I know a lot of you have been anxiously waiting for the release of Book Two of the Trilogy, but I've been patiently waiting along with you and not wanting to promote Dancers of Light until it was ready.
I'm very excited about this book. There are some new characters, there's deepening plot development, as one would expect, and Shatwa Hei and Iya-Ko-Naya are dangerously close to consummating their forbidden affair, and in the process risking death, mayhem and likely a lot of re-Awakening of ancient skills, which everyone (including me, Iya's Sister-cousin and my Beta readers) all want the two Medicine Seekers to hurry up and get to. But alas, as in any series, ya just gotta save some of it for later.
In the meantime...
The hardest part of Dancers of Light was to build a believable back story for the antagonists who play a huge role in this book. I hope it's not too much, and I tried to make it exciting reading. I'm personally not disappointed that the resolution to the dilemma posed to She-Who-Whispers and her tiny daughter Star-Speaker in Book One, Sisters of Light, takes the entire second book of the trilogy to be resolved. It's an important part of both plot and character development within the series. To me, it was like transplanting an entire tree. Now we just need to see it take root and eventually produce fruit.
If you haven't yet read Book One, Sisters of Light, it's still FREE TO DOWNLOAD at Smashwords, Barnes & Noble and i-Tunes.
So, here's the timeline for Dancers of Light:
Print proof is ordered. Barring complications I'll have it read through and okayed for print within a couple of weeks or less. For me, it's way easier to write in print format then adapt the format to e-book, rather than the other way around. With Book One I learned that the hard way, and basically ended up having to rewrite the entire book in print format. So for Book Two, Dancers of Light, the e-version will be a reformat of the print book..
I'm old-school when it comes to editing, and having the pages in front of me is an entirely different experience than reading from a screen. There's a biological reason for that, and many articles have been written on the topic of reading from screens that self-generate the light source rather than imprinting on the retina as reflected light. Our psyches shift. Many writers do edits from printed manuscripts for that very reason, even though they might only be doing it intuitively. Science aside, I'm truly pleased with the development of both plot and characters in Dancers of Light.
While I was waiting for format review from the printer, I jumped into Book 3, Medicine Riders, which brings an interesting turn of the events that so far have developed. And yes, re-Awakened skills can, like any learned skill, be forgotten.
Having mulled over a question that was posed by one of my favorite indie fantasy authors, Lindsay Buroker, I decided to include Chapter One of Book Three, Medicine Riders, at the end of Dancers of Light.. Or course I did it merely to whet readers' appetites for Medicine Riders. I want them to be as super excited as I am about the third book of the trilogy.
And yes, I haven't forgotten about the Mountain of the Ancestors. But Shatwa Hei has to get there before we get to see that turn in plot development--including romantic interest. Email me if you have a desire to know more. Until then, happy reading.