Fighting to survive in a world where loyalty is rare, resolve is tested, and hope is dangerous.
“There was a world out there full of wonder, a violence of colours. Yet those in charge lived with their eyes purely on the value of its belly.”
Ruthless ruling corporations wage holy war in pursuit of the Colour—a mysterious mineral that fuels machines and floats continents. To the brutal Trident Extraction Corporation, it's divine. To the monstrous Alchemy Mining Company, it represents limitless power.
When the Extraction Wars demand more, they descend upon the quiet town of Amberley, where the Greyshun family is torn apart and cast into chaos. Theodore, a blacksmith, is conscripted and, in the fires of battle, uses and adapts his skills to change the course of the war. Meredith, his wife, is sent into forced labour at a water collection camp, where she draws the attention of the administration and uses her cunning to plant the seeds of resistance. Freddie, their daughter, escapes capture and finds herself adrift among the orphans of war, where she must decide where her future lies. Hardships and life-changing choices shape their adventures, but the thought of reunion guides their hearts.
Shapes in the Grass is the first book of Secure the Colour, a dystopian fantasy series about the Greyshun family as they try to reunite, battling against the tide of war, greed, and zealotry. It is an ecological, anti-authoritarian, post-steampunk exploration of the true cost of a society that prizes a powerful mineral above human lives.
