I’m a last-minute participant in the Dreaming of Books Giveaway Hop (mainly because I love blog hops and I love giveaways!). Enter to win an ebook copy of Artemis Rising in any format the winner chooses. The blog hop lasts from Jan. 13 to  Jan. 19. I’ll announce the winner on Jan. 20. In the meantime, feel free to enter for the giveaway in the Rafflecopter widget below.

Want to fall in love?

You can within the pages of Artemis Rising, a YA historical fantasy is set in the Azores Islands, Portugal. This intense story centers on a girl torn between two faiths and two young men. Read on…

On the voy­age home to the Azores Islands, Eva accepts the pagan name of Arethusa but learns too late that her life will mir­ror the Greek nymph’s tragic end. Her mother reveals that her des­tiny lies with Diogo, the shipowner’s volatile son. But Eva has a vision of another…

When the ship founders in a storm off the coast, Tristan, a local boy, saves her life and steals her heart. Destined to be with Diogo yet aching for Tristan’s for­bid­den love, Eva must some­how choose between them, or fate will choose for her.

This is an engross­ing novel in which sev­eral strands of myth com­bine to cre­ate a com­plex yet beau­ti­fully sim­ple romance. It is at its high­est level an explo­ration of fun­da­men­tal philo­soph­i­cal questions—the debate between fate and choice, the nature of love and desire, the tena­cious and often dan­ger­ous hold of belief on the human psy­che. At bot­tom, and the rea­son why you will love it, this is a bildungsro­man about a girl find­ing her way to adult­hood and a story about two lovers both sep­a­rated and entwined by their beliefs.

Recent reviews…

Artemis Rising is an intrigu­ing and com­plex tale, yet in the hands of author Cheri Lasota, the story flows seam­lessly, gath­er­ing the reader into a world so real you can smell the berg­amot along with Eva, feel the pitch­ing of a storm-​​tossed ship, and the sweet taste of first love. Yet Eva’s world, Arethusa’s world, is one of magic, a place where themes of ancient myth and reli­gious thought meet, con­front, and strug­gle for supremacy. When Eva is ship­wrecked on the Azores Islands off Portugal, she encoun­ters Tristao, the blue-​​eyed boy who will fight for her against the beguil­ing but ruth­less pur­suit of Diogo. Be pre­pared for shocks, twists, and sus­pense when you read this story. Also be pre­pared for the exquis­ite Portuguese back­ground, its cul­ture, color, and cus­toms. With vel­vety and pow­er­ful prose, Ms. Lasota lets us see, taste, smell, feel, and hear each expe­ri­ence as she guides us through lay­ers of sus­pense, myth, magic, and romance.

—Alice Lynn, Author of Volunteer for Glory

This book is filled with a com­plex yet fluid retelling of two sep­a­rate myths that have been intri­cately weaved together in a way that it pulls you head-​​first into the story. Throughout it all I found myself com­pletely entranced by this, and I had a hard time putting down my Kindle once I got started. Only for the need of sleep did it take me two days to fin­ish. The plot itself is one that is beau­ti­fully writ­ten and well thought out, though I will admit if you are read­ing this half­heart­edly you may become con­fused at times. I adore mythol­ogy and I really like when authors come up with a cre­ative way to inte­grate them into their own sto­ries, and I can hon­estly say that I found this to be com­pletely orig­i­nal and fresh. I was famil­iar with the story of Tristan and Isolde but not that of Alpheus and Arethusa, and even now that I’ve become famil­iar with both I can see that they have no true con­nec­tions. However Lasota man­aged to pull these two sto­ries together and com­bine them in such a way that I’ll prob­a­bly never looked at them the same again. After all the emo­tions that pulled me back and forth and though I was sad to see it over, the end­ing was per­fect to me as it felt complete.

—Michelle Gilmore, In Libris Veritas

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