Auralia's Colors
Auralia’s Colors had the rare honor of being published for two Christy Awards, in the categories BEST FIRST NOVEL and VISIONARY.
When thieves find an abandoned child lying in a monster’s footprint, they have no idea that their wilderness discovery will change the course of history.
Cloaked in mystery, Auralia grows up among criminals outside the walls of House Abascar, where vicious beastmen lurk in shadow. There, she discovers an unsettling–and forbidden–talent for crafting colors that enchant all who behold them, including Abascar’s hard-hearted king, an exiled wizard, and a prince who keeps dangerous secrets.
Auralia’s gift opens doors from the palace to the dungeons, setting the stage for violent and miraculous change in the great houses of the Expanse.
Auralia’s Colors weaves literary fantasy together with poetic prose, a suspenseful plot, adrenaline-rush action, and unpredictable characters sure to enthrall ambitious imaginations.
Praise for Auralia's Colors
“Film critic and author Overstreet (Through a Screen Darkly) offers a powerful myth for his first foray into fiction. The kingdom of Abascar is cloaked in gloom, sentenced to an ongoing “wintering” by a jealous queen, in which colors have been done away with and are only allowed in the royal court. But young Auralia, found as a baby by the river and raised by outcasts, has a talent for finding colors everywhere and bringing them to life in a way no one has ever seen before. The fate of the kingdom rests on what Auralia chooses to do and how the king responds. Overstreet creates a world with not only its own geography but its own vocabulary — it is haunted by beastmen, home to cloudgrasper trees, vawns (something like dinosaurs) and twister fish. … Overstreet’s writing is precise and beautiful, and the story is masterfully told. Readers will be hungry for the next installment.”
–Publishers Weekly (Review, 7/16)
“Through word, image, and color Jeffrey Overstreet has crafted a work of art. From first to final page this original fantasy is sure to draw readers in. Auralia’s Colors sparkles.”
–Janet Lee Carey, award-winning author of The Beast of Noor and Dragon’s Keep
“Jeffrey Overstreet’s first fantasy, Auralia’s Colors, and its heroine’s cloak of wonders take their power from a vision of art that is auroral, looking to the return of beauty, and that intends to restore spirit and and mystery to the world. The book achieves its ends by the creation of a rich, complex universe and a series of dramatic, explosive events.”
–Marly Youmans, author of Ingledove and The Curse of the Raven Mocker
“In Auralia’s Colors, Overstreet masterfully extends the borders of imagination. Whereas so many writers sacrifice characterization for plot or substitute weirdness for substance, Overstreet does neither. His characters are richly crafted but still recognizably human, and therefore, inhabitable. This story is wild and intricate tale, a high-octane full-throttle fantasy. Fasten your seat belts.”
–Gina Ochsner, author of The Necessary Grace to Fall and People I Wanted to Be
“The late John Gardner said that a good story should unfold like a vivid and continuous dream. With Auralia’s Colors, Jeffrey Overstreet has crafted just such a story, one that will leave readers ready to dream with him again.”
–John Wilson, Editor, Books & Culture
“Jeffrey Overstreet weaves myth and reality, hope and loss into his tapestry, and he ties off The Red Strand with a cataclysmic flourish.”
–Kathy Tyers, author of the Firebird trilogy and Shivering World
“Welcome to the land of the fangbear, the muckmoth, and the Midnight Swindler. To a story brimming with lovely literary rewards and a cast of characters by turn loathsome and hilarious, winsome and mysterious. It’s not often one gets to be present at the birth of a classic, but Auralia’s Colors is that kind of storytelling. A true delight on so many levels.”
–Clint Kelly, author of the Sensations Series: Scent, Echo, and Delicacy
“In this new fantasy novel Auralia’s Colors, Jeffrey Overstreet weaves together a wide cast of compelling characters and an intriguing story in the setting of a world both imaginative and arresting–a world phantastic in both old and new meanings of that word. Readers will care what happens both to the characters of the tale (all of them) as well as to the realm of Abascar itself, and will not want to put this book down.”
–Matthew Dickerson, co-author of From Homer to Harry Potter: a Handbook of Myth and Fantasy and Ents, Elves, and Eriador: the Environmental Vision of J.R.R.Tolkien
“… the trick with excellent fantasy is to build a world that is more than the context for beloved characters. The world itself is a subtle character and parallels in important ways our experience; it is full of political and cultural commentary. The society is thick. Balancing this thickness without prostituting characters to score pet cultural points is not easy. Few authors manage it. The too-common tragedy in contemporary fantasy involves a thick political subtext which turns more on the author’s partisan axe-grind than on letting good characters find their own battles. It’s knife’s-edge work to create masterful tales that take not only great skill, but quiet conviction.
“This is what makes Jeffrey Overstreet great, and that is why his work is paralleled in review after review with the greats of the fantasy world.
“What makes Overstreet’s writing fresh is that each novel grapples with the piece of a larger cultural question…. The narrative coherence is probably the singular brilliance, as we encounter time and again in his characters deeply problematic questions that stay with us long after the novel is done, its plot resolved, and its characters finished for the day.”
– Robert Joustra, Comment
“Overstreet’s use of language is beautiful and lyrical, reminiscent of Patricia McKillip’s elegant prose. … Overstreet gives us a story that we want to see to its end, but that we also do not want ever to end.”
– Matthew Winslow, Greenman Review
Preferred Bookstores for Ordering Overstreet’s Books
You can find copies of Jeffrey Overstreet’s books through any of your favorite bookstores, but these fantastic stores have been especially supportive in sharing this volume with their customers and communities. Many thanks to all of them!
Personalized, Signed Copies
If you would like an inscribed copy signed by Jeffrey Overstreet, here’s what you can do:
Make a personal check out to Jeffrey Overstreet and send it to:
Jeffrey Overstreet
Seattle Pacific University
3307 3rd Ave W, Ste 109
Seattle, WA 98119-1997
That price will cover the book AND the shipping.
Price: $20.00 per copy.
Please specify if you want Jeffrey to write a note to someone in particular, and make sure he can read the name clearly. And if this book is a birthday present, he’ll be happy to mention that in his note as well. Don’t forget to include the address of the package recipient.