Book Review: The Ghost Rebellion

The Ghost Rebellion

By:  Pip Ballantine & Tee Morris

Publish Date:  June 10, 2016

Format:  eBook

Genre:  Steampunk

Series:  5th in The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences series; Book 1 ~ Phoenix Rising, Novella 1.5 ~ Silver Linings, Book 2 ~ The Janus Affair, Book 3 ~ Dawn's Early Light, Book 4 The Diamond Conspiracy

First Impression:  The Ministry must stop the man responsible for so many deaths is still free, and creating the serum that's dangerous!

Synopsis:
The chase is on! After rescuing Queen Victoria from the clutches of the Maestro, Agents Eliza D Braun and Wellington Books are in hot pursuit of Dr Henry Jekyll. While he continues his experiments on the aristocracy of Europe, he leaves a trail of chaos and despair in his wake. However when Eliza and Wellington run him to ground in India, they are forced to come face to face with ghosts from the past, and the realities of empire.

Meanwhile Ministry agents Brandon Hill and Bruce Campbell travel deep into Russia hunting down a rare ingredient to save Queen Victoria's life. Amid the cold they uncover a threat from the revitalized House of Usher that comes directly from their new Chairman.

All in the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences will find their allegiances in question, and their mettle tested as a new dastardly era of international intrigue dawns.

First Sentence:
Wellington Thornhill Books took in a deep breath, sparing just a moment to collect his wits.

Purchase At:
Amazon  /  Barnes & Noble

My Thoughts and Summary:
Okay. I have to stop and bring my thoughts together. There is, once again, much we learn here as our Agents fight the best battle they can.

We follow two missions through this book. First and foremost in many eyes is what Wellington Books and Eliza Braun are up against. Following the trail of the isotope Blackwell created for in Dr. Jeckyll, Wellington Books and Eliza Braun find themselves in India where a person Jeckyll had been in contact with was heading.

Books and Eliza are trying  to track down all on the list that are working with Dr. Jekyll. It's going a bit...rough. They are trying to clean up Dr. Jekyll's work and mess of super-enhanced people who go a bit mad and grow in size along with other abilities. This leads them to where one of  Dr. Jekyll's patients had worked, and shared secrets with military in India. Not only are the medicines that Jekyll experiment with an issue, but there are experimental equipment that is now in the hands of the Ghost Rebellion forces. And this brings a new battle for Wellington and Eliza to battle, trying to get to Jekyll.

But reinforcements come! Well, one assassin that is, and the agents that remain in India. Yes, you guessed it by the mention of assassin. We get to see Sophia again. I really do love this woman, and seeing her personality clash with Eliza's is fun. I believe we will see her more in the last book to come as well - you'll come to the same conclusion in the end.

The second mission we follow is with Bruce and Brandon. They are sent to the arctic cold winter of Russia to find and obtain a Firebird feather to help cure the queen after the effects of Dr. Jekyll's serum in the last book. I have enjoyed the bold Bruce in previous books, but here I have started to see another side to him. Bruce seems to have a softer side here, a genuine person.

We get to see inside the House of Usher meetings too! And they are behind so much that Books has unknowingly stopped. Oh and a bit more on our dear Wellington too. There are major points shared with us that I just can't share because I don't want to spoil the book for you.

While the remaining agents are on their missions we see them deal with the great losses, and losses of those that were dear friends as well. There are connections to those we knew and the losses are still fresh in many hearts. The Ministry is reforming after the great losses felt preciously. It's a lot of work, and being in the state The Ministry is, anything can happen...

I want to add, I love that we have a couple that still function and interact as individuals paired together. They are who they are and love each other for that reason. Eliza and Wellington still banter and make me smile as they go through their missions, but they are more to each other as well. I enjoy writing of couples in this way.

For me steampunk is all about the gadgets. And Tee and Pip don't let me down! I love the gadgets created and used or seen with other agents. Awesome! But they also drew in the emotions from lose to love and blooming friendships into the book as well as the adventures and dangers continue.



**If you found my thoughts helpful, please click Yes at Amazon.

Cover Reveal: The Ghost Rebellion

Our favorite steampunk duo is back! Eliza Braun and Wellington Books are back at it!

As many of you know, I love this series! And I'm thrilled to share with you the cover reveal of the book that was successfully funded through Kickstarter.

The Ghost Rebellion

The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences #5

By:  Pip Ballantine and Tee Morris

Due Out:  June 10, 2016

Publisher: Imagine That! Studios

Word Count: about 100,000

Cover Artist: Photography by Go ForWard and design by Designed by Starla

Book Description:

The chase is on! After the destruction of the Diamond Jubilee, Agents Eliza D Braun and Wellington Books are in hot pursuit of Dr Henry Jekyll. While he continues his experiments on the aristocracy of Europe, he leaves a trail of chaos and despair in his wake. However when Eliza and Wellington run him to ground in India, they are forced to come face to face with ghosts from the past, and the realities of empire.

Meanwhile Brandon Hill and Bruce Campbell travel deep into Russia hunting down ingredients to save Queen Victoria's life. Amid the cold they uncover a new threat from the revitalized House of Usher .

All the agents of the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences will find their allegiances in question, and their mettle tested as a new dastardly era of international intrigue dawns.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Excerpt:

Chapter One: Wherein a Delightful Luncheon Is Cut Short

Wellington Thornhill Books took in a deep breath, sparing just a moment to collect his wits. Otherwise he risked not living to see dessert.

The archivist-turned-agent dabbed at the corner of his mouth with his snow-white napkin, and draped it carefully over his lap. Outside the window the gleaming Atlantic rolled under their ocean liner the African Sunset, but that was not the view that held his attention. His focus remained with the dandy in front of him. Since their first meeting, the bombastic Lord seemed rather taken with the sound of his own voice, which was why the change in his dining companion's demeanour came as such a shock.

If an attack should come Wellington still had his dinner knife and fork. He was also in possession of a glass of wine, half finished—a pity to use, since it was a delightful vintage and paired perfectly with the duck—that could blind his opponent for a few valuable moments.

His lunch date kept a hard glare fixed on him, the monocle digging into the folds of his cheek. Rather unexpected to Wellington, Lord Hieronymus Featherstone had run out of things to say, and was now giving him his undivided attention.

Wellington thought he had shown unending fortitude while being subjected to Featherstone's eternal droning on about his recent excursions across Africa, India, and Siam. He now knew to what far reaches Lord Featherstone had traversed in the name of Her Majesty—which might be useful.

Yet now Featherstone sat before him, no longer the awful, droning chatterbox. The gentleman's jaw twitched as he kept his ice-chip blue eyes trained on Wellington, demanding satisfaction.

"Well," the lord spoke, his voice booming from his barrel chest, "answer me, man."

Sod it, Wellington thought as he picked up his glass. At the very least, I will finish this excellent wine.

"You obviously mentioned her name during one of your riveting stories when crossing the Serengeti," Wellington replied, taking in a good, long sip of his wine.

"My dear Bernice does not care for heat."

"Then perhaps you mentioned her joining you as you crossed the Canadian Rockies?"

"Nor does she care for the cold."

Mrs. Bernice Featherstone did not sound either lovely or agreeable, a perfect match for her husband, it seemed.

Nodding in resignation, Wellington cast another quick glance across the table, taking note of the knife and fork. Both hardly suited for close-quarter combat, but still useful. "M'lord, we could speculate for the entirety of the afternoon on how I came to know your lovely wife's name, but why don't we just cut this clever banter short and try a more direct form of engagement."

"Which would be?"

"The truth." With a final dab at of the corners of his mouth, Wellington dropped the napkin on the table, swiping up the fork and placing it in his lap. He positioned the silverware for a quick thrust as he began. "Lord Featherstone, it is no lie when I say your company has been enlightening. I have genuinely enjoyed our spirited and scintillating discussions whilst we journey around the Ivory Coast. However, to say we 'met you' by chance would be disingenuous." His grip tightened on the fork as he said, "My associate and I have been tracking you since your boarding in Conakry."

~~~~~~~~~~~~

About the Authors:

Philippa (Pip) Ballantine
Born in Wellington, New Zealand, Philippa has always had her head in a book. For this she blames her father who thought Lord of the Rings was suitable bedtime reading for an eight year old. At the age of thirteen she began writing fantasy stories for herself.

She first earned a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature and Political Science and then a Bachelor of Applied Science in Library and Information Science. So soon enough she found herself working in the magical world of libraries where she stayed for over a decade.

Her first professional sale was in 1997, and since then she has gone on to produce mostly novel length fiction. In 2006 she became New Zealand’s first podcast novelist, and she has voiced and produced Weaver’s Web, Chasing the Bard, Weather Child and Digital Magic as podiobooks. Her podcasts have been short listed for the Parsec Awards, and won a Sir Julius Vogel award.

Philippa is the author of the Books of the Order series with Ace- Geist and Spectyr and Wrayth out now, and Harbinger to follow. She is also the co-author of the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences series with Tee Morris. Phoenix Rising debuted in May 2011 and The Janus Affair came out in May 2012. She also has the Shifted World series with Pyr Books, with the first book Hunter and Fox out now.
When not writing or podcasting, Philippa loves reading, gardening, and whenever possible traveling. With her husband, Tee and her daughter, she is looked after by a mighty clowder of three cats.

Tee Morris
Tee Morris began his writing career with his 2002 historical epic fantasy, MOREVI The Chronicles of Rafe & Askana. In 2005 Tee took MOREVI into the then-unknown podosphere, making his novel the first book podcast in its entirety. That experience led to the founding of Podiobooks.com and collaborating with Evo Terra and Chuck Tomasi on Podcasting for Dummies and its follow-up, Expert Podcasting Practices for Dummies. He won acclaim and accolades for his cross-genre fantasy-detective Billibub Baddings Mysteries, the podcast of The Case of the Singing Sword winning him the 2008 Parsec Award for Best Audio Drama. Along with those titles, Tee has written articles and short stories for BenBella Books’s Farscape Forever: Sex, Drugs, and Killer Muppets, the podcast anthology VOICES: New Media Fiction, BenBella Books’ So Say We All: Collected Thoughts and Opinions of Battlestar Galactica, and Dragon Moon Press’ Podthology: The Pod Complex.

Tee brought all these skills to the award-winning Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences series which he wrote with his wife, Pip Ballantine. When he is not writing, Tee enjoys life in Virginia alongside Philippa Ballantine, his daughter, and three cats.


Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheMinistryOfPeculiarOccurrences
Twitter: https://twitter.com/BooksandBraun
Tumblr: http://ministryofpeculiaroccurrences.tumblr.com
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/pipballantine/the-ministry-of-peculiar-occurrences/

Keeping it Fresh

I'm thrilled to share a post by the amazing Philippa Ballantine. She and her husband Tee Morris are working hard to bring us the next two (YES TWO!) books in the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences series.

They have a Kickstarter going to bring us these books, and BOTH! have been funded and WILL happen. You can back the project and get the books too! AND!! A nice bonus is if the funding goes high enough, we could purchase the scandalous Countless Hues of Crimson. (If you read Diamond Conspiracy, you'll know what Countless Hues of Crimson is.)

I'm thrilled to have Philippa Ballantine by today about Keeping It Fresh with a series. Please welcome Pip!

Keeping it Fresh….After All This Time.

By Pip Ballantine

Back in 2008 I pitched the idea of writing a podcast for pay to my (then friend, now husband) Tee Morris. It was just supposed to be a little steampunk side project. Just a bit of fun to seeing if getting people to pay for podcasts was possible.

We ending up not actually finding that out. An agent, and a bidding process with multiple publishers ended up making it into a book…then a series…then a roleplaying game…and round again to a podcast.

So the first book of the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences came out in 2011, and here we are, again in a place I never expected. Within those four years later give or take a month or two with Books Five The Ghost Rebellion and Six Operation: Endgame funded.

Along the way we’ve learning how to co-write together, and we’ve developed a world we really enjoy writing in. It started out with Wellington and Eliza, and is now populated with a whole plethora of villains and heroes.

So how do we keep it fresh as we approach book five? Well luckily we still have plenty of world to explore. Welly and Eliza have been to America, Germany and France (briefly), so they haven’t really explored a great deal of the globe at all.

We don’t want to give too much away, however we can say The Ghost Rebellion is partly set in India, which is a culture and setting with tremendous possibilities. We’re lucky that we have over the years made friends far and wide in the steampunk community. So we’re extremely grateful to have Suna Dasi of Steampunk India as our consultant, to keep us on point with our Indian history and culture.

As well as the world as a whole, there is a lot more depth to examine in our main characters. Eliza might have had her mind taken off New Zealand, by her attraction to Wellington, but the desire to go home is still strong in her. In The Ghost Rebellion there will be many reminders of her past, and that the strings are still firmly attached.
Also Wellington is still dealing with the repercussions of his father’s experiments. The House of Usher put a lot into creating him, and they will want a return on investment. Our quiet archivist can travel as far as he likes, but the tentacles of the House are everywhere.

We are also looking at what happened to Sophia del Morte after the events of The Diamond Conspiracy. Having been labeled a turn-coat, and without the protection of the Maestro, what has the assassin been up to? How can she make a living now? Hopefully the answers in The Ghost Rebellion will surprise some people. Sophia has become something of a fan favorite, and the evolution of her character has been interesting.

So this whole adventure, both the Kickstarter and the novels has been quite a ride. And now, thanks to funding two more books, we will be riding around in the Ministry world for awhile longer. Not just that, but we have some earlier periods to explore too. I have about half a YA book done, which is all the about the Ministry Seven before they met Eliza D Braun. So yes…there is plenty more in the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences world to play with.

There is still time to pre-order The Ghost Rebellion and Operation: Endgame but the Kickstarter ends 9.30pm EST November 15th.

About the Author:
Philippa Ballantine
New Zealand born fantasy writer and podcaster Philippa (Pip) Ballantine is the author of the Books of the Order and the Shifted World series. She is also the co-author with her husband Tee Morris of the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences novels. Her awards include an Airship, a Parsec, the Steampunk Chronicle Reader’s Choice, the RT Reviewer’s Choice Award for steampunk, and a Sir Julius Vogel. She currently resides in Manassas, Virginia with her husband, daughter, and a furry clowder of cats.

Find the Authors:
Twitter:
  @PhilippaJane
  @TeeMonster

Blogs/Sites:
   http://www.pjballantine.com/
   http://teemorris.com/


I hope you visit and back the kickstarter as well. :)

The Ghost Rebellion is coming!

Many of you know I'm a huge fan of steampunk and Tee Morris and Philippa Ballantine. I've enjoyed their four books in the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences series along with so many podcasted stories in their playground by other authors.

If you've read and enjoyed this series as well, I have news for you!

Tee and Pip have created a kickstarter for The Ghost Rebellion, the 5th book in the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences series. The kickstarter is still in the process, but at this point it WILL go through. The book is FULLY! funded.

Go ahead and jump over to back the kickstarter too.



What is new being worked toward in the kickstarter is funding for book 6, Operation: Endgame! We are ever soooo close to having this added to our list of books to purchase. Book 6 will be coming, but we could have it added to this list to purchase if the goal is hit now. Then after that is funded and if people keep backing the project to the next level, we could get the scandalous and sexy novella, Countless Hues of Crimson, mentioned in Dawn's Early Light.

So I'm rambling. I know. But I'm so excited to see this kickstarter in full funding and going for beyond the gold. :) (Countless Hues of Crimson would be so cool to see! lol)

If you'd like to back the project, please head over and pick your level.