Longtime since I did  blog post…
A lot has happened! 
Mostly centred around the ongoing health issues of my husband, which included heavy issues like triple bypass, valve replacement and pacemaker. 

OTHER newsy things:

• Continuum Convention, bless ’em,  over in Melbourne has very kindly invited me as Australian Guest of Honour for the 2020 Convention in June. More about that closer to the day! I’ve always had a soft spot for that particular convention, and their International guest will be a Malaysian, which makes things doubly special for me.

• And also in 2020, I will be going to the World SF Convention in Wellington, New Zealand in August. Well, I’ve bought the ticket anyway, so fingers crossed!!

• Ezvid Wiki over in Los Angeles has included “THE LASCAR’S DAGGER” as one of:

 …that every author loves.

Every now and then you get a review from someone who really “gets” what you, the writer, are trying to say.
Here is one such, from Ryan Frye at Civilian Reader blog.

Below is Ryan’s summary, but you can read the whole review here.


Overall, The Lascar’s Dagger is a great read. The pacing is
great, with plenty of action and swagger. While I thoroughly enjoyed
every aspect of this book, Larke left plenty of hints that there’s
greater depth to the characters, the world and the story to be found in
later volumes. If you are looking for a new epic fantasy series that
will engage, entertain (and maybe even enthrall you) in equal measures,
then Larke’s your author and The Forsaken Lands is your series.

The second book of THE FORSAKEN LANDS is out today.

If you haven’t read book 1, THE LASCAR’S DAGGER, look here for reviews to see if it might interest you. To my intense pleasure, it made “the best fantasy of the year” for one SFF blogger, and featured on a couple of “best-books-read-in-2014” lists compiled by book bloggers.

So what is Book 2, THE DAGGER’S PATH all about? 

Well, half of it is set on the opposite side of the world, in the spice islands of the story. That’s the Sorrel, Saker, Juster and Ardhi thread.


Back in the Va-cherished Hemisphere, those left behind (Fritillary Reedling, Lady Mathilda, Gerelda) have their own horrors to confront. 

Both sides of the known world are under threat, but the threats are very different … or are they linked? The characters have been pushed by the dagger into confronting these dangers, but how they tackle them, and whether they find solutions — that’s up to them.

 

The world of The Forsaken Lands Trilogy

Below are some photographs of some of things and places that inspired me. 


Much of the background of the story has its roots in South-east Asia where I have lived and worked  for most of my life

A morning in tropical rainforest, Malaysia

Pulau Tiga (the original Survivor island of first show)

Sabah — glorious tropical Islands

Sabah mountains

As part of the book includes the journey of getting from one side of the world to the other, I had to pay attention to sailing ships. I went on board every one I find, but the two which offered the greatest authenticity and were more appropriate to the period were two replicas found in Australia:  Dufken, below, from 1606 and the Endeavour from 1770.

Below: officer cabins on Endeavour

Endeavour replica mess

Interior of the Duyfken replica – 1st European ship to Australia

Main crew mess of Endeavour

THEY FOLLOW WHERE THE DAGGER LEADS

When sailors came to Ardhi’s island home, they plundered not only its riches, but its magic too. Now Ardhi must retrieve what was stolen, but there are ruthless men after this power, men who will do anything to possess it . . .
Sorcerers, lascars, pirates and thieves collide in this thrilling sequel to Glenda Larke’s epic fantasy adventure, THE LASCAR’S DAGGER.

 ‘Outstanding all the way to the last word.’ – Elizabeth Moon on The Lascar’s Dagger

Here’s the latest GLENDA LARKE news.


BOOKS

• “The Lascar’s Dagger“,
  book 1 of a trilogy “The Forsaken Lands” is now out, available as an
  eBook and a paperback worldwide. If you would like to know more about
  it, see a couple of author posts I’ve put up on the www.Orbitbooks.net
  site. Book 2 has already been delivered and is due for publication in
  January 2015.

If you want to help out the author, tell your friends — or write an honest review somewhere or other!

• “The Aware”,
  the first book of the “Isles of Glory” trilogy, is free as an eBook on
  all formats (Apple, Kindle, PDF, Nook, Smashwords etc etc)  until the
  end of the month. I believe it has already had over 2,000 downloads just
  on Amazon! Of course, this is designed to entice you into buying books 2
  & 3…

• “Havenstar” is now available from Tigonderoga Press, Amazon, etc as a hardback or paperback. The eBook is up everywhere except Amazon — try Smashwords, B&N, Apple, Sony, Kobo…

My other two trilogies, The Mirage Makers and The Watergivers (Stormlord books) are available pretty much everywhere as ebooks and paperbacks.


CONVENTIONS

• I will be attending three SFF conventions this year.

The first is Swancon over Easter in Perth, Australia.
The second is the World SF Convention Loncon3 in London in August,
and the third is the British Fantasy Convention in York UK in September. If you’ll be at any of them, please say hi!


READINGS /SIGNINGS

• Some readings, chats etc to look forward to:

Charlottesville Virginia at the B&N in 5th April at 6pm
Forbidden Planet in London post Loncon3, with Karen Miller, date to be decided.

The idea for this trilogy came to me in a flash one day …


Er, no. As for all my books, there’s no one idea, but dozens, some of them larger than others, and they came from all over the place, and not all at once. 


I suppose the main inspiration originated from my desire to write a book that drew on my experiences living in South-east Asia, something evocative of a period and a place not usually touched upon in fantasy epics. And so this trilogy is set in a fantasy world of two hemispheres, east and west, where western countries are setting out to trade with the other side of the world–and their main desire is to procure tropical spices. Think 17th-18th century Europe; think the rivalry between the British and Dutch East India Companies; think the Spice Islands of Indonesia and the impact of this contact between two hemispheres. And then think: but what if...

What if the Spice Islands had magic?

And so, being a fantasy, it’s not just about a clash of cultures, but about a clash in religious/magic systems…The trilogy’s protagonists come from both hemispheres.


“Lascar” is a term that is not very specific in its application. The word is Persian/Arabic in origin, meaning guard, soldier or more generally pertaining to military, but later came to mean a militiaman or seaman from the southern Asian region (i.e. not Chinese/Korean/Japanese). 

“Lascars” came to mean those serving on British naval ships under so-called  “lascar” agreements. The first British East India merchantmen sailing to India had lascar sailors on board. 

Many of these lascars never returned to the countries of their birth after their period of service. They became the first wave of Asian migration to Britain. Intermarriage was common. Most of these British lascar’s were from the Indian sub-continent–whereas the lascar of my book comes from the tropical spice islands of my fantasy world, a place I call Chenderawasi. 

As a sidebar: My husband’s ancestry is, in part, Minangkabau. These people have their origins in western Sumatra, Indonesia. They were often traders and sea-faring folk. It is logical to assume that among my husband’s forebears there may well have been one at least who ended up as a lascar!

Watch this site for the maps to come…