THE SERAPHIM’S SONG By Barbara Casey

If you have been coming to fundinmental for a while, you probably know how much a cover can influence me. That is why I invited Barbara Casey here to tell us her thoughts. Take it away Barbara.

THE ARTFUL EXPRESSION OF BOOK COVERS

One of the things I am most pleased about in writing The F.I.G. Mysteries is the fact that my publisher is also a professional and extremely talented artist. From the beginning when she first published Book 1 – The Cadence of Gypsies – she sensed the emotional tenderness underlying the story. The cover she designed – an obscure symbol found in the Voynich Manuscript – expressed that emotional tenderness perfectly. At that time, I wrote The Cadence of Gypsies as a stand-alone novel. After it was published, however, my publisher convinced me to expand it into a series. The original cover metamorphosed into something different that was perfect because it now tied in with the other covers on The Wish Rider, The Clock Flower, The Nightjar’s Promise, and now, The Seraphim’s Song.

Each cover symbolizes the main underlying theme of the book in a beautiful and sensitive expression. Books 1 through 4 have focused on the personal emotional journeys of Carolina and the females of intellectual genius as they search for answers to explain why they were placed in an orphanage and who their biological parents were. With those answers for the most part found, The Seraphim’s Song elevates Carolina and the F.I.G.s to another level of understanding. There are new questions; more answers are needed. This involves an ancient artifact that, in fact, is a key to all knowledge in the universe that has been hidden in a cave in China for as long as the planet Earth has existed. The cover shows a “key” surrounded by colors of the universe. It is beautiful, and it is perfect.

It is really nice to visit with you again. Thank you for inviting me and for your continued interest in my books. All best to you and your bloggers. ~Barbara

I am so happy to have you here and look forward to ‘seeing’ you again soon, Barbara.

The Seraphim’s Song by Barbara Casey

GENRE: Fiction/Mystery

BLURB

Book 5 – The F.I.G. Mysteries

Many changes have taken place at Wood Rose Orphanage and Academy for Young Women while Carolina and Larry were on their honeymoon in Frascati, Italy, on the Granchelli farm. The newlyweds have been given a larger bungalow; Ms. Alcott, niece of the founder of Wood Rose, and Mrs. Ball, assistant to the headmaster, have moved into a bungalow together; and Jimmy Bob, caretaker and night watchman at Wood Rose has moved from his family home down the road a bit into a small bungalow on the orphanage property with his hound dog Tick, as well as his new cat and her litter of kittens. Most important, thanks to the persuasive powers of Ms. Alcott and Mrs. Ball, the F.I.G.s have been given a forever home at Wood Rose.

Summer is coming to an end and the F.I.G.s will soon return to the universities to complete their special projects. They are starting to feel anxious, and the coping mechanisms they have used their entire lives are starting to work overtime. Dara’s thoughts turn to an unknown language, possibly from another world; Mackenzie focuses on the relationship of math to music; and Jennifer keeps hearing the note of B flat minor and is drawing dark swirls on her canvas board.

Deadly forces and natural disasters are unleashed into the world when Milosh, the evil young man who placed a curse on Carolina when she searched for her mother, steals an ancient artifact—a “key”—from an archaeological site near Puli, China on the Yellow Sea where he is working. This artifact, when paired with a certain note—B flat minor known as the Seraphim’s song—opens a portal that enables man to communicate with the gods.

When the key gets lost in a storm, Carolina comes into possession of it through Jimmy Bob’s dog, Tick, and when she does, she hears Lyuba, her gypsy mother, tell her that time is running out. The F.I.G.s and Carolina must go to the forbidden cave on the Yellow Sea, the place where the early gypsies are believed to have settled before travelling into Europe. For it is there where the key must be returned before all is destroyed.

EXCERPT

As she usually did in the early, pre-dawn hours, Lyuba was digging roots, in the dark of the crescent moon, and every so often replanting a good piece of a root to grow next year.  The day before she had picked herbs, during that time when the essential oils are at their strongest, before they could get evaporated by the midday sun.  Where she searched was her favorite place, the place where the energies were strongest.  Surprisingly, it was the old church graveyard built on a slight mound just outside of the rural Italian village of Frascati, which is why the other gypsy women stayed away.  Unlike Lyuba, they feared being so near the dead. They believed that being near death would hasten their own, therefore they refused to go there. Lyuba, however, saw death as the natural and necessary progression of life, in another form, in a different dimension. She found comfort and solace in its nearness.

A creek ran nearby, and a tall, unkempt yew tree grew near the entrance to the graveyard, poisonous, but giving off positive energies.  It was a place Lyuba knew well, having discovered it from earlier times when the travelers came this way. It was there where she found peace.

She would prepare her potions from the roots, bark, and hard seeds she gathered and make decoctions by soaking them overnight and boiling them the next day.  Some of the decoctions she would add honey or sugar to; others she would thicken into syrup or add lard to make ointments and salves.  The freshest herbs she saved for her oils.

Once her potions were ready, she would take them into the village to sell.  Coughs or colds, rheumatism, cuts and bruises, burns—it didn’t matter.  She knew what remedy was necessary to relieve pain, create lustrous hair, revive the impotent, whiten teeth, cure constipation, or simply heal the broken spirit.  Unlike others who only pretended, she had the gift.

As she scraped pieces of root and bark, and gently picked the seeds from the plants she revered, she suddenly paused, aware of something different in the air around her—an unseen potent force. She stood up and, closing her eyes, listened quietly as she sniffed the air. There was an unfamiliar strangeness surrounding her. She felt the slight tremor of the earth and somewhere very far away, she heard the low-pitched hum.

It was a sound she knew well for it had been given to every civilization from the beginning of time. Used in all of the major religions—Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Islam, Zoroastrianism and Christianity—it was the sacred universal sound.  A single sustained note, a mantra, it was the melody of the angel that acted as the means of communication between the gods in the heavens and the humans on earth. It was the seraphim’s song.

But something was wrong; the single note was slightly off-key. The pitch wasn’t quite right. Then, because she was a choovihni and had the knowledge of the universe coursing through her veins, a cosmic consciousness that had been passed down to her from her mother, her grandmother, and her great grandmothers through all time, she sensed darkness and evil.

AUTHOR Bio and Links

Originally from Carrollton, Illinois, author/agent/publisher Barbara Casey attended the University of North Carolina, N.C. State University, and N.C. Wesleyan College where she received a BA degree, summa cum laude, with a double major in English and history.  In 1978 she left her position as Director of Public Relations and Vice President of Development at North Carolina Wesleyan College to write full time and develop her own manuscript evaluation and editorial service.  In 1995 she established the Barbara Casey Agency and since that time has represented authors from the United States, Great Britain, Canada, and Japan. In 2014, she became a partner with Strategic Media Books, an independent nonfiction publisher of true crime, where she oversees acquisitions, day-to-day operations, and book production.

Barbara has written over a dozen award-winning books of fiction and nonfiction for both young adults and adults. The awards include the National Association of University Women Literary Award, the Sir Walter Raleigh Literary Award, the Independent Publisher Book Award, the Dana Award for Outstanding Novel, the IP Best Book for Regional Fiction, among others. Several of her books have been optioned for major films and television.

Her award-winning articles, short stories, and poetry for adults have appeared in both national and international publications including the North Carolina Christian Advocate Magazine, The New East Magazine, the Raleigh (N.C.) News and Observer, the Rocky Mount (N.C.) Sunday Telegram, Dog Fancy, ByLine, The Christian Record, Skirt! Magazine, and True Story.  A thirty-minute television special which Barbara wrote and coordinated was broadcast on WRAL, Channel 5, in Raleigh, North Carolina.  She also received special recognition for her editorial work on the English translations of Albanian children’s stories. Her award-winning science fiction short stories for adults are featured in The Cosmic Unicorn and CrossTime science fiction anthologies.  Barbara’s essays and other works appear in The Chrysalis Reader, the international literary journal of the Swedenborg Foundation, 221 One-Minute Monologues from Literature (Smith and Kraus Publishers), and A Cup of Comfort (Adams Media Corporation).

Barbara is a former director of BookFest of the Palm Beaches, Florida, where she served as guest author and panelist.  She has served as judge for the Pathfinder Literary Awards in Palm Beach and Martin Counties, Florida, and was the Florida Regional Advisor for the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators from 1991 through 2003.  In 2018 Barbara received the prestigious Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award and Top Professional Award for her extensive experience and notable accomplishments in the field of publishing and other areas. She makes her home on the top of a mountain in northwest Georgia with three cats who adopted her, Homer – a Southern coon cat, Reese – a black cat, and Earl Gray – a gray cat and Reese’s best friend.

www.barbaracaseyauthor.com / www.barbaracaseyagency.com

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