WinterDream by Chantal Gadoury - Audio Book Tour + Giveaway
Author: Chantal Gadoury
Narrator: Anne Marie Lewis
Length: 10 hours 22 minutes
Publisher: The Parliament House
Released: Dec. 31, 2019
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
This Christmas Eve, no creature was stirring, except, maybe, a mouse. At long last, can true love break the Nutcracker’s curse?For Clara Stahlbaum, this Christmas means the end of her youth. A daughter of the aristocracy, Clara is expected to give up her dreams of adventures and the extraordinary for more normal days as the wife of a cruel viscount.But when magical Uncle Drosselmeyer returns with his wondrous, dancing contraptions and one special gift for Clara, she is beckoned to the land of Winter Dream, where she is thrust into the greatest adventure of her wildest dreams.But will she be able to break the Nutcracker's curse? Uncle Drosselmeyer’s apprentice Anton is handsome as he is mysterious. But what is it about him Clara finds so alluring?Winter Dream is a phenomenal retelling of The Nutcracker from the eyes of Clara Stahlbaum with all the magic of the Holiday season. If you loved S. Jae-Jones’ Wintersong, you’ll fall in love with this stunning tale of love, war, redemption, and Christmas magic. Listen to it now!
Amazon Bestselling Author, Chantal Gadoury, is a 2011 graduate from Susquehanna University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Creative Writing. Since graduation, she has published The Songs in Our Hearts, and The Songs We Remember, with 48Fourteen Publishing. Allerleirauh, Between the Sea and Stars, Blinding Night and WinterDream with the Parliament House Press. Chantal first started writing stories at the age of seven and continues with that love of writing today. For Chantal, writing novels has become a lifelong dream come true! When she’s not typing away at her next project, she enjoys painting, drinking lots of Iced Coffee, and watching Disney Classics. Chantal lives in Muncy, Pennsylvania with her Mom, sister and furry-‘brother’ Taran.
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Singer and actor Anne Marie Lewis has enjoyed a richly varied and long career in the performing arts. She has performed across the globe from Carnegie Hall to Boise to Little Rock to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula as well as in Canada, England and Scotland. Chicago area credits: My Fair Lady, Peter Pan, Into the Woods (Music Theater Works); 1776 (Porchlight Music Theater); Midnight Cowboy (Lifeline Theatre); Northanger Abbey, The Skin of Our Teeth (Remy Bumppo); Love, Loss and What I Wore (Oil Lamp Theater); bare (RefugeTheatre Project); Graveyard of Empires (16th Street Theater); Jake’s Women (Spartan Theatre); The Scullery Maid (Idle Muse Theatre); Moon Over Buffalo (Jedlicka Performing Arts Center); The Diary of Anne Frank (Metropolis Performing Arts Center); The Merry Wives of Windsor (Fury Theatre); Fancy Nancy, Elephant and Piggie (Northbrook Theater); Little Red Riding Hood, Camp Wonderland (Theatre at the Center), Don Giovanni, Shining Brow (Chicago Opera Theatre); Pride and Prejudice, The Sound of Music, Hansel and Gretel, Persuasion, Cosi fan tutte (Chamber Opera Chicago); Gianni Schicchi (DuPage Opera); La boheme, Die Fledermaus, Don Pasquale, Don Giovanni, Carmen (Opera Studio Highland Park). Regional credits: Die Fledermaus, Le nozze di Figaro (Pine Mountain Music Festival), Little Women (Lyric Opera Cleveland), La boheme (Quad Cities Opera, Arkansas Symphony, Battle Creek Symphony); Mozart Requiem, Schubert Mass in G (Carnegie Hall). International credits: Persuasion (Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Camden Fringe Festival, Buxton Fringe Festival, Victoria, BC). Anne Marie, a Pittsburgh native, is a proud graduate of the University of Notre Dame and Northwestern University. She maintains a private voice studio and has recently entered the wonderful world of audiobook narration and production, with fifteen titles to her credit.
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Before I write, I honestly always cast my characters just so that I can see them in my head more vividly, and so I can describe them better to readers! So, taking the cast that I originally created at the very beginning of my writing process, this is who’d cast for a film of “WinterDream.”
Clara: Hailee Steinfeld
The Nutcracker: Aaron Taylor-Johnson
Lady Irina: Charlize Theron
Uncle Drosselmeyer: Hugh Bigney
The Mouse King: Himself
Yakov: David Oakes
Music is such an important piece of my writing. I’ve always been the sort of person who thrives off of the music they listen to, in any given situation. Road Trip? I have a playlist for that. A love letter? You betcha, I have a CD Mix I want you to listen to. Writing a novel, let me share with you my spotify playlist I’ve specifically designed for it!
And that goes with all of my novels, ranging from “Blinding Night,” [A Hades and Persephone Retelling] to “The Songs in Our Hearts,” [A Contemporary High School Romance.] “WinterDream” was no exception.
Take a listen to my “WinterDream” Playlist that I listened to as I wrote. This playlist is mostly all classical/score music - as I avoid listening to music with words when writing. When I write, scenes almost unfold in my mind like a movie; so added dialogue can at times, kill the situation.
Highlights:
I think of this almost like it’s “Clara’s song.” This is your introduction to who Clara is instrumentally.
Miniature Overture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us6YGiWbsbw
Of course, the traditional opening to “The Nutcracker.”
The party at the Stahlbaum’s House
Selbourne Wood: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TFLDc8yxSg
This always reminded me of the time of the Nutcracker and Clara wandering in the wintry woods.
The Dance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hY7GQydpjrE
The Ballroom scene when Clara and the Nutcracker dance together - however brief.
Pas de Deux: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AI7rod5ue5E
Again - the Ballroom scene, but with the music that truly inspired WinterDream
This takes a different tone to the novel - when some unfortunate things happen to a few of our characters!
And the battle for WinterDream begins!
Dance of the Knights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBsKplb2E6Q
The Nutcracker and the Mouse King are fighting each other at the end - and who will win?
Was it all a Dream?
I also have a playlist of more “Various Artists” that seemed to fit in with what “WinterDream” was to me. Take a listen! https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0M4SwfHaWMTnc4Ew00ifCa?si=2hvsxo-8QN-UtylC6yTMpQ
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