I have told many people that enjoyed Architect: Book 1 of Calamity’s Window that it was simply me getting all the necessary sand in the sandbox in order to build sandcastles in Books 2 & 3. All of the characters you know, love, and hate will face their own trials both in the Middle and across Halja. Many of them represent varying aspects of our own society as well as the temptations and problems we face daily, just on much grander and imaginative scales. I finished Chapter 8 of Book 2 last Thursday night, and I have ten more chapters to write that I plan to have finished by the end of this year. This installment of Calamity’s Window, entitled Matron, is MUCH bigger, more exciting, and much grander in its scope. It is also quite a bit more philosophical and reflective, given that the reader has already been given access into the minds of most of the characters. The Ashen Man and Mother are two diametrically opposed entities who have much of their backstory and motivations revealed to the reader early on in Matron. As I have been writing, I have grown particularly close to Mother and what she represents. The Ashen Man, in his sinister, obsessive hunt for Mother, has continued his descent into madness and continues to remind me of the wild, instinctive, predatory violence seen in the animal kingdom and other places outside our (relatively) peaceful, democratic cultures. There will be confrontation and there will be resolution, at least partially… Prepare to have questions answered with more questions and the true nature of the more reticent inhabitants of Halja revealed.
HUGE thank you to Blake Chambers, who did the cover art for Book 1 as well. Blake is an incredibly talented artist with a flair for sci-fi and fantasy, plus he is just a really great human. Currently, he works full time at Mom’s Tattoos in Austin, Texas. Go check him out if you need some good work done!