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Here’s a snippet from Kings of the North to either whet or satisfy your impatience for the release date (65 days from now, not that I’m hinting or anything like that…) This one is from early in the book.
Spoiler warning now (mild spoilers but some of you don’t want any spoiler–so if you don’t, don’t click on the “Read the rest of this…” button.)
Where: the Verrakai country residence
When: after Midsummer and Dorrin’s post-coronation activities. Dorrin has come home, accompanied by the Marshal-General and her new squires.
………………………………………..
As they neared the house, Paks’s red horse lifted its muzzle from the grass and whinnied loudly. Paks appeared from the gate in the garden wall, trailed by a gaggle of children.
“Marshal-General!” she called, waving; she broke into a run, leaving the children behind.
The Marshal-General stiffened; her horse stopped abruptly. “That light!”
Dorrin said “The sun’s glow?” It seemed especially golden that evening.
“It’s more than that,” the Marshal-General said.
“Dorrin,” Paks said, slowing to a walk. “How was it? Did the king like the crown and things?”
“It’s a long story,” Dorrin said. “I’ll tell it all, once we’ve bathed and eaten. You need to meet my new squires–Gwenno, Beclan, Daryan–”
She dismounted just in time to meet the swarm of children who had now caught up with Paks. “Auntie Dorrin! Auntie Dorrin!”
Dorrin looked at Paks, who shrugged. “They’re your family; they needed something to call you besides my lord.”
It made sense, but…Auntie? She supposed she was, to most of them, but she had never imagined herself as an auntie. From the looks on her squires’ faces, neither had they.
…………………………………………
One of the adjustments Dorrin has to make, changing from cohort captain to lord of a domain, is in the most difficult for her, family relations. Unfortunately, as these books wanted to grow in all directions, radiating out from each character, I did not have the space or time to do much with Dorrin becoming a family member to these children, someone they could trust and even love. Many ideas had to be thrown off the sledge (as another writer friend puts it sometimes. Some of them hopped back on the sledge in Crisis of Vision, and I think a few more will climb aboard in Book IV.
This is the first time the Marshal-General has seen Paks since the ordeal and healing. She had seen Paks in the Duke’s Stronghold (in Oath of Gold, before Paks rides off on her paladin mount) but Paks was changed again in that later experience. So the relationship of Marshal-General to this paladin will be different–though figuring it out will take some time. That’s another fascinating bit that didn’t fit into this volume.
Comment by Kip Colegrove — January 16, 2011 @ 6:36 pm
I smile to think of Dorrin as Auntie, not just in the Paksworld context but in light of some of your other tales, wherein aunts are sometimes formidable figures indeed.
Comment by Kerry (aka Trouble) — January 16, 2011 @ 8:27 pm
Oops, extra letter in Name field probably sent my Thank you to moderation.
Comment by FrancisT — January 17, 2011 @ 2:28 am
@Kip. Yes I think ‘Auntie Dorrin’ would definitely have something in common with those formidable Familias aunts
Comment by Eir de Scania — January 17, 2011 @ 7:24 am
Agreed, but I’m still amused. I bet Paks found it amusing as well.
Comment by Jenn — January 17, 2011 @ 8:45 am
Thank you so much for the snippet.
I love the “Auntie Dorrin”.
Formidable Aunts are sometimes the ones who you come to love the most.
Comment by elizabeth — January 17, 2011 @ 9:20 am
Of course one of the ironies here is that she’s already killed three of the children who were invaded by other Verrakaien…it makes her feel very odd to have these children snuggling up to her. She knows she holds their lives in her hand, as her uncle did, and though she intends them no harm–in fact, wants the best for them–it’s an odd situation for her.
Comment by elizabeth — January 17, 2011 @ 9:21 am
Dorrin at 75 or 80–if she lives that long–would certainly fit in with them. Right now they’d look on her as “promising, but not mature, really.”
Comment by elizabeth — January 17, 2011 @ 9:24 am
Oh, it is funny. But I’m not sure Paks thinks so–she thinks it’s natural (she doesn’t pick up on the incongruity that makes it funny.) Paks’s sense of humor is a lot simpler.
Comment by elizabeth — January 17, 2011 @ 9:25 am
I wish I had met my great-aunts earlier in my life…I think I’d have had a lot of fun with them.
Comment by Linda — January 17, 2011 @ 8:47 pm
I’ve long been curious about how you managed to co-write with Anne McCaffrey ( who has created such complicated interwoven stories) without going nuts … and today’s comments make it clear that complicated interweaving must be as natural to you as falling off a sledge … so to speak.
I love going to pre-order your books at my favorite bookstore because the clerks invariably squeal “Oh good, I’ve been wondering when the next one would be out.” They’ll be tickled to hear how far out you’re thinking!
Comment by elizabeth — January 17, 2011 @ 10:06 pm
If I had known as a young person that I didn’t have to write short stories before writing a novel–if I’d known that short-story-starts that grow without apparent limit, getting more complicated all the way are actually a sign of a novel-sized plot…I might’ve been published much younger. But I wouldn’t have had the life experiences that I think helped the books I did finally let go and write.
And thanks for the pre-ordering and informing the clerks.
Comment by Jenn — January 18, 2011 @ 8:22 am
Speaking of Short stories
Will you ever consider the one where Paks gains the trust of the Verrakai children. I was thinking how abused these children probably were considering what we know of Dorrin’s youth.
I wonder if she would use much of what she learned from Master Oakhollow in healing these little ones.
Comment by elizabeth — January 18, 2011 @ 8:42 am
It would be an interesting to look at that, yes, but like all my stories, it would have to come to me…or, the right POV person would have to come to me with the proposal. My story-writing brain works in a peculiar way (though I know some other writers whose brains work the same way.) That’s one of the reasons I’m an erratic writer for anthologies–either a story bubbles up from below, that fits the anthology’s profile, or…it doesn’t. The more restrictive the profile I’m given, the more likely the story that comes will fight against it. There’ve been some serious near-misses.