F.I.G. MYSTERY SERIES by Barbara Casey
Series Details:
Book Title: The F.I.G. Mysteries by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17)
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release dates: The Cadence of Gypsies (2011); The Wish Rider (2016); The Clock Flower (2018); The Nightjar's Promise (2020)
Tour dates: May 25 to June 5, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Title: The F.I.G. Mysteries by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17)
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release dates: The Cadence of Gypsies (2011); The Wish Rider (2016); The Clock Flower (2018); The Nightjar's Promise (2020)
Tour dates: May 25 to June 5, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Details:
Book Title: The Cadence of Gypsies (The F.I.G. Mysteries) by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17), 200 pages
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release date: The Cadence of Gypsies (2011)
Tour dates: May 25 to June 5, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Title: The Cadence of Gypsies (The F.I.G. Mysteries) by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17), 200 pages
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release date: The Cadence of Gypsies (2011)
Tour dates: May 25 to June 5, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Description:
Three high-spirited 17
year olds, with intelligent quotients in the genius range, accompany
their teacher and mentor, Carolina Lovel, to Frascati, Italy, a few
weeks before they are to graduate from Wood Rose Orphanage and Academy
for Young Women. Carolina's purpose in planning the trip is to remove
her gifted, creative students from the Wood Rose campus located in
Raleigh, North Carolina, so they can't cause any more problems
("expressions of creativity") for the headmaster, faculty, and other
students – which they do with regularity. Carolina also wants to visit
the Villa Mondragone where the Voynich Manuscript, the most mysterious
document in the world, was first discovered and search how it is related
to a paper written in the same script she received on her 18th birthday
when she was told that she was adopted – a search that will fill in all
of the missing pieces of her past and help each of her students to
discover something meaningful within themselves.
Book Details:
Book Title: The Wish Rider (The F.I.G. Mysteries) by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17), 220 pages
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release date: The Wish Rider (2016)
Tour dates: May 25 to June 5, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Title: The Wish Rider (The F.I.G. Mysteries) by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17), 220 pages
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release date: The Wish Rider (2016)
Tour dates: May 25 to June 5, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Description:
Seventeen-year-old Dara Roux and her two best friends, Mackenzie
Yarborough and Jennifer Torres, the three collectively referred to as
the FIGs (Females of Intellectual Genius) because each has an
intelligence quotient in the genius range, have just returned from
Frascati, Italy. It was there that their much loved teacher and mentor,
Carolina Lovel, discovered that her birth parents were gypsies, and that
she had a connection to the Voynich Manuscript, the most mysterious
document in the world. Now, with graduation from Wood Rose Orphanage and
Academy for Young Women behind them, Dara asks Mackenzie, Jennifer, and
Carolina to help her locate her birth mother when she learns that she
might be living in New York City. All the young women have to work with
are five addresses, and when Mackenzie prepares a grid showing the
location of all five addresses, four of the locations form a square with
the fifth in the middle—which is also Grand Central Terminal. Relying
on Dara’s gift for speaking and understanding foreign languages, the
black and white images that stir musical cadences in Jennifer’s mind,
and Mackenzie’s mathematical calculations that normally provide
numerical solutions and answers to life’s most difficult questions but
now keep showing the number “61”, the determined young women tirelessly
go from one address to another in search of Dara’s mother. Their
determination turns to desperation, however, and they ignore caution and
the dissonant chords Jennifer frantically scribbles on her eight-stave
musical paper as they pursue one final address—the one located in the
middle of Mackenzie’s grid. Encountering a dark hidden society and sub
culture more dangerous and terrifying than they could have imagined, it
is there that Dara learns why she was abandoned as a seven year old in a
candy store all those years ago.
Book Details:
Book Title: The Clock Flower (The F.I.G. Mysteries) by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17), 180 pages
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release date: The Clock Flower (2018)
Tour dates: May 25 to June 5, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Title: The Clock Flower (The F.I.G. Mysteries) by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17), 180 pages
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release date: The Clock Flower (2018)
Tour dates: May 25 to June 5, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Description:
The three FIGs—Females of Intellectual Genius—as they are called,
have graduated from Wood Rose Orphanage and Academy for Young Women
after returning from New York City where Dara learned why her mother
abandoned her all those years ago, and they are now attending
universities where they can further their special talents. This means
they will be separated from each other and from Carolina, their
much-loved mentor and teacher who is “one of them,” for the first time
in their young lives. They vow to try living apart for one semester, in
the so-called real world that doesn’t include the orphanage; but if
things don’t work out, they will come up with another plan—a plan where
they can be together once again. Dara is invited through Yale University
to take part in an exciting archeological project in China. Jennifer,
once again visualizing black and white images and the unusual sounds of
another cadence that seem to be connected to Mackenzie, is engrossed in
creating her next symphony at Juilliard. Mackenzie, because of her
genius at problem-solving, is personally chosen by a US Senator to get
involved in a mysterious, secret research project involving immortality
that is being conducted in a small village in China—not too far from
where Dara is involved with the archeological site. Once there, however,
she finds herself facing a terrifying death from the blood-dripping
teeth of an ancient evil dragon. Her best friends, the FIGs and
Carolina, rely on their own unique genius and special talents to save
her as she discovers the truth of her birth parents.
Book Details:
Book Title: The Nightjar's Promise (Book 4 of The F.I.G. Mysteries) by Barbara Casey
Category: YA Fiction (Ages 13-17), 130 pages
Genre: Mystery, Fantasy
Publisher: Gauthier Publications (Hungry Goat Press)
Release date: April, 2020
Format available for review: print, gifted Kindle, PDF
Will send Print Books to: USA and Canada
Tour dates: May 4 to May 22, 2020
Content Rating: PG. There are some themes that deal with the
Jewish Holocaust and some frightening scenes appropriate for young adult
and adult readers.
Book Description:
Jennifer Torres, one of the three FIGs (Females of Intellectual Genius)
who is a genius in both music and art, is the last to leave the closed
rehearsal for her upcoming performance over Thanksgiving break at
Carnegie Hall when she hears something in the darkened Hall. Recognizing
the tilt of the woman’s head and the slight limp of the man as they
hurry out an exit door, she realizes it is her parents who were
supposedly killed in a terrible car accident when she was 15 years old.
Devastated and feeling betrayed, she sends a text to Carolina and the
other two FIGs—THURGOOD. It is the code word they all agreed to use if
ever one of them got into trouble or something happened that was too
difficult to handle. They would all meet back at Carolina’s bungalow at
Wood Rose Orphanage and Academy for Young Women to figure it out.
As soon as they receive the text, because of their genius, Dara starts
thinking of words in ancient Hebrew, German, and Yiddish, while
Mackenzie’s visions of unique math formulae keep bringing up the date
October 11, 1943. That is the date during World War II when the
Nazis—the Kunstschutz—looted the paintings of targeted wealthy Jewish
families and hid them away under Hitler’s orders. And as Carolina waits
for the FIGs to return to Wood Rose, she hears warnings from Lyuba, her
gypsy mother, to watch for the nightjar, the ancient name for the
whip-poor-will.
As they search for “The Nightjar’s Promise” and the truth surrounding
it, Carolina and the FIGs come face to face with evil that threatens to
destroy not only their genius, but their very lives.
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Add to Goodreads
Coming Soon to Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, and Bookstores Everywhere!
Meet the Author:
Originally from Carrollton, Illinois, author/agent/publisher Barbara
Casey attended the University of North Carolina, N.C. State University,
and N.C. Wesleyan College where she received a BA degree, summa cum
laude, with a double major in English and history. In 1978 she left her
position as Director of Public Relations and Vice President of
Development at North Carolina Wesleyan College to write full time and
develop her own manuscript evaluation and editorial service. In 1995 she
established the Barbara Casey Agency and since that time has
represented authors from the United States, Great Britain, Canada, and
Japan. In 2014, she became a partner with Strategic Media Books, an
independent nonfiction publisher of true crime, where she oversees
acquisitions, day-to-day operations, and book production.
Ms. Casey has written over a dozen award-winning books of fiction and
nonfiction for both young adults and adults. The awards include the
National Association of University Women Literary Award, the Sir Walter
Raleigh Literary Award, the Independent Publisher Book Award, the Dana
Award for Outstanding Novel, the IP Best Book for Regional Fiction,
among others. Two of her nonfiction books have been optioned for major
films, one of which is under contract.
Her award-winning articles, short stories, and poetry for adults have
appeared in both national and international publications including the
North Carolina Christian Advocate Magazine, The New East Magazine, the
Raleigh (N.C.) News and Observer, the Rocky Mount (N.C.) Sunday
Telegram, Dog Fancy, ByLine, The Christian Record, Skirt! Magazine, and
True Story. A thirty-minute television special which Ms. Casey wrote and
coordinated was broadcast on WRAL, Channel 5, in Raleigh, North
Carolina. She also received special recognition for her editorial work
on the English translations of Albanian children’s stories. Her
award-winning science fiction short stories for adults are featured in
The Cosmic Unicorn and CrossTime science fiction anthologies. Ms.
Casey's essays and other works appear in The Chrysalis Reader, the
international literary journal of the Swedenborg Foundation, 221
One-Minute Monologues from Literature (Smith and Kraus Publishers), and A
Cup of Comfort (Adams Media Corporation).
Ms. Casey is a former director of BookFest of the Palm Beaches, Florida,
where she served as guest author and panelist. She has served as judge
for the Pathfinder Literary Awards in Palm Beach and Martin Counties,
Florida, and was the Florida Regional Advisor for the Society of
Children's Book Writers and Illustrators from 1991 through 2003. In 2018
Ms. Casey received the prestigious Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime
Achievement Award and Top Professional Award for her extensive
experience and notable accomplishments in the field of publishing and
other areas. She makes her home on the top of a mountain in northwest
Georgia with her husband and three cats who adopted her, Homer, Reese,
and Earl Gray - Reese’s best friend.
Connect with the author: Website~ Goodreads ~ Facebook
Tour Schedule:
May 25 – KC Beanie Boos Collection – series spotlight
May 26 – Nighttime Reading Center – series spotlight / giveaway
May 26 - Sefina Hawke's Books – series spotlight
May 27 – T's Stuff – series spotlight / author interview / giveaway
May 27 - Book Corner News and Reviews – series spotlight / giveaway
May 28 – Locks, Hooks and Books – series spotlight / guest post / giveaway
May 28 - Library of Clean Reads – series spotlight / giveaway
May 29 – Jazzy Book Reviews – series spotlight / giveaway
May 29 - La libreria di Beppe – series spotlight / giveaway
June 1 – My Reading Journeys – series spotlight / giveaway
June 2 – Bookworm for Kids – series spotlight / author interview / giveaway
June 2 - @momfluenster – series spotlight / giveaway
June 2 - Stephanie Jane – series spotlight / giveaway
June 3 – Splashes of Joy – series spotlight / author interview / giveaway
June 4 – Celticlady's Reviews – series spotlight / giveaway
June 4 - Blooming with Books – series spotlight / giveaway
June 5 – Writer with Wanderlust – series spotlight / guest post / giveaway
June 5 - Books for Books – series spotlight
Interview with Barbara Casey
There are four books in The F.I.G. Mysteries. Did you know in advance what each book would be about?
The Cadence of Gypsies is the first book in the series, and I wrote it as a stand-alone novel. At the time, I wasn’t even thinking about doing a series. It was my publisher who suggested that I turn it into a series after The Cadence of Gypsies was published, and it was then that I decided to focus each book on one of the F.I.G.s (females of intellectual genius) and their search for answers as to why they were placed in an orphanage.
Do you have a favorite F.I.G.?
I think I love them all equally, as though they were my own children. Each girl has so much to deal with, and yet they learn to adapt to living in a world where they are considered different.
How did you come up with the idea of including gypsies in your books?
In The Cadence of Gypsies I write about Carolina Lovel who is hired by Wood Rose Orphanage and Academy for Young Women to mentor Dara, Mackenzie, and Jennifer - the F.I.G.s - and “keep them on a short leash,” as the unsympathetic headmaster explains to her. Carolina has her own mysterious background. She learned that she was adopted on her 18th birthday, and it was then that she received a small wooden box that contained among other things an old photograph and a document or letter of some sort written in an unknown language. This letter resembled the ancient Voynich Manuscript, the most mysterious manuscript in the world. This manuscript actually exists, and in reality, no one has been able to decipher it. My imagination immediately took me to gypsies.
How do you do your research?
For fiction, I use the same methods as I use for my nonfiction books. I research period newspapers, books on the subject, the FBI vault of archived documents, and the Internet. For The Cadence of Gypsies I was able to find out-of-print books on gypsy culture and medicinal practices. The Wish Rider, Book 2, took the three girls and Carolina to a little-known underground area of Grand Central Terminal that actually exists. In Book 3, The Clock Flower, I was able to find research on experimentation that is taking place on the dandelion flower, and in Book 4, The Nightjar’s Promise, I connected Jennifer to the Nazi looting of art that took place during World War II.
Are most of your characters included in all four books of this series?
Yes. Each character is somehow impacted by Dara, Mackenzie, and Jennifer. In spite of the turmoil brought on by the mischief and bad behavior of the F.I.G.s, the people they come in contact with care for them and want them to succeed in life.
Are you planning to write another series?
I would like to. In enjoyed writing this one so much. For now, however, I am working on another nonfiction book for adults.
Thank you so much for your interest in The F.I.G. Mysteries. I have enjoyed visiting with you. I wish you and your bloggers my best. ~Barbara
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