Shelley Kinsman read and offered critiques on an early draft, not only strengthening the manuscript but giving me the confidence to publish it—I value her opinion tremendously, and she didn’t hate the book so I knew it couldn’t be that bad.
Lilith Saintcrow for blurbing the book and believing Livi (and me). There are insufficient words for how much her support has meant to me.
My platonic murder wife, Dina James, permitted me use of the Ferrari metaphor. I hope I did it justice and thank her again for telling me I was a Ferrari when I needed it. She is also “Dr. Dina”, whom I run things by every time I do something horrible to my characters. When the zombie apocalypse comes, at least I might know how to stitch up a wound.
Agnes at the Church-key Pub (formerly The Stinking Rose) brought me nachos and drinks while I labored over this book for months—best place to write, hands-down, and best writer fuel.
My mum loved this book from the moment she read it three years ago, and I’m pleased to finally hand her a polished, published copy of it.
Aunt Judy also read a copy three years ago, and sent the print book back to me with a note about how much she enjoyed it, and how she was looking forward to Odin’s Spear. It still hurts to think about how she never got to read the rest of Livi’s adventures—every time I finish a zero draft of something, my first urge is to send it to her. I miss you, Aunt Judy.
Finally, many thanks to my Patrons of Snark. You have done so much for me with your monthly support. I hope you enjoy this book and the many more to come.
Author’s Note
Thank you for purchasing and reading Solomon’s Seal.
Livi popped up in my head April 2012. The series I was currently writing, though I loved it, wasn’t selling, and I wanted to try something a little more high concept. Tomb Raider meets Gilmore Girls seemed to fit the bill.
What I wasn’t prepared for was the sheer amount of research it would take, nor how taxing it was mentally to write outside of my comfort zone. Add onto that the character of Dale West, who continually holds all the cards and doesn’t tell me what’s going on until the very end, and it seems to take me at least a year to write and polish each book. But I love them—the characters are among my favorites, and some days a writer just needs to settle into a world with a heroine who would jump in a dragon’s mouth.
Besides the character of Livi, who is near and dear to my heart, two others mean a great deal to me.
Her best friend Pru came about, first, because I was tired of seeing urban fantasy heroines with no female friends (which I am guilty of writing as well)—I wanted a book where women are friends, not rivals, and create their own family. Second, Pru exists because I wanted to see a disabled character in an urban fantasy novel who a. didn’t magically get better, and b. wasn’t given super human abilities because of it. Multiple sclerosis is a terrible, scary disorder that my very close friend battles every day, and I frequently participate in the MS Walk to raise money for research. If you have some extra pennies, please consider donating them to your local Multiple Sclerosis Society. Although Pru has the same disorder as my friend, she is in absolutely no way based on her (she is, in fact, the opposite of my friend). As the books progress, her disease will progress, though I’m hoping together we will find a real world cure that I can steal for fiction before long.
And then, of course...there is West.
Before I started writing him, I knew next to nothing about North Korea. I didn’t even know he was from the north until halfway through the book when he whispered it in my ear. Suddenly he made a lot more sense, particularly the more I read about the country.
There are a handful of books translated into English written by North Korean defectors who survived the “labour camps” and their horrendous conditions. NK uses an archaic “three generations” rule, meaning if you’re caught trying to escape, speaking against the government, or any number of “offences”, you and up to three generations of your family will be shipped off to the camp. Children born in the camp remain there, often worked to death and severely abused. West came from a camp for irredeemables, where he was born and would’ve died had he not escaped, considered part of the joktae kyechung or “hostile” caste. I’ve written a novella prequel partially from his POV as well as some of Solomon’s Seal, and both gave me nightmares just learning all he went through. He’s always present in my head much the way the character of Zara Lain (from Demons of Oblivion) is.
In the west, we’ve turned North Korea into a joke, laughing at the eccentricities of the country’s leaders without fully acknowledging the horror the average citizen goes through. I encourage readers to expand their understanding of what the people endure there by looking into some of the biographies of defectors. There are a couple of organizations out there working to resettle NK refugees who are always in need of help.
So here’s the sitch with the Livi Talbot series: I know the arcs of each book and I’m gonna need ten of them to tell this complete story. That’s a lot of books, and several of them have cliffhangers, and a lot of things can happen between books one and ten. I have been through cancelling two series now (River Wolfe and Demons of Oblivion) due to low sales and illegal distribution. Since becoming chronically ill, my stress level dictates what I do and do not publish, so I’m committing to publishing two sequels to Solomon’s Seal, no matter what, to see how they do.
“How they do” is fairly subjective. I don’t have a sales threshold, it’s more a question of, “Do people like these books?” and “Are they paying for them or stealing them?” I can’t afford to keep up a series that isn’t selling enough for me to pay at least some of my bills. There are so many exciting things coming up in this series (I am dying for people to read the fourth, Shiva’s Bow), so I’m hopeful it’ll run for a while.
Again, thank you for reading. If urban fantasy is your thing and you haven’t checked it out yet, the five-book Demons of Oblivion series is now complete, and I have YA paranormal books beginning with River.
Look for Livi Talbot’s adventures to continue with Odin’s Spear, tentatively scheduled for first quarter 2017, and hopefully Zheng’s Tomb later in the year!
Livi Talbot’s adventures continue in...
Odin’s Spear
ALL’S FAIR IN SIBLING RIVALRY AND WAR.
After nearly losing her family and her life, Olivia Talbot is trying to leave the world of supernatural artifact hunting behind. But an adrenaline junkie unsuited for a 9 to 5 job can’t hide herself forever, especially when deadly operative Dale West comes knocking with off-book work for his covert organization.
It’ll be “easy”, West says—just a trip to the museum. But a deranged former solider is seeking to reunite the pieces of Gungnir—spear of the Norse god Odin—which is capable of starting war, and this job is much bigger than anyone has let on.
Followed by the dogged son of a tabloid mogul, competing with her archeologist older brother, and still struggling to trust West against her better judgement, Livi will venture into an ancient underwater city in the Mediterranean to stop the dawn of a new war. But the spear of a god has plans for them all, and power not even she might be able to withstand.
About the Author
Skyla Dawn Cameron has been writing approximately forever.
Her early storytelling days were spent acting out strange horror/fairy tales with the help of her many dolls, and little has changed except that she now keeps those stories on paper. She signed her first book contract at age twenty-one for River, a unique werewolf tale, which was released to critical and reader praise alike and won her the 2007 EPPIE Award for Best Fantasy. She now has multiple series on the go to keep her busy.
Skyla is a fifth generation crazy cat lady who lives in southern Ontario, where she writes full time, works as a freelance designer, stabs people with double pointed knitting needles, is an avid gamer, and watches Buffy reruns. If she ever becomes a grownup, she wants to run her own Irish pub, as well as become world dictator.
You can visit her on the web at www.skyladawncameron.com. When she’s not writing or being glared at by cats, she’s probably on Twitter. You should ping @skyladawn and tell her to get back to work.
Want to Keep Up with New Releases?
Sign up for Skyla’s mailing list options by visiting her website at http://www.skyladawncameron.com/newsletter/newsletter
You can also follow her on Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com/skyladawn
Occasionally she can be found at Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/SkylaDawnCameron and Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/skyladawnc
Connect with other readers (and catch sneak peaks at what she’s working on) at her Facebook fan group, Alchemy Red: https://www.facebook.com/groups/AlchemyRed/
For exclusive content, sneak peeks, and free books, you can support her work directly at Patreon as a Patron of Snark: http://www.patreon.com/skyladawncameron
Solomon's Seal Page 33