Coming March 2014, from the author of the Stormlord trilogy . . .

FAITH WILL NOT SAVE HIM.

Saker looks like a simple priest, but in truth he’s a spy for the head of his faith. It’s a dangerous job, and more lives than merely his own depend on his secrecy.

When Saker is wounded by a Lascar sailor’s blade, the weapon seems to follow him home. Unable to discard it, nor the sense of responsibility that comes with it, Saker can only follow its lead.

It will put him on a journey to strange shores, on a path that will reveal terrible secrets about the empire, about the people he serves, and likely lead to his own destruction. The Lascar’s dagger demands a price, and that price will be paid in blood. 

THE LASCAR’S DAGGER is the first book in The Forsaken Lands – a brand new epic fantasy trilogy from Glenda Larke, full of scheming, spying, action and adventure.

See what Glenda has to say about the inspiration behind this exciting new series here:

        “One of the wedding presents given to my husband and me was a hand-crafted Malay dagger, and it was on my wedding day that I was first told that a mystical spirit inhabits the blade of a kris…

         I lived in Southeast Asia for thirty years, and during that time I stayed and worked in places as diverse as sprawling Asian cities, coral atolls, logging camps, mangroves, peat swamps and tropical forests. In the field, as part of my ornithological work, I saw the intricate dance and heard the glorious songs of some of the most beautiful birds on Earth. Meanwhile, in my mother-in-law’s kitchen, I learned about Asian spices.

         Perhaps it was inevitable, then, that I should one day turn to birds of paradise, and to the real magic of spices, and to the spirit of the Malay kris to inspire a book. Yet, always, there was also a reluctance to use material that was not mine by birth.

         In the end, I have woven the European origins of my family with the Indonesian origins of my husband’s ancestry to create a place of my imagination, a place evocative of the 18th century and the spice trade that led Europeans to Indonesia. Along the way, I have paid homage to another family connection of mine, the Master’s Mate who strode the decks of Captain Cook’s Endeavour when it sailed through the Indonesian archipelago in the 1770s.

         But that’s all background. THE LASCAR’S DAGGER is really a story of honour, love and courage; a tale about men and women who like power too much, and those who would challenge them. It’s about ordinary people struggling to make sense of the world when they are thrown out of their comfort zone. And in this world of theirs, when cultures clash, so does their magic!”

~ Glenda Larke