Cover Reveal and Giveaway: The Lightning Road Series by Donna Galanti

Welcome to Donna Galanti today to show off her AWESOME new covers for her Lightning Road series! My 12 year old LOVES theses books. SO. MUCH. I'm so excited to help reveal her amazing new covers. Plus enter to win a $25 Amazon Gift Card at the end of this post and get the first e-book in Donna’s series, Joshua and the Lightning Road, on sale now through October 15th for just $0.99cents. 

Donna shares what stories affected her childhood and writing plus read an excerpt from Joshua and the Arrow Realm!

What fiction most influenced your childhood, and what effect did those stories have on Joshua and the Arrow Realm? by Donna Galanti

My love for writing and reading went hand in hand right from the beginning. I began writing plays and acting them out with the neighborhood kids when I was seven years old. At the time I lived in England, where I attended a Harry Potter-like castle school.
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​​Progressing from plays to stories, my first short story was about a flying ship, wizards, and Dodo birds. At that same time I vividly recall the first book I fell in love with: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. I read the entire Narnia Chronicles curled up in a nook in my gray and pink woolen school uniform (bowler hat and tie included!). I then gobbled up all of Roald Dahl’s books and especially loved Mr. Fantastic Fox and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
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After England, we moved to rural New Hampshire where my parents owned and operated a campground and along came Laura Ingalls Wilder’s The Little House Books. We had barns and hogs and chickens, and how I loved gathering the rotten apples in the orchards to feed the hogs.

One fall day we rounded up the hogs for slaughter and I dreamt of being Laura Ingalls blowing up the pig’s bladder like a balloon and tossing it about and roasting the pig’s tail – just like Laura did! 

Although, my mother was not so thrilled with scooping out the eyes to make head cheese as Laura’s mother did!
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When I became a teenager, Tolkien’s The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings came into my life and I was swept away to Middle Earth. One Halloween at school I even dressed up as Aragorn (what I envisioned he looked like at the time) and of course no one knew who I was in my cloak, boots, and dirt-grimed face.

​As a child, fantasy was my reality. I read fantasy and also created fantasy worlds living out my favorite books so it’s no surprise that I write fantasy! From that first story about a flying ship to Joshua and the Arrow Realm, fantasy has always claimed me.
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​Growing up on a mountain as an only child, I spent much of my time roaming the woods with my notebook in hand, putting stories on the page in hidden glens and the nooks of trees. My love of the woods and fantasy both fueled the wooded world of Joshua and the Arrow Realm, where Joshua must survive the hunt and discovers a hidden tree world of other kids! 
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​JOSHUA AND THE ARROW REALM EXCERPT:
Rain streamed down and the wind whipped at me, driving the stinging pellets. Charlie and I ran on, leaving our enemy behind. We held each other up as we staggered through the storm.
“Joshua, stop! Can’t. Go. On.” Charlie gasped out the words as he dragged me back.
I tugged his shirt, ripping it. “We’ve got to!”
Oh, where was this Grand Tree and could these Wild Childs help us?
When my lungs threatened to explode, a howl behind us pushed my aching legs to full throttle. Claws swiped at us and a blast of rotten meat stench hit me. Anger at this world choked me into a fury. For sucking me up into its danger and death again. For turning my friend against me. For having to run for my life again. For wanting me to be their hero.
I skidded to a stop, riding wet leaves. Charlie’s eyes blinked with surprise as I shoved him aside and turned to face the unleashed creature. It flew over my head—an exploding mountain of fur and legs and tail—and slammed onto the ground. It turned to face me, panting. Pacing back and forth, its massive paws glinted with curved nails as it smashed the mud. Steam bellowed from its giant nostrils and horns protruded from a head covered in a shaggy brown mane. Tinted burnt orange, the beast raged part lion, part bull. I backed away from the monster, hauling Charlie with me.
“What now?” Charlie stuttered.
I carefully nocked an arrow to my bow, keeping my eyes on the beast as it snorted and pawed the ground, spewing up clomps of dirt. The rain spiked harder.
“Let us go,” I said.
The beast churned up the ground and shook its giant mane, groaning low in its throat. “Hungrrrry.” I must’ve imagined him speaking. Without my lightning orb, I didn’t have powers to understand animals on Nostos.
Charlie pulled me back. “What did it say?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Well, I think it said ‘time to eat’.”
He had no idea how right he was.
With each step the beast inched toward us, we took one back. I pulled back my arrow, the tension scorching my arm. The lion-bull shuddered; loose skin flapping against its gigantic, bony frame. Its swollen tongue hung from its mouth, and its ribs outlined sharp against its skin with each desperate pant. Red-rimmed eyes burned into mine.
“It’s starving, Charlie,” I whispered.
“And we’re dinner!”
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​ABOUT JOSHUA AND THE LIGHTNING ROAD: Twelve-year-old Joshua Cooper learns the hard way that lightning never strikes by chance when a bolt strikes his house and whisks away his best friend—possibly forever. Armed with only luck and his grandfather’s mysterious crystal, Joshua must save his friend by traveling the Lightning Road to a dark world that steals children for energy. New friends come to Joshua’s aid and while battling beasts and bandits and fending off the Child Collector, Joshua’s mission quickly becomes more than a search for his friend—it becomes the battle of his life.

PRAISE FOR JOSHUA AND THE LIGHTNING ROAD:  "Vividly imagined characters in a gripping action fantasy that never lets you go until the very last page." —Jenny Nimmo, New York Times bestselling author of the Charlie Bone series

**$0.99 DEAL!** Joshua and the Lightning Road is available now through October 15th for just $0.99cents on e-book from these book sellers: 

Amazon: mybook.to/TheLightningRoad
Barnes & Noble: https://bit.ly/2zwsiLx 
Kobo: https://bit.ly/2Q6Kukn 
Apple iBooks: https://apple.co/2NF5MZA

ABOUT JOSHUA AND THE ARROW REALM: Joshua never thought he’d be called back to the world of Nostos so soon. But when his friend King Apollo needs his help in the Arrow Realm, Joshua braves this dark world once more in order to save him. With Joshua’s loyalties divided between Nostos and Earth, he must rely on his courage and powers to restore magic to this desperate world and to free its people. Abandoned by his friends in his quest, unarmed, and facing great odds, can he survive on instincts alone and not only save those imprisoned—but himself?
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PRAISE FOR JOSHUA AND THE ARROW REALM: “Fast-paced and endlessly inventive, this is a high-stakes romp through a wild world where descendants of the Greek gods walk beside you, beasts abound, and not everything—or everyone—is as it seems.” –Michael Northrop, New York Times bestselling author of the TombQuest series 

Joshua and the Arrow Realm is available through these book sellers: 

Amazon: mybook.to/ArrowRealm 
Barnes & Noble: https://bit.ly/2N3OYGG 
Kobo: https://bit.ly/2IjXYGX 
Apple iBooks: https://apple.co/2xFU4Ea

​ABOUT DONNA: Donna Galanti is the author of the bestselling paranormal suspense Element Trilogy and the children’s fantasy adventure Joshua and The Lightning Road series. Donna is a contributing editor for International Thriller Writers the Big Thrill magazine, a writing contest judge at nycmidnight.com, and regularly presents as a guest author at schools and teaches at writing conferences. She’s lived from England as a child, to Hawaii as a U.S. Navy photographer. Donna also loves teaching writers about building author brand and platform through her free training series at yourawesomeauthorlife.com. Visit her at donnagalanti.com.
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CONNECT WITH DONNA: 
Website: http://www.donnagalanti.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/DonnaGalanti
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DonnaGalantiAuthor
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20983429-joshua-and-the-lightning-road

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