A Book Launch, A Glowing Birthmark, and One Very Proud Book Coach

I am so excited to share this one with you.

Eira Morgan-Jones’s YA fantasy novel, Sentinel of the Sun, is now out from Graffeg, and it has been an absolute joy to see this book make its way into the world.

I had the pleasure of working with Eira on the road to publication. I gave her a little manuscript feedback along the way, but the bulk of our work together was on her pitch materials: the synopsis, the query, the framing of the book, and the careful business of helping the story present itself clearly and confidently to the people who might champion it.

And now here it is. A real book.

With a cover.

And pages.

And an ISBN.

And everything.

Honestly, it never gets old.

Here’s the blurb:

Seventeen-year-old Alexis struggles to fit in to the extremely religious valley where she lives, not helped by strange birthmarks that have begun to glow.

When a tidal wave devastates the valley, just the latest freak disaster, Alexis goes into hiding to avoid being taken in by the state.

As she becomes closer to Theo, he reveals that he is a sentinel and believes she is one too. He explains that if she regains her power they can bring an end to the disasters.

I mean. Glowing birthmarks, freak disasters, hidden powers, a religious valley, and a teenage girl forced into hiding while the world around her is quite literally falling apart.

That’s practically a large neon sign saying, “Come in, things are about to get complicated!”

Sentinel of the Sun is a YA fantasy novel and available now!

What I love about this premise is the way it combines external danger with internal awakening. Alexis isn’t simply dealing with disasters in the landscape around her. She’s also dealing with the far more intimate terror of discovering that the thing which makes her different may also be the thing that makes her powerful.

That is such rich YA territory.

Because adolescence is already a kind of speculative fiction, isn’t it? Your body changes without permission. Adults suddenly start treating you differently. You are expected to know who you are while everyone around you is busily telling you who you should be. Add glowing birthmarks and catastrophic weather events, and frankly, the metaphor is doing gymnastics.

One of the things I often talk about with writers is that a strong story does not only ask, “What happens next?” It also asks, “Who does this person have to become in order to survive what happens next?”

From the blurb alone, Alexis is facing exactly that kind of story question. She begins as someone who struggles to fit into a world that already has rigid ideas about who belongs and who doesn’t. Then disaster strikes and hiding becomes survival. Then Theo appears with the possibility that Alexis’s difference is not a curse, but a calling.

That is the sort of story engine I adore. It’s personal, emotional, mythic, and dangerous.

It is also a reminder of something I believe deeply about writing and publishing: getting a book into the world is rarely about one grand heroic leap. It’s much more often about a series of focused, practical steps.

You write the story. Revise it. Learn what the story is really doing. You work out how to talk about it, shape the pitch, and refine the synopsis. You try to make the book legible to someone who hasn’t fallen in love with it (yet).

That last part can be surprisingly hard.

Writers know their books from the inside. They know the atmosphere, the characters, the backstory, the twists, the private obsessions, the scenes they secretly hope readers will underline, and the bit in chapter nineteen that nearly caused a small emotional collapse over a packet of Hobnobs.

But pitch materials require a different skill. They ask: what is this book? Who is it for? What is the promise? What makes it compelling? Why should someone keep reading?

That isn’t easy work. It is compressed work. Strategic work. Often slightly maddening work. But when it is done well, it gives a book a clearer path to the people who are looking for exactly that kind of story.

So I am thrilled for Eira. Truly.

Eira is based in Southampton, works as a Digital Content and Marketing Manager for NHS Hampshire and Isle of Wight, has previously published three children’s books, and holds both a BA in English Literature and an MA in Professional Writing.

In other words, this isn’t someone who woke up one morning, found a magical publishing contract under a fern, and skipped merrily to the finish line.

(Although if anyone knows where the magical publishing-contract fern is kept, do let me know.)

This is the result of work, craft, persistence, and professionalism. Eira had the willingness to keep going through the unglamorous stages as well as the exciting ones.

That’s worth celebrating.

So please do take a look at Sentinel of the Sun. If you enjoy YA fantasy with hidden powers, high stakes, disaster, belief systems, secrets, and a young heroine stepping into a dangerous truth about herself, this may be one to add to your list.

And to Eira: huge congratulations. It was a privilege to play a small part in the journey of this book.

May Alexis find her readers.

May the sentinels do whatever sentinels are meant to do.

And may all glowing birthmarks be narratively significant.