The following cover design by Paula Becattini.
You can find more of her work at http://paulabecattini.com or http://www.liqueocomunico.it. (The latter is under construction at the moment.)
I am indebted to everyone who voted in the poll. As thanks I’ve included anyone who left their names in the Acknowledgements.
The mobi version of the Parting Gift will be published on Amazon on 6th November.
First bit of news is that I have finished the current round of edits of The Unconquered Sun and it’s back again with my editor. Before The Unconquered Sun is released, I will be publishing a short story set in the same world called The Parting Gift. The draft blurb is below:
Certamen’s god is dead. His people, the Ors, are broken and enslaved. He finds consolation in the knowledge that they are safe… But not for much longer. Their masters, facing decimation by disease, are growing desperate. Desperate enough to kill.
I have a choice of covers for it so I am running a poll to decide which cover is the most popular. Please vote HERE!
I am delighted that A Bright Power Rising has been honored with the B.R.A.G.Medallion. This is a stamp of quality for Indie books. The selection process is very strict. Books undergo an initial screening process to ensure minimum quality standards are in place. If the book passes this hurdle (50% fail), it is appraised by IndieBRAG’s reviewers based on a comprehensive list of criteria relating to the writing, the story and layout. One key criterion is would they recommend the book to their best friend. Only 10% of submissions receive the B.R.A.G.Medallion.
I just received a round of edits of The Unconquered Sun, resulting in the usual array of vowel sounds (ooh, eh? ah, aha, etc), followed by cracking knuckles and feverish typing. The release date will be confirmed when the book is more advanced through the editing process. In the meantime, to wet your appetites, below is the cover, again by Marek Purzychi. It matches pretty well with the cover for A Bright Power Rising. I was a bit queasy about moving my name further up the cover, Frankly, if the Golden Rule was a trilogy, I wouldn’t have agreed to it. But I think it captures the Sol Invictus motif spectacularly. Hopefully, what will be behind the cover will be as good.
In other news, the short story which will hopefully be released before The Unconquered Sun has also been submitted for editing. More details on it shortly.
The Unconquered Sun is currently in editing. I finished my last pre-edit draft a bit later than I expected. The release date will not be finalized until the editing process is sufficiently advanced. However, I will reveal the book’s cover next month. I also have written a short story set in the Photocosm. It takes place before the main story in A Bright Power Rising/The Unconquered Sun.
A Bright Power Rising is now available on Kindle Unlimited. It will be free on Amazon from 23rd-25th April. Do check it out!
After a lot of consideration (oh about nine months), I’ve decided to enter A Bright Power Rising into Kindle Select. The interest in the book seems to be concentrated on Amazon so that is where it has to be. It probably won’t be entered until mid-next month. I’ll keep you posted.
A Bright Power Rising has a new cover! The image remains the same but the titling has been updated to better fit with the cover of The Unconquered Sun.
The cover is already up on Amazon. The paperback will be available from Createspace by the end of the week, hopefully.
I know that having a series matching is important to many people so anybody who purchased/received the paperback/ebook with the old cover please feel free to contact me at noelcoughlan@photocosm.org.
I am busily working away on the sequel to A Bright Power Rising, The Unconquered Sun. I hope to have the book ready for developmental editing in January. I am about half-way through this draft and everything is coming together nicely.
In other news, Ronel van Tonder has published a review of A Bright Power Rising on her site here.
This image might remind you a little of the Statue of Liberty. However, it is in fact a roman sun god by the name of Sol Invictus, sometimes translated as the Unconquered Sun. His worship was popularlised in the third century by the emperor Aurelian.
At the time that Aurelian took over the Roman Empire, it was in decline due to civil wars and poor leadership. In the west, part had broken away to form the Gallic Empire, while several of the eastern provinces had become the Palmyrene Empire. Barbarians were pouring what was left. Things were looking pretty bad.
Aurelian reversed the decline, reunited the empire and dealt with the barbarian threat. He was a zealous reformer. He also encouraged all the people of the empire to follow one god, Sol Invictus, in a manner very similar to Constantine The Great’s later adoption of Christianity. Indeed, it is interesting that Sol Invictus is found on roman coinage until then.
We will never know what might have happened to the Roman Empire, if Aurelian had survived longer to consolidate popular devotion to his religion. He died violently as so many emperors before him. A strict disciplinarian, he engendered terrible fear among his subordinates. He even looks severe in many of his surviving images. In the end, it cost him his life. A secretary, fearing terrible punishment for a small lie, concocted a greater lie to save himself. He convinced other officials that the emperor intended to have them executed, so they struck against Aurelian first, and the rest is, as they say, history.
The thriller writer (and occasional chicken plucker) S.L. Shelton has posted his review of A Bright Power Rising on his website. If you haven’t read it yet, please do check it out. Shelton’s own current series is the Scott Wolfe novels. He has links to his current reviews on Goodreads on his site for anybody interested.
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