Juliet Merida is a writer from Cleveland, Ohio who now resides in the Portland, Oregon area. She writes cozy YA Fantasy and is excited about her current work-in-progress, Adventures For Hire, which is her first book.
Inspired by tabletop role playing games and influenced by 80s adventure movies, Disney’s TaleSpin, and that one Daring Do episode, Adventures For Hire follows four young people who long to have real adventure but are stuck working at a tourist trap “adventure tours” company which takes clients on pretend adventures like stealing a dragon egg or saving the city from an evil baddie. But one day, a real adventure accidentally finds them.
Juliet has three cats, two kids, and a wife who are pretty okay.
Find Juliet in the Fediverse at @julie@merida.hair
A character exercise while working on Adventures For Hire.
“Gods dammit!” Inga Firestorm exclaimed as one of the strings on her ukulele snapped with a loud “twang!” narrowly missing hitting her in the face. She had been practicing one of her new favorite songs when she got a little too into her solo.
Setting down her instrument she fished around in her bag for a few minutes looking for a replacement string but came up short. How did she manage to run out of strings again? Always at the worst times! She would try to remember to add checking for extra strings to one of her many checklists, but even she knew the odds of using the checklists were incredibly slim.
She flung her ukulele onto her back and gave the strap a tug to snug it up. Over her other shoulder she slung her satchel which was stuffed mostly with notebooks serving various purposes- one for song writing, one for note taking and list making, and one where she kept her super secret Zaon the Destroyer fan fiction. (She definitely shipped Zaon and Skyler but she would never admit it.)
As she made her way to the door she called out, “Mom, I’m heading to the music store! I’ll be back in a bit.” A coarse voice in another room responded with words of affection and a request that she be safe on her outing.
It was a cold day in the Upper City but fortunately living in a neighborhood filled with other music loving goblins meant it was never very far to a music store. The closest establishment, Harry’s Harmonies, just happened to be her favorite.
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An excerpt of the first chapter of my work-in-progress, cozy YA Fantasy novel, Adventures For Hire
Arrows flew past her head in sharp zips, striking the trees behind her as Ryel Layn ran through the forest with her two companions trailing behind her, struggling to keep up. The young elf woman darted behind a particularly large tree, short of breath. After a few seconds the two Dwarves finally caught up and joined her. The three of them exchanged nervous, but excited glances.
“We know you’re back there. Give us the artifact,” called a small voice from one of the three bandits who now had them trapped. “We’ve got you cornered so don’t make this harder than it needs to be,” called a slightly bigger voice.
The adventuring trio had just finished escaping ancient ruins after collecting a long-lost magical artifact held deep within. They braved traps, puzzles, and trials of strength before finally getting their hands on the artifact which would save the City of Crex from its poisoned water supply. After a narrow escape from a shrinking room that dared to crush the life out of them they found themselves in the forest near a well-worn path.
With a collective sigh of relief they set on their way back toward the city, their mission to recover the artifact and bring it back to headquarters was nearly complete. But then the bandits tracked them down. They wanted the artifact for themselves.
“I don’t know how they knew we were here, but we’re in trouble,” Ryel told her party mates. “The moment we come out from behind this tree we’re going to be pincushions. We’ve got to get the artifact back to headquarters. It’s the only way to save the city.”
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