Some of you will remember a character in The Singing of the Dead named Paula. Paula’s day job was to research dirt on political candidates, but her real job was writing novels, and she was working on a book about Marco Polo’s granddaughter traveling the Silk Road west, ostensibly in search of her grandfather but truly in whole-hearted answer to the call to adventure.
This is, in fact, a real book I’ve been working on for over a decade, ever since I read The Travels of Marco Polo and never recovered.
So, okay, this guy was swanning around China for twenty years. You can’t tell me he didn’t scatter some seed around.
And thus, his granddaughter, Johanna, was born. Shortly thereafter appeared her evil stepmother, wise woman Olan, childhood friend and bodyguard Jaufre, Edyk the Portugese, Uncle No-nuts, Hari the mad monk, Jean the excommunicated Knight Templar, Tiphaine the outcast Jew, and a cast of thousands more. The story begins in Chandu in 1322 and ends in England in 1327, and takes in most of the continents of Eurasia in between, and I have begun posting excerpts on the website here.
I went to China to research this novel, and the photo is of the group I was with in the middle of the Teklamakan Desert. The map shows some of the many silk routes traveled by traders like the Polos back in the day (Johanna will be taking the sea route to India and then overland).
So, when you come up for air from Prepared for Rage, 
my second Coastie thriller, you know, the one you should have rushed right out to buy when it published this month, take a look at Silk and Song, and please do post about it.
20 Comments
Do we post about Silk & Song here?
I for one am intrigued and would love to read more.
China’s history is rather fascinating, and I haven’t seen much of it in fiction (or maybe I haven’t looked hard enough).
And besides that, I liked the characters and their relationships, especially the not so conventional love triangle that might be brewing, as well as the slight humanizing of Johanna’s evil stepmother.
After reading the first 4 chapters (I humbly thank you for posting them, and look forward to seeing more) it is hard to believe that you have not yet secured publishing for this book. In such a short period of time you have drawn such terrific characters that intrigue me and make me want to know more about them. They’re fleshed out nicely, but not completely - there’s so much more to discover. I so hope that you have the opportunity to finish what has started out to be another terrific story.
Sandy
Hey Dana,
It was great to get to meet you at the Seattle Mystery Bookstore signing today. You look just like your pictures and evince the same warmth in person as in your pictures.
As for the similarities to Arlene… which you noted in your previous blog that people have made, but that you stated were surface only: Anyone who can do the writing that you do, have the curiosity and creativity, as well as the thoroughness and dedication to do the amount of research, both to provide authenticity and to give insight and then have the energy and time to give to the business aspects of bookwriting and still maintain warmth and a sense of humor, in my book, IS waaaaay cool!
In the meantime, am eagerly awaiting your next book out and rereading Prepared For Rage which I swallowed whole the first time, and am now sipping to thoroughly enjoy the nuances. I do hope that quite soon you and your publisher will come to agreement regarding publishing Silk & Song. Your gift in characterization and ingenuity of storyline translates into any genre. I do hope that your publisher soon realizes that diversity is an integral part of creativity.
Regards,
Carol G
Dana,
Just finished reading what you have written of Silk and Sand. More, more, please more! The story cannot stop there. Has your publisher seen what you have written thus far? Get it to him. Tell him there will be readers waiting with shekels in hand upon the book’s release. You’re doing your usual magic with words.
Carol G
Re Silk and Sand
Looks like a great story. My only problem with is the opening. It seemed a bit slow. Since it is not a mystery you can’t open with a dead body, unless you open with the death of Johanna’s father.
From the point that Johanna was summoned to her step-mother to the end I love the pace and intrigue. Keep writing and posting and I will keep reading.
Cathy
HI Dana
Silk and Road
The 1st 4 chapters were GREAT - you already have me hooked. You are such a great storyteller - I can’t imagine that you could not get it published. The characters are so warm and colorful and you can see/feel the area and time - I want to know more..Please keep going..
but Please keep doing Kate —
Thanks
Cass
Thanks, everyone, and Cass, look for an excerpt from Whisper to the Blood, the next Kate Shugak novel, posted to the website on March 11th.
I think what you’ve posted of Silk and Song is fantastic. I’m real fan of historical fiction and a very real fan of all of your writing, too. I would absolutely love to see this book in print. In fact, after the excerpt i just read, I’m craving it! I find it very hard to accept that I can’t just reach out and get a copy.
Tell your publisher that I am far from the only one to feel that way (how many others have you already heard from saying much the same thing?) and, besides, nearly all of your fans like the way the you write well enough to take a chance on anything with your name on it. It’s the truth. Ask around; you’ll find I’m right.
Please, please–one way or another, I want to read the rest of Silk and Song.
Thank you so much, Patti. Naturally, this is just the kind of thing I wanted to hear. I really want to write this book.
Silk & Song;
Please, Please,we are out here, panting for more.
Kate and Mutt are classic, The Coastie women stand tall, and Johanna will be welcomed to such select company. She is off to a fine start; rubies sewn in her hems and a fine, white horse, stolen from a lover.
And, for what it’s worth, I wouldn’t trade you for Arlene and all of Johanna’s rubies.
A devoted fan,
Erma
P.S.
Took Prepared for Rage out of the box and started it before I fed the cat and finished it (the first reading) before I could go to bed.
It was sooo grim in parts;I hope you have more fun writing Silk and Song.
Meanwhile, there will be more Kate….
Thanks, Erma! Although I should warn you, there will be a certain amount of grimness in Silk and Song, too. The medival world was not kind to the weak or the poor.
Dana,
You have excellent timing! I just read From Venice to Xanadu, Laurence Bergreen’s take on Marco Polo’s travels (which was good, though not as engrossing as his book about Magellan, Over the Edge of the World). So I was ready to ‘visit’ that part of the world again, vicariously until I can do so for myself. Tell your publisher that these chapters merely whet my reading appetite for more. And I have friends who aren’t mystery readers (which I find inexplicable, she said with a grin) but who love historical fiction, so I’d be happy to push copies on them.
Meanwhile, I’ll keep checking back here for more on the Silk Road ….
Deee-lighted to hear it, Kate, and thanks! Please do keep checking back, I’ll be posting more excerpts.
Dana,
Just finished the first 4 chapters of Silk & Song. You’ve done it again - created a new group of characters I MUST get to know better. I hope you batch up every one of these comments and send them to your publisher. This may be a new genre for you, but I predict it will be at least as successful as Kate, the Coasties, & Liam. I am looking forward to the new Kate mystery, but also now NEED to have more of Silk & Song!!
Please continue!!!
Thank you so much, Penny, and will do!
Wow! Someone needs to camp out on your publisher’s doorstep until he/she agrees to read - and publish! - this. It is crazy for a publisher to insist on an author staying with his/her “tried and true” subject/ genre / characters, when that author is as talented and has as great an imagination as you are and do.
When word comes out that the book will be published, I’ll be standing in line with my money (or at least ordering it online, since there aren’t any bookstores near me).
Thanks. You comfort me.
I love the strong women whom you create. I have just finished reading the 6 chapters of Silk & Song and I can’t wait to read more and learn more. From my mouth to your publisher’s ear: are you crazy that there’s not a contract already signed? There’s a lot more money which will flow into your pockets when this is published. Isn’t that your bottom line? My bottom line is that it’s a fascinating tale that I want to read and I’m ready to pay my money.
From your mouth to New York’s ear, Sally. Even if I sez it who shouldn’t, I think it’s pretty good, too, and I really want to write it.
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