REGENERATION by Stacey Berg (Interview, Showcase & Giveaway)
Regeneration
by Stacey Berg
on Tour March 13-April 1, 2017
Genre: Sci-Fi
Published by: Harper Voyager
Publication Date: March 14th 2017
Number of Pages: 384
Series: Echo Hunter 367, #2
Purchase Links:
Synopsis:
The Church has stood for hundreds of years, preserving the sole surviving city in a desert wasteland. When Echo Hunter 367 is sent out past the Church’s farthest outposts, she’s sure it’s a suicide mission. But just when she’s about to give up hope, she finds the impossible – another thriving community, lush and green, with a counsel of leaders who take her in.
Wary of this new society, with ways so different from the only life she’s ever known, Echo is determined to complete her mission and bring hope back to the Church. She’s unsure who she can trust, and must be strong and not be seduced by their clean, fresh water, and plentiful energy sources. If she plays her cards right, she may even still have a chance to save the woman she loves.
Read an excerpt:
Echo Hunter 367 studied the dying woman in the desert with grudging admiration. The woman had walked long past what might reasonably be expected, if that lurching stagger could be called a walk. When she couldn’t walk any more she had crawled, and after that she had dragged herself along, fingers clawing through sand until they clutched some purchase, body scraping over rocks and debris, heedless of the damage. Now and then she made a noise, a purely animal grunt of effort or pain, but she forced herself onward, all the way until the end.
I smell the water.
Desperate as the woman was, she had still been cautious. Though an incalculable distance from any familiar place, she still recognized danger: the wind-borne sand that scoured exposed skin clean to the bone, the predators that stalked patiently in the shadows for prey too weak to flee. The cliff edge that a careless girl could slip over, body suspended in space for the briefest moment before her hands tore through the thornbush, then the long hard fall.
Echo jerked back from that imagined edge. It was her last purposeful movement. From some great height, she watched herself collapse in the sand. One grasping hand, nails torn, knuckles bloody, landed only a few meters from the spring’s cool water, but she never knew it. For a little while her body twitched in irregular spasms, then those too stilled. Only her lips moved, cracking into a bloody smile. “Lia,” she whispered. “Lia.” Then she fell into the dark.
For a long time there was no sound except water trickling in a death rattle over stones.
Then the high whine of engines scattered the circling predators. Pain returned first, of course. Every inch of skin burned, blistered by sun or rubbed raw by the sand that had worked its way inside the desert-proof clothing. Her muscles ached from too long an effort with no fuel and insufficient water, and her head pounded without mercy. Even the movement of air in and out of her lungs hurt, as if she had inhaled fire. But that pain meant she was breathing, and if she was breathing she still had to fight. With enormous effort she dragged open her eyes, only to meet a blinding brightness. She made a sound, and tasted hot salt as her lips cracked open again. “Shhh,” a soft voice said. “Shhh.” Something cool, smelling of resin and water, settled over her eyes, shielding them from the glare. A cloth dabbed at her mouth, then a finger smoothed ointment over her lips, softening them so they wouldn’t split further when she was finally able to speak. Lia, she thought, letting herself rest in that gentle strength until the pain subsided into manageable inputs. Then she began to take stock.
She lay on something soft, not the rock that had made her bed for so many weeks, although her abused flesh still ached at every pressure point. The air felt cool but still, unlike the probing desert wind, and it carried, beyond the herbal tang, a scent rich and round, unlike the silica sharpness of sand she’d grown so accustomed to. Filtered through the cloth over her eyes, the light seemed diffuse, too dim for the sun. Indoors, then, and not a temporary shelter, but a place with thick walls, and a bed, and someone with sufficient resources to retrieve a dying woman from the desert, and a reason to do so. But what that reason might be eluded her. The Church would never rescue a failure.
Unless the Saint commanded it.
She mustered all her strength and dragged the cloth from her eyes. She blinked away grit until the blurred oval hovering above her took on distinct features, the soft line of the cheek, the gently curving lips. Lia, she thought again, and in her weakness tears washed the vision away. She wiped her eyes with a trembling hand.
And stared into the face of an utter stranger.
Excerpt from Regeneration by Stacey Berg. Copyright © 2017 by Stacey Berg. Reproduced with permission from Harper Voyager. All rights reserved.
Author Bio:
Stacey Berg is a medical researcher who writes speculative fiction. Her work as a physician-scientist provides the inspiration for many of her stories. She lives with her wife in Houston and is a member of the Writers’ League of Texas. When she’s not writing, she practices kung fu and runs half marathons.
Visit Stacey Berg on her Website, Goodreads Page, and on Twitter!
Q&A with Stacey Berg
Writing and Reading:
Do you draw from personal experiences and/or current events?
I don’t draw from current events on purpose, but I can certainly tell that I’m influenced by what’s going on in the world around me. Regeneration is full of characters struggling to understand whom to trust and what to believe about the turmoil in their society. As for personal experience, I don’t directly put my own experiences into stories, but when I’m figuring out how a character would feel or act, I try to find analogies in my experience and work from there.
Do you start with the conclusion and plot in reverse or start from the beginning and see where the story line brings you?
I have to know how the story ends—not necessarily the actions, but the emotional arc for the main characters. And I usually know roughly where the story starts. In between—well, I would love to be a more efficient plotter, but most of the time I finish a scene and ask myself what would logically happen next (that would be interesting), how that could steer the story towards the climax, and that’s the way the story goes. In revisions I spend a lot of time making sure that the plot events, character development, and story themes are as tightly integrated as I can make them.
Are any of your characters based on you or people that you know?
Nope Although I will admit that sometimes I use famous people as a sort of body double for certain characters until I can get a proper hold on them. For example, former President Jimmy Carter stood in for one of the characters in Dissension, the prequel to Regeneration, until that person came to life on his own for me.
Your routine when writing? Any idiosyncrasies?
I get up very early and write before work. I really try to be consistent; otherwise I feel like it takes me too long to get my head back into the story when I’ve been away from it for more than a day or two. I don’t know if this counts as an idiosyncrasy, but when I’m brainstorming I really like to do it with a medium point gel pen in a spiral notebook, while when I’m actually writing, I much prefer to type on my computer.
Tell us why we should read this book.
If you like character-driven science fiction with a fast-moving plot and strong women characters, I hope Regeneration (and Dissension) will appeal to you.
Who are some of your favorite authors?
I love this question! I could go on for a long time, but I’ll try to keep the list short so it fits in the space. Phillip Pullman. CJ Cherryh. Patricia McKillip. Peter O’Donnell, who wrote the Modesty Blaise books. Alastair MacLean. Not only do I love these authors’ books, but I spend a lot of time dissecting how they do the things I love, so that I can write better myself.
What are you reading now?
I just started a book called The Voices Within, a nonfiction book about our internal narrative and stream of thought. It’s fascinating and I’m very curious to learn more about the stories we’re all constantly telling ourselves.
Are you working on your next novel? Can you tell us a little about it?
I am working on my next novel. It’s speculative fiction, set in a very different world from the Echo Hunter 367 books, but I think there’s going to be a similar underlying feel. It’s still early days, though, and I’m afraid if I say too much too soon, it will break.
Fun questions:
Your novel will be a movie. Who would you cast?
Halle Berry! (Lots of Halle Berrys, since there are clones). Actually this is a tough one for me. I know lots of writers “cast” their characters in their heads to make it easier to visualize them, but that doesn’t work for me. In fact, I think the most interesting thing about having a movie made from the books would be to find out how the director envisions the characters. You can never really tell if a reader is seeing what you are.
Favorite leisure activity/hobby?
Walking on the beach is my favorite thing—any beach, anywhere; although the US mid-Atlantic coast is the “real” beach to me.
Favorite meal?
I love food! For sentimental reasons, the tasting meal where my wife and I picked the dishes for our wedding dinner was my favorite meal ever. On any given day, what would I most like to eat? Pizza from Mineo’s in Pittsburgh. There’s nothing like it.
Tour Host Participants:
Visit the other stops on this tour for reviews, interviews, guest posts, and more great giveaways!!
Giveaway!!
This is a rafflecopter giveaway hosted by Providence Book Promotions for Stacey Berg and Harper Voyager. There will be 3 winners of one (1) eBook copy of Dissension by Stacey Berg. The giveaway begins on March 13th and runs through April 4th, 2017.
Thanks for the great showcase and fun interview!
Great interview!
“President Jimmy Carter stood in for one of the characters in Dissension” – Hey, I read Dissension! which one was Jimmy C.???? Now I have to know!
Getting ready to start Regeneration!
And – Halle Berry! Great choice!