Primary Fault, the first book in Sharon’s Schattenreich series, is set in Cologne, Germany. Sharon, a retired archeoseismologist who actually lives in Cologne herself, creates a unique, engaging, magical world which combines mythology, seismology, history, and romance.

After leaving small-town Texas for Cologne, Germany, Caitlin’s seismologist brother Gus vanishes, and is wanted by the Cologne police. Caitlin’s search for her brother—and his doppelgänger—earns her a bump on the head and a trip to the hospital.

With the help of the sexy aristocrat she’s fallen for, Caitlin locates a vital witness: her brother’s former lover. When Caitlin arrives late to the rendezvous at Cologne’s Gothic cathedral, an earthquake flings her into a bleak Otherworld. There she finds the woman she arranged to meet—and a tall, gaunt wraith she has no desire to see.

Primary Fault is available for a limited time in The Realm of Faerie bundle.

Enter the Realm of Faerie, a world of beauty, danger, and enchantment. But remember the legends if you want to make it back home again…

Excerpt

The creepy but shapely blonde from the airport stood in front of me facing away across a long room. She looked into the distance as if searching. Her voice sounded distracted. “Reality is not always what we imagine, is it, Caitlin Schwarzbach?”

As I walked towards her, she faded away. A wrenching physical displacement followed a vibration from below, and I closed my eyes against a sudden dizziness. When I opened them, the room had changed to a meadow clearing enclosed on all sides by trees that formed a leafy canopy, open in the center. Moonlight cast the clearing in pale relief edged with shadow.

Something large flew over the trees. It’s big enough to eat you. Run away. I cringed and fought the urge to run for the trees as the huge black shadow flew in front the moon, blotting it out.

After it had gone, I noticed the woman. She stood a few feet away and had positioned herself between two men, her arms crossed and her legs spread in a fighting stance. The jeweled hilt of a sword strapped to her back jutted above her shoulders. Long, coal black hair framed a fierce expression and matching posture. She stared at me with bold dark eyes full of arrogance, but her slanted smile suggested amusement. I crossed my arms back at her.

Three fat crows with metallic black beaks and shimmering feathers picked at the grass at her feet. At the far end of the clearing, a half-dozen long-necked birds burst out of the trees and ran toward us. Ducks? The black-winged creature swooped down like a fast-moving cloud of death and gripped a duck in its distinctly reptilian beak before flying away.

The remaining ducks quacked and ran in agitated circles at the loss of their companion. The excited noises faded to the sounds of the two men gabbling at each other, augmented by angry gestures. Shadows hid their faces. They were tall, taller even than Gus, but about equal to each other in height. I caught a flash of blue eyes as they looked around and appeared to notice me for the first time.

A jolt within me accompanied a rumble of ground that threw me to my knees. When I looked up again, the clearing was deserted. Overcome with exhaustion and relieved to be alone again, I curled up on the grass to sleep.

— from Primary Fault by Sharon Kae Reamer

About Sharon

Now a full-time writer living near Cologne, Sharon Kae Reamer’s speculative fiction is inspired by her participation in various archeoseismology projects during her twenty-something years as a senior scientist at the University of Cologne. Locations that include the Praetorium and medieval Jewish settlement in Cologne, ancient Tiryns in Greece, and Greek ruins in Selinunte, Sicily, provide perfect backdrops for creating fantasy stories rich with history and mythology, such as her Immortal Guardian and Schattenreich Mystery novelette series and her five-book Schattenreich novel series.

Her love for mixing and mashing science fiction and fantasy continues unabated. Night Shepherd, in the Schattenreich universe is a spinoff (one of many) of her soon-to-be-published first novel in The Sundered Veil series, a further conception of science fantasy.

Sharon still pursues archeoseismology projects. She also cooks daily (German-English), gardens (chaotically, at best), knits (badly), does needlepoint (rather well) and reads (everything) all the damn time.

And, of course, she has cats.

Find Sharon

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