Black Moon Rising

In this fantasy romance, magical realism series, a suicidal young girl transforms into the savior of an ancient race.

In Telos, the city buried beneath Mount Shastina, the Remnant Lemurians' DNA strain is at its end. On the earth's surface, world apocalypse looms. A surface-equal, a virgin with virtuous heart and pure blood must be found to stave off extinction of the Lemurian race before life on earth is obliterated. To this end, the Lemurians send their equal, Aaron Delmon, topside to secure a bride.

Rarely does one escape their destiny, or so they say. Julissa Grant just never dreamed hers would include becoming the Virgin Mother to the leader of the New World, producer of pluripotent cells, a manipulator of life-force energy, or an ignor-inferus – one with Lemurian physical traits but lacking the skills and wisdom of a true Lemurian. After all, she's just a sixteen-year-old Midwestern Catholic-raised girl who wanted nothing more than to find renewed hope after death and despondency crushed her idyllic perception of the world.

After the deaths of her father and a dear friend, Julissa succumbs to disillusionment when her mother uproots and moves her cross-country. Throwing caution to the wind, Julissa skips class one day to go boy-hunting. Here she meets the high school's outcast, Aaron Delmon. She becomes infatuated with the golden-haired, blue-eyed boy who has mastered the Lemurian art of transferring and manipulating life-force energy and who's training to be a Mnemonist – one who remembers all. As she's drawn into Aaron's world, Julissa is introduced to a surreal Utopian way of life, one which is ruled by the Law of One - that all things are connected.

As their relationship evolves, Julissa uses Aaron as a conduit to explore the Lemurian world into which she has fallen. When Aaron is suspected of murdering a classmate, relationships crumble. Loyalties are fractured. Julissa's tenuous world spirals down. When Julissa finds out she'll be moving back home to Minnesota, she panics and convinces Aaron to allow her to accompany him to the Sacred Rock on Mount Shasta. It's here where Julissa is forced to release her core-life to Aaron and dies. Aaron, in turn, carries Julissa into Telos and donates his bone marrow, restoring her with pure Lemurian blood, thus making her a viable candidate for the surface equal.

Upon returning from Mount Shasta, Julissa and Aaron are forced to part ways, he returning below to Telos to heal, she remaining topside. Depressed and suicidal, Julissa searches for answers and finds them in a gang known as the Sons and Daughters of Belial, genetic Lemurians turned Atlanteans, ruled by the goddess, Nani Doris. Lacking Aaron's guidance on how to manipulate and control her life-force energy while discovering she's been embodied with the Holy Grail for healing, Julissa turns to the materialistic, power-hungry world of the Atlanteans to salve her loss and to come to terms with her notoriety. When Julissa discovers she's being targeted for defilement or death by Nani Doris, she reassesses her choice and returns home to her mother, only to find her life obliterated.

Although considered ignorant and inferior (ignor-inferus) and emotionally incapable of controlling life-force energy, Julissa is the Lemurians' best option for survival. The Lemurians want Julissa to come to Telos to marry Aaron and produce the offspring HeIs, who will carry on the Lemurian DNA and rule the New World. Little of her surface life appeals to Julissa, as many of those she's loved have died. Julissa now faces a choice: remain topside to be obliterated with the rest of humanity in the coming apocalypse or escape to Telos to fulfil her new destiny as the savior of the Lemurian race.