One Man's Skill, Another Man's Magic

One man’s accepted skills may be another man’s magic, or at least that’s the way Megan McMuir sees it when she learns her husband is a faery wizard. David’s a trooping faery, a human-sized fae, complete with antenna, wings and a glamour keeping anyone—including his wife—from seeing his true form. Once he confesses his duplicity to Megan, however, she makes a rule: No more glamour on the wife. She wants to see her husband and their entire household just as it is.

It’s a bit of a shock. Instead of a stately antebellum mansion, their home is actually a large magnolia tree in the middle of a vacant lot. Inside, it looks like a coal mine, with uncut gems twinkling in the darkness and roots hanging from the ceiling and protruding from the walls. Grass and flowers decorate the rooms and the bathroom comes equipped with its own waterfall. In fact, as Megan sees it:

The halls and corridors had always appeared narrow and cramped. Now, with the shield of glamour torn away, they became a series of tunnels, seemingly carved out of living rock. The walls melded into the ceiling in a continuous curve. Tree roots hanging from cracks pushed their way through crevices. Fissures gaped to reveal the sparkle of unmined gems.

At any moment, she expected to see Doc, Grumpy, and Sleepy appear and start singing Heigh-Ho!

As if that isn’t enough, now Megan finds herself the only mortal in a houseful of fae. First, of course, there’s husband David:

Copper brows winged above his eyes, not arching as they had before, but arrow-straight. And the eyes themselves... They were like an animal’s, the entire eye a deep green iris. Protruding from his forehead were antenna. Not butterfly-like but smoky, feathery tendrils floating in the air above his head. And the wings…Dragonfly-like, they didn’t come from under his shoulder blades but grew on each side of his upper spine. Not the tiny things shown in drawings of fairies either, but equaling David’s height. Delicately translucent in bronzes and golds, the colors of a Monarch's wings magnified.

…and David’s manservant, and familiar, Ossian:

…More handsome than David, if that were possible. Ossian was beautiful. Statue beautiful. A masterpiece. A pointed-eared man in a dark business suit, sporting a pair of brilliant blue and emerald wings, with the antenna sprouting from his forehead matching the glow of his blue, blue eyes.

…and Ossian’s twin sister, Brigid:

…just as beautiful in her own way. Her long, dark hair was braided and wound into a coronet at her crown.

And in the middle of this magical setting, is Megan O’Connell McMuir…newly-wed…expectant mother…human…with no magical powers and nothing but her love of her husband to keep her on a straight and steady court of sanity. Oh, and there’s the icing on the case: David’s been sent to protect the Earth from the invasion by his arch-rival, Exeter Dubhtina, a wizard with power equal to his own, and if David fails, both his own dimension as well as the little blue planet called Terra will be forfeit…

Ho-hum. Life’s never dull for a Wizard’s Wife!

Wizard’s Wife was released January 15, 2011, by Class Act Books and is available in both print and e-version. For a glimpse into Chapter One, click here http://www.classactbooks.com/The-Wizards-Wife-Trade-by-Toni-V-Sweeney_p_269.html