Guest Post + Giveaway with Jennifer Estep & Professor Metis

PLEASE WELCOME JENNIFER STEP AND PROFESSOR METIS

Greetings and salutations! First of all, I want to say thanks to Kristen for having me on the blog today. Thanks so much, Kristen!

My name is Jennifer Estep, and I write the Mythos Acad­emy young adult urban fan­tasy series for Kens­ing­ton. The books focus on Gwen Frost, a 17-year-old Gypsy girl who has the gift of psy­chom­e­try, or the abil­ity to know an object’s his­tory just by touch­ing it. After a seri­ous freak-out with her magic, Gwen is shipped off to Mythos Acad­emy, a school for the descen­dants of ancient war­riors like Spar­tans, Valkyries, Ama­zons, and more.

Touch of Frost, the first book in the series, came out on July 26. First Frost, a prequel e-story to the series, is also available now. The sec­ond book, Kiss of Frost, will hit shelves on Nov. 29.

So today, Kristen asked me to write a post giving a tour of Mythos Academy. Here to be your guide is Professor Metis, the myth-history professor at the academy. Take it away, Metis:

Hello! I’m Professor Metis, and I’ll be your tour guide today. As you can see, we’re standing on the edge of the upper quad here at Mythos Academy in Cypress Mountain, North Carolina. It’s a lovely, picturesque spot with its lush carpet of grass, iron benches, curving cobblestone walkways, and massive shade trees. This is also the heart of campus and where students spend most of their time at Mythos Academy during the day.

 

Now, if you’ll follow me, we’ll start our walking loop around the quad and stop at each one of the various building so you can get an idea of what’s inside and how it relates to the rest of campus.

The Library of Antiquities: Here we have the Library of Antiquities, which is the largest structure on the Mythos Academy campus. The library soars seven stories into the air, and its architecture is quite unique, as you can see from the various towers, balconies, parapets, and more.

What’s that? Oh, I see someone has mentioned the library’s remarkable resemblance to a creepy Gothic castle straight out of an old horror movie. Well, yes, some folks view it that way, but I think it’s quite lovely.

Now, housed inside the library are hundreds of thousands of books on every possible subject and topic you can imagine – all the better to help the students complete their homework assignments. The library also has an extensive collection of artifacts – things like armor, jewelry, weapons, and more that have been used by various gods, goddesses, warriors, and creatures over the years in the Pantheon’s ongoing struggle against the Reapers of Chaos. As an added bonus, frescoes featuring gold, silver, and sparkling jewels adorn the ceiling.

The gym: Moving on, we have the gymnasium, which is the second largest building on campus and features state-of-the-art training facilities, including several pools, saunas, spas, and more. Of course, the most important part of the facility is the actual gym itself. In there, the floor is covered with heavy mats, and the walls are lined with racks of weapons. At Mythos Academy, gym class is more about weapons training than anything else, and students are graded on how well they can fight. Swords, daggers, spears, staffs – at Mythos, students learn how to use all those weapons and more, along with whatever magic they possess, to prepare them to fight Reapers and protect the world from the Reapers’ evil plans.

The dining hall: The students eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner in the dining hall, which features suits of 

armor, oil paintings, and most impressively, an open-air indoor garden full of grape vines, along with almond, orange, and olive trees. Isn’t it lovely?

What’s that? Oh, you want to know about the menu. Well, Mythos Academy only serves its students the finest foods – everything from veal to lamb to lobster – prepared in various sauces and creative presented by our gourmet chefs. If you want, we can sample one of the chef’s special escargot breakfast omelets. Why are you suddenly looking so green?

The English-history building: Students attend a variety of classes in this building, which also houses my office.

The math-science building: Students also attend a variety of classes in this building. There are some other, er, departments housed in this building, but it’s best not to dwell on things like student deaths at the hands of Reapers.

The statues: Now, I’m sure you’ve noticed that all the buildings on campus feature stone statues of a variety of mythological creatures, like gryphons, gargoyles, Gorgons, dragons, chimeras, and more. Now, I know all the statues look quite fierce and even a little gruesome, but there’s no need to be alarmed – even if you do think that the statues are watching your every move. It’s just, er, a trick of the light.

Curriculum: As far as the curriculum goes, students take classes in all your typical subjects – English, chemistry, economics, calculus, geography, and more. Mythos Academy prides itself on its high academic standards, for our first-year, 16-year-old students, all the way up to our sixth year, 21-year-old students.

Of course, one of the classes unique to the academy is myth-history, which I teach. In that class, students learn about the evil god Loki and how he and his Reapers of Chaos tried to take over the world. That led to the long, bloody Chaos War before Loki was eventually defeated by Nike, the Greek goddess of victory, and imprisoned by her and the other gods. We also focus on how students can help the members of the Pantheon in their eternal fight to keep the Reapers from freeing Loki once more and plunging the world into another Chaos War. Once again, it’s best not to dwell on such unpleasant things on such a lovely day.

So that concludes our tour of Mythos Academy. Any questions?

Why are you slowly edging away? I mean, sure, anyone at Mythos can be a Reaper, from students to staff to professors, but it’s not like a group of Reapers are going to attack us out here in broad daylight. Well, Reapers usually don’t attack like that. Why are you running away? Wait! Come back!

Um, thanks for the tour, Professor Metis. What about you guys? Is Mythos Academy the kind of place you’d like to go to? What are some of your favorite fictional settings?

Thank you to both Jennifer Estep and Professor Metis for visiting Seeing Night Reviews and giving us a veyr interesting tour of Mythos Academy :) 

AUTHOR INFORMATION

Jennifer Estep is a USA Today bestselling author who also writes the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin urban fan­tasy series for Pocket Books. The books focus on Gin Blanco, an assas­sin code­named the Spi­der who can con­trol the ele­ments of Ice and Stone. When she’s not busy killing peo­ple and right­ing wrongs, Gin runs a bar­be­cue restau­rant called the Pork Pit in the fic­tional South­ern metrop­o­lis of Ash­land. The city is also home to giants, dwarves, vam­pires, and ele­men­tals – Air, Fire, Ice, and Stone.

Books in the series are Spider’s Bite, Web of Lies, Venom, and Tan­gled Threads. Spider’s Revenge, the fifth book, will be released on Sept. 27. Visit www.jenniferestep.com for free short stories, excerpts, and more.

NOW FOR THE GIVEAWAY!

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GOOD LUCK!