About the Book
Book: Sky of Seven Colors
Author: Rachelle Nelson
Genre: YA Fantasy
Release Date: August 8, 2023
In a strange part of the forest, the divide between worlds grows thin.
After the accident, Meg would do anything to wake her best friend from his deadly coma. At least, that’s what she whispered into the woodland shadows. She never imagined her wish would trap her in a gray other-earth, void of any color.
Meg’s vibrant humanity is a priceless artifact in the gray kingdom, coveted by the royal court. All she wants to do is find a way back home. Until she discovers the other-earth contains healing powers that can save her friend. But only if Meg becomes what the gray people need—a human bride for Kalmus, the powerful king of the capital city.
With her heart torn between earths, Meg’s choices may cost more than she knows.
Click here to get your copy!
About the Author
Rachelle Nelson grew up reading fantasy novels and getting her clothes muddy in the pine forests of Idaho. These days, she still loves hiking through mountains and libraries, though she is a bit less fond of mud. She doesn’t write true stories, but she writes about truth. When Rachelle is not reading and writing, she sings in a band with her talented husband, who makes her happier than should be legal. If you like adventures, good food, and honest conversations, you are her favorite kind of person.
Interview with Rachelle
Q: What was the inspiration behind this novel?
Rachelle: Growing up, thick tomes of Grimm's, Anderson's, and Arabian Nights always sat on my nightstand. Then, around the time I turned thirteen, my love of YA fantasy began and somehow never ended.
Sky of Seven Colors was inspired by all my daydreams of fairytales. There are many stories of magical creatures entering our earth. What if a human was considered a magical creature in another earth? I wrote about that place, and a human who travels there.
I have also been a youth mentor for more than a decade, and I’m often heartbroken by destructive messages in popular young adult novels.
Like the message that love is an uncontrollable force, excusing all toxic behavior. We see it in romanticized love triangles. The characters choose to explore feelings and desires over care and concern for everyone involved.
So I wanted to write about the difference between desire and love. Real love. The kind that puts others first. The kind that is hard.
In my story, Meg is transported from our world into a colorless other-earth, where her humanity is a priceless artifact. She is desired. But is she loved? And the other-earth contains healing powers that could save Meg’s dying best friend. She may never see him again if she never returns home. What is she willing to sacrifice for him to be healed?
Q: How long did it take you to write this novel?
Rachelle: Sky of Seven Colors is the first thing I ever wrote. I know, I know, you’re not supposed to publish your first book, but I fell deeply in love with my gray earth and I couldn’t give up on it. I wrote the first draft in three months, then spent almost two years learning about story-craft and revising my work.
My next book should go much faster. I’m anticipating a book per year, with breaks for pitching and marketing.
Q: What was the most surprising thing you discovered while researching and writing this novel?
Rachelle: I did a deep dive into color science. I wanted to make sure my magic system worked within the laws of reality.
Here’s a little bit of what I discovered. Color doesn’t come from the surface we see it on. Color is in the light shining on that surface. Certain molecular structures reflect different colors from the light. Prisms refract the full rainbow.
So, in the gray other-earth, there must be color in the light. But nothing in that earth has the ability to reflect or refract that color, except for things from our earth, like Meg.
Meg’s color contains certain properties that are priceless to the gray people. She allows them to access a power in their own light that they would otherwise be oblivious to.
Of course, none of the science is discussed in the book. But it had to make sense to me so I could write the story.
Q: Do any of the novel’s characters hold a special place in your heart?
Rachelle: I don’t want to spoil anything for you, so I won’t give any names. There is a character in Sky of Seven Colors who is a combination of all the nerdy guys I have known and loved. He talks too much, he chews with his mouth open, and he has a know-it-all answer for everything. (The know-it-all part is a bit from me as well, unfortunately.)
And he has a beautifully heroic story arc.
I didn’t mean for him to be a hero. He was meant to be a comedic source of information. But he became important to me, and incredibly important to Meg as the story developed.
I think that’s how relationships work in life too. You can’t always tell which people will end up being dear to you. It’s often the ones you least expect, especially the annoying ones.
Q: Do you have a favorite quote from this novel?
Rachelle: A friend recently sent me this quote, and I had forgotten about it, but I needed to hear it.
"The greatest among us are not the most gifted. They are the ones who listen to their purpose, no matter how small.”
I also am partial to my first couple of lines.
“On my seventeenth birthday, I hiked into a forest. It was Andrew’s idea. The hike, not the disappearance.”
Q: What do you hope readers take away from this novel?
Rachelle: I want to give them courage to face the hard things in their lives. And I want them to know God can work anything for good. Even our own mistakes.
More from Rachelle
Sky of Seven Colors is a story, in part, about beauty. I wrote it for my younger self, and for all the women I love.
When I was twelve years old, the girls in my neighborhood frequently weighed themselves and ended up forming an “under-100-club”. I have no idea why the arbitrary measurement of one hundred pounds was chosen, but I do know I was the first to outgrow the standard. A fact that was made known to the neighborhood boys during a driveway basketball game.
A chant began. “One hundred, one hundred.” And I didn’t play basketball again for the rest of the summer.
At the time, I didn’t know I would soon grow to my full height of 5’9” and would always be “bigger” than the other girls. I was convinced I could never be beautiful if I was the biggest, and I desperately wanted to be beautiful. You will probably think I was vain if I tell you I prayed every night before bed that God would make me prettier.
Now, as a woman well into her thirties, I am much more comfortable with the body God gave me. I have been a youth mentor for over a decade, and while getting to know some amazing teens, I have come to appreciate that every girl wants to be beautiful.
And they are.
I’m not just saying that in the “everyone is pretty in their own way” sense. I mean it. It’s an indisputable truth.
Femininity is beautiful.
Youth in and of itself is beautiful.
And powerful. You don’t have to look far in the world to see that these things are desired, commodified, admired, sometimes cherished, and more often exploited. And every girl possesses them.
I have watched as generations of girls desperately long to be something they already are. They diet and compare and shop for anything to help them look their best. In our youth, we blindly walk out the perils and the gifts of beauty.
In my debut young adult fantasy novel, Meg travels to a colorless other-earth where she is the only human in a royal city of strange, gray people. The elites of society prize Meg’s color for its rare traits, and seek to control it, even pressing her into an ancient, binding agreement with their king.
Her color is intrinsic, like all of our bodies, not something she chose. And it is what everyone sees when they look at her. The color puts her in danger, and it is a gift she carries. But she must decide who she will be in spite of that gift, and also because of it.
Just like all girls must choose to respond to a world that sees them for their bodies.
The Bible has something profound to say about the connection between our outer and inner selves in this verse from 1st Peter:
“Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes. Rather, it should be that of your inner self….”
Meg is a very flawed character and doesn’t make all the right choices along the way. (I don’t know many people in life who fully have, even if we’re trying.) But she does come to understand that being desired and being loved are two different things, a truth I want every girl in my life to grasp deeply. And if Meg’s identity comes from within, she will have to choose the path of loving others, even when it seems impossible.
Especially then.
Blog Stops
Becca Hope: Book Obsessed, August 17
Debbie’s Dusty Deliberations, August 18
Texas Book-aholic, August 19
Through the Fire Blogs, August 20 (Author Interview)
Christina’s Corner, August 20
Locks, Hooks and Books, August 21
Tell Tale Book Reviews, August 22
Because I said so — and other adventures in Parenting, August 23
The Book Club Network, August 24
Truth and Grace Homeschool Academy, August 25
Blogging With Carol, August 26
Labor Not in Vain, August 27
Simple Harvest Reads, August 28 (Guest Review from Mindy Houng)
Beauty in the Binding, August 29 (Author Interview)
Raining Butterfly Kisses, August 29
Of Blades and Thorns, August 30
Giveaway
To celebrate her tour, Rachelle is giving away the grand prize package of a hardback copy of Sky of Seven Colors, a $50 Amazon gift card, a signed bookplate, a set of 3 bookish themed waterproof stickers, and a bookmark with exclusive Sky of Seven Colors character art!!
Be sure to comment on the blog stops for nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter.
Link for giveaway: https://promosimple.com/ps/2716b/sky-of-seven-colors-celebration-tour-giveaway
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