Blog Tour: Tales from Ardulum by J.S. Fields

About the Book

Title: Tales from Ardulum

Series: The Ardulum Series

Author: J. S. Fields

Publisher: Ninestar Press

Release Date: Monday, June 10 2019

Price: 5.99

Length: 56,500

Cover Artist: Natasha Snow. Interior illustrations by Micah Epstein

Genres: science fiction, space opera

Categories: lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, nonbinary, space battles, origin stories, space rouges

Warnings: fantasy space violence, moderate sexual content

Synopsis

One year after saving the Neek homeworld and redefining the people’s religion, the crew of the Scarlet Lucidity returns to the Charted Systems for a much-needed break. For Nicholas and Yorden, the Systems will always be home, but for Emn and Atalant, too many memories compound with Emn’s strange new illness to provide much relaxation.

TALES FROM ARDULUM continues the journey of Atalant, Emn, Yorden, Nicholas, and Salice as they try to define their place in a galaxy that no longer needs them while battling the artifacts of Ardulan colonization. Other stories include Yorden’s acquisition of the Mercy’s Pledge (and his grudge against the galaxy), Atalant’s exile from her homeworld, Ekimet and Savath’s romance, and many others.

Series Blurb

The ARDULUM series blends space opera and hard science into a story about two women persistently bound to their past, and a sentient planet determined to shape their future.

Purchase Links

Amazon US

Excerpt

“She is nothing, anymore,” the president responded. “She is Exile.”

“You can’t!” Neek burst towards the door just as it slammed closed. She rebounded and fell back to the floor, her tailbone taking the brunt of the fall. The ship’s engines began to whine, and the floor jostled as the craft left the surface.

Neek ran to the controls and slammed her hands on the stuk interface. Through the viewscreen, she saw capital buildings, the Ardulan Temple, and then treetops as the skiff left the city and moved to the suburbs. She tapped command after command into the computer, but each try brought an angry beep and no change in course. The ship was on autopilot and password locked. She had no control.

Neek swallowed, trying to ease the ache in her throat. Wherever they stashed her, she would find a comm. She would smuggle out handwritten messages if she had to. She wasn’t going to give up. That she had lost the robes, lost the Guard…she could mourn that in time. Saving the forests, that was her job. Helping her people move beyond Ardulum so they could truly participate in the Charted Systems, that was why she did all this, right? That she loved piloting was just a bonus.

Right?

A low tremble went through the ship. Neek had never felt a skiff do that before. Had she lucked out? Was it malfunctioning? Neek sent another query to the computer. The ship was…

Neek blinked. It couldn’t be.

The ship was going up.

Neek frantically queried the computer. The viewscreen still showed treetops, but that silo in the distance…that had been there the first time she’d looked. It had seemed closer for a while, but now, she realized as she squinted, it was far away again. She was watching a prerecorded loop!

“No!” The skiff was clearly going up. Neek’s ears were popping, and there was a funny feeling in her gut. Her planet’s skiffs were not designed to leave even the lower atmosphere. Only settees could do that, and this was no settee. Whatever the president’s engineers had done to make it spaceworthy, it hadn’t been nearly enough.

Neek threw commands at the computer. Land. Coast. Glide. STOP.Each returned with a ping and the perpetual image of treetops. He couldn’t do this. He had no right to do this! What in Ardulum’s name was the president thinking? Neek pounded at the controls, and the recorded loop fuzzed out to reveal space. Endless space.

Text scrolled across the computer screen:

Hours of air left: 233

Gallons of water remaining: 2

Food rations available: none

Communication systems: disabled

Destination: high orbit around planet Neek

Entertainment options: one video available of Heaven Guard airshow #4194, highlighting the double barrel rolls of Guard Four; all Neek holy texts available

Neek screamed. She kicked the console, her boot denting the cheap biometal. The Neek did not leave their planet. They did not live on space stations or strange worlds. They stayed put, to wait for Ardulum’s return. And she…she was meant to rotup here, in Neek space—rot while watching a planet she could see but never again touch. Rot while the Heaven Guard executed flawless formations in Neek’s upper atmosphere, ignoring her gold coffin spinning by. Rot while reading texts she’d had shoved down her throat since she was old enough to read—texts that were slowly destroying her planet.

And…and…

She would never get her settee.

She was only nineteen years old, and she was going to die, alone, in space.

And there was nothing she could do.

Know your Ardulum Characters

Pt 1 – Atalant

Although there are numerous POV characters across the ARDULUM series, the books are really about Atalant’s (formerly known as Neek) journey of found family. In part one of this four part series (find the other three parts on the blog tour for TALES FROM ARDULUM), we explore ten random facts about Atalant that just didn’t make the cut into the final books.

• Atalant is an electronics aficionado. In early versions of FIRST DON, she collected antique weaponry and ‘fixed’ it with new technology. There was even a scene where she used her share of the money from the last haul to buy a printer pen so she could draw her own weapons.
• Atalant wears boots when all the other characters don’t wear shoes at all. In TALES you get an answer (finally) as to why people don’t wear shoes in space, but no reason is ever given for why Atalantdoes. The reason is With biometal floors on most spaceships, and Neek people secreting empathic mucous from their fingertips andtoetips, shoes are a really good idea. The Neek people are the only beings in the Charted Systems to routinely wear shoes, which doesn’t help their backwater image at all.
• The Ardulans and their subspecies have a trinary gender system and trinary procreation system as well. Atalant, like many (but not all!) Neek and Ardulans, is pansexual. Emn is not, so if the two do take on a third partner some day, it will almost certainly be another woman
• Atalant specifically chose the magenta color of the Scarlet Lucidityto irritate Nicholas. The two had much more animosity in early versions of FIRST DON, but the final version cooled their relationship to mild ribbing. TALES FROM ARDULUM, in Nicholas’ backstory, showcases the origin of the irritation, when Nicholas, inadvertently, insults Neek several times in a row.
• The sex scene between Atalant and Emn in book three was originally slated for book two, and there was a much more intense make out scene in the cockpit as well. The scene was eventually moved to the middle of book three, so Emn and Atalant could have more time to get to know each other, and of course, to further the sexual tension
• The sex scene in book three did not originally mention Atalant’s stuk in terms of its lubricating abilities. That part was added in a late round of edits, at the demand of my writing group, who thought it was hearsay to have a character who secreted natural lubricant and not use it in a sex scene. My writing group would like everyone to know that yes, they accept fan mail.
• A very early draft of SECOND DON had a dream sequence where Atalant killed the president of Neek. It was later cut as it foreshadowed the actual death of the president a bit too much, and with all the events of book two, made it look like Atalant might have had a hand in the death, instead of it just being a little dream revenge.
• Of her three parents, Atalant is closest with her talther. In a draft version of Atalant’s origin story in TALES, Atalant and her talther had a one-to-one talk about her rallies and general pot stirring. Her talther was not pleased, and the scene showed the emotional turmoil of Atalant going against her favorite parent’s wishes.
• Atalant’s bark doll that appears in a few places throughout the series was made from andal bark, of course. Maybe that made it semi-sentient?
• The scene where Atalant freaks out because she is covered in the synthetic mucous in the Talent Chamber was meant to be the end of a long-winding joke from the first book. Originally, during the opening of Emn’s stasis tube, Nicholas ribbed Atalant about the tube having space slugs, and Atalant went on an epicrant about how much she hated space slugs and how disgusting their mucous was. Nicholas then made a comment about Atalant beinga giant space slug, which did not go over well. Unfortunately, that bit of antagonism did not make the final cut.

For the record, however, Atalant still does hate space slugs.

Giveaway

J.S. Fields is giving away four prizes with this tour: a collectible soft enamel pin of the Mercy’s Pledge (2), and a high res version of one of the interior illustrations (their choice, pick from Yorden, Nick, Emn, or Atalant) (2). Enter via Rafflecopter:

 a Rafflecopter giveaway

Direct Link

About the Author

J.S. Fields (@Galactoglucoman) is a scientist who has perhaps spent too much time around organic solvents. They enjoy roller derby, woodturning, making chainmail by hand, and cultivating fungi in the backs of minivans. Nonbinary, and yes, it matters.

Fields has lived in Thailand, Ireland, Canada, USA, and spent extensive time in many more places. Their current research takes them to the Peruvian Amazon rainforest each summer, where they traumatizes students with machetes and tangarana ants while looking for rare pigmenting fungi. They live with their partner and child, and a very fabulous lionhead rabbit named Merlin.

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