With the finished draft of my next book at the editor, it’s finally time for it to be promoted from “Unnamed WIP“ (Work In Progress) to “Named WIP.” Not a huge promotion, but we all have to start somewhere.
Those of you following my FaceBook have probably already guessed the time and setting of this book. For those that haven’t, here is a short summary of the upcoming work.
Constantinople, 1097.
As an insignificant thief in the underbelly of Constantinople, Daniel wants to matter, to be known. After a botched job forces him to flee the city, he is swept up among the thousands of crusaders as they depart for the Holy Land on their mission to retake Jerusalem. Their first obstacle: Nicaea, an impenetrable city of stone walls and high towers, impervious to assault and immune to siege.
Now a fledgling servant to a gruff Scottish knight, Daniel struggles to fit in among Saracens and Crusaders, princes and priests. Will he find his worth as he learns to live in this new world of blood and death, or will he succumb to the storm of war?
I must admit, I struggled mightily to come up with a title for this one. Then I stumbled upon an account of the Crusaders’ time at Nicaea in a work written by the historian Albert of Aachen (otherwise known as Albert of Aix). He was describing events after a battle in front of the walls of Nicaea, and said, “When the storm of this first battle had settled around Nicaea…” and then he went on to describe other events, some of which are covered in my book and so I won’t mention them here. However, it was this imagery of battle as a storm that stuck with me and finally gave me my title.
Storm of War
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