The Hidden Children (The Lost Grimoire #1) by Reshma K.Barshikar
~ Release Day Blitz ~
The Hidden Children (The Lost Grimoire #1)
by Reshma K.Barshikar
13th November 2018
13th November 2018
About the Book:
‘What price would you pay to be extraordinary? What would you do to speak to a butterfly?
Shayamukthy cruises through life: shooting hoops, daydreaming and listening to her favourite books. Even moving from the US to India, to a new school, a new culture, hasn't really rattled her. But something isn't right anymore and it begins when 'New Girl' joins the school.
She pulls Shui into a world of magic and wonderment, a world she has been hidden from all her life. What starts as a quest to look for a lost book, hurtles Shui into a world where people live in trees, talk to the dead and speak to butterflies.
But like all power, magic comes at a steep price, and under all things wondrous lie demons waiting to crawl out. The more Shui learns, the more she doubts everything and everyone around her.
Will she be able to master her powers, or will they devour her and everyone she loves?
Read an Excerpt:
‘That was pretty dramatic,’ said Anya, as I put the cards away. ‘Is it always like this...?’ she asked, floating around my room, touching everything but not. Her fingers grazed over the junk on my bedside table, the white alarm clock that never woke me up on time, my Winnie the Pooh bear from when I was four. Then she walked back to my window and smelt the candles. I saw my bra peeking out of from under a towel and leapfrogged across the bed to hide it from her. By the time I’d turned around, she’d lit them all. The votives glowed like fireflies, and the flames flickered yellow gold and the edges of the window lit up and it was suddenly so pretty that I gasped. They would go out any minute, I thought to myself. It was stupid to have flames by the window, but I loved the way they looked against the night sky, my very own queen’s necklace. After walking around the entire room, she smoothened her skirt underneath her and sat, very delicately, on the edge of my bed, her one leg neatly tucked in behind the other.
‘So then,’ she said, ‘tell me all about school.’
And I did. I told her about the crazy house names and the basketball; how I haven’t been able to shoot very well in a while. I told her about the move from Denver, the first few terrible days and months. I told her about the teachers, their eccentricities, how Mr Nelson never finished his apple at lunch. I bitched about Malvika, avoided Aadyant completely, and we laughed about the basketball hitting her stomach. We wondered how Malvika would feel if she woke up in the morning and found her porcelain cheeks covered with pustules.
I asked about her pendant, a doughnut-shaped stone that nestled between her collarbones, and about her goth-like ring. She said they were both the Ouroboros, a snake eating its tail, and that they had belonged to her mother. She told me about her mother, how she’d died and I felt terrible. I told her about my knot, the one that was buried deep in the cotton that clogged my brain up. We talked about the whys and the hows of Kate Bush, whom I had no idea about, and Ranbir Kapoor’s abs; she giggled when I showed her his picture on my desktop. It was 10 p.m. when Ma walked in and asked Anya for her dad’s phone number so that we could get permission for a sleep over. By 4 a.m. we had talked ourselves out; our mouths were dry and our fingers were tingly. And the candles never went out.
‘So then,’ she said, ‘tell me all about school.’
And I did. I told her about the crazy house names and the basketball; how I haven’t been able to shoot very well in a while. I told her about the move from Denver, the first few terrible days and months. I told her about the teachers, their eccentricities, how Mr Nelson never finished his apple at lunch. I bitched about Malvika, avoided Aadyant completely, and we laughed about the basketball hitting her stomach. We wondered how Malvika would feel if she woke up in the morning and found her porcelain cheeks covered with pustules.
I asked about her pendant, a doughnut-shaped stone that nestled between her collarbones, and about her goth-like ring. She said they were both the Ouroboros, a snake eating its tail, and that they had belonged to her mother. She told me about her mother, how she’d died and I felt terrible. I told her about my knot, the one that was buried deep in the cotton that clogged my brain up. We talked about the whys and the hows of Kate Bush, whom I had no idea about, and Ranbir Kapoor’s abs; she giggled when I showed her his picture on my desktop. It was 10 p.m. when Ma walked in and asked Anya for her dad’s phone number so that we could get permission for a sleep over. By 4 a.m. we had talked ourselves out; our mouths were dry and our fingers were tingly. And the candles never went out.
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