Giveaway: The SA speculative fiction edition (giveaway now closed)

UPDATE: Thanks so much to everyone who entered the giveaway. Unfortunately there could only be one winner, but don't fret, because there'll be more of these to come.

That said, congratulations to The Book Wurrm. You've won yourself copies of any two books listed below. You have 48 hours to claim your prize, thereafter which another winner will be chosen.

Next giveaway will be coming your way in the near future.
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Today I’m all about celebrating some of South Africa’s most talented authors and because I want their books to be read widely and everywhere, I’m making this an international giveaway (Yay - although I should add that my giveaways are almost always open worldwide).

I’m offering two of any of the books listed below to one lucky winner.

All you need to do is leave a comment and tell me what the one book is that you wish more people would read or talk about and why.

Below are just a few of the many wonderful SA writers out there and this is only the first of many SA-themed giveaways I’d like to do (Fear not, fabulous SA authors who aren’t mentioned, this is only the beginning).

Here are brief descriptions of the books you stand a chance of winning!

Deadlands by Lily Herne (Add to your Goodreads TBR pile)
In Deadlands, life is a lottery.

Ten years have passed since Cape Town was destroyed in the war with the living dead. Now, human survivors are protected from the zombies that lurch around the suburban Deadlands by shrouded figures known as 'Guardians'.

But the price for protection is steep: each year, the Guardians hold a human lottery in which five teenagers are chosen for a secret purpose.

Seventeen-year-old Lele hates everything about her life in the city: her new school, the brainwashed zombie-lovers, the way everyone seems creepily obsessed with teenagers . . . She wants out. Then she is picked as a Chosen One: but she's not prepared to face whatever shady future the Guardians have in store for her.

So she runs for her life - straight into the Deadlands, and into the ranks of the Mall Rats - a renegade gang of misfit teens who have gone underground - and are preparing to take a stand.

When the Sea is Rising Red by Cat Hellisen (Add it on Goodreads here)
I’ve recently ran a giveaway for Cat’s latest, but for those who haven’t heard of When the Sea is Rising Red, which is Cat’s first published novel, I thought that this would be a fab opportunity for readers to choose this as an option

After seventeen-year-old Felicita’s dearest friend, Ilven, kills herself to escape an arranged marriage, Felicita chooses freedom over privilege.

She fakes her own death and leaves her sheltered life as one of Pelimburg’s magical elite behind. Living in the slums, scrubbing dishes for a living, she falls for charismatic Dash while also becoming fascinated with vampire Jannik.

Then something shocking washes up on the beach: Ilven's death has called out of the sea a dangerous, wild magic. Felicita must decide whether her loyalties lie with the family she abandoned . . . or with those who would twist this dark power to destroy Pelimburg's caste system, and the whole city along with it.

The Guardian’s Wyrd by Nerine Dorman (Add it on Goodreads)
Sometimes having a fairytale prince as a best friend can be a real pain.

Jay didn't realise that sticking up for Rowan, the gangly new kid at school, would plunge him into the dangers and politics of the magical realm of Sunthyst. But if anyone is up for the challenge it's Jay September. With his trusty dog, Shadow, at his side, he braves the Watcher in the dark that guards the tunnels between the worlds, and undertakes a dangerous quest to rescue the prince.

It's a race against time - can he sneak Prince Rowan away from under King Lessian's nose and bring him safely back home - all before the prince's sixteenth birthday? Or is Rowan's mother, the exiled Queen Persia, secretly trying to hold onto her power by denying her son his birthright?

Jay is ready for anything, except, perhaps, the suffocating darkness of the tunnels. And that howling …

The Mark by Edyth Bulbring (Add it on Goodreads)
In the future, the world has flipped.

Ravaged by the Conflagration, this is a harsh world where the relentless sun beats down, people’s lives are run by a heartless elite and law is enforced by a brutal brigade.

A mark at the base of the spine controls each person’s destiny.

The Machine decides what work you will do and who your life partner will be.

In this world, everyone must make their contribution. Some more than others. Juliet Seven – “Ettie” – will soon turn 15 and her life as a drudge will begin, her fate-mate mate will be chosen.

Like everyone else, her future is marked by the numbers on her spine. But Ettie decides to challenge her destiny. And in so doing, she fulfils the prophecy that was spoken of before she even existed.

The Faerie Guardian by Rachel Morgan (Add it on Goodreads)
Protecting humans from dangerous magical creatures is all in a day’s work for a faerie training to be a guardian. Seventeen-year-old Violet Fairdale knows this better than anyone—she’s about to become the best guardian the Guild has seen in years.

That is, until a cute human boy who can somehow see through her faerie glamor follows her into the Fae realm. Now she’s broken Guild Law, a crime that could lead to her expulsion.

The last thing Vi wants to do is spend any more time with the boy who got her into this mess, but the Guild requires that she return Nate to his home and make him forget everything he’s discovered of the Fae realm.

Easy, right?

Not when you factor in evil faeries, long-lost family members, and inconvenient feelings of the romantic kind. Vi is about to find herself tangled up in a dangerous plot—and it’ll take all her training to get out alive.

Devilskein & Dearlove by Alex Smith (Add it on Goodreads)
When thirteen-year-old Erin Dearlove has to move in with her aunt on Cape Town’s bustling Long Street, she struggles to adapt to her new life, harbouring a dark secret.

But her friendship with their upstairs neighbour, Mr Devilskein, soon helps her to adjust.

Like Erin, Mr Devilskein has something to hide: he is the keeper of six mysterious doors. He entrusts Erin with the key for one of these doors, and she discovers that they lead to infinite magical worlds.

In wonder she explores an underwater paradise, the lost works of William Shakespeare, and a beautiful Chinese garden.

During her adventures she meets a prisoner names Julius Monk, but Julius is not all he appears to be. The captive and his Book of Dooms prove dangerously enticing, and soon it is up to Erin to save the lives of those she’s grown to love.

Devilskein & Dearlove is as sinister and intriguing as it is quirky and colourful. With inimitable storytelling flair, Alex Smith weaves an enchanting tale of friendship, adventure and magic.

Sister-Sister by Rachel Zadok (Add it on Goodreads)
That night, I slip into her mind and dream her dreams. I see myself, Thuli, strange and disconnected and the wrong way round, like I’m stuck in a mirror.

We walk across the patch of veld to Saviour’s Pit Stop, our arms crooked at the elbows and linked together. The sky is silver-blue and the propeller on the Legend winks as it turns slow in the breeze, fanning our cheeks. The colour of her dreaming is sharp, as if our lives then were so much brighter…

In childhood Thuli and Sindi are inseparable, pinkie-linked by a magic no one else can understand.

Then a strange man comes knocking, bringing news from a hometown they didn’t know existed. His arrival sets into motion events that will lead them into the darkest places, on a search for salvation where the all-too-familiar and the extraordinary merge, blurring the boundaries between dream and reality.

Updated: Giveaway closes 25th of May.