Archives par étiquette : Context Literary Agency

MARKLESS de C.G. Malburi

“With an interesting magic system and a fresh take on soulmates, this enemies-to-lovers romantasy will enthrall readers.” —Booklist

MARKLESS
by C.G. Malburi
Levine Querido, June 2024
(via Context Literary)

Ruti is Markless. In a society where worth is determined by the mark on your palm and the magic it grants you, this also deems her worthless. Except she’s also a hardened survivor, a protector of the Markless…and the most powerful witch in Somanchi. With a single song, she can pray to the many gods for unimaginable powers.

Dekala’s Mark is strong, a Mark fit for the future queen of Somanchi, but it’s also unstable. She knows the only solution is to be bonded, but she also knows that this would mean relinquishing control over her throne and kingdom. So when she is witness to Ruti’s power, Dekala offers the witch a deal: She can be prosecuted for her crimes…or she can help Dekala ascend to the throne, unbonded.

Dekala is cold and brutal and cares only about getting her way. She is also determined, intelligent, and compassionate. Ruti is torn between wanting her to fail or to emerge victorious. But as the gods are defied, new alliances are forged, and unexpected feelings are unearthed, Ruti realizes the fate of the kingdom––and the survival of the Markless––lies in her unmarked hands.

“Fast-paced and thrilling, this magical fantasy brings the enemies-to-lovers trope to new heights while poignantly examining themes of poverty, discrimination, and sexuality.” —Kirkus

“Malburi crafts an ambitious adventure teeming with surprises and romance” —Publishers Weekly

When C.G. Malburi read her first sapphic love story, she felt recognized in a way that she never had before. Now, she’s determined to fill bookshelves with more sapphic books for teens so they can experience the same. She lives on the East Coast and loves fandom, tropes, and stories in which characters flout destiny to choose each other.

THE MIDNIGHT CLUB de Margot Harrison

Four friends solve the decades-old murder of their best friend with the help of a drug that can not only bring them back to the past, but change it.

THE MIDNIGHT CLUB
by Margot Harrison
Graydon House/HarperCollins, September 2024
(via Context Literary Agency)

“How could you leave the past undisturbed when it was hiding parts of you from yourself?”

It’s been twenty-five years since The Midnight Club last convened. A tight-knit group of college friends bonded by late nights at the campus literary magazine, they’re also bonded by something darker: the death of their brilliant friend Jennet junior year. But now, decades later, a mysterious invitation has pulled them back to the pine-shrouded Vermont town where it all began.

As the estranged friends gather for a weeklong campus reunion, they soon learn that their host has an ulterior motive: she wants them to uncover the truth about the night Jennet died, and she’s provided them with an extraordinary method—a secret substance that helps them not only remember but relive the past.

But each one of the friends has something to hide. And the more they question each other, the deeper they dive into their own memories, the more they understand that nothing they thought they knew about their college years, and that fateful night, is true.

The Midnight Club explores that innate desire to revisit our first loves, our biggest mistakes, and the gulf between who we are and who we hoped we’d be.

“A strange, riveting, brilliant fable. Like a fever-dream of Donna Tartt’s The Secret History.” —Lev Grossman, New York Times bestselling author of The Magicians

“I devoured THE MIDNIGHT CLUB. It’s a smart, surprising, and gripping mystery about the reality that we can’t change who we were back in college, but we’d all be a lot better off if we could. And, for the characters in this fine novel, one of them might even still be alive.” —Chris Bohjalian, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Flight Attendant

Margot Harrison is the author of four young adult novels, including an Indies Introduce Pick, Junior Library Guild Selections, and Vermont Book Award Finalists. She grew up in New York and now lives in Vermont. THE MIDNIGHT CLUB is her debut adult novel.

NOW COMES THE MIST de Julie C. Dao

A sexy, romantic, feminist retelling of Dracula from the point of view of Lucy Westenra.

NOW COMES THE MIST
by Julie C. Dao
Podium, October 2024
(via Context Literary Agency)

Lucy Westenra is beautiful, rich, and admired by men. But under her sparkling, flirtatious façade, Lucy is melancholy and obsessed with death after losing her beloved father; she both fears and is captivated by death and dreads leaving her loved ones behind, especially Mina Murray, for whom Lucy cherishes an unspoken romantic attraction.

Lucy balks against the rules of upper-class society. She longs for experiences that are considered inappropriate for a respectable young lady, from traveling to indulging in her sexual curiosity and enthusiasm as men do. When she meets the sexy, mysterious Vlad, she realizes she has the chance to get everything she ever wanted. Or lose it.

Julie C. Dao is the critically acclaimed author of many books for teens and children including Forest of a Thousand Lanterns and Broken Wish. Her novels have earned starred reviews from Booklist, School Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly, won recognition as Junior Library Guild Selections and Kids’ Indie Next List picks, and landed on multiple best-ofyear lists including YALSA and the American Library Association. A proud Vietnamese- American who was born in upstate New York, she now lives in New England.

THE FORGOTTEN BOY de Laura Andersen

Full of mystery, romance, and grief, THE FORGOTTEN BOY is a gorgeously written novel that tells the story of three powerful women who experience love and loss in vastly different time periods.

THE FORGOTTEN BOY
by Laura Andersen
Open Road Media, April 2024
(via Context)

1460: Ismay Deacon, caught between sides in the War of the Roses, tries to hide away in her ancestral home, Havencross. But when word gets out that she has a child, Ismay has to make a terrible choice to protect her son. The Deacon family disappears, but there are rumors of a young ghost haunting the halls of Havencross.

1918: Diana Neville, an experienced war nurse, is hired by Havencross School for Boys to run the infirmary. But soon there is knocking on her door in the middle of the night and she hears footsteps in empty corridors. Plus, the youngest students are reporting a ghostly boy luring them from bed in the middle of the night, all while the Spanish Flu hits Havencross. In the midst of the pandemic, the youngest boy disappears, and Diana has to face her deepest fear by going into medieval tunnels after him.

2018: Juliet Stratford is hired to spend the winter at Havencross to clear it out before it comes a luxury hotel. Juliet, an historian, throws herself into the mysteries of Havencross. Especially: Who is the forgotten boy that has haunted Havencross for so long? And is it the same boy that Juliet has begun to see in the echoing, empty house?

Laura Andersen is the award-winning author of The Boleyn trilogy, The Tudor Legacy trilogy, and The Darkling Bride.

A BRIGHT HEART de Kate Chenli

What if you could avenge your own murder? A brilliant young woman gets a second chance at life in this debut YA tale of vengeance, court intrigue, and romance inspired by clasic Chinese tropes.

A BRIGHT HEART
by Kate Chenli
Union Square Press, October 2023
(via Context Literary)

Mingshin is murdered by the prince she loved, the man she helped become king. But as she is dying, she prays for time to turn back so she can have a chance to make things right. Her prayer is granted.

When Mingshin wakes up two years earlier, she swears two things: She will do whatever it takes to prevent Ren from becoming king and she will never fall in love. But it isn’t easy to stop a man who is willing to lie, steal, kill, and even give his soul to the most evil form of magic. And it isn’t easy to prevent falling in love with a good man. Even if that man is Ren’s brother, who is also in competition for the throne.

Book 2: A FIERY SPIRIT – June 2025:

Kate Chenli returns to a world of magic and courtly intrigue in this heart-stopping conclusion to A Bright Heart.

Blessed with a second chance at life, Mingshin has defeated Prince Ren and found love in the handsome, Prince Jieh. Though Ren’s plot has been foiled, Mingshin and her friends have not escaped the dangers of this new timeline.

The Night Dragon, Xiangyu, has been revealed as the sorcerer behind the dark machinations at court—and he’s after the Divine Stone.

As dark forces move in to destroy Dazhou, Mingshin must learn to harness the power of the Divine Stone or risk losing those she loves forever.

Kate Chenli has a Master’s degree in Computer Engineering, but has always enjoyed creating elaborate worlds and characters more than designing complex software. Besides reading and writing, her passion is world travel (four continents down and counting.)