By
Bianca Swan (Guest Blogger)
If
your ultrasound shows two little bundles of joys, then you are
carrying twins. Two names to think of. Two strollers or one-double.
One each arm. Two bottles or two tits. Two cribs, two college
tuitions. Oh, but I digress. Here goes: If offspring are identical,
they are monozygotic, which means they develop from one zygote that
splits and forms two embryos. If they are not identical, they are
dizygotic ('fraternal'), meaning that each embryo develops from
a separate egg and each egg is fertilized by different sperm cell.
At
any rate, the rate of monozygotic twins
remains at about 1 in 333 across the globe. Chances are slim on those
identical babies keeping you up all night.
That’s
about as technical as I want to get or you want me to get, I suspect.
I will add this, which I found interesting:
Then,
I came to a chimera. In Greek mythology, a chimera is a
fire-breathing female monster with a lion's head, a goat's body, and
a serpent's tail. Wikipedia, in their “twins” article, said it
“is an ordinary person or animal except that some of their parts
actually came from their twin or from the mother. A chimera may arise
either from monozygotic twin fetuses (where it would be impossible to
detect), or from dizygotic fetuses, which can be identified by
chromosomal comparisons from various parts of the body. The number of
cells derived from each fetus can vary from one part of the body to
another, and often leads to characteristic mosaicism skin
coloration in human chimeras. A chimera may be intersex,
composed of cells from a male twin and a female twin. In one case DNA
tests determined
that a woman, mystifyingly, was not the mother of two of her three
children; she was found to be a chimera, and the two children were
conceived from eggs derived from cells of their mother's twin.”
If
you want to learn more about twins, my reference is Wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin
My
twins are an impossibility, and therein lies the plot. The
characters’ motivation is another layer in the story. The fantasy
setting? When I thought of Alastair Keep, I pictured St. Michael’s
Mount off the coast of England. The twins started talking to me early
one morning, after a night on South Beach, and the original draft was
written in purple pen on a legal pad.
Her
Brother’s Wife (named by the publisher—my title was Gemini
Rising) is a dark psychological novel dealing with a controversial
subject in a fantasy setting, much like Cersei and Jamie in “Game
of Throne”.
Blurb
From
birth, Alain and Alina Alastair are a scientific phenomenon—identical
male/female twins—a biological impossibility. Wishing to avoid
notoriety, Lord and Lady Alastair whisk their miracle children to
their island home isolated by a two-hour ferry journey from the
mainland of England. It is at Alastair Keep that their destiny
unfolds to the constant percussion of a restless sea.
As
a young man, Alain craves escape from the seclusion while Alina more
willingly follows her heart. Unaware, they struggle with a genetic
proclivity, the Gemini Factor, that will lead them down the farther,
forbidden paths.
The
secrets at Alastair Keep will undermine the foundations of their
world and indeed threaten their very lives.
Excerpt
Alain
tucked the in-flight magazine into the seat pocket and gazed out the
window. The distance from one life to another vanished with the
clouds fleeing beneath silver wings. The new 777-200 transported him
from a sunlit future to a misty past…from a black-haired beauty to
a fair-haired princess. Sunlight broke through cloud striking steel,
blinding him for an instant.
Someone
was going to get hurt.
Already
he hurt—a low throbbing like a toothache. If he returned to
Portugal, Alina would be devastated. His father would disown him. If
he picked up his discarded heritage, a part of him would die and
Maritza would grieve. For a time. He wasn’t vain enough to
think she’d pine for him forever`.
The
choice lay in his hands.
Damn,
life got complicated when he tried to declare independence from The
Keep. He shifted his long legs cramped beneath the airline seat. He
preferred not to think, but fragments of memory plagued the corners
of his eyes.
A
vivid picture of Alina supplanted images of recent days drenched
white-hot by a Portuguese sun. His twin’s presence was more
corporeal than the woman sitting to his left. Welcome or not, Alina
was there inside him, the mere thought of her a compulsion. He
sensed her anticipation mounting as the miles melted. Expectation
tingled over him. In self defense, he grasped at a memory of riding
the splendid Lusitano stallions, their beauty and majesty a temporary
refuge. Like Maritza. As he pictured his lover framed in an
arbor of roses, his heart dived. Grief mingled inseparably with the
mounting excitement.
His
seat mate muttered something. He smiled vaguely at the tiny movie
screen where imaginary figures acted out their roles. The film would
end happily; every desire fulfilled. He hated the silver screen
people. Things never turned out right—except in the movies.
The
roar of jet engines and the spattering of conversation became a
distant echo. Alina was journeying. When his sister took flight,
despite the distance, she’d lead him down the path her imagination
chose. Alina had always been the leader. Or is that a cop out to
ease my own guilt? He laid his head back on the seat and closed
his eyes. Why fight the inevitable?
The
rumble of the sea surrounded him. July sunshine warmed his face. The
light of home was different from any other place, diffused, like
sunlight filtered through a special camera lens. He stood on the top
tier of the formal garden, looking down on another sweeping
flagstone terrace. A brisk waterfall sprang from an aperture in rock
to feed the swan pond. Even in summer the water rippled clear, green,
cool.
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About
Bianca
Bianca
lives in deep in Dixie with her characters and other friends visit.
She has two children of whom she is extremely proud. She loves
horses, sports cars, travel, theater, symphony and a very few TV
programs, including Lucifer. News on the sports car front: This
spring she handed in her Peter Pan shoes, trading a hot racy car for
an SUV. She still believes in the power of love—and the power of
lust—and enjoys delving into the soul of both the l-words, bringing
to life hot men and the hot women who love them.
Website:
http://www.BiancaSwan.com
LADIES
AND GENTS, LEAVE A COMMENT WITH
YOUR EMAIL!
BIANCA IS GIVING AWAY A $10 GIFT CARD TO BUY SOMETHING FOR YOUR
TWINS.
4 comments:
Thanks to one of you lovely readers, I found that my website is down. If you want to find out more about my books, please visit my blog at https://biancaswanblog.wordpress.com/ Sorry peeps!
Hello, Bianca!
Welcome to Beyond Romance. I adore your author photo! The book sounds very intriguing.
I've encountered a couple of chimeric twin plotlines before, and was always intrigued! Will keep an eye out for this one...
--Trix, vitajex(at)aol(Dot)com
Thanks for stopping by Vita!
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