Self Published Sunday: His Black Wings

This week Big Book Little Book welcomes Astrid Yrigollen as she tells us about her new book His Black Wings and shares and excerpt with us.
Astrid Yrigollen is a self-published author of young adult and children’s books. Astrid started her writing career when she began work for the international video game giant, Sega of America. Working her way up the ranks, she began writing companion guides for games. With a love for writing fiction since childhood, she took her short stories out of storage and had her first story ever written published. It was only after that she found out that first stories are never published! She has resumed writing full time and has succeeded in putting out the titles, The Doughnut Tree, Mysterious Pootkins, and The Mosswoods–to name a few. Her short stories have appeared in the literary journal of Threshold Press and Shock and Awe Magazine. She now has a new YA fiction releasing in early November, titled His Black Wings. Astrid thinks of His Black Wings as her pride and joy!
Tell us about your book?
His Black Wings is set in a post apocalyptic world, but it’s not Mad Max like at all. That reference may be a little old for some, so I will say it’s not all gloom and doom and cannibals. It’s about a young woman, Claren Maidstone who grows up during a Victorian era revival period with futuristic technology, but the aesthetic, buildings, clothes are Victorian. Her parents die in an accident and Kurten Wandsworth, a mad man who is in love with her, attacks her. She escapes, but goes from the frying pan to the fire as they say. She ends up in an old mansion called Westwind where Etrigan Lowood, a brooding young man lives. He has been isolated his whole life because he has these massive black wings and he doesn’t want her there. If readers enjoy Beauty and the Beast and Jane Eyre type stories, I think they will enjoy His Black Wings.
Do you ever experience writers block? How do you overcome it?
Most times that I am writing my fingers are flying and I can’t keep up with the story. It’s like its telling itself and I am just a middle man. But there will be times when I have to figure out how to connect events or people but it’s not coming to me as I type. So I immediately get up, do some house chore while thinking of the scene. Then a few minutes later the answer comes to me. Maybe that’s why the dishes never get done.
What are you currently reading?
Miss Peregrines Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs and The Dark and Hollow Places by Carrie Ryan
What/Who inspired you as a reader?
My father was always an avid reader and taught me to treat books with respect and to collect books for my own library. There would be times I would have a stack of 8 books by my bed and finish them all off in a week’s time. Now I am down to two at a time since I am writing much more. In first grade I also developed a great love for the library and consider it a second home .
If your book had a soundtrack which artists would feature on it?
Cocteau Twins, The Sisters of Mercy, The Smiths, The Cure, Karl Orff for the intense scenes and I would have to figure out how to sneak in some Tom Waits.
His Black Wings is…
Beauty and the Beast set in the future during a Victorian era revival.
The Grand Council has brought the world peace, but will it last?
Malice, revenge and lust are not easily defeated…
Claren Maidstone has been forced to flee her childhood home, following the death of her parents and a vicious attack from a man who intends to marry her.
She assumes a new identity and finds employment as an assistant to the handsome, Fredrick Lowood. However, Fredrick’s generosity isn’t without a price and Claren soon finds herself forced into a strange friendship with his disfigured son.
Unaware of how Claren’s past entwines with his own,
Etrigan Lowood begins to yearn for her love.
Unfortunately, the past is not far behind.
Is his love for Claren enough?
Or will Etrigan remain alone with his black wings…
His Black Wings by Astrid Yrigollen
Beginning of Chapter 1
I didn’t’ know what to say , so I sat there stupidly. He grinned at me from behind white teeth. His ice blue eyes held a coldness and judgment I had not seen before. My heart fluttered and felt like a huge fish was rolling over in my breast.
“Well?” he said as he traced the outline of my knee through my heavy skirt with his slender, white finger.
“What is your wish, Claren?” My heart, upon hearing him use my real name beat harder. I felt the adrenaline push itself through my veins. He seemed to be aware of it, and licked his lips quickly.
“I don t know what is it you ask Sir.’ I stammered, my own voice sounding as a childs would when confronted with some wrong doing.
He had used my real name, was it safe to assume he knew who I really was?
He stopped smiling and cocked his head to one side, contemplating me.
“But you do Claren, you know very well what I want, what you want.”
How did it ever come to this? I thought franticly. What was I going to do, now that he knew who I was? He seemed to read my thoughts in my eyes because he answered my question without it ever being posed.
“What will I do indeed? What can I do is the question, Claren. Here we are on a train, bound for the quaint countryside. No alarm has been raised, no Porter is valiantly trying to fight for your honor or to even help and cover your embarrassment, your lies. Thus, it shall remain so. At least, until we arrive at our destination.”
“Then what? “ I questioned quietly.
I am resolved to die, but not without a fight. He knows this that is why he will not attempt to take me here, on a train full of people. My question hangs in the air between us, like a solid thing. He still has not answered as the whistle of our train shrieks into the wind, we race into the tunnel, blackness engulfing our private car.