“A Midsummer Night”, by Sherie Greer, is a copyrighted, work-in-progress.
The blurb:
Elizabeth escapes into the enchanted woodland of the nymphs where she is offered protection from a world and a life she has to leave behind.
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Fantasy is a genre that takes me back to those childhood days when my little friends and I would play make-believe. A Midsummer Night, currently a work-in-progress, would not have been a story that we would have pretended…at least not before we turned at least 12 years old…but only because the winged nymphs and magic things are entwined in a bit of murder and mayhem!
But when it comes to fantasy stories like this, I’m still the little girl who likes to play make-believe. I love this story.
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A P’Review’
Elizabeth’s mother has died some time before, and left her with no protection from her father, who has no other use for her than use as a tool to secure the family’s ‘fortune’. She has had the misfortune to be promised to an evil man in a marriage of convenience, but Elizabeth is determined to escape her fate.
She is wedded on Midsummer Night, but late into the celebration, when her husband becomes drunk and aggressive and begins to beat her, she attacks him and, thinking she has killed him, runs away into the forest. Elizabeth is terrified when she hears someone – something – following her. In a panic, she trips and falls to the forest floor, where she looks around, trying to see through the darkness, for whoever is trailing her…
…and spies fairy lights!
Minute creatures, flitting around on the tiniest of wings, surround her and reassure her that they are there to help, at the behest of Marrok, the wolf, who had once been tended by Elizabeth’s mother when he was injured to the point of death – it was he who was tracking her, in order to keep her safe…and so the story truly begins.
Elizabeth is magically transfigured into one of the creatures…at least to the same size as they…and taken to the kingdom of the woodland nymphs, where she is told she may stay for the rest of her life, so long as she does not contact any who dwell in the human world. Safe at last, she accepts that she will undergo training in the ways of the nymphs in order to fully join their community, and tries to reconcile herself to never seeing her siblings, ever again.
But the husband from whom she escaped was not dead, though his injuries should have insured that he was. Upon his revival, he sent hunters to find her, preferring her to be brought in alive to face his wrath. In the process of the hunt, the entire enchanted kingdom of the nymphs was in danger of being discovered and destroyed.
Elizabeth knew in her heart that she must return to her husband in order to save the nymphs from discovery, but with the help of the Nymph Queen, Winter (and to her detriment), a doppelganger is created to take her place.
More magic ensues…but I will say no more.
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This story portrays a serene world under the great trees of the forest. You can smell the earth, feel the softness of the mosses and even taste the delicious concoctions that are prepared by Elizabeth’s companion and keeper, Blossom. It is just a lovely story.
If you would like to follow A Midummer Night as it unfolds, please feel free to click on the (working) book cover above, where you will find it, and Sherie’s bio and more of her work, on Goodreads.
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