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Hi reader,
Two days. On Friday, Jennie Wren Foster puts out two books at once, at opposite ends of the map, and I want to give each of them a proper minute rather than lump them together.
The Broken Script of the Stars (Chronicles of the Celestial Fold, Book 2), landing Friday.
The god is buried. The one who wrote the god is not.
Last week I told you what this book is about. This week I want to tell you who it is about. Valeriana spent three hundred years as an empress who never let anyone watch her sleep, running on a rule she made young and never questioned: love is a loss you take before it can take you. Take it first, on your own terms, and it cannot be done to you. It is a rule that works, in the sense that a locked door works. This is the book where she is given one last chance to unlearn it, and where the cost of unlearning it is laid out in front of her in advance, so that choosing it means choosing it with her eyes open. Everything else in the story, the erased girl, the choir of two thousand, the thing in the dark that was fed to a door a thousand years ago and has been grieving ever since, is built to ask her that one question.
Sapphic-centered romantasy, open door, found family, and a dark that keeps.
The Broker's Mask (Midnight Auction, Book 2), also landing Friday.
If the library is the aching one, this is the dangerous one. A second descent into the Midnight Auction, where nothing changes hands without a price and every face at the table is a mask over a deal, and where the bargains are the kind you understand completely and take anyway. Worldbuilding-forward romantasy, bond-driven, romance-forward and closed door. Book two of five, following The Midnight Auction.
Both go on sale Friday: https://www.jlcollinspublishing.com/books
And if you want something tonight rather than Friday, Hostile Intent (Kira Deveraux, high heat, 18+) and Hidden Truths at Mercy General (Clara Langford, over 40, closed door) have both been on the shelf since the seventh, at opposite ends of the heat scale, and either one will hold you until the weekend.
Want to read a Jennie romantasy first, for free? Join Read It First, our launch team, and tick Jennie on the signup form. Both August 21 books are going out to the team right now, and you can tick Kira and Clara as well: https://readitfirst-jlcollinspublishing.beehiiv.com/p/read-it-first. And if Hostile Intent or Hidden Truths landed for you, an honest review is the single most helpful thing you can do for it.
📌 Quick save: the Broken Script of the Stars pin is live on Pinterest. Tap Save so more romantasy readers find it: [PIN URL — paste the live pin link when building in Beehiv] (pinterest.com/jlcollinspublishing)
One question while we wait for Friday: is a rule like Valeriana's, take the loss first so it cannot be done to you, self-protection or self-sabotage? I genuinely go back and forth. Hit reply and tell me where you land.
Happy reading,
Something to listen to in the meantime. There is a new podcast from the house, Story Worlds from JL Collins Publishing and Glassbound Ink. Episode one is "Every Book Is a Doorway," which is a fitting place to start for a week when two of them are about to open at once. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxrgNNk8yik
Jennie, Kira and Clara
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