Stars of Darkover by Deborah J. Ross & Elisabeth Waters

Author:Deborah J. Ross & Elisabeth Waters
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: laran, Darkover, Short Stories, Dry Towns, ESP
Publisher: Marion Zimmer Bradley Literary Works Trust
Published: 2018-07-24T06:00:00+00:00

HOUSE OF FIFTEEN WIDOWS

by Kari Sperring

One of the trickiest challenges in writing nonhuman characters is portraying them as both alien and emotionally accessible to the reader. In “The Fountain’s Choice,” we saw a riyachiya through the eyes of another character. Here, British author Kari Sperring switches viewpoints to give us human characters, with all their strengths and vices, as seen by a riyachiya narrator. Immie’s simplicity and nonjudgmental loyalty illuminate the altogether human dilemmas of her world.

Kari Sperring grew up dreaming of joining the musketeers and saving France, only to discover that the company had been disbanded in 1776. Disappointed, she became a historian instead and as Kari Maund has written and published five books and many articles on Celtic and Viking history and co-authored a book on the history and real people behind her favorite novel, The Three Musketeers (with Phil Nanson). She’s been writing as long as she can remember and completed her first novel at the age of eight (twelve pages long and about ponies). She’s been a barmaid, a tax officer, a P.A. and a university lecturer, and has found that her fascinations, professional or hobby-level, feed and expand into her fiction. Living With Ghosts, her first novel, evolved from her love of France and its history, ghosts, mysteries, Celtic culture, strange magic, sharks, and sword-fights: The Grass King’s Concubine has even found a creative role for book-keeping. She lives in Cambridge, England, with her partner Phil (who helps design the sword-fights) and three very determined cats, who guarantee that everything she writes will have been thoroughly sat upon. She’s currently at work on her third and fourth novels at once, because she needs more complications in her life. She can be found at http://www.karisperring.com, on Facebook (Kari Sperring), Twitter (@karisperring) and on Live Journal as la_marquise_de_. She says she’s been reading and loving the Darkover series since she was thirteen and is delighted and honored to be allowed to write in this wonderful world.

My house has fifteen widows. They are Chrysa, Elena, Janet, Kathia, Laurenna, Lilias, Mikhela, Mirella, Moira, Patryce, Priscilla, Robina, Tessa, Valli, and me. Not all of us were once married, but Lady Laurenna says we are all widows because of Dom Justin, even me, and that all of us are sisters, even though Priscilla is old and half-blind and Lilias has not come to her woman-time. Even me and Valli, though no one is allowed to marry us because we are not really people, not like the others. Lady Laurenna is Lord of our house, because we have no menfolk anymore and because she is leronis, even though Domna Priscilla is the oldest and a proper lady because of being married to Dom Martin who was Dom Justin’s grandfather and Patryce is the strongest and Mikhela has laran, too, although she was not Tower-trained and so does Lady Mirella, but she does not talk since the bad days happened and I made Dom Justin die.

I did not mean to make him die, only to make him stop hurting my Lady and her sisters, but I did it wrong and he died.

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