awards

And a good Monday to you all! Happy end of January!

Why am I so cheerful? Because I finally got the cover for The Chronicles of John Zebedee squared away!

The preorders are being set up now, and as soon as I have the links, I’ll share them. Look for them in the newsletter on Friday! (Are you not getting my newsletter? It’s only once a month, and there are recipes…)

Children of Dreams is up for an award — the Paranormal Romance Guild’s Reviewers Choice Award. This award is voted on by the reading public, so if you read and enjoyed Children of Dreams, go vote! Voting is open for another few days, and you can find the ballot here. I also had a fun interview, which you can see here.

I’ve been busy with The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath, too. It gives me something to do while I wait for the edits on Morrigan’s Heir.

The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath
(The White Raven Duology, Book 2)

I’ve seen a lot of talk recently about writing history, and presenting a rosy view of history. Which, I’m not going to lie, I’m totally doing in The White Raven. There are details that are accurate, but the view of Rome… not so much.

The thing is, I know I’m doing it. The White Raven isn’t set at a fixed point in Celtic history. It doesn’t have to be — it’s a fantasy. I do mention Rome in Princes of Air — there’s a comment in Niall’s book about dining while reclining like Romans, and that’s all it was. A throw-away comment that wasn’t meant to do anything more than give the reader an idea of what was going on. To Niall, Rome was a concept, not a place. He’d heard of it, but that’s all.

Lorcan actually experiences Rome as a place. However, the Rome he experiences is only tangentially the Rome that actually existed. There was never an Emperor named Lucanus, for example. This is a fictional Rome set in my fictional universe where Gods walk among men… and sometimes do more than walk. So I can pick and choose what parts of Roman history I want to use, while being relatively accurate to Roman culture and religion.

Which is probably going to get me into all sorts of difficulties with the history people. But it’s fiction, and I’m going to put an author note in the books saying pretty much what I just said to you. That this is my fictional world, that it’s only lightly based on the Rome of our history, and honestly, there are men and women who can turn into ravens in this universe. That doesn’t lend itself to an accurate depiction of Rome…

So we have a fantasy romance, set in a romanticized version of Rome, starring a man who can turn into a raven because reasons.

This absolutely sings historical accuracy, right?