WARRIORS OF CAMLANN

January 20, 2023

When the thick fog descends on a school group, two children from the year 2000 find themselves transported back to what looks like the year AD75. And nothing is the same. Dan finds that survival depends on brilliant fighting skills and a fearless ability to fight to the death. Ursula discovers that she has magical abilities worthy of the most accomplished priestess. Soon these two become involved in the greatest struggles of their lives, as they realise that survival depends on skills that they never imagined they possessed.
A brilliant, riveting novel full of passion, action and drama.

I loved the Arthurian legends and books about King Arthur as a child and always wanted to write one.
I had introduced Taliesin as a character in Warriors of Alavna just because I thought some readers might recognise his name from the Arthur stories and find it intriguing, but by happy coincidence it gave me a good place to start looking for a sequel. I was also fortunate in having made Dan’s sword, ‘Bright Killer’ a significant part of the story in Alavna. I was influenced in part by the myth of Excalibur so making Bright Killer into Excalibur was an obvious plot device.
My plot was helped too by another happy coincidence: Arthur’s name means ‘Bear’ and he is sometimes known by the translation of his name ‘Ursus’. It was pure chance that my heroines’ name, ‘Ursula’ could be seen as related to the name ‘Ursus’, as in my earliest draft she was called ‘Marie’!
I enjoyed exploiting these chance relationships in linking Dan and Ursula with the myth of Arthur and I liked finding out about that period in history. It must have been a strange, insecure time when the civilisation of Rome had crumbled, the cities and administrative systems in decay, while there was the constant threat of attack from invaders and recent settlers expanding their territory.