It’s wet and drizzly and cool here in Oregon’s Willamette Valley — in other words, perfect reading weather. I’ve posted the prologue and first chapter of my latest fantasy, A Tale of Two Giants, over at the Rymadoon site. If it’s wet and drizzly and cool where you are (or even if it’s not, I suppose), I hope you take a few minutes and read it.
What is the Rymadoon site? Well, since much of what I write is not really appropriate for younger readers, I wanted an easy way to help kids (and parents, too, I suppose) know which of my books they might find interesting. Of course — and this is directed at you, young Johnny — you are perfectly capable of making up your own mind about what you want to read, and I certainly won’t stand in your way. But then I can say I did my part in helping to protect the innocence of youth. Think of it as a Surgeon’s General Warning.
(Part of this might stem from the fact that I’ve already gotten a fair amount of criticism from some quarters claiming that my first novel, The Last Great Getaway of the Water Balloon Boys, full as it is of inappropriate stuff, is corrupting young minds all over the world. So far, however, there hasn’t been quite enough of this criticism to drum up any book burnings or even a school library expulsion or two, but a writer can dream. Believe me, nothing would please me more than to know my book had been banned.)
Anyway, I’ll be adding to the Rymadoon site from time to time, both with books set in Rymadoon and other books for kids. And what is Rymadoon, you say? Well, I actually wrote a poem about it, which I put at the beginning of every book set there:
THE LOST LANDS OF RYMADOON
Fellow traveler, have you ever journeyed to the Lost Lands of Rymadoon?
Have you ever been to Morfen Sley or Ilia or the caverns of Mana Thune?
Have you ever been to Nogero or Willow Isle or the deserts of Giant Bone?
Or perhaps, like others, you’ve discovered a Lost Land all on your own.
Dear traveler, you must be warned of what awaits you in a world like Rymadoon.
There are towering peaks and deep chasms and great cities that now lay in ruin.
There are slumbering dragons and hungry giants and soldiers who never die.
There are even places in the Lost Lands where you never have to say goodbye.
Oh traveler, I fear this will not be your last sojourn to the world with the shadow moon.
I fear you will plunge into a hole or creep through a cave or sing an enchanted tune.
I fear, like me, you will find your way back here, not eventually, not someday, but soon
For no warning or caution or even a rhyme can stop you from returning – to Rymadoon!