Mushroom eBooks News

The Winged Man by Moyra Caldecott, set in Celtic Britain and Ancient Greece during the Olympic Games, this is the story of King Bladud, the legendary father of King Lear.

Previously availability of this great story has been limited, but it is now available in all the usual eBook formats immediately from eBookAd, Cyberread, eBookMall and Mobipocket, and will soon be available from Fictionwise, Amazon and hundreds of other ebookstores.

Here is the blurb:

To this day, throughout the ancient city of Bath, there exist statues and images of the man who was the legendary founder of the city, and the father of King Lear. A leper and a swineherd… a necromancer and a wise king… his memory lives on.

Restless at the royal court, the young Prince Bladud sets off to consult an oracle in the west country – a wild wooded place near a mysterious hot spring that gushes from a cave. There the priestess tells him that he will be a great king, and that one day he will fly like an eagle.

When he returns to his father’s hill-fort at Trinovantum, ancient London, Bladud’s head is full of magnificent dreams… until trickery entraps him in a loveless marriage. His unquenchable thirst for knowledge, sharpened by a mysterious experience at the burial mound of his forefathers, takes him away from his home and wife on a dangerous journey to faraway Greece. There he meets and falls in love with a woman who has appeared to him many times already in dreams and visions.

On returning to his own country, he finds his father dying and his wife conspiring with his brother to disinherit him. Then, found to be suffering from a disease believed to be leprosy, he is driven from the court and shunned by his people. In this dark time he becomes a swineherd. One day, he notices his pigs are free of sores after wallowing in hot mud. He tries the healing waters of Sul himself, is cured, and returns to claim his throne…

His was a golden age of wisdom and magic, where Otherworld beings mingle freely with the people of this world, and where swans and ravens and owls take on their own special mysterious significance.

Full of brilliant imagination, this colourful fantasy draws its strength and inspiration from the strange and beautiful realms of Celtic and Greek myth and legend.

The Tall Stones, the first book of The Guardians of the Tall Stones series, and one of Moyra Caldecott‘s best books, is now available in multiple formats from all the best ebookstores (see the list on the right — though there are many more). We had previously only published it as a Mobipocket title. It is considered one of the best esoteric novels of all time, and has been continuously in print since its first publication in 1977 (quite impressive in these days of short-lived “bestsellers”).

Here is the blurb:

The first of four novels set in Bronze Age Britain, a society focused around the great circles of Sacred Stones scattered across the landscape. It tells the story of a community threatened by the evil designs of Wardyke, a corrupt and ambitious priest, and its only defence, the courageous young psychic, Kyra. But to defend her community, Kyra must enter the forbidden circle of stones and call upon its unseen, mystical powers…

And this from the Introduction:

This is a story set in Bronze Age Britain, c.1500 BC, when the great circles of standing stones that were such a feature of the Neolithic Age were already more than a thousand years old, yet still in use as sacred temples. Hundreds of stone circles have been found throughout Britain, the most famous today being Avebury and Stonehenge in Wiltshire. That such a homogeneous culture flourished in communities so widely separated by dense and dangerous forests, mountains, and wild and stormy seas, is extraordinary.

The Tall Stones begins in a stone circle in Scotland where a young girl, Kyra, finds that she has psychic powers usually only possessed by the Priesthood. She is thrust into a situation of great danger in order to attempt to rescue her community threatened by a dark and menacing evil. She is forced to ‘spirit travel’ before she is ready, to seek the help of the mighty Lords of the Sun.

Go on, give it a try…

Etheldreda by Moyra Caldecott is now available much more widely and in the full range of our formats. All the usual eBookstores (see the list in the right-hand column) will be carrying it, whereas it could only previously be found at a couple of retailers. Samplers are available from the Etheldreda webpage.

The book is a fictionalized retelling of the life of Etheldreda, the seventh century Anglo-Saxon saint, written in the exciting and believable style for which Moyra Caldecott is so renowned. As one critic has said about her work: “…the author is so immersed in her subject that no trace of fantasising or contrivance is apparent. Like Joan Grant, she lives her work. Because it is so well done it is believable…” (The Glasgow Herald).

The blurb goes something like this…

Etheldreda, Princess of East Anglia, Queen of Northumbria and Abbess of Ely, was a remarkable woman who lived in restless, violent times when old beliefs were dying and new ones were struggling to emerge. Pagan clashed with Christian as the seven kingdoms of the Germanic tribes warred against each other and against the native Celts. Occasionally an uneasy peace was bought by the skilful use of the ‘diplomatic marriage’, and twice Etheldreda, though vowed to chastity, submitted to marriage for political reasons. When her second husband refused to accept the ‘arrangement’ between them, she fled south to the Island of Ely. But this is not just the story of a seventh-century Anglo-Saxon saint. It is about the general human struggle to comprehend the enigma of existence and to come to terms with Christ’s God, faced as we are by a violent and cruel world. This edition also contains several pages of chronology, genealogy, place names, notes and a map.

The eighth title, Fliers of Antares by Alan Burt Akers, in the long-running Saga of Dray Prescot is now published in multiple eBook formats. Many formats are available from eBookAd.com immediately, and the complete range of formats will be available from Fictionwise probably on Monday.

Here is the blurb from the book:

Dray Prescot, the Earthman who had been brought across interstellar space as the tool of the mysterious Star Lords, confronted his most baffling task while he was a hunted and harried wanderer of the continent of Havilfar. That task was to discover the means by which the aircraft of that continent’s most advanced civilization operated. Prescot is no scientist, but fulfill his task he must or he would never return to the princess and homeland he had won. So, for Dray Prescot there was but one course — with a whole continent against him, with time itself conspiring to balk him, the secrets of an unknown science must be made his…

Book seven of the excellent chronicles of Dray Prescot is now available from all the usual places online. Here is the blurb…

Never a man to leave something half done, Dray Prescot knew his task on the mysterious continent of Havilfar was far from completed. There were cruel conquerors to be overthrown, there was pursuit of the manhounds and their masters, and there was the dreaded arena. Could he survive the life of a gladiator against the killers and monsters of a spoiled queen — while the Star Lords waited for his mission to continue?

The sixth title in the Saga of Dray Prescot is now available from eBookAd.com and Mobipocket.com. The ebook will be available from most other retailers over the next few days. More information is available here.

This is the blurb from the book:

Would Dray Prescot be able to remain a prince of proud Vallia or would he become just another human victim of the hunters and manhounds of the mysterious Southern Continent? For that was the enigmatic fate that the Star Lords had suddenly confronted him with. They wanted someone freed from the terrified pack of human prey among whom Prescot found himself. But who it was and how it was to be done, they left to Dray to work out…

The fifth novel in Alan Burt Akers popular Dray Prescot series, Prince of Scorpio, is now available from Mobipocket.com, and will soon be available from Fictionwise.com and eReader.com. You can find out more here.

Here is the blurb…

Dray Prescot had fought long and hard through perilous lands to claim the hand of the heiress of the mighty Vallia. Yet, when finally he set foot in that long-sought empire, it was not as hero or noble… It was as an unknown, a mendicant, and finally as a condemned slave. For the combatant fates that had interfered continually with his quest on the planet of the twin suns of Antares had yet more tests for the man they had selected as their agent. But for Dray there was only one goal — already in sight — and he would not be turned aside any longer no matter what dangers Vallian intrigues and quasi-human mysteries may have in store for him. This edition contains maps and a glossary.

I got my new laptop yesterday, but I wasn’t happy with the font display. I turned on ClearType, but it wasn’t much better. So I did a search on Google, and found a ClearType Tuner provided by Microsoft to make your fonts look great. This is highly recommended, especially for reading ebooks on a PC or Laptop. It only appears to work with Windows XP, but there may be similar features or utilities for other platforms. Here is a snippet from the first step of the process (there are only three easy steps):

ClearType Tuner Step 1: Turn on Windows XP ClearType

With Windows XP, ClearType delivers improved font display quality over traditional forms of font smoothing or anti-aliasing. ClearType improves readability on color LCD displays with a digital interface, such as those in laptops and high-quality flat panel displays. Readability on CRT screens can also be somewhat improved.

Technorati Tags: ebooks, e-books, xp, readability

If your favourite eBook retailer is eBooks.com, I am sure you will be very pleased to hear that most of Mushroom eBooks’ titles are now available directly from them. Any missing titles will be added over the next few days.

I was saddened to learn of the death of Ken Bulmer (aka Alan Burt Akers, among many other pseudonyms). He passed away peacefully in his sleep on 16th December 2005. He had been suffering from a series of strokes which had robbed him of his speech and his ability to write. He was 84. My thoughts and condolences go out to his family and friends.

I am sorry to say that I never met Ken, but I feel that I knew him to some extent through his written words, and through which, I hope, his memory will live on.

And there’s more… Swordships of Scorpio, the fourth ebook telling the exploits of everyone’s hero, Dray Prescot, is published today by Mushroom eBooks. You can buy it and download it from mobipocket.com immediately, and from other online retailers over the next few days.

Here is the blurb:

What does a man do when fate makes him the protector of the royal head of the land of his enemies? If it is Dray Prescot, Earthman on Antares, he sets aside his quest to do his duty. His duty was to reach Vallia and his princess Delia and help her claim her throne. His duty was to defend Vallia’s ancient foe and place its rightful heir on its throne — sworn to attack Vallia. So when the third force, the pirate fleets known as the swordships came between the two contending demands, Dray sees that only by following his own personal star could the contradiction be resolved.