The Golden Princess - A Novel of the Change

Zusatztext Praise for S.M. Stirling and his Novels of the Change  “Absorbing.”— San Diego Union-Tribune “[A] richly realized story of swordplay and intrigue.”— Entertainment Weekly “Nobody wrecks a world better than S. M. Stirling! and nobody does a better job of showing that people remain people! with all their high points and low! in the wreckage.”—Harry Turtledove! New York Times bestselling author of Supervolcano: Things Fall Apart “Vivid…Stirling eloquently describes a devastated! mystical world that will appeal to fans of traditional fantasy as well as post-apocalyptic SF.”— Publishers Weekly (starred review) “Stirling is a perfect master of keep-them-up-all-night pacing! possibly the best in American SF! quite capable of sweeping readers all the way to the end.”— Booklist (starred review) “A highly complex fictional universe with loads of characters and political intrigue.”— Kirkus Reviews “[A] vivid portrait of a world gone insane…Full of bloody action! exposition that expands character and telling detail that makes it all seem very real.”— Statesman Journal (Salem! OR) “Stirling has blazed a clear comet trail across his post-apocalyptic landscape that illuminates both the best and the worst of which our species is capable.”— Science Fiction Weekly Informationen zum Autor S. M. Stirling is the author of many science fiction and fantasy novels! including the Novels of the Change ( The Given Sacrifice ! Lord of Mountains ! The Tears of the Sun ! The High King of Montival ! The Sword of the Lady ! The Scourge of God ! and The Sunrise Lands ). ALSO BY S. M. STIRLING ACKNOWLEDGMENTS CHAPTER ONE Near the nemed of Dun Barstow County of Napa, Crown Province of Westria (Formerly Napa County, California) High Kingdom of Montival (Formerly western North America) April 30th, Change Year 46/2044 AD Órlaith Arminger Mackenzie bore the first unlit torch forward to her father’s pyre as the sun touched the low mountains to the west. All I want is to crawl alone into somewhere dark and greep like a little lass, she thought. Or run to my mother that we may weep together. But I’ve more than twenty summers now, Mother is far away in the north building Dún na Síochána , I’m his heir. I must do this for him. His big long-fingered hands were crossed on the hilt of the Sword of the Lady as he lay on the bier, shapely though scarred and battered. He was dressed plainly in the simple kilt and shirt and plaid, ankle-boots and knee-hose of the people who’d borne him. There was an inhuman peace now to the face that had been so lively with the play of thought and feeling, and the golden torque around his neck hid the wound that had killed him. Rudi Mackenzie—High King Artos—had been a tall man, still broad-shouldered and narrow-hipped in his forty-seventh year; his red-gold hair held no trace of gray, or his short-cropped beard, though there were deep lines beside his eyes. It was as if he were withdrawing before her eyes, from the living man who had sired her to the sculptured image of the King who’d forged a realm that stretched over half a continent. From the light of common day into the time of legends. At least she was among Mackenzie clansfolk, mostly, so they wouldn’t expect her not to weep. Following the steps of ritual helped, she found. The tears trickled down her face, but her voice was steady as she laid the torch at her feet and raised her arms in her faith’s gesture of prayer: “He was High King and father to all the land, but to me he was my da,” she said. “This memory I give, and it is my first of him: my mother lets me go and I run stumping towards him and he sweeps me up, high, so high, and he laughing up at me with the w...

Product details

• Authors: S. M. Stirling
• Publisher: Penguin Books USA
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Release: 02.09.2014, delayed
• EAN: 9780451417336
• ISBN: 978-0-451-41733-6
• No. of pages: 432
• Series: Change Series; Change Series
• Subject: Fiction > Science fiction, fantasy