Monday, October 8, 2012

Sentence Sneak Peek - Alchemystic

Alchemystic by Anton Strout

The first sentence from each chapter of Alchemystic, it's a mini summary of what you can expect to read.

*Spoilers are highlighted like so :)


Waking was easy.”

Punching clay felt a lot more satisfying than any sexy-time Ghost-pottery-wheel-spinning nonsense ever could.”

When you have your own catacombs—in the basement of your family’s building, no less—having a funeral is a relatively quick and painless affair.”

“Rules, Miss Belarus,” the Tribeca Y’s artist-in-residence said from behind his oversized and over-cluttered desk at the front of the large, open art space.”

Deep in thought, I discovered far too late that I had walked way east before correcting myself and turning left onto Second Avenue, heading uptown through the East Village on my way towards Gramercy Park.”

In the midst of the freedom of flying, a panicked sensation overwhelmed me like lightning coursing through my stone form, catching me so off guard that my body curled in on itself, my wings folding in around me.”

The sound of chaos somewhere in the alley behind me had died down minutes ago, but the pounding of my heart hadn’t and I remained where I was, stunned, my fingers locked through the loops of the fence, holding myself up there as long as possible.”

I dumped the stack of folders on a huge desk in my great-great-grandfather’s studio.”

When my father caught up with me later that evening, I was sketching at one of the old drafting tables my great-great-grandfather had once used.”

I had done all the work I could on the files my father had given me to take up to the studio while I remained inside.”

I stood as a silent rooftop sentinel in one of the older city sections called the Bowery, waiting for the woman within the building while her blue-haired friend lingered on the street below.”

Rory paced back and forth like a panther and turned to me as I came out of the front door of the old building clutch-ing my broken-strapped shoulder bag and file folders.”

There was little shame in falling asleep in my great-great-grandfather’s studio library.”

The first thing I noticed upon waking perched on top of the Balarus building—other than the fading memories of my maker’s face—was a cool wetness against part of my stone skin.”

I came down the stairs fast, taking two at a time with the old, worn notebook clutched in my shaking hands.”

I awoke with my eyes still closed, the image of the maker in my head and his voice still ringing in my ears.”

After the gargoyle had taken to the sky, we headed back into my great-great-grandfather’s studio and library and threw ourselves down across several of the couches laid out in the reading area.”

Although the building collapse that had killed my brother had happened more than four months ago, not much had changed at the site on St. Mark’s Place.”

I slept in and I slept late, my family’s business schedule be damned.”

The strangest thing about Brooklyn was figuring out where the hip, habitable areas ended and the closed, run-down areas began.”

Rory’s brutality on the docks must have messed my head up more than I thought, and I spent another restless night tossing and turning as various gruesome combat scenarios played out in my head, almost all of them ending with our grisly deaths.”

A strange pulling sensation of the maker’s kin called me in a slow, subtle rhythm, and I dropped  down off the roof to the terrace below, my extended wings slowing my descent.”

I crashed hard that night, what with Stanis gone and neither Rory nor Marshall returning my calls.”

Now that I was alone and my latest creation was toast, I read what I could about Spellmasons—the ability to transmute stone into a living thing, establishing connections through alchemical processes, and trying to figure out just where I had gone wrong with my mini-Frankenstein monster.”

My day was spent pushing back morning meetings to spend more time following reference book to reference book all over my great-great-grandfather’s library, investigat-ing one of the soul stone threads, the one called the Ruler’s Chest.”

I flew lower across the tops of buildings than I normally did given the extra weight I was carrying.”

“We’re going clubbing?”

When Alexandra sent me to task against the creatures she called stone eaters, I did as she wished.”

Stanis had flown off is such a hurry after the incident at Cathedral that I hadn’t had time to truly assess any of the damage to him other than that one bite on his right arm."

I got a solid eight in, had a big, hearty breakfast, then ignored day-job stuff the entire day as I looked for things through-out my great-great-grandfather’s whole library that might prove of some use in rescuing Devon.”

After the maker’s kin told Marshall and Aurora to hurry back to the Belarus building as quick as they could, Alex-andra and I flew off across the night sky back toward Man-hattan, over the river.”

My stomach sank as we fell, Stanis pulling his wings around me before crashing through the roof of the elevator below.”

Alexandra, Marshall, and Rory led the way into the depths of the building.”

Free of invaders, the building felt empty, despite Rory and Marshall on either side of me on one of the couches up in the library.”

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