Risuko

by David Kudler

  I must of course thank my middle school English teacher, who happens also to be my mother, Jackie Kudler. She read more drafts of Risuko than anyone (well, almost anyone—see below). Her fine eye for detail and narrative through-line was as helpful now as it was when I was thirteen—and much more welcome.

  My wife Maura Vaughn was on a literary quest of her own through much of the time that I was writing this novel; her book on text analysis for actors, The Anatomy of a Choice. Nonetheless, she read every rewrite of each chapter, providing her thoughtful insight, her patience, and her astonishing sense of story to the task, day after day. Joseph Campbell says in The Hero with a Thousand Faces that each would-be hero has the assistance of magical helpers as he or she wanders the indescribably difficult path of adventure. I know who my magical helper was and is, and I am honored and blessed to have her for a partner.

  Last and greatest is my debt to my own two daughters, Sasha and Julia. They were my inspiration; they were also my first audience. When I began writing Risuko, they were young—in Julia’s case, too young to read the book on her own. Nonetheless, I read new chapters to each of them, even once they had grown well past the age when they needed to be read to. They are now both young women, wonders in their own rights, with amazing futures before them. I hope that I have captured half of their spirit in Murasaki and her friends.

  Also from Stillpoint/Atalanta

  Winter Tales

  The Seven Gods of Luck

  Shlomo Travels to Warsaw

  How Raven Brought Back the Light

  by

  David Kudler & Maura Vaughn

  From Stillpoint/Prometheus

  Science Fiction & Fantasy

  The Law and the Heart by Kenneth Schneyer

  Exploring the seams where humanity and technology, society and individuality intersect, thirteen tales of near and far futures that will amuse, amaze, and unsettle

  The Keeping Time Trilogy by Heather Albano:

  Timepiece (Coming Summer, 2016)

  Timekeeper(Coming Autumn, 2016)

  Timebound (Coming Summer, 2017)

  Mindbending steampunk where time travel meets Waterloo meets Jane Austen meets Frankestein meets the law of unintended consequences

  David Kudler is not afraid of heights. He just has a healthy respect for depths. “I’m as surprised as anyone,” he says, “that I’ve written a book featuring a girl who loves to be as high up in the air as possible.”

  An editor and author, he lives just north of the Golden Gate Bridge with his wife, actor/teacher/author Maura Vaughn, their author-to-be daughters, and their (apparently) non-literary cats.

  He is the founder, publisher, and editor-in-chief for Stillpoint Digital Press. Since 1999, he has overseen the publications program of the Joseph Campbell Foundation, for which he has edited three posthumous volumes of Campbell’s previously unpublished work (Pathways to Bliss, Myths of Light and Sake & Satori) and managed the publication of over sixty print, ebook, print, audio, and video titles, including the third edition of the seminal Hero with a Thousand Faces. He is honored to serve as the vice-president for the Bay Area Independent Publisher’s Association (BAIPA). He also blogs on books and publishing for Huffington Post.

  Risuko is his first novel. His children’s picture books The Seven Gods of Luck, Shlomo Travels to Warsaw, and How Raven Brought Back the Light (all co-written with his wife Maura Vaughn) are available as the Winter Tales. He is currently at work on Bright-Eyes, the second book in the Seasons of the Sword series, as well as six Kunoichi Companion Tales.

  For more information about David Kudler and his writing, visit

  Risuko.Net

  You can also follow him on social media:

  twitter.com/dkudler • davidkudler.tumblr.com

  facebook.com/risuko.books • davidkudler.pinterest.com

  davidkudler.livejournal.com