Sea Glass »

Maria V. Snyder changed from being a meteorologist to a novelist in 1995, when she began writing to keep her sanity while raising two children. Since then, she has published numerous freelance articles in magazines and newspapers, and teaches fiction-writing classes at the local college and area libraries. The classes give her the wonderful opportunity to encourage fellow writers, and to keep improving her craft.

Born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Maria always had a fascination with big storms. Dreaming of chasing tornados, Maria earned a bachelors of science degree in meteorology at Penn State University. But she discovered, much to her chagrin, that forecasting the weather wasn't one of her skills. In order to chase tornados you had to predict where they might form. Creating fantasy worlds where she has complete control of the weather was more agreeable to her.

Maria's research on food-tasting methods with an expert chocolate taster, her husband, turned out to be a delicious bonus while writing Poison Study.

Maria has a brown belt in Isshinryu Karate, and enjoys playing volleyball and the cello. Traveling in general and via cruise ship in particular are her biggest distractions from writing. Maria has traveled to Belize, Canada, China, Costa Rica, Europe, Mexico, the Caribbean and through the Panama Canal.

Maria lives with her husband, son, daughter and yellow lab, Hazelnut, in Pennsylvania where she is at work on more LUNA novels. She is also pursuing a master's degree in writing popular fiction from Seton Hill University.

Readers are welcome to contact Maria at the following email address:maria@mariavsnyder.com.

Student glass magician Opal Cowan's newfound ability to steal a magician's powers makes her too powerful. Ordered to house arrest by the Council, Opal dares defy them, traveling to the Moon Clan's lands in search of Ulrick, the man she thinks she loves. Thinks because she is sure another man—now her prisoner—has switched souls with Ulrick.

In hostile territory, without proof or allies, Opal isn't sure whom to trust. She can't forget Kade, the handsome Stormdancer who doesn't want to let her get close. And now everyone is after Opal's special powers for their own deadly gain….

Publishers Weekly

The second installment in Snyder's new Glass fantasy trilogy follows the trite pattern she established in the previous: heroine Opal Cowan struggles to come of age as a glassmaking magician in the two-dimensional environs of Ixia, Sitia, and the Stormdancers' cliffs over the Sunset Ocean. All the while, she endures quest, capture, discomfort and torture, escape-and then does it all over again...and again. Snyder tries to maintain suspense by placing Opal and her indecisive adolescent hormones between hunky Stormdancer Kade and two other boys of interest, Ulrick and Devlen. Snyder's colloquial style jars poorly against her quasi-medieval setting. Ultimately, the plot remains too predictably convoluted to be convincing, and the characters too conventional to be appealing.
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