Hello fellow traveler,

It's been 1 week since I launched The Rooted and the Winged on Kickstarter and we have achieved so much!!

We reached our funding goal in 1 hour and 2 minutes, hit 2 stretch goals - so you'll get a free bookmark and free stickers with every physical order - AND we got the Project We Love badge from Kickstarter!! This is a hand-picked award given by staff from Kickstarter for examples of creative projects. It's rare to get it on a campaign of our size so I am SO delighted and honored! We've also planted over 60 trees. <3

Here's the Kickstarter link if you haven't gotten a chance to grab your book yet! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/samanthacurran/rooted-and-the-winged-an-illustrated-faerie-fantasy-novel​

Also!! The special edition hardcover proof arrived from Bookvault's printers in the UK, ah!! Let me take you on a little tour.

If you want this beauty to also have 12 extra illustrations, deleted scenes, and a making-of section, then you'll want to get it on Kickstarter if you haven't already! I'm making this exclusive edition with more features only one time as a thank you for supporting my book launch. A launch only happens once, and I wanted to make it extra special for you.

I am so grateful for your support and excited to see where we can go.

To give a bit of a personal update, now my Kickstarter is up and running, I'm finding I have some free time again. So I've been thinking a lot about my book plans from here. I didn't have a sequel idea for The Rooted and the Winged for the 6+ years I was dreaming and drafting the book. But now that it's finished, I did get a sequel idea. And I am spilling over with excitement about it. I'm planning two more books in this world - so it will be a trilogy when it is complete!

The sequel will take the themes of The Rooted and the Winged - themes of the difficulty of giving to others, and how we must fight to save our dying earth - and push them to their breaking points. It's going to be intense. But also, I hope, a little source of strength and inspiration in this current bleak state of world affairs we find ourselves in.

If you remember this illustration that you'll find at the back of The Rooted and the Winged, I think it represents the heart of the sequel story well.

P.S. Things I Love Right Now

1. This beautiful sunny April weather
2. I was trying to figure out naming systems for my Roman inspired faerie race in books 2 & 3. And I realized I should be looking at the names after Caesar conquered Gaul and established a Roman footing there. Then I found this fantastic site that lists real Roman names with Celtic elements from history that were found in archaeological studies from Roman Britain. All that to say - I know it's super niche but if this is useful to you too here's the link.
3. Cinnamon tea with honey and milk. It's like drinking a pastry. It's sooo good.