Fidelis

‘Spero’ (Hope) is one of those Latin words that you sort of know, even if you were lucky enough to attend a school which didn’t obstinately prioritise fluency in dead languages.  It is incorporated in quite a few modern English words, most obviously ‘desperate’, or ‘de – sperate’, meaning literally ‘without hope’.  Fortunately, although the times that AR Horvath is writing about may indeed be desperate, the quality of the writing itself is far from it.

Spero elaborates on the events described in ‘Fidelis’, but starts and ends in different places.  This may sound like an odd way to tell a story (book two of a series traditionally picks up where book one finished, after all), but it proves to be a refreshing and clever way to – almost literally – weave a narrative, with a different thread of the future history that Horvath is constructing being plucked out of the tapestry of the whole and examined. Read the rest of this entry »

If you are encountering the Birth Pangs series for the first time you may be wondering if you needed to start at the beginning, with Fidelis, in order to understand Spero.

Actually, the way that I’ve written the books they can each be read independently. You can read either or both and in any order.  This will be true for the remaining of the series, too.

Why?

The series is not linear.

In other words, Spero doesn’t start where Fidelis leads off.  For a number of reasons, I am writing the series with each book (except book 7) reflecting the perspective of a different character in the series.  The time frames covered by all of the books is roughly the same and where the characters of the different books interact, the same scene is present in each book, seen from that character’s unique perspective.  Where the characters depart from each other, the story branches off.  You might say that each book overlaps the others.

This approach allows me to lay ever deeper layers of meaning to the events in the books. One character will think nothing of an event in one book but in another book, another character will perceive the event as a turning point or startling development.

In short, you’ll be able to read any of the first six books in any order that you please.  Each is stand alone, but none are the whole story.

The seventh book will start, chronologically, where the first six books end, and proceed to tie up all the loose ends, weaving the six story lines into a single rope.

There are a number of reasons for why I took this approach.  One of them is that I perceive that our entire lives are like this.  Each of us is a character in a book.  There are some 10 billion books in the ’series,’ with many of our ’stories’ overlapping the stories of others. Taken together, our individual stories constitute one grand story.  This grand story contains elements that are astonishing, but in my view, missed if you take the stories of our lives one at a time.  At the same time, one cannot overlook our individual lives, for pieces of them are what make the grand story, the Mosaic, we’ll call it, what it is.

My seven book series is a very faint shadow of what I perceive is reality.  It begs the question:  if the Birth Pangs series are a mosaic of my authorship, who is the Author of the series of our lives?  Is there really no Author?  Really?  I don’t think so.  If you think that way, one of my aims is to persuade you otherwise.

I noticed that I am selling my books for less than Amazon.com so I thought I would look around to see what other prices are.

To my surprise, BarnesandNoble is offering the best prices hands down- even beating me- especially on the hard cover.

Here are current prices:

Amazon.com

I got word today that Steven McEvoy at Bookreviewsandmore.ca has posted a review of book 1, Fidelis.  As you can guess from the review, I’ll be definitely interested to read his review of book 2, Spero.  I hope I was able to sustain Steven’s interest!

Fidelis is the best speculative fiction I have read since the early 80’s. Reminiscent of Heinlein’s writings with the skills of a master wordsmith, A.R. Horvath has created an amazing world and looks to a possible future that is dark and brooding. He creates a world in which the United States has entered a second dark ages after a military defeat. The writing is superb, the characters believable and engaging. As you read you become transported into the events by Horvath’s skill with the pen for he draws you in and captivates you. His storytelling is masterful.

Read the rest of the review.

The biggest day of shopping each year is coming up in just a few days.  We are all told we must buy buy buy in order to save the economy.  Just in time, I am bringing out the first book Fidelis, with a new cover and larger print.  This second edition of the soft cover has the same cover as the hard cover of Fidelis.  Now, with the Birth Pangs series now consistently themed, you will find that a gift of the Birth Pangs series is an attractive, matching gift for the holidays.

If you recently purchases a copy of Fidelis in the first edition cover, please contact me and I will send out the second edition to you for $10 which includes media mail shipping.  This is essentially sending you a copy at cost.  Email me at author@birthpangs.com.

I note that Amazon.com is now selling Spero for $14.35, undercutting me by a good sixty cents!  No biggie.  I can still do what Amazon.com can’t, though, and that’s sign the books.  An autographed set of a second edition Fidelis and first edition Spero is just right for the readers in your life.

In conclusion, make sure that if you buy Fidelis in soft cover that the cover is red and has the ISBN of 978-0979127656. Hopefully, the old one (978-0979127618) will be replaced by outlets like Amazon.com and the reviews transferred over appropriately.