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Publication Order of Red Winter Trilogy Books
Publication Order of Spell Weaver Books
Publication Order of Steel & Stone Books
Publication Order of The Guild Codex: Demonized Books
Publication Order of The Guild Codex: Spellbound Books
Chronological Order of The Guild Codex: Spellbound Books
Publication Order of The Guild Codex: Unveiled Books
Publication Order of The Guild Codex: Warped Books
with Rob Jacobsen
Annette Marie is a Canadian author best known for a series of young adult and fantasy fiction novels. The most popular of her novels include the Steel & Stone series and the Red Winter Trilogy. She has always loved reading ever since she was a kid when she used to read the Nancy Drew mysteries. It was from these classic novels that she learned that some young heroines portrayed some weird attributes such as being too prone to fainting even though they were perfectly healthy. Given the abundance of Sweet Valley High books in her school library, she soon graduated to these more mature narratives. She cannot put a finger on what value she drew from these novels, save for the fact that the real high school experience was so different from the fictional one. In her teenage years she gravitated towards fantasy fiction, with The Belgaris by David Edding one of her favorites. It was from Edding’s series of novels that she discovered that she was more attuned to the world of fascinating adventure and action rather than the banality of high school drama.
Annette likes to go against convention when it comes to innovation and imagination. This is all well and good given that her first love is fantasy fiction, where one is allowed to bend and break boring rules of reality. With her fantasy novels, she can write about tantalizing forbidden romances, bold heroines, and fast paced urban fantasies. Unlike your normal young adult fiction or fantasy writer that likes to make clear demarcations between the dark and the light, Marie’s novels do not fit the contemporary mould. Annette builds a world where there is no division between daemon and human morality, evil and good daemons, or black and white. This aspect makes the novels so intriguing and interesting given that it is more reflective of the real life situation where you cannot trust anyone. The characters have to constantly challenge and redefine their own and other people’s conception of the bad and good guys throughout the novels. For instance, Piper finds that she has to challenge herself constantly, and is often unsure of whether she is in the spectrum of evil or good. The novels also break many conventions particularly about what makes a character special. You will not find in the novels any helpless/timid heroines that are the perfect fodder for young adult fiction yet do not exist in real life. Marie’s heroines face up to barriers and challenges in their relationships as would be expected in any romantic relationship. Nonetheless, they are not perfect and still need to be rescued, but they still take no crap from anyone and can take care of themselves.
As for her inspiration, music is one of her biggest sources though not in terms of themes or character development. For Annette, Music fires her up and gets her in the mood. A good song can get her the motivation and imagination to write for hours. The old anime or fantasy movie is also a huge source of thematic and character inspiration, and a few hours of watching will usually get her creative juices flowing. She will also draw inspiration from everyday happenings in her day-to-day life. The way she describes it is like collecting ideas about premises, events, places, and characters like random puzzle pieces, which she drops into a bucket. She will then reach out and scoop a few pieces that fit in with a new story that she is writing, when she needs to. Given her penchant for drawing inspiration from other works, the character development in the series is not cast in stone. She will usually have the basics such as major turning points and portions of the characters destroy written out, but for the most part, the writing process involves a lot of discovery. Despite the nature of her writing, Annette creates characters that are unique, mysterious, yet likable.
Annette lives in the northern reaches of Alberta Canada, which she describes as a frozen winter wasteland. She lives with a comparatively sensible and patient husband and Caesar, their cat whom they have christened the furry minion of darkness. When she is not banging out another of her bestsellers, you can find her elbow deep in one of her homemaking projects that have nothing to do with adult responsibilities.
In Chase the Dark, Annette Marie’s first novel in the Stone and Steel series, we are introduced to Piper Griffiths whose only wish in life is to become a keeper of the peace between daemons and humans, a Consul. It is not going to be easy since there are three obstacles she has to get over first. The first is the Sahar Stone, a magical weapon that had been kept in the consulate under great secrecy, which had been stolen by thieves that had then gone underground. The second is a daemon known as Ash. Ash is a disturbingly attractive yet scary, dangerous, powerful daemon that knows everything but lets out nothing. The last in Incubus who is one of the most wicked of daemons and is as handsome as the Prince of devils. Incubus has sworn to bed Piper even as he annoys the crap out of her in his attempt. With thieves robbing her of the precious Sahar Stone, she is forced to flee with every daemon in the city baying for her blood, and her dream of becoming Consul in tatters. She now has no one to trust save for the unpredictable daemons Incubus and Ash, who she rightly believes have ulterior motives.
In the second novel in the Steel and Stone series, Piper is now planning to break one of the cardinal rules of being a trainee consul, by getting into a relationship with daemons. After the Sahar Stone scandal that nearly cost her her life blows over, she has returned to take her place as Apprentice Consul. However, getting to keep her Apprenticeship is twice as hard as she thought it would be. She is now flirting with irritating though sinfully irresistible Lyre, and the notoriously lethal and enigmatic Ash, who in all fairness she believes are not that bad daemons. But with Ash disappearing without a trace, she finds herself torn between risking her future to find the daemon that saved her life but also betrayed and lied to her. She knows that with his penchant for trouble, he must be in some hot water somewhere. With no one to save him, it is up to her to pick up the slack. Yet with such an enigma, every secret she unearths seems to drag her deeper into the dark world that Ash lives in, where she has no hope of escape.
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One Response to “Annette Marie”
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I’ve written to you before. The first time I was rude. Complained about a series I was reading and the third and final book of the series was in e-book only. You had replied that you had a problem with you publisher, and sent me a copy of that book to my computer. Thank you. I ended up waiting until the book was in hard cover before reading it. I’ve since read everything you have written, and enjoy them very much. I was wondering if you have issued the books to the Backfire series yet.