QSFer Alexa Lee has a new queer YA fantasy out (bi, demi, poly), Inescapable Escapism book 1: The Worlds Behind Her Eyelids.
“Tell me, kid… How do you feel about desecrating a graveyard?”
Suffocated by her narcissistic mother’s constant complaints, Grace retreats into the refuge of her mind. Her imagination becomes her only source of escape, and there she meets a grizzly treasure hunter, Mitch, with a history of rescuing strays. He takes Grace under his wing, allowing her to accompany him on his search for a long-lost artefact.
Split between her mundane reality and the exhilarating new world she has created, Grace leads an exciting double life. In one, she is a normal teenager, but in the other, she travels with Mitch, slowly discovering more about the shadowy world he is involved in and those hunting him down.
The lines between reality and imagination blur as Grace continues to delve into her daydreams whenever reality is too hard to deal with, but soon, she finds other worlds. However, they are not as welcoming as she expected, and escape may not be quite so simple…
Warnings: Mentions of child neglect, maladaptive daydreaming and mental health
Get It At Amazon | Universal Buy Link
Excerpt
Chapter One
“Your father is such a moron.”
The words should have been jarring but they meant nothing to me anymore. Logically, I knew that they should have been hard to hear, but my mom had said them so many times that they’d lost all impact.
She sat on the end of my bed and threw her long blonde hair back from her face. My bedroom door was open, he could have easily heard, but I knew she didn’t care. It was probably a conscious decision. She wanted him to hear.
“He just never listens to anything I say,” she continued angrily, not seeming to care that I wasn’t listening either.
I’d learnt a lot from her tirades over the years. When I was younger, I’d tried to listen more actively, to suggest things that might help, but I’d learnt that it was pointless. She didn’t want solutions or for things to get better, she just wanted to complain about him.
They’d been together for twenty years, married after two years, had me just under two years after that, and from what I could gather, they’d never had a good relationship. Sometimes, she’d tell stories of when they first got together, how incompetent and clueless he’d been. She’d apparently been chased by so many men, all of whom were better than my dad, but she’d settled for him.
I didn’t believe her stories though. She liked to exaggerate things. She always wanted her life to sound grander and more interesting than it really was. I got that, to a certain extent. I didn’t really like my life either.
It was fine. I couldn’t really complain. I went to a good school, didn’t do too badly, was an only kid, had a pretty nice room to myself, and a couple of friends. It was fine, unless I thought about it too hard, and then it got a little less fine. I barely slept and was constantly kept awake by the stink of cigarette smoke and the almost deafening sound of the television that came from downstairs.
They always had it like that. That way they didn’t need to talk to each other. They spent every evening watching countless shows and movies, basically ignoring the other person. It was for the best. Whenever they talked, they just argued and then my mom would come up to complain about him.
She didn’t care what time it was or if I was pretending to sleep. She’d slam the door open and drop down on the end of my bed, where she was now, sometimes trailing cigarette ash with her.
I’d once made the mistake of asking her not to smoke in my room because it made me cough and her reaction had been… well. Exactly as expected. She’d accused me of trying to kick her out of her own house. It wasn’t worth the fight.
There was a lull in her conversation as she paused to draw a breath.
“Mmm,” I said noncommittally, knowing that it was all I needed to say to keep her happy.
I sucked in a deep breath, being careful not to let it out too heavily in case she mistook it for a sigh again. That had almost been worse than when I had asked her not to smoke; she’d accused me of being bored of her. Which I was, but then she’d started ranting about how she’d given up her life to raise me, and if it weren’t for me and my father, she’d be running a very successful business by now or modelling or doing some other fantastical thing.
I leaned my head back against my headboard and stared longing at the wall of books. My dad never hesitated to buy me a book. I didn’t like asking them for anything but he always went out of his way to get me some. I don’t know if it was guilt or if he recognised my need to escape.
I yearned to be reading one of those books as Mom continued, her face turning redder and her voice getting louder, but instead, I was stuck staring around my room. Dark blue carpets with a couple of burn holes near the end of my bed where mom sat lined the floor, complemented by the light cream walls. A huge window lay at the end of the room overlooking our garden. I’d run out there sometimes when my parents were fighting, slip through the fence at the back, and venture into the wilderness beyond.
A field stretched out behind the house but beyond that was a luscious forest. Moss lined the ground and a thick canopy protected me from the light above. It felt almost like slipping into another world. One where it was quiet and I was safe.
“You know?” my mom demanded, looking at me expectantly.
“Yeah,” I agreed flatly, not bothering or needing to inject any feeling into my voice.
It didn’t matter, she wasn’t listening.
“Exactly! And yet, he never learns!” she continued, but I’d already stopped listening.
My eyes fell on my desk, which was piled high with half-complete homework. I really needed to get it done tonight. I’d fallen behind weeks ago and just didn’t have the motivation to do anything about it. I needed to get my parents to sign my planner, acknowledging that they were aware that I wasn’t doing my homework and that they would help me with it, but I couldn’t do that now. Mom would be too furious. I’d wait for the morning when her hangover had set in. She wouldn’t be bothered to read the note and just sign it.
I briefly debated telling her I had homework to do and asking her to leave so that I could work on it but there was no point. She wouldn’t care.
Author Bio
Alexa Lee began writing during the pandemic, without really knowing what she was doing, but she quickly got hooked. Now, she writes almost constantly. Author of Thick as Thieves, Inescapable Escapism, a couple more novels and countless work in progresses, her books are generally fantasy novels, aimed at young adults, but anyone can read them.
At first, Alexa started by posting her writing online on the popular webnovel platform, Royal Road, where some of her books remain, but she was soon picked up by a publisher, Aethon Books, for her first series and Riverfolk Publishing and Tantor Media for her second series.
Now, she also works as a script writer for the Webtoon Original series, Re: Monarch, with more coming soon…
| Author Website | https://www.alexalee.co.uk |
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| Author Facebook | https://www.facebook.com/alexaleeauthor |