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Well, so here we are again.

With regard to recent news, I don’t think I’ve got much to add to what I said on this blog when the UK voted to leave the EU.  It’s here if you want to reread:  https://www.penelopewallace.com/here-we-go/ – and it still seems apposite, even the two comments.

In the meantime, “We Do Not Kill Children” will be available to buy from Amazon or via Mightier than the Sword www.mightierthanthesworduk.com from Monday, this Monday coming, 14th November. I’m told the digital version can be preordered from Barnes and Noble, Kobe, Smashwords and Apple already.

(After today, I’ll try to give you a break from boasting-author-stuff.)

Most of you know this already, but in case you don’t… it’s a story of murder and intrigue in a fictional setting. This setting is Christendom with a feminist twist.

As I explained in an another previous post, this is “Swords Without Misogyny – a medieval setting with minimal magic, and without the oppression of women that seems to be normal.  I was fed up with stories, either fantastical or historical, where either our noses are rubbed in the misery/irrelevance of women’s lives, or we have to concentrate on one extraordinary woman who manages with difficulty to overcome the expectations of her misogynistic society.  Women ought to have other things to do than combat sexism, and men ought to have other roles than either aiding or thwarting the women.  (Of course there are the stories that ignore women altogether, but I avoid them.)”

(A thought: This is an exciting time for me, after about three years of writing, rewriting and trying to find a publisher.  In all that time, no one has read the book except nice family and friends, who are kind… and professional readers, who are polite… Now is the time to brace myself for the response of complete strangers – which is likely to be  indifference (of course) but may include actual harsh criticism.  No one (well, maybe one person who gave up after two pages) has said, “This is rubbish.”  By publishing, I’m giving anyone the right and the opportunity to do so. “If you can’t stand the heat…”)

Some of the people who have helped along the way are named in the Acknowledgements at the end:

“I am forever grateful for the encouragement of those who read on to the end and liked it: Kathy Buchan, Ginny Cooper, Sally Hodges, Clint Redwood, Judith Renton and Eleanor Wallace.  Also for the encouragement generally of Fran Beedell, Deirdre Bell, Michael Dunster, Ruth Dunster, Alan Howe, Maura O’Neill, Lindy Todd, Margaret Stone, Andrew Wallace, Ruth Young, my family and the housegroup….

Thank you to Jono Renton (www.studiorenton.com) for creating my website, Ian Storer (http://scipio6.wixsite.com/scipio-designs) for illustrating it, and Stephen Hall for turning my scrawl into actual maps…

Jonathan Batchelor answered medical questions, and Gina Hall was helpful about horses…

But supremely, for doing nearly all the above, and much much more, thank you Mark.”

Finally, just to whet your appetites:

“Far far away,” she chanted, hugging her knees and staring into the firelight, “far to the south are the Jattaman Mountains. They are full of trees and chasms and wolves. Their peaks reach up to the stars.”

“Go on,” urged Kai, seven years old.

“So the man with no hope travelled over the moors, through the city with its thieves, across the rivers deep and cold, and came to the mountains. And he climbed, alone. And he came to three villages, each smaller than the last. The first village is called Dayspassing. The second is called Daysend. The third has no name.

“In the last village, they warned him to go no further, but his heart was stone, and he went on. At last he came to the Place. A ring of great stones, taller than a house, put there by long-ago people. He said, ‘I have come here to die’, and stepped into the circle under the moon. And he died.”

“Why? What killed him?”

“The Old Stones killed him. It is the Place to Die. The place killed him, and his despair.” (Chapter 3)

Read the book to find out more about the Place to Die… and also to check if “We Do Not Kill Children” is really as dark as the above extract makes it sound…

Love from the PPI Blogger

PS Next week, for the first time, the blog will feature a suggestion for a family craft activity!