Having last blogged for Mother’s Day (on my author blog), it seems only fair to blog here for Father’s Day. Not too much direct experience with the mother thing, granted, but I do have experience with being a father. In 2014, I launched my novel AIKO, about a man who discovers he is a father. However, before he can celebrate Father’s Day, he must overcome a lot of obstacles to claim his child. Perhaps it is a simple story. The details make it special. And yet, it is strangely similar to one of the grand opera stories of my youth: Madama Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini. (Here is the Metropolitan Opera’s synopsis.)
As a music student in college, I was not averse to attending an opera or two. Some were more interesting than others. My mother, who always promoted my musical interests, took me to my first opera when I was a boy: Richard Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman, about a ghost ship doomed to sail the seas forever. (Why is there no movie version today? It would make a great paranormal film.) But it was Madama Butterfly that became my favorite, and the only opera I can enjoy just listening to without having to see the stage production.
In the opera, an American naval officer visits Japan and because he is staying there a while on business, he arranges to have a “temporary” wife. The inevitable happens: his business is concluded and he leaves, promising to return, and later she discovers a child will be born. He does eventually return, but with his American wife in tow. He is surprised to find his Japanese lover has a child but he is determined to bring the child home to America. The Japanese woman is so distraught over that verdict that she commits suicide in one of opera’s most tragic scenes.
While I was living in Japan in the late 1980s and early 90s, teaching English to the students of a small city, I wrote the story of an American man who meets a Japanese woman. They have a relationship then must inevitably part. A child is born. Eventually the man learns of the child’s existence and wants to do the right thing. Despite his American wife’s objection, he goes to Japan to check things out. I’m skipping over a lot of details, of course, but you see how the plot is similar to the Madama Butterfly story. That was purely unintentional.
Seeing that similarity, I decided to exploit it and revised my story to use some elements of Madama Butterfly more overtly. First, I wanted to tell the story from the man’s point of view. The opera is all from her side. Before I knew much about Japanese history and customs, I had always wondered why Cho-Cho-san (literally “Madame Butterfly”) decided to kill herself to solve the problem. She should have killed him for trying to take away her child! Not to say killing is acceptable, of course. In my Western mindset, I could not understand her motivations. Now I do. So in telling the story from his side, I would need to show him as a rational, responsible, do-the-right thing kind of guy who has all the best intentions while dealing with the situation.
The next thing I wanted to change was the time period. The opera is set at the turn-of-the-century when American naval forces first begin to rule the Pacific. In changing the setting to the late 1980s and early 1990s (the same time period I wrote it), I could exploit the new “internationalization” focus of Japan. Because of a booming economy and criticism of Japan’s unfair trade practices, the government initiated (among other acts) the importing of foreign English teachers from the USA, UK, Canada, and Australia. I was part of that influx of teachers who went to Japan. I was there at the exact time of the story, and I described the clash of generations: the older World War II seniors and the pop culture youth who knew little about the war. It was an interesting yet awkward time. And it fit perfectly for my version of the story.
So there you have it: Art imitating a life which imitates art.
Being a guy, of course I wanted my male protagonist to not be a jerk, to do the right thing. But he is human and thus has flaws. He also faces the clash of customs, lost among people who think differently, where the acts that make no sense to him seem perfectly logical to the local folk. Japan in the 1990s is a modern place, but in inaka (the rural, “backwoods” regions), the old, traditional ways still hold sway. So our hero, Benjamin Pinkerton (yes, I borrowed the name from the character in the opera, just to make the connection more obvious), tries to do the right thing: save a child he never knew he had while risking everything in his life back home. It is another stranger in a strange land scenario I like to write.
For Stefan Székely it is a fate worse than death: To be dead yet stuck with his dead parents. After 13 years Stefan can endure it no longer. He wants a castle of his own.
First he must visit his family’s bank in Budapest. But with endless strife across Europe, Stefan hardly recognizes Budapest, capital of the new Hungarian Federation. Nevertheless, he embarks on his reign as a vampire playboy – until he gets a stern warning from the local vampire gang.
Will Stefan fight for his right to party like it’s 2027? Or will an encounter with a stranger change everything? As clashes between vampire gangs and State Security escalate, Stefan discovers he might be the key to changing the fate of Europe forever. If he can survive three bloody nights in Budapest.
For Stefan Székely it is a fate worse than death: To be a vampire yet stuck with his vampire parents. After 13 years Stefan can endure it no more. He wants a castle of his own. But first he must visit his family’s bank in Budapest.
With endless strife rumbling across Europe, Stefan hardly recognizes Budapest, now capital of the Hungarian Federation. The world has changed. Nevertheless, he embarks on the reign of terror he always denied himself, living the vampire playboy lifestyle. Until he gets a stern warning from the local vampire gang. He is not welcome – unless he plays by their rules.
Should Stefan fight for his right to party like it’s 2027? Or will an unexpected encounter with a stranger change everything? As clashes between vampire gangs and State Security escalate, Stefan realizes he just might be the key to changing the fate of Europe forever! . . . If he can survive three bloody nights in Budapest.
Budapest at sunrise
In 2014 my medically accurate vampire novel A DRY PATCH OF SKIN came out to a couple rave reviews. My main purpose then was to counter the hysteria of the Twilight experience with some medical research crossed with an understanding of established legends. I wanted to tell a realistic vampire tale. I even set the story in my own city and the action in the story followed the actual days and months I was writing the story. The story and my writing of the story ended the same week. Of course, I revised and edited after that.
Then I thought . . . what might possibly happen next? So I chose a gap of, say, 13 years (the number seems significant in horror stories). Now, where did I leave my protagonist? How is he doing? What could have happened since the end of the first book? What has changed in the world during these 13 years? How would what’s different in the world affect his own corner of the world? How would he cope with these changes?
As I started on another vampire story I quickly realized that I had to also write essentially a science-fiction story. A futuristic story. If I were setting the story 13 years after the end of the previous novel, then this sequel would be set in 2027. And it would be somewhere in Europe, which is where our hero was at the end of the first book.
What do I know of 2027? Not much. Like many science fictioneers writing about the future, I took the present circumstances, the way things are now (good and bad), and extrapolated how they might progress. Remember that novel by George Orwell, 1984? It was published in 1948 just as fears of a Communist takeover gripped Europe. It was supposed to be a warning. Orwell imagined how the concerns of his present might play out in the future.
With the current strife in Europe, mass immigration, refugees coming to Europe from the Middle East and Africa, the increase in crime, warfare between left and right political groups, I could see all these happenings extending, continuing and growing through the following decade. The moral question that arises is whether an author should follow his/her own beliefs; that is, how the world should be, a Utopian view – or choose a path of development which would be the best setting for the story, however the society might become – or try to take an honest look at current events and let things fall where they might, for good or ill.
I chose both. If I have to make a choice, I will lean toward what makes a good story over what my own beliefs might be. For the sake of this story and for the way I think society will continue to progress/digress or develop or evolve over the next 10 years, I’m letting the European conflicts play out in the sequel: my now less-medically accurate vampire novel, titled SUNRISE.
In this sequel, the new Hungarian Federationis a strictly run Euro-centrist society. The State Security apparatus runs a tidy ship and getting in is very problematic. Staying in if you are a “diseased” resident such as a vampire is dangerous. However, our hero, Stefan Székely, is already within the boundaries of the Hungarian Federation at his family’s estate in the former Croatia; therefore, I, the author, must deal with the vagaries of that location. It was not an unpleasant effort. I love to travel vicariously.
Needless to say, our hero has difficulties – or there wouldn’t be a story. Yet as I charged through the final chapters and then undertook the revision stage, the look and feel, the horrors, and the dystopian ambiance seemed right. Will Stefan escape from the repressive Hungarian Federation? Or will powers greater than himself and the vampire gangs of Budapest have the final say?
In SUNRISE the world gets darker before the light shines again. Book 3, to be titled SUNSET, picks up the story even further into the future. By then, we are in full-fledged Dystopia territory. But, hey! I’m sure everything will work out just fine…if you transform into a vampire in time.
Here at Myrddin Publishing, we cover a lot of genres and romance is no exception. Whether you like contemporary, historical, or paranormal romance, there is something for everyone on your list. Below is just a sample of where you might find your next Valentine’s day treat! you can find the full list of Myrddin romance here.
Contemporary
A Beautiful Chill by Stephen Swartz
Life is impossible when every moment of the present is haunted by the past.
Íris is a refugee from an abusive youth in Iceland, further abused on the streets of Toronto – until she sees Art as an escape. With a scholarship, she drifts from depression to nightmare to Wiccan rituals to the next exhibit. There’s a lot she must forget to succeed in a life she refuses to take responsibility for.
Eric is settling in at Fairmont College, starting a new life after betrayal and heartbreak. Divorced and hitting forty, he has a lot to prove – to his father, his colleagues, and mostly to himself. The last thing he needs is a distraction – and there’s nothing more distracting than Iris.
A Beautiful Chill is a contemporary romance set in the duplicitous world of academic rules and artistic license.
Ednor Scardens (The Charm City Chronicles Book #1) by Kathleen Barker
Growing up in an Irish Catholic neighborhood in Baltimore in the 1960’s was hard enough when everything went right. Kate Fitzgerald wasn’t that lucky.
Struggling to cope with unwanted attention from older boys and men, Kate’s childhood friendship with shy classmate Gabe Kelsey begins to blossom, but quickly becomes tangled when she falls hard for his darkly handsome older brother, Michael.
As the brothers vie for Kate’s affections, she doesn’t know how to choose between them without tearing their family apart. She looks to her girlfriends for advice, but the tragic death of a classmate brings them face-to-face with mortality, shattering their facade of invincibility.
Her dilemma deepens when a predatory priest with a hidden past arrives at Holy Sacrament School. And when she silently witnesses a frightening scene between Gabe and Fr. O’Conner, Kate unknowingly becomes O’Conner’s intended next victim.
Viking: The Truth about Lagertha and Ragnar by Rachel Tsoumbakos
Lagertha was known to be one of the wives of the famous Viking, Ragnar Lodbrok. But did you know they first met each other at a brothel? And just how long did their marriage last? Was Lagertha really the revered shield maiden we see her as today? ‘Vikings: The Truth About Lagertha And Ragnar’ aims to unravel all these secrets.
‘Vikings: The Truth About Lagertha And Ragnar’ is so much more than a history book though.
In Part One their story is brought to life with a historically accurate retelling. Part Two then explores the historical facts surrounding this story.
When Joshua Grant vanishes days before his wedding his fiancée Remy is left with only bruises, scratch marks and a hastily written note. Heartbroken, she sets off alone to find him and begins a long journey where strange things begin to happen.
As Joshua descends into his new immortal life he indulges his thirst for blood and explores his superhuman strength and amazing new talents while becoming embroiled in coven politics which threaten to destroy him. But Remy discovers a strength of her own on her quest to bring Joshua home.
Fate toys with mortals and immortals alike, as two hearts torn apart by darkness face ordeals which test them to their limits.
Ice and snow are all 12 year old Anuka knows outside the hut in Greenland where she was born. When her mama dies, Anuka struggles to survive. The harsh winter forces her to finally journey across the frozen island to the village her mama always feared.
But the people of the village don’t know what to do with this girl. They try to educate and bring her into the modern world, but Anuka won’t make it easy for them. She sees dangers at every turn and every day hears her fate echoing in her mama’s voice.
Her mama gave her that name for a reason. She is A GIRL CALLED WOLF, forever searching for the place where she belongs, a destination always just out of reach, on a path she will always make her own.
Based on the amazing coming-of-age and adult adventures of librarian, boxer, and Canadian soldier Anna Good!
Joshua, Remy, and the twins are settled in their new life. However, life doesn’t always run smoothly. An argument between Becky and her twin causes unforeseen circumstances, an admission by Samir almost costs him his life, and the traitor provides critical information to Liam. But who is it?
As Jakki’s visions begin to focus on the turncoat’s activities, a member of the coven disappears, and others find themselves endangered.
And when Liam’s coven attacks, who will endure?
Fate continues to toy with mortals and immortals alike, and as more hearts descend into darkness, can they overcome the dangers they face and survive?
When Tali is hired to cut out the heart of Prince Kas, the huntress can’t refuse.Tali realizes there is no escape from the dark magic of the queen’s mirror, even though her own feelings for the prince are far too complex to understand.
As they try to run from their shared destiny, Tali and Kas have to rely on their wits and each other as hunter becomes prey and hearts are won and lost.
A genderbent Snow White for adults (18+ only.) All royalties go to Save the Children.
Another mysterious disappearance sparks a frightening chain of events for Remy and her family. Events foretold come to pass, and more strange and alarming occurrences assail her life. Where can she turn?
Coven politics continue to threaten Joshua’s existence, but an even bigger menace looms . . .
And Remy’s life hangs in the balance – can Joshua save her?
Fate still toys with mortals and immortals alike, as hearts torn apart by darkness confront perils which could lead to their doom.
A conversation with Galahad
A prince on a quest and a goddess in mourning
A stolen kingdom and the Fractal Mirror
Three tales of wonder and great deeds
Three tales of heroes and villains
Open the door and enter the Dreamtime, the world of fairytales, the flower of all that is delightful and mysterious, frightening and amazing.
How far would you go to save the love of your life? Through a portal to another world?
Sebastian, that quiet tax examiner at the corner desk in the IRS service center, carries a dark secret: once upon a time he and his high school sweetheart Gina found a rip in the universe and stepped through it to a strange world of magical beauty.
Far from being a Disney-esque playground, the world of Ghoupallesz bursts with cosmopolitan elegance, alien perversions, and political strife. Gina, the adventurous one, falls in love with the adventurous possibilities. Not Sebastian; always practical, he insists they return to Earth. Gina refuses so he goes back alone, vowing never to return. Yet he finds himself drawn back repeatedly–he calls it “research”–and often crosses paths with Gina. Sometimes he saves her, sometimes she saves him, forever soul mates.
Now years later, life on Earth hasn’t gone well for Sebastian. Then the headaches revisit him, with flashes of memories from Ghoupallesz. Gina is in trouble again, he senses, and he must, as always, save her. Meanwhile, a pair of too-curious IRS co-workers have accidently overdosed on the Elixir of Love he brought back on his last trip and the antidote exists only on Ghoupallesz. With these co-workers in tow, Sebastian returns through the interdimensional portal, fearing it may be his final adventure. He must gather his old comrades from the war, cross the towering Zet mountains, and free Gina from the Zetin warlord’s castle before her execution. Perhaps then she will stay with him.
But are his adventures to the other side real? Or are they just the dreams of a psychotic killer? That’s what the police want to know when Sebastian returns without his co-workers.
THE DREAM LAND is a genre-mashing epic of interdimensional intrigue and police procedural, a psychological thriller marbled with twisted humor, steampunk pathos, and time/space conundrums.
Law school grad Miranda Beeling is trying to recover from the recent death of her mother and the betrayal of her fiancé (a bigamist wannabe). She’s retreated back to her childhood home, trying to sort through her clutterholic father’s horde of junk, despite his determined opposition. (Her mother’s ghost, who appears to her in dreams and is inclined to nag, insists she keep trying.) Miranda’s only social outlet is playing saxophone in the local community band, a motley collection of eccentric musicians. Miranda enjoys the pizza and beer bull sessions after rehearsals, when everyone enjoys dissing their despotic band director. The enjoyment ends when trombonist David Hu is killed, and bassoonist Louisa Parkinson, Miranda’s best friend, is at first accused of the murder, then attacked herself. Motivated by concern for her friends and an inescapable feeling that she might be next on the victim list, Miranda is driven to investigate the case. She is further driven by a crush on the investigating detective, who won’t date a potential victim/suspect, no matter how cute he thinks she is. Armed with only her legal research skills, a keen sense of humor and a gift for getting into trouble, Miranda may eventually figure it all out, but not before uncovering several secrets she would rather not have known.
Trapped in the nightmarish world of 1942 Munich by a freak twist in time, two strangers must navigate their way to safety with only each other and the help of a rag-tag group of university kids hell-bent on taking down Adolf Hitler and the entire Third Reich. Silent No More is a riveting story of historical fiction based on the true-to-life courage of one small band of Germans – The White Rose – who refused to remain silent in the face of Nazi barbarism. An inspiring and action-packed tale, Silent No More will command your attention until you turn the very last page.
When Joshua Grant vanishes days before his wedding, his fiancée Remy is left with only bruises, scratch marks and a hastily written note. Heartbroken, she sets off alone to find him and begins a long journey where strange things begin to happen.
As Joshua descends into his new immortal life he indulges his thirst for blood and explores his superhuman strength and amazing new talents while becoming embroiled in coven politics which threaten to destroy him. But Remy discovers a strength of her own on her quest to bring Joshua home.
Fate toys with mortals and immortals alike, as two hearts torn apart by darkness face ordeals which test them to their limits.
He’s 18. She’s 16. As her alpha-male, athletic boyfriend’s departure for college looms, shy, underclassman Kate worries that Michael won’t be able to resist the siren call of his promiscuous ex-girlfriend, who is prepared to do anything he desires in order to reclaim his affection. As the pressure mounts to engage in a thrilling physical relationship that she may not be ready for, haunting flashbacks resurface from the frightening assaults she endured in childhood. As her gradual seduction intensifies, Kate is torn between waiting until she is older or giving in to her own impatient desires.
When Michael’s brother tries to rekindle his own previous relationship with Kate, and a new boy from a different school falls hard for her as well, she realizes she’s in for a difficult year.
A uniquely humorous, sensual romance, The Body War will keep you reading this story of timeless, maturing young love.
Four years of college has not taught Alex as much as he will learn in a month on the Turkish coast!
Fresh from college, Alex Parris, naïve History major and innocent computer geek, claims his reward from his proud parents: a tour of the Classical world. Most of all, Alex longs to visit the site of ancient Troy (Ilium) and walk the same pathways as the Greek and Trojan warriors did nearly 3000 years ago.
While sailing from Greece to Istanbul on a cruise ship, Alex meets an older woman, Eléna, who he indulgently fantasizes as the mythic Helen to his Paris. She, with her own mysterious background, toys with him and draws him into an affair. Eléna leads Alex through their sacrilegious journey through Istanbul and he is happy to try on the confident, adult role he has long desired. Alex sees Eléna as the perfect woman for him and he can see a future together.
The culmination of Alex’s tour is the visit to the site of ancient Troy, a place that is finally more important to him than sex. There, bored with Alex’s history lesson, Eléna sparks a confrontation with some Turkish men. Seeing his lover accosted, Alex must save her, even as he knows he is no match for them. Fortunately for Alex, there are three off-duty Navy men who join him in the fight. When they escape from the local jail, a new Odyssey begins for Alex, making their way across the Turkish countryside. Alex must return for Eléna. But what is he willing to do, how much will he have to endure to be reunited with his lover?
After Ilium is available on Amazon for Kindle, here.
Growing up in an Irish Catholic neighborhood in Baltimore in the 1960’s was hard enough when everything went right. Kate Fitzgerald wasn’t that lucky.
Struggling to cope with unwanted attention from older boys and men, Kate’s childhood friendship with shy classmate Gabe Kelsey begins to blossom, but quickly becomes tangled when she falls hard for his darkly handsome older brother, Michael.
As the brothers vie for Kate’s affections, she doesn’t know how to choose between them without tearing their family apart. She looks to her girlfriends for advice, but the tragic death of a classmate brings them face-to-face with mortality, shattering their facade of invincibility.
Her dilemma deepens when a predatory priest with a hidden past arrives at Holy Sacrament School. And when she silently witnesses a frightening scene between Gabe and Fr. O’Conner, Kate unknowingly becomes O’Conner’s intended next victim.
Beth Ranier never paid much attention to romance or to society’s definition of beauty. Her relationship with Montgomery’s most eligible bachelor, Dr. Aaron McAfee, had a tendency to leave her in a state of confusion and disappointment. Then she met his older brother, Daniel.
Daniel McAfee never complains about the way his life turned out. As a young man his is forced into deciding between his own happiness or the needs of his family. Daniel puts his dreams of becoming an artist on hold to take over the family farm. He does not understand his younger brother’s disdain toward him. Still he takes great care to clean up the string of messes Aaron always leaves behind.
Convinced he will never be more than a farmer, Daniel loses the ability to see his life as anything more. But when Aaron brings home his latest girlfriend, Daniel’s artist soul reawakens. In Beth, he sees everything he wants in woman, and once again he must choose between his brother’s happiness or his own.
Love werewolves and gorgeous hunks? Then this is the book for you!
CJ Carson believes herself to be slightly crazy. For as long as she can remember, she has been plagued with strange dreams, migraines and an imaginary friend that never seems to go away: a voice of love and reason she has heard in her head since childhood.
Orphaned at birth, Mika Elkhart was raised by the Guardian’s of Haven to become a member of Delta Pack, the Theriontrope Foundation’s elite defense force. His was a world of death and darkness aside from his one ray of hope, CJ Carson.
The time has come for Mika to reveal his true identity and convince CJ to take her place as the Guardian of Haven, but the road to Haven is laid with danger. Without a Guardian, Haven will destroy itself and without CJ in his life, so may Mika.
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