Introduction to Mâvarin

Welcome to Mâvarin, where circumstance, choices and magic can turn a person into someone very different. Human to tengrem, villager to royalty, friend to foe, daughter to mother, magician to trader... the one thing you can count on in Mâvarin is that people change, one way or another.

The question of what makes us who we are lies at the heart of my trilogy, Heirs of Mâvarin, and the trilogy that follows it, Mages of Mâvarin. Mâvarin is an "otherworld" equivalent of the Eastern United States. It is a place where magic works (for some people and against others), but literal monsters didn't exist until a generation ago. Most of all, it is the home of Rani Fost and his two best friends: Del Merden and Del's twin sister Crel. Their respective journeys have more to do with self-discovery than with surviving magic and treachery, finding a lost king or getting back to where they need to be - although there's plenty of that, too.

The first trilogy, Heirs of Mâvarin, was under contract with a publisher, which has since expired. The search begins shortly for another publisher. One way or another, all three volumes should be available in ebook and dead tree editions before 2019 is over.

A prequel novelette, "The Boy Who Saw," appears in the new anthology Beyond Tucson: Adventures in the Multiverse, now available in electronic and trade paper editions. I also have a science fiction novelette, "The Jace Letters," in the same anthology.

More books about Mâvarin are in various stages of preparation. Mages of Mâvarin is about 95% written, which is to say that I'm still tinkering with it. (Leonardo DaVinci said, "Art is never finished, only abandoned.") I've also written a few scenes for the prequel, To Rule Mâvarin, and for a further sequel, tentatively titled The Mâvarin Revolutions. (The weekly serial Mall of Mâvarin, which appeared in two of my blogs in 2005, is most likely apocryphal.) I am determined that these books, my life's work, will be published. These characters deserve no less.

This site is perpetually under construction, with a one-person crew that seldom shows up for work. It will eventually include a better map, more background information on the setting and history of Mâvarin, and more information on the writing of the books. It will also be updated with publication info as the books go to press. The heart of the site is the character pages, which can be accessed below from a gallery of character drawings by the well-known sf/fantasy artist Sherlock. Some of these have apocryphal letters or journal entries by the characters, which do not appear in the books themselves.

• The Boy Who Saw - a prequel, not intended to be the first volume read. Appears in the anthology Beyond Tucson: Adventures in the Multiverse (published October 2018). 40 years before the events of The Tengrem Sword and about 20 years before the events of To Rule Mâvarin, it follows the adventures of two young orphans, Fabi and Hasi, as they try to reach the Citadel College of Magic after the sudden death of Fabi's parents.
  
• To Rule Mâvarin (also called A Prince of Mâvarin) - a prequel, not intended to be the first volume read. I've only written about a chapter of it so far. It will detail the troubled relationships between Lore (later Lormarte), her sister Jere, the doomed future queen Genva, and young Prince Jor.
  
• Heirs of Mâvarin. Originally intended as a 170,000 word novel, this is now a 209,240 word trilogy, and is intended to be read first. When Rani Fost encounters a tengrem and disappears, Del Merden sets off to find and help his best friend. His twin sister Crel is then uprooted from her home and sent to Thâlemar, Mâvarin's capital city. While on their separate journeys, each twin comes to realize that they aren't the people they thought they were. Faced with arrest, poisoning and other dangers, they must adapt to their new identities, learn to distinguish friend from foe - even when the answer keeps changing - and quite possibly restore the kingdom in the process. The three novels are
  • The Tengrem Sword
  • The Road and the City, and
  • Castle in the Swamp.
    
• Mages of Mâvarin is also a trilogy. It is about 95% written, and currently being revised. A young mage adept, Darsuma, comes to Mâvarin and befriends Rani before the evil influence of her dead mother causes her to very nearly destroy the lives of most of our major characters. The three volumes are as follows:
• An Adept in Mâvarin
• Another Mâvarin
• Return to Mâvarin
• The Mâvarin Revolutions - is intended to be the last book (or possibly trilogy) in the series, although this could change at some point. Like the prequel, it is in the very early stages of being written. The government of Mâvarin is destabilized in two worlds as one monarch dies, and others are distrusted due to their relationships with friends and loved ones.