Tolcser

Jurassic Park meets Once There Was in this page-turning middle grade fantasy adventure set at a nature preserve for magical beasts, where two girls find themselves on a wilderness expedition gone disastrously wrong.

Hattie Swift is a maid-in-training at Majestica, a resort and nature preserve where visitors come face-to-face with rare magical flora and fauna. She’s thrilled to be invited along on the park’s famous wilderness train excursion for the first time, but there’s a catch: She has to accompany Evelyn Ridgewell, the hotel owner’s haughty niece, who wants nothing to do with her.

Soon after embarking, Evelyn overhears a man who aims to hunt the park’s creatures for sport, and Hattie meets Jacob Threadborne, an apprentice magician sent by a foreign government on a top-secret mission. Then the magical fences keeping guests safe stop working, and the train breaks down in the most treacherous part of the jungle. Faced with poachers, man-eating trees, and a dragon on the loose, Hattie, Evelyn, and Jacob must stick together to figure out what’s gone wrong at Majestica . . . that is, if they want to make it out alive.

Features a richly illustrated map of the expansive nature preserve, as well as a bestiary with all the magical--and dangerous--creatures at Majestica.

Sarah Tolcser is the author of the two fantasy novels for teens, Song of the Current and Whisper of the Tide. She lives and writes in a 100-year-old house in New Orleans, and enjoys video games, NBA basketball, and books about girls who blow stuff up. Visit her online at sarahtolcser.com and follow her on Twitter @SarahTolcser.