I first arrived in Japan in the spring of ’84 to take up a job I had got while completing my doctorate on 18th century English literature at Edinburgh University. I had been hired as a “Guest Professor of English” by a new university located in a fishing village in northern Shikoku. Shikoku is one of Japan’s four main islands, but it is also the smallest, the most rural and, at that time – before the construction of bridges linking it to Honshu and Kyushu – the most remote.
I recently released my first fantasy novel, 𝘌𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘦𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘋𝘳𝘢𝘨𝘰𝘯𝘴, and I would love to share how this book came to be. It has been a long journey for this first novel in the Awakening series, but so many aspects of my culture, my personal life, and my journey as a writer have come into play so that 𝘌𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘦𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘋𝘳𝘢𝘨𝘰𝘯𝘴 really feels like an appendage of myself.
Colorful characters experience a week of hell while Los Angeles is baking in a heat wave where the temperature hovers around 107 degrees. The temperature isn’t the only disruption in LA though. Dead people and animals are coming back to life. Money disappears. A vicious giant shoves a cop’s face into a tank full of…
When you look at a picture, do you just see the obvious? Or are you one of those people who dig beneath the surface to find out what is hidden underneath? Do you ask ‘what if’ questions about what is in the picture? Asking questions and digging beneath what is plainly seen is a great…
