THE POTION DIARIES

PHILTRE, a teen novel, is set in a second world with technology like our own, but with one key difference: magic. It’s very fast-paced, and the fact it’s set in a modern fantasy world makes it feel very different from what else is out there in the market, but very appealing.

Samantha Kemi is the granddaughter of one of the most prominent alchemists in Nova. Except no one needs alchemists anymore. Not now that most potions are manufactured in labs out of synthetic materials and mass-produced by huge corporations like ZoroAster Corp. Still, she works in her family’s shop to keep the business alive, and sells illicit study aids to her fellow students to make enough money to buy her way out of her mundane existence. Sam harbours a secret dream of going to university to study potions, and then joining ZoroAster Corp as one of their mixers. It’s the only career path she can foresee for herself. She’s ordinary – she has absolutely no magical talent – but her ability to sense how to put together a potion is second to none.

When Nova’s princess is poisoned by a faulty love potion, representatives from prominent alchemists (like Sam, for the Kemis) and synth corporations are tasked with finding a cure. There’s one main condition: that the potion be made entirely without synthetic material. This is the chance of a lifetime, and Sam is sent across the globe in the hunt for fresh ingredients.

Through setbacks and hurdles, she hunts down the ingredients: pearl from a mermaid, pink jasmine, eluvian ivy, hair from an abominable, unicorn tail, facing incredible dangers along the way. It seems that someone is determined to make sure the Kemi family don’t complete the hunt, and soon Sam discovers that the stakes are higher than she’d ever thought possible and even include her life.

Amy Alward works in children’s publishing and has written both fiction and non-fiction previously. PHILTRE is a new direction for her.