Since Beautiful People hosted by Paper Fury seems to be cancelled this month, I’ve decided to participate in Daniela Ark’s A Book’s Genesis Link-Up. I haven’t talked enough about Subsapien on this blog (Red Hood has been stealing all of the limelight), so I’m using this as an opportunity to do that. I talked about the third book in Beautiful Books (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3), but I haven’t talked much about the first book which I’ll be editing starting next month. Unlike Beautiful People, this link-up doesn’t have much structure, but Tracy @ Adventure Awaits came up with a pretty good format which I’ll be basing mine on (because I’m anal retentive and require structure). Be sure to check out her post to the link-up too.
Here we go!
Note: All of the artwork except that shown in the setting category is mine. I don’t own that stuff. I’m not that good of an artist.
The Blurb:
The only life seventeen year old Bryce has ever known is that of a subsapien grafting—a half-human, half-cheetah creation—a prisoner in the Rota labs and the guardian of his beloved younger brother, Matt. He’s never met his parents or been to school, only endured whatever unethical experiments the scientists subjected him to. After his legs are crushed during yet another test, he wakes up in a different lab far away with new mechanical prosthetics—and without Matt.
Judah Mitchell, the manipulative CEO of the company who owns Bryce, offers him a deal to change his destiny as a lab specimen. He wants Bryce working security with Matt in his home, giving Bryce the chance to save both himself and his brother from the abuse of the labs.
The price? Bryce has to become like the humans who have tortured him.
With the help of another subsapien named Caleb, he must learn to become the race he’s hated since the first needle prick. He must turn away from the ways of survival and animalistic behavior ingrained into him as a child and become normal. But secretly, he vows to escape the labs altogether—and save his brother and friends before they perish at the hands of the scientists like so many others.
Are humans all bad, like the scientists and guards? Will he ever see his little brother again? Can he save his friends in time? Above all, is the deal worth giving up Bryce’s identity?
The Setting:
The book is set in the year 2123, so in the semi-near future, so there’s a lot of futuristic technology such as robots (most commonly Janidroids which are basically jacked up way more intelligent roombas), autodrive cars, healing serums, holoscreens, and Everys (my invention that’s basically device that can become both a phone and computer because it changes sizes). Most of the book takes place in a big laboratory in the capital of the Dome Web (the network of Domes humans live in to escape toxic gases from bioweapons clouding the outside atmosphere). Here are just a few pics from my Pinterest board for the book, but you can check more there.
The Main Characters:
Bryce is a seventeen year old cheetah subsapien grafting. His only family is his younger brother, Matt, whom he’s fiercely protective over. The only life Bryce has ever known is that as an experiment in a lab called the L.G.R., but when he was seven a man told him of the wonders of the Outside and Bryce is determined to get his sickly brother to a place where he can be safe and happy–even if Bryce has to sacrifice his life for it.
At twelve years old, Bryce used his charm, passion, and superior fighting skills to become the Dominant or lead grafting over the hundreds in his lab. He has encouraged and guided his kind in their collective pursuit for freedom. His second in command has been Emil, his best friend. However, Bryce’s endeavors have been slowed since he got into a severe accident during a large test. The lab had him transported to one in the capital of the United Americas Domes where Bryce was made into a biomech with metal appendages and eyes.
He has been forced to live with humans his age named Pro and Caleb. All his life, Bryce has despised humans for the cruelty and brutality they’ve shown him and his species. But it seems that now the only way to find his little brother and leave Rota for good is directly work for the Head of Rota, legal owner of Bryce and all the other graftings.
Do you want to know more about Bryce? He’s up for more questions for his character interview coming up next Friday! Get yours in before the deadline! You can ask him here!
Caleb is a fourteen year old Biomechanical Subsapien and an amnesiac. After a tragic train accident that claimed his parents, he became paralyzed and Rota saved him using bionic parts. Because of head trauma he sustained from his injuries, he has no memory of his life before just a few weeks ago.
Since he has no where to go, he stays in the Rota laboratories to work for them. He rooms with Pro and Bryce. Though he has a crush with Pro, he’s afraid to admit it to her in fear of messing up their friendship. On the other hand, he does not do not get along with Bryce. Caleb’s shy, awkward, and analytical personality is the complete opposite to Bryce’s reckless, smooth, and antisocial personality. Caleb sees Bryce as a rival as Bryce ends up growing up the teen social ranks without even trying while Caleb is struggling to fit in.
He may not remember much of his past, but he does know that loves to build things. Engineering and math come easy to him and calm him when he’s stressed, especially after a rigorous day of training at the Rota labs. Despite lab employee’s assurances that what Caleb is doing is for the greater good, he is suspicious that something nefarious is going and he’s determined to find out what it is and find a way out.
You can ask him questions for his character interview next month! In the mean time you can check out his Beautiful People.
The Villain:
Judah S. Mitchell III is the CEO of Rota Enterprises, the biggest company in the Dome Web. It created most of the technology that has kept the post-war country alive. The business has been in Judah’s family for generations so he’s accustomed to the constant paparazzi. To the press he is a charismatic heir to billions with a loving wife and child, but off camera he has his own agendas. Using his honeyed words and his nearly limitless assets, he manipulates people to suit his plans–including my main characters Bryce and Caleb.
Between pressures from his demanding wife and his company’s board of directors, it isn’t easy to keep up his public persona. In his little free time, he likes fishing with his five-year-old son on his boat in the lake behind his state of the art mansion and going to his son’s basketball games. He keeps his son unaware of the shadowy side of his life of blackmailing and making non-ethical contracts with the government that almost entirely relies on his funds. Judah has nearly an entire nation in his hands and this tycoon won’t tolerate anyone ruining the corporate empire that’s taken him and his family decades to establish.
The Secondary Characters:
Cynara Parks is seventeen and a biomech, a half human half robot similar to a cyborg. She grew up with multiple sclerosis, making her unfavorable in her father’s eyes, until recently when she was converted to a biomech which fixed her damaged nerves.
Now she lives in a Rota lab while she recovers, adjusts to her added metal parts, and eventually goes on secret missions to help the Dome Web government. She hopes that doing the missions will finally allow her to experience adventure, meet good friends, and impress her father.
Cynara’s mother and younger sister died three years ago in a Gas Leak, making the rift between she and her father worse than ever before. Her father is a senator of a Dome so she always lived in a wealthy environment, but he never liked Cynara around in fear that she would ruin his image and favored her younger “perfect” sister. Despite her father’s favoritism, she and her sister maintained a good relationship. Some of her fondest memories were spent on their private tennis court when her sister would take Cynara out there and go easy so she could hit the ball, and playing the piano while her mother and sister sang.
Because of her seclusion and her eccentric personality, she’s never made too many friends. But now with her new life where she has full mobility and not under constant scorn from her only parent perhaps she finally can be the person she’s always wanted to be.
Pro (Promise) Jamerson is fifteen years old, but don’t call her “Promise” unless you want a fist to your face. She is a biomech aka she is half human and half mechanical and works for the government to support her poor urban family, whom she only gets to visit on weekends. After an accident with some of her brother’s drug dealers, Rota made her whole again. She feels both indebted to them and grateful she can also help out her single mom and older brother.
She has worked undercover for the government for over a year as spy in a school to root out traitors to the country among the students. This work has conflicted with her morals, but what choice does she have? She’s gone too far to go back. When not at school or playing basket ball, she trains for future missions at Rota. The moment she became a biomech was when she became permanent asset for them.
Though her time is short, she savors the precious weekends she has with her family. After her former roommates disappeared, she gained two more in Bryce and Caleb. They are different than her others, and Bryce irritates her, but she enjoys not being alone in her dorm anymore. Despite what Rota tells her she wishes there was a way out of Rota, but she dares not try to leave, because that’s what her roommates did and she’s never seen or heard of them since.
Able is one of the Rota scientist’s favorite specimens. He is grafted with five different kinds of animal DNA, giving him multiple abilities, making him one of the most powerful subsapiens in existence.
Two problems: the price of these abilities is high–he requires a lot of medication to keep himself working–and his mental maturity does not match his physical appearance. Growth hormones made him grow quickly, so though he may look like a sixteen year old, but he is only five. He dreams that one day his masters won’t make him hurt anyone anymore and he’ll have his own kitten.
He grew up isolated from all other graftings in one of Rota’s L.G.R. (Laboratory of Genetic Research) facilities located in the Dome Web. He has been tested on, trained, and tweaked to be the best. Most of his life was spent in a single cell with only his red rubber ball to keep him company.
All five of his senses have been sharpened by his different DNAs. Wings allow him to get anywhere quickly and his chameleon blending abilities allow no one to notice him. His claws, superhuman strength, prehensile tail, and gun built into his metal arm give him superior combat abilities. By manipulation and the use of drugs to keep him passive, the scientists can make him do whatever they want.
Only recently was he assigned to be a bodyguard and companion for Judah Mitchell’s son, Peter Elias. Now he lives in Judah’s mansion and he has his own room and toys. In the day time, he keeps an eye on five year old Peter Elias at his fancy private school and plays with him when he gets home.
But after Peter Elias goes to bed, he sheds his business suit, dons his his combat unitard, and does any under the table tasks Judah needs done. As long as he obeys all he’s told, his Master Judah has promised him a safe future, one that might even include a kitten, but if he doesn’t all of that will be taken away.
There are lots more secondary characters, but these are the most important ones. And I don’t have artwork for them yet. ^ ^’
That’s a bit about my baby series. It’s my favorite I’ve ever written and I love it so much. You can check out an excerpt of the book here. After I edit it, I’m going to be pitching it this year at a conference and possibly querying it too. *crosses fingers*
Are you planning to/have already participated in this link-up? If so, share the link! What’s your work in progress? Do you have a blurb for it? Who are some of your characters?
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