered out the back door
toward the barn. “Who’s disturbing my goats?”
With her hair disheveled and her clothes askew, she did indeed look as if
she had spent a raucous night of partying—the after-effects of being zapped by
a ray gun.
Laycee and Fletcher followed Agnes into the barn, where the spacecraft
was once again visible. Now the hatch was open, with guards standing on either
side pointing ray guns at Agnes, Laycee and Fletcher.
“Holy extraterrestrial!”
With a sizzle of purple, one of the alien guards fired his gun and
Fletcher crumpled to the ground.
“Why did you do that?” Ryan hustled out of the spacecraft.
“He is of GIG,” one of the guards stated. “He is a danger to our Queen.”
“Is he dead?” Ryan knelt over Fletcher’s inert body.
“Simply stunned. We will revive him when the danger to our Queen is gone.”
The two guards loaded Fletcher onto a transport board, which levitated and
moved inside the spacecraft.
“Your mouth isn’t moving but I can hear your words.” Laycee’s shocked
whisper matched the stunned expression in her eyes.
“Our Canine Queen is birthing and is not to be disturbed.” This time the
alien’s mouth moved as he spoke, and he looked like any other human except for
a twinkle of star light in his eyes. “Weren’t you getting milk for the royal
puppies?”
“Yes.” Ryan refocused his attention on this task, determined to ignore
Laycee’s presence. What was she doing here anyway? “Agnes, do you have milk
from your goats?”
“My goats don’t much like to be milked.”
“Surely it can’t be that difficult,” Ryan said.
Agnes lifted an eyebrow. “You’re welcome to try. I’ll get a clean bucket.”
Determined to get milk for the Queen’s puppies, Ryan began stalking one
of the goats.
“I think it should be a female,” Laycee said.
Ryan felt like a first grader again. “I knew that.”
Laycee coughed behind her hand to cover her laughter. “There’s a girl goat
on top of the space ship.”
Ryan looked up the curved, smooth surface. “Maybe there’s another girl
somewhere easier to reach.”
He stepped around the space ship and over the boards broken when the
craft crashed through the roof. “There’s a girl! Help me get her into a stall.”
“Um-kay.”
While Ryan circled around the nanny goat one way, Laycee closed in on her
from the other side. The little goat narrowed her eyes at the humans and, when
they were within a couple feet of her, she let out a bleat and ran between
Ryan’s legs. Startled, he stumbled and dropped to one knee.
“Watch out!” Laycee’s shout made Ryan turn in time to see an irritated
male goat charging toward him.
Genre:
Excerpt Heat Level: 1
Book Heat Level: 1
BLURB
The Lending Library-a fantasy. By C. L. Kraemer
Faeries try to fit into the human world when the forest
where they make their home is destroyed by a mysterious enemy.
Chasing Rainbows-a contemporary romance. By Genene
Valleau
An eccentric aunt, an inventive uncle, a mother who wears
poodle skirts, and a brother who wears pearls provide a hilarious backdrop for
the courtship of a young woman who yearns for a "normal" family.
The Gift-a historical romance. By Christine Young
A man and a woman on opposite sides of the Civil War get
a second chance at love after one final battle returns soldiers to their
war-torn homes to rebuild their lives.
