A look behind VENGEANCE OF GRIMBALD by Richard Hacker – Guest Blog and Giveaway


This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Richard Hacker will be awarding a $25 Amazon or Barnes and Noble GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

A look behind VENGEANCE OF GRIMBALD

Battling evil through time and death.

Six hundred years after a fifteenth century scryer gains the alchemical knowledge to create a dark future in his own image, Addison Shaw inherits a destiny: to fight this ancient war that threatens all he loves with extinction. Using an alchemical pen, he writes himself into past lives, leaving his body in the present. Upon completion of his mission, he must die in order to break the link and return home. Addison, and his inking partner, Jules, are members of the League, a secret alchemist society of Inkers who protect the time continuum. They believe they defeated their enemy, Cuthbert Grimwald, known to them as Kairos. When he resurfaces filled with vengeance, intent on destroying the League, and acquiring the Alchimeia, a book of such power the League has hidden it for millennia, Grimwald leaves a path of destruction across centuries. As he quests for absolute control of reality, Addison and Jules pursue him through time and death in a desperate struggle to save the world from his vengeance.

You might wonder where a story like this comes from. People who know me would say a twisted mind. LOL. But actually, it started with a fountain pen. I was holding a fountain pen one day and my mind wandered to the power of words. Human beings have been naming things since the beginnings of language. It’s how we find our place in the world and in some cases I think, gives us a sense of control. Or at least the illusion of control. So, what would happen if a character had a pen filled with alchemical ink that when he wrote the name and a date for someone living in the past, his consciousness would be transported into that person? What would he do with that astounding capability? And as with most technology, what if someone decided to use the alchemy to acquire power and control time itself? How would the protagonist fend off this attack on the time continuum and reality as he knows it? And then I put the fountain pen down, pulled out the laptop, and started writing.

The story goes all over the world, past, present, and future such as ancient Egypt; 19th century Alexandria; WWII Belgium; an altered present day Seattle and Tokelau Atoll in the Pacific; 1940’s Padang, West Sumatra; 17th century Delft, Dutch Republic; and Cromwell’s England. As the story in Book 2 unfolds the time continuum once again shifts, sometimes with subtle changes and sometimes with radical shifts in culture and technology. And my characters have to play on this multi-dimensional chessboard. So, I’m sure you can imagine, I had to be structured to the point of working from an outline and making notes to myself at the end of each writing session to keep me oriented.

But what drives a story are characters. I think you’ll find the protagonist, Addison Shaw, to be both an interesting and a complicated guy. He has a deep guilt and sense of responsibility for the death of a girlfriend when he rolled their car on a mountain road in a snowstorm. He carries the scars of that night, emotionally and physically with a damaged knee requiring him to use a cane to walk. He went from school athlete to disabled loner. As the story progresses, he will face even greater challenges and will have to find a way to heal himself enough to move forward. He’s also a bit of a smart ass, a little compulsive, more shy than he’d like you to think, and willing to act even when he’s terrified.

His partner, Jules, takes more center-stage in VENGEANCE OF GRIMBALD. She is a strong character, well-grounded, with a burning desire to seek justice for the murder of her parents, who were also inkers in the League, by Kairos. Unknown to her, she has died in one continuum, to exist in another. Given that a relationship can be challenging in one-time dimension, her relationship to Addison, who has known her in each, becomes complicated.

In in the fantasy world, many of the books lean toward fantastical world building far from our own reality. The Alchimeia Series has its feet on the ground, anchored in the actual. There’s a sense that, even though the story is fantasy, the speculative and historical elements feel very possible. I once heard Ken Burns say the attraction of professional baseball is that you can watch in the stands and think you can actually play the game. But of course, it takes tremendous skill to hit a 95 mph fastball. But it sure is fun imagining the possibility! In VENGEANCE OF GRIMBALD, readers can realistically imagine they could do the things these characters are doing. It seems possible. Which I think is an important message in our day and time. When life looks hopeless, when everything seems to be turned upside, the people who make a difference are not superheroes, but people like you and me, people who persevere in spite of the odds and do the best we can.

Thanks for having me on the blog and thanks readers for dropping in today.

BTW, I don’t have a trailer for Vengeance of Grimbald, but I do for Die Back and it’s a good visual introduction to the series. You can find it here.

Addison and Jules, members of the League, a secret alchemist society of Inkers who protect the time continuum, believe they defeated their enemy, Cuthbert Grimwald, known to them as Kairos. When he resurfaces filled with vengeance, intent on destroying the League, and acquiring the Alchimeia, a book of such power the League has hidden it for millennia, Grimwald leaves a path of destruction across centuries. As he quests for absolute control of reality, Addison and Jules pursue him through time and death in a desperate struggle to save the world from his vengeance.

Enjoy an Excerpt

“You’ve done well my friends. A bit of a shaky start, but in the end, I am pleased with the result.”

Jules glanced to Addison, who was also pulling himself up to stand. “What are you talking about? You could have killed us.”

“If I wanted you dead, we wouldn’t be talking.” Boggy raised his hands as if to parry their blows. “Today’s lesson is partnership. Do you see?”

Addison slowly rotated an arm with a grimace. “Keep talking.”

“Inking is a dangerous enterprise. You find yourself in a foreign world in an earlier time, often fighting to survive long enough to complete your mission. But the physical dangers of inking do not hold a candle to the emotional and psychological dangers. Your consciousness, the essence of your being, occupies the mind of another. With each passing moment, a small part of who you are slips out of your grasp unless you master the relationship between Inker and host. You must die to live, right? But all living creatures naturally gravitate toward life and away from death. The world of an Inker is therefore a paradox of conflicting realities. Without a partner, you struggle alone against insurmountable odds. Partners have each other’s backs, keeping the hosts alive and the mission viable. And upon completion, partners ensure their hosts die. Because we never leave an Inker behind. Never.”

About the Author:Richard Hacker, lives and writes in Seattle, Washington after living many years in Austin, Texas. In addition to the science fiction/fantasy novels of The Alchimeía Series, his crime novels ride the thin line between fact and fiction in Texas. Along the way, his writing has been recognized by the Writer’s League of Texas and the Pacific Northwest Writers Association. As a judge in literary contests shuch as PNWA and ChicLit, and as a freelance development editor, he enjoys the opportunity to work with other writers. In addition, he is the Sci-Fi/Fantasy editor for the Del Sol Review. DIE BACK was his first novel in the Alchimeia series.

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Books by Richard Hacker are available at Amazon

The Alchimeía Series

DIEBACK: Book One

VENGEANCE OF GRIMBALD: Book Two

Other books by Richard Hacker:

Nick Sibelius Crime Series

KILL’T DEAD OR WORSE
BUZZARD BAIT
ALL HAT AND NO CATTLE

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Comments

  1. Thanks for hosting!

  2. Diana Hardt says

    I liked the synopsis and excerpt. It sounds like a really interesting book. Thank you for sharing.

  3. thanks for hosting.

  4. Bernard Wallace says

    How did you come up with the characters names in your book?

    • Richard Hacker says

      I’m one of those people who stays at the end of a movie. I’m looking at the hundreds of names of folks who worked to make the film. There are some great names in there! Otherwise, the names, like Cuthbert Grimbald, just come out of the air.

  5. Richard Hacker says

    Thanks to Long and Short for hosting today!

  6. Victoria Alexander says

    I’ve enjoyed following the tour for Vengeance of Grimbald and can’t wait to check it out. Thanks for sharing all of the great posts along the way 🙂

  7. Rita Wray says

    I have enjoyed the tour. The book sounds great.

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