Rethinking A Decision Made for My Second Egyptian #PNR Book

I don’t really have mistakes to report on my first book, Priestess of the Nile, although I’m sure when I eventually get the rights back, I’ll revise it with all the many things I’ve learned since writing the story in 2011. Seven years of writing more books and interacting with great editors and getting better at craft issues have to make a difference.

But overall, I remain pretty happy with the story and with it being my first published title. I will forevermore be in love with that cover - thank you, Carina Press and Frauke of Croco Designs!

Where I do think I went a bit wrong was with the second book in that Gods of Egypt series, Warrior of the Nile. I do a TON of research, all the time, into various aspects of ancient Egypt, but for this book, I veered off the track in the hero’s backstory in my opinion. I made him the last survivor of a mountain tribe that had its own gods and myths (conveniently created by me to fit my story), although since he was adopted by Pharaoh’s family at a young age, he also subscribed to the Egyptian beliefs. Indeed, the entire book revolves around a demand made by the goddess Nephthys and her personal involvement in the quest.

In fact, however, much of how the book’s plot is resolved ties back to this personal belief system the hero Khenet retains. There’s a key scene in a ruined temple belonging to an ancient goddess predating Egypt, again all from my own inventive brain. There’s another pivotal moment where Khenet receives a bit of help from his tribe’s god, fulfilling a prophecy. And then there are these jewels….

Now if I’d been writing fantasy, nothing wrong with creating and injecting all kinds of cool new mythos and lore and etc.

Sobek - photo is Author's Own

But I really try to tell these stories from the standpoint that the gods exist and interact in the daily life circa 1550 BCE the way the ancient Egyptians believed they did, and very much wanted them to do. I feel the success of the later books in the series revolves around that key aspect. Not in taking giant departures and left turns from the overall Egyptian culture. (Liberties and conscious anachronisms, yes. Wholesale invention of new stuff – no.)  So to me, book two rings bit false now, like a brass bell in a lineup of silver ones. Not the same tone. I haven’t repeated that ‘mistake’. I find a way to make my plots happen much more concisely within the ancient Egyptian framework. They had such a complex civilization and belief system to match.

Don't get me wrong - I like the book and my hero, I love some of the 'Egyptian' elements in it wildly, like Lady Tuya's visit to the goddess Isis...I just think I moved away from what's at the core of my Gods of Egypt series by injecting a fantasy side story that had no roots in anything the Egyptians believed.

I’m not writing historicals. I am writing paranormal elements but I’ve always felt with Warrior I went too far away from what keeps me (and my readers) grounded in the Land of the Pharaohs as I visualize it.

(And with apologies to the very co-operative and supportive Carina Press Art Department staff at the time, the cover for Warrior - which was not done by Frauke - was just never my favorite of the series, for...reasons. Although some aspects of it are very cool!)

I've been self publishing the Gods of Egypt series since Warrior was released (up to seven books now!)  but I'll always be SO grateful to Carina Press for launching my career.

Cover Reveal and Excerpt LADY OF THE NILE

I was excited to do a cover reveal this week for my next paranormal romance, set in ancient Egypt. I hadn’t written one in quite a while and it was fun to dive back into my version of 1550 BCE! I also have a new scifi romance coming in November – more on that next week.

Here’s the story:

Tuya, a high ranking lady-in-waiting at Pharaoh’s court, lives a life of luxury, pageantry and boredom. Khian, a brave and honorable officer from the provinces temporarily re-assigned to Thebes, catches her eye at a gold of valor ceremony. As the pair are thrown together by circumstances, she finds herself unaccountably attracted to this man so unlike the haughty nobles she’s used to. But a life with Khian would mean leaving the court and giving up all that she’s worked so hard to attain. As she goes about her duties, Tuya struggles with her heart’s desires.

When Tuya is lured into a dangerous part of Thebes by her disgraced half-brother and kidnapped by unknown enemies of Egypt, Khian becomes her only hope. Pharaoh assigns him to bring the lady home.

Aided by the gods, Khian races into the desert on the trail of the elusive kidnappers, hoping to find Tuya before it’s too late. Neither of them has any idea of the dark forces arrayed against them, nor the obstacles to be faced. An ancient evil from the long gone past wants to claim Tuya for its own purposes and won’t relinquish her easily.

Can Khian find her in time? Will he and his uncanny allies be able to prevent her death? And if the couple escapes and reaches safety, what of their fledgling romance?

The excerpt:

Facing down the attacking Hyksos hordes at the Meribe Pass had been easier in many ways than preparing to meet a grateful Pharaoh to receive the reward for not accepting defeat. Captain Khian walked the line of his small troop murmuring encouragement, straightening a sword here and making a joke there, anything to lighten the men’s tension as they waited outside the ceremonial chamber for their moments under Pharaoh’s eye. It wasn’t often that common soldiers had the chance to stand in front of the Living God who ruled Egypt. The idea was terrifying.

At last the scribe touched his elbow. “You can march in now, captain.”

He nodded, gave his soldiers one final, critical inspection. “We’ll do the Jackal Nome proud, men.”

Khian set the pace, walking behind the young scribe, keeping his proud military bearing, not looking to the right or the left but focusing on the glittering dais where Pharaoh’s golden throne sat and the Great One himself waited to honor them. He might be only a landholder, commissioned to fight in the war against the invaders, rather than one of the career officers, and his men might be farmers in their daily lives, but by the gods, they’d held that damned pass and saved the day for Egypt. Pride for what his troops had accomplished in battle filled his heart and pushed aside trepidation over being in a completely foreign environment now. He just wanted to get through the ceremony without disgracing himself or his men in front of the ruler.

The scribe had them line up off to the side, awaiting their moment with Pharaoh, who was still speaking with a group of ambassadors. “Your name will be called and then move forward in front of the throne. Salute and stand at attention.”

“We’ll do as you instruct.” Khian clenched his hand on the hilt of his sword. He gazed across the chamber while he waited, taking in the crowd of courtiers attending the audience. For the most part the nobles, officers and functionaries were a blur of painted faces, fine clothes and elaborate jewelry but one woman caught his attention. She sat near the queen, so was obviously high ranking, but her expression was sweet rather than haughty and she stared at him as if trying to give him encouragement. Could she tell he was nervous about committing an inadvertent error of royal protocol? The lady smiled, plying her ostrich feather fan flirtatiously. He made a slight bow to her, before he abruptly remembered where he was.

Ridiculous as it might seem, he felt as if he had a friend here.

Boredom had been weighing on Tuya all afternoon. She’d sat through many audiences at the court of Pharaoh Nat-re-Akhte and this one was no different—newly arrived dignitaries to greet, a few issues needing  Pharaoh’s judgment, gold of valor to be awarded to a deserving soldier or two. In her five years as chief lady-in-waiting to the Royal Wife, Tuya had seen all variations.

Pharaoh would present the gold of valor next, and Tuya found herself glancing at the assembled soldiers. The officer captured her attention instantly. Something about his face drew her gaze. He had the look of a man going into combat and she guessed his unfamiliarity with royal protocol and the customs at court might lie at the heart of his tension. Or he was worried for his men that they’d manage the moments under Pharaoh’s scrutiny with honor. Direct attention from the living god was a frightening thing to most people.  She wished she could take the officer aside for a moment and reassure him that Pharaoh was a kind man, a soldier himself in fact, and would most likely be tolerant of any minor breaches in protocol from overawed rural troops.

The captain was looking at the crowd now, as he waited, and when his attention turned to her, she smiled and tried to project encouraging thoughts for him. It doesn’t matter how the court perceives you, only Pharaoh’s opinion counts with the gods.

The Best of Both Worlds For Me

This week’s topic is about doing worldbuilding for the pleasure of doing it, as I understand the guidelines.

I write in two very different worlds – ancient Egypt and the far future. (I also have one fantasy romance out, The Captive Shifter, but as yet I haven’t written enough there to really discuss today. Although yes, I have massive worldbuilding in my head.)

Ancient Egypt is a very well established world, with oodles of research out there to revel in and draw from, and gorgeous artifacts galore, some of which I’ve seen with my own eyes and marveled at. I have multiple book shelves full of tomes about ancient Egypt – everything from translated love poems to scholarly treatises on one tomb by itself -  and I love doing the research. There are so many more stories and story possibilities than I could use in a lifetime.

 I picked my era, which is around 1550 BCE, when the Egyptians drove out the Hyksos and embarked upon an age of expansion and stability in the New Kingdom. I invented my pharaoh to allow myself more latitude in the stories I could tell, although he’s based on several real rulers of the time.  My added element is the fact that I have the Egyptian gods and goddesses involved in daily life the way the Egyptian believed and hoped they were. My readers have told me that I make them feel as if they were in ancient Egypt, despite the fact I have this paranormal or fantasy element going on, and I also commit certain deliberate anachronisms to make my books work better and sound plausible to the modern reader who may not be immersed in all the research about the time. (Not writing actual historical where every detail is expected to be 100% accurate.)  I have a page devoted to this on my webpage in fact. As an example, Egyptian deben wasn’t actual money per se, no coins but more of a concept of relative value, but my characters deal in actual money.

I really enjoy trying to fill in the blanks left for us by the elaborate tomb paintings and the artifacts, to figure out and portray what daily life might have been like for a lady in Pharaoh’s court or living on a country estate. How was it to take a ride in a war chariot and go so much faster than you’d ever moved in your entire life? What did a priestess of the Crocodile God do all day, running her temple?

In short, I have a heck of a wonderful time dwelling in ancient Egypt on my terms, telling my story and then returning to my own modern life.

Pretty much any topic I have questions on, I can find at least a few kernels of useful information in the research materials or online and then let my imagination soar.

Now the science fiction romances are a different story and there I created my interstellar society, the Sectors, from scratch.

Except not really, because my chosen author theory is that we as humans are going to remain pretty much the same, whether in the past or thousands of years into the future. I really resonated with the well-worn, lived in, used spaceship type of universe depicted in the “Aliens’ movies and the early “Star Wars.” I also loved Andre Norton’s science fiction and the structural set up she had going on. 

My Sectors are kind of similar to all of these influences, although I’ve added elements of my own including various alien civilizations both friend and foe. The longer I write Sectors novels, the more I add to the world building. I do have some secrets that only I know, which may or may not ever be revealed in a novel, but which give me the high level context to write the stories.

So I have fun in either universe I’m inhabiting – Egypt of the Pharaohs or the far future in the big galaxy. Currently I have my next Sectors novel at the developmental editor and I’m about midway through writing the first draft of my next Gods of Egypt novel. I'm living the best of both worlds!