Tonight, I’ll Be Ruthless

About TONIGHT, I’LL BE RUTHLESS

TONIGHT, I’LL BE RUTHLESS, complete at 82,500 words, is a young adult reimagining of Cinderella as a swashbuckling action thriller set in a world that resembles ours at the turn of the 20th Century.

My Cinderella is 17 year-old Emma who, five years ago, was sentenced to life as her family’s butler after she and her father were implicated in a botched plot to assassinate the King. Now, on the eve of her father’s execution, she must attend the annual New Year’s Masquerade Balls, not to find a prince, but to save her father’s life by rescuing him from his prison inside the palace.

She learns about the execution from an unlikely “fairy godmother”: Leo, the boy she once loved whose selfish actions five years ago condemned her to a life of servitude. Emma is conflicted about saving her father – after all, he wasn’t wrongfully imprisoned – and what’s more, trusting Leo, who’s now a conman and addicted to a drug called slipper, would be folly. But she’s also intoxicated by the promise of one night of freedom. So against her better judgment, she agrees to a reconnaissance mission.

But when that mission bears fruit and a plan begins to form in Emma’s mind, she has more to contend with than a vengeful prince and a social climbing stepmother. She must decide whether it’s worth risking her comfortable life to save her father, a man she's not sure is worth saving. And even if Emma wants to risk it, she’d be running into the fire with Leo, who betrayed her before and could very well be leading her to ruin yet again.

In 2018, TONIGHT, I’LL BE RUTHLESS earned me a spot in the prestigious SCBWI Nevada Mentorship Program.