Virtual Advent Tour: Indie songs for the season (Dec. 22)

Hi! Welcome to Random Magic Tour - The Coven, the official site for Sasha Soren, author of Random Magic.

Random Magic is an indie title, and so we thought it'd be fun to celebrate some other independent projects. What could be nicer than to enjoy some songs for the season!

What's more, these are all tunes you might not have heard, yet - all the selections are by indie artists. We hope you enjoy them all, and if you'd like to support the artist by downloading their tracks, a link has been provided for each.

Have fun, and hope you find at least one wonderful winter tune that you just love!

Shown above: Live performance, The Atheist Christmas Carol

Title: The Atheist Christmas Carol

Indie artist: Vienna Teng

Find this track: Amazon

More Vienna Teng: Blog | YouTube | Twitter

Shown above: Live performance, Thanks for the Roses

Title: Thanks for the Roses

Indie artist: Antje Duvekot

Find this track: Free gift from Antje - MP3 download! | Amazon

Watch official video: Thanks for the Roses

More Antje Duvekot: Blog | YouTube | Twitter

Shown above: Slideshow, Snow

Title: Snow

Indie artist: Loreena McKennitt

Find this track: Amazon

More Loreena McKennitt: Blog | Bio

Shown above: Lyrics, Angel

Title: Angel

Indie artist: Grey Eye Glances

Find this track: Amazon

More Grey Eye Glances: Blog

Shown above: Cover art for album that includes Sol Invictus

Title: Sol Invictus

Indie artist: Thea Gilmore

Find this track: Amazon

More Thea Gilmore: Blog

Listen to: Awake the Voice

Shown above: Promo still, Krista Detor

Title: Awake the Voice

Indie artist: Krista Detor

Find this track: Amazon

More Krista Detor: Site | Blog | YouTube | Twitter

Image source (promo photo)

We hope you've had a nice time here, and you're welcome to find out more about Random Magic by browsing any of the links below:

Find Random Magic: Print | Kindle

Explore Random Magic: YouTube | Tumblr | Twitter

You're also quite welcome to visit Songs of the Season, a fun music hop organized by @RandomMagicTour and featuring cool bloggers from all over the world:

Songs of the Season
Dec. 10-25, 2011
Visit: Songs of the Season

If you're dropping by from the Virtual Advent tour, please feel free to leave a souvenir badge to your post in the collection below. If you're not part of the tour but have a related winter post to include, you're welcome to add something nice.

Thanks for stopping by!
Advent Tour 2011 schedule is here: Find more posts

get the InLinkz code

Virtual Advent Tour: Reading by Firelight (Dec. 10)

Hi! Welcome to Random Magic Tour - The Coven. This is the official site for Sasha Soren, author of Random Magic. We do a weekly collective gallery of cute reading nook images, called Book Nooks, and you're welcome to browse some images or to participate here, if you like: Book Nooks

For this stop on Virtual Advent Tour 2011, we thought it'd be fun to enjoy some winter-related book nooks and winter palaces, so below we have some pretty images you might enjoy.

All of the images will be related to winter and castles or great homes - all marvelous places to find ancient fireplaces and luxurious surroundings, perfect for reading by firelight.

Here's a quick excerpt from Random Magic, so you can imagine at least one of these places - although, of course, this particular great home is a little less comfortable for guests who'd like to read by firelight. In fact, in this instance, reading with the lights down low all around you is not recommended...at all.

Excerpt, Random Magic:
Please note: Edited for length

There couldn't possibly exist a more pleasant spot in the entire world. Not possibly. Watercolor painting in the garden? But of course. The lady of the house is in ecstasies over the proposal. So charming. Yes, it will be arranged at once, for tomorrow afternoon, when the light is best...

All, one decides in satisfaction, is well with the world. London and all her annoyances seem a million miles away, and that's all to the good.

Then night falls.

And one begins to realize that the confining stone walls of Castle Marlybone contain somewhat more than immediately meets the eye: All those attics. Gloomy hallways. Secret doors and unexpected dungeons. Moats, crypts, and spectral visits from irritating fellows popping through walls...

The crammed-in houseful of unwary guests are treated to ghastly shrieks at midnight and faces in mirrors which don't, alas, belong to them, levitating books, and amorphous balls of light flitting through the shrubbery...

Doors slam in deserted wings...and drowsy sleepers are forced to listen for hours on end to irksome commentary from feckless nincompoops who died for love...

Through it all, grey ladies whom everyone likes to pretend aren't really there pop up and down the stairs at odd hours, vanishing at inconvenient moments, so that one doesn't know at all where one is.

Every last bit of it is patently endured, in the name of keeping up appearances...until one is joined unexpectedly in the bathtub by a skeleton wearing nothing but a smile and a top hat.

The violet-scented guest soap is abandoned mid-lather. The luggage is left behind, to be sent for next season, if ever...One flees back to the embrace of ordinary, overcrowded London, sends for the family doctor and takes to bed for a month, sleeps with the lights on and jumps at every sound...

And, so, now you know what to expect when Lord and Lady Mucklewater invite you 'round for crumpets and tea at Castle Greylaudanum. Things are nearly never what they seem to be, and often a great deal worse.

Alas, Witherspoon Manse wasn't that sort of castle. It was rather more mundane than all that. Which made it all the more shocking, in the end....

What happens next? Find out!

Browse or buy Random Magic: Print | Kindle

Explore Random Magic: YouTube | Tumblr | Twitter

And, now, here's a nice gallery of the top five or so places - that are not this place! - that no doubt include some perfect spots for reading by firelight:

About: Location and artist unknown

Source: Pinterest

About: Location is Tsarskoye Selo, Saint Petersburg, Russia. Artist unknown.

Source: Tumblr via We Heart It

About: Location given by the poster (English Ladye) as Hanham Court, Bristol, UK

Source: The English Ladye

About: Bletchley Park, Bletchley, Buckinghamshire, UK
Source: Flickr via We Heart It

About: Schloss Neuschwanstein, village of Hohenschwangau near Füssen, Bavaria, Germany
Source: Daily Architecture

Note: By the way, the 'Swan King' who dreamed up this outlandishly romantic castle also appears briefly as a character in Random Magic. He was also called der Märchenkönig, or the Fairy Tale King, the Dream King and Mad King Ludwig.
Read more about Ludwig II of Bavaria (shown above)




Shown above: Enjoy a video clip about the Dream King and Schloss Neuschwanstein, courtesy of World Site Guides.

About: Château de Pierrefonds, Pierrefonds, Picardy, FR
Source: Lorem Ipsum, The Pretty Princess

More nice things to browse...

We hope you've had an enjoyable time here, and you're welcome to find out more about Random Magic by visiting any of the places below:

Browse or buy Random Magic: Print | Kindle

Explore Random Magic: YouTube | Tumblr | Twitter


You're also quite welcome to visit Songs of the Season, a fun music hop organized by @RandomMagicTour and featuring cool bloggers from all over the world:

Songs of the Season
Dec. 10-25, 2011
Visit: Songs of the Season

If you're dropping by from the tour, please feel free to leave a souvenir badge for your post in the collection below. If you're not part of the tour but have a related winter post to include, you're welcome to add something nice.

Thanks for stopping by!

Advent Tour 2011 schedule is here: Find more posts

get the InLinkz code

get the InLinkz code

get the InLinkz code

get the InLinkz code

Image source: Spooky castle. Location and artist unknown.

Inside Random Magic: The Painted Soul

[Tour host info: A quick write-up on some of the subtexts in the Garden of the Muses. This one is specifically about the symbolism of the butterflies. If you'd like this for your post, please leave a comment below, send an email, or msg via Twitter. Trying to make sure there's a nice selection of additional content to post alongside reviews, interviews, trailer, etc. If you already have your completed interview, you might not need additional content, but if you don't have your interview, yet, and would like to include some useful info about the book for your readers, then just speak up -- the additional content is for use on the tour, just trying to match up a particular post with whoever's most interested in including the topic!] Images available: Text: In the Garden of the Muses, the air is teeming with butterflies in vivid colors. It’s a beautiful image, but those little splashes of color also have a more subtle meaning. The dazzling butterflies, in fact, literally are thoughts. The Ancient Greek word for "butterfly" is ψυχή (psȳchē), which translates as “soul” or “mind.” In one sense, the butterflies would be symbolic of the Muses’ shifting thoughts. In another sense, they’d be the messengers of inspired thoughts to their favorite writers, artists, poets, or other seekers. In a third sense, the butterflies represent the Muses' general benevolence, kindness and good nature toward mortal beings, since seeing a butterfly can symbolize that love is on its way to you soon, or that you’ll see someone whose face you miss. In the last sense, because a butterfly starts life as a lowly caterpillar, then a pupa, before finally emerging as something delicate and glorious, with a flutter of resplendent wings, the butterfly represents the creative process, itself. You start with something ugly or low, or not quite developed, then through stages of development, survival and patience, in the end something really quite extraordinary emerges. Of course, the vibrant color and delicate glory of butterflies are also, unfortunately, very short-lived. But of course that’s what makes temporal things so beautiful, even life itself. This awareness is recognized in the Japanese concept of “mono no aware,” or a sensitivity of ephemera. In brief, one of the reasons cherry blossoms are celebrated is because of their beauty. But also because their beauty will only exist for a brief span of time. What’s interesting, of course, is that, while human beings are mortal, the things they create are immortal. They don’t have the lifespan of immortals like the Nine Muses, but, ironically, the things they create are immortal. The physical object might be destroyed, but the memory, or the representation of it lives on. If you’re not sure if this is true or not, you might consider that today we can still hear the works of Mozart or Grieg, or watch a story told by Shakespeare or, to go even further back, by Homer. The dead can’t speak, but, yes, their legacy can. Unlike butterflies, which bring welcome beauty into the world, and just as quickly abandon the world, human hands can create immortal works of art. As the Latin saying goes, “Ars longa, vita brevis.” (Art is long, life is short.) These are just some things to consider when you’re reading that section of the book -- and also, perhaps, the next time you happen to see a butterfly. [Additional info you'd like to add: URLs, next tour stop info, related links, your review link, etc.]