Jun 30, 20213 min read

Curse of the Specter Queen: blog tour/review/giveaway

HEY! Welcome to my stop for the tour of CURSE OF THE SPECTER QUEEN by Jenny Elder Moke! This tour is hosted by Rock Star Book Tours! Check out my review and enter the giveaway!

Jenny Elder Moke writes young adult fiction in an attempt to recapture the shining infinity of

youth. She worked for several years at an independent publisher in Austin, TX before realizing she would rather write the manuscripts than read them. She is a member of the Texas Writer’s League and has studied children’s writing with Liz Garton Scanlon. She was a finalist in the Austin Film Festival Fiction Podcast Competition in 2017 for her podcast script, Target. When she is not writing, she’s gathering story ideas from her daily adventures with her two irredeemable rapscallions and honing her ninja skills as a black belt in Tae Kwon Do. Jenny lives in Denver, CO with her husband and two children.

Title: CURSE OF THE SPECTER QUEEN (A Samantha Knox Novel Volume 1)

Author: Jenny Elder Moke

Pub. Date: June 1, 2021

Publisher: Disney-Hyperion

Formats: Hardcover, eBook, audiobook

Pages: 352

AMAZON GOODREADS BARNES AND NOBLE BOOK DEPOSITORY

A female Indiana Jones meets Tomb Raider when Samantha Knox receives a mysterious field

diary and finds herself thrust into a treacherous plot. After stealing a car and jumping on a train,

chased by a group of dangerous pursuers, Sam finds out what’s so special about this book: it

contains a cipher that leads to a cursed jade statue that could put an end to all mankind.

MAY THE HAZEL BRING YOU WISDOM AND THE ASPEN GUIDE AND PROTECT YOU.

Samantha Knox put away her childish fantasies of archaeological adventure the day her father

didn't return home from the Great War, retreating to the safety of the antique bookshop where she works. But when a mysterious package arrives with a damaged diary inside, Sam's peaceful life is obliterated. Ruthless men intent on reclaiming the diary are after Sam, setting her and her best friend, along with her childhood crush, on a high-stakes adventure that lands them in

the green hills outside Dublin, Ireland. Here they discover an ancient order with a dark purpose

- to perform an occult ritual that will raise the Specter Queen, the Celtic goddess of vengeance

and death, to bring about a war unlike any the world has ever seen. To stop them, Sam must

solve a deviously complex cipher - one that will lead her on a treasure hunt to discover the

ancient relic at the heart of the ritual: a bowl carved from the tree of life. Will she find the bowl

and stop the curse of the Specter Queen, or will the ancient order bring about the end of the

world?

Indiana Jones gets a refresh with this female-driven mystery adventure, set in the 1920s, full of

ciphers, ancient relics, and heart-stopping action - the first in a brand-new series!

Can I just say how much I love the idea of a female Indiana Jones? Like, I'd buy every book with the theme of an ancient curse, a clever and intuitive group of protagonists.

When Sam Knox is given a strange diary to restore, she finds herself on the run from a group of men who burn down her bookstore. She escapes and finds, childhood crush, Bennett, and his sister Jo and together they decipher the diary to discover something much more dangerous than they imagined.

What I loved:

1. The writing: Jenny Elder Moke has a way with words that should put us all to shame. I love her style and the voice of her characters.

2. The characters: all unique in their way and vital to the story. Sam is our main character, but we also get reckless Jo, her former friend, and crush, Bennett who I just wanted to squeeze.

3. The setting: 1920's Ireland! Ireland is one of my favorite places IN THE WORLD so being on this journey through some of the most wondrous areas I've visited was amazing. I could picture the train scenes in my head as a feature film and promptly swooned. Ugh, if only readers could vote on which books were made into movies. Sigh

Everything about this book is perfect. The story is perfect. The characters are perfect. They now live in my head in their perfect state.