March 10, 2025 – Camille J. Severino, a former bartender in the Chicago area, will release her debut novel, Secrets of the Jeweled Flask, with PathBinder soon. The fantasy book with a decided Italian flavor is in the final editing and design stages, with a cover to be released soon.

The story centers on Vito Glandell, a fearful man approaching forty with little hope of ever determining his own fate. The overbearing mother he still lives with sees to that, with help from a Catholic priest who has been telling Vito what to do for as long as he can remember.

Then a strange, jewel-encrusted flask comes into Vito’s possession, offering him hope of being lifted from his dreadful existence. But when the gin he sips from the flask renders his whole world gray, Vito loses his job as a paint salesman.

To get his colors back, Vito must complete a series of adventures that begin through a magic portal in the basement of his mother’s house. Aided by the spirit of his long-dead Uncle Frank and three sisters who happen to be witches, he begins. When he enters the fog at the top of the basement stairs, he comes out the other side sharing someone else’s body. He goes back in time to become the bully who beat him up, his mother just after his own birth, and others.

Camille was born and raised in Melrose Park, Illinois. A bartender for most of her adult life, she now works as a ghostwriter. She has lived in New Orleans, Louisiana; and Austin, Texas. She has a Bachelor of Arts degree in English Language and Literature from Northeastern Illinois University. She lives in the northwest suburbs of Chicago with her life partner, their two black cats, and their cockatiel, Gandalf.