K.A. Linde on returning to Alandria in House of Shadows
K.A. Linde, author of The Wren in the Holly Library, chats House of Shadows, the second Royal Houses book, now reprinted by Tor Bramble.
Fans of The Wren in the Holly Library are in for a treat. K.A. Linde’s Royal Houses series, originally self-published in 2020, is now reprinted in hardcover thanks to Tor Bramble (Macmillan UK). In House of Shadows, Linde takes readers deeper into the magic, romance, and intrigue of Alandria. In this guest post, she shares what it’s like to see her indie series reprinted, offers new insights into House of Shadows, and gives a glimpse at the dragons, betrothals, and spells that make this book an unforgettable ride.
Guest post written by K.A. Linde, author of House of Shadows and The Wren in the Holly Library.
The Royal Houses series has long been a favorite of mine. I first indie published the books one a year starting in October of 2020. I had a growing fantasy fanbase with these books, but after The Wren in the Holly Library because a #1 Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller, these really took off as well. I was fortunate enough to have them picked up by Bramble in the UK and Bloom in the US to be republished in hardcover and distributed wide in bookstores.
I’ll be frank—that was a dream come true.
I don’t know how else to say it. This series that I loved so very much was going to be put in stores worldwide for readers to discover. I cried. The books get to live not one life but two, and you all get to be a part of that.
We got an incredible illustrator in to reimagine the series. Each book has a dragon sitting on top of one of the royal houses (actual house!). So you can flip it upside down and it will show you the house as well. Plus it gives you a little peak into what the story is going to be like in each book.
The second book, House of Shadows, is the darkest cover and it matches the storyline as well. Which follows the heroine Kerrigan as she goes back to the House of Shadows with the hero, Fordham, to help him regain his title as crown prince only to find that a thousand year old spell is weakening around their home and she might just be the thing that breaks it. Couple that with magic draining, dragon training, spirit training, a Season a la regency England, protests, an unwanted betrothal, and even more romance than book one, you’ll be in for a ride.
One of the questions, I get about it being republished is if anything changed in the different drafts. Substantively the stories are the same. We did do all new rounds of edits on every book and clarified some of the world building along the way, but otherwise mostly the same.
I can tell you that each of the hardback editions will have a new never-before-seen bonus scene from Fordham’s point of view. These books are primarily told from Kerrigan’s point of view with some other characters throughout but never Fordham. So we really get to see his side of some of this and that was really fun for me.
So dive into Alandria and meet my dragon riding, enemies to lovers, regency-clothing wearing (yes cravats!) darlings as they try to save the world from the faceless Red Masks.
