False Tidings is a way that they might have said “Fake News” back in the pseudo-historic context of the novel. The basic theme of the book is truth, and I try to lightly highlight some of the ways in which our own modern world is impacted by those who seek to mislead, confuse, and harm us. For example, William meets in a tavern a pair of men who are bubonic plague deniers. At the time of the book’s inception, the pandemic was still in progress, and the damage that fake news had inflicted on the world was evident for all to see. In later novels in the series, I hope to explore this theme further.
My work isn’t primarily about humour for its own sake. I am trying to write about serious things while, hopefully, raising the odd chuckle. I’d hate to have a weight of expectation on me to be consistently funny. It wouldn’t be fun! I think the book is a primarily a fantasy with a significant amount of history and a light frosting of humour. My challenge from the outset was to position the book to fit into the same niche as the grand daddy of fantasy humour (Terry Pratchett RIP) without being an imitation of anything by the great man. For sure, there will be those that feel I've failed. They may feel it's not funny enough, or the serious issues aren't handled as well, or it's just not as good. To which I say, if it's half as good, I'll die happy. On the other hand, most people don't make that comparison at all and just enjoy the book for what it is, and to those folk, I say thanks for the encouragement.
It may appear in parts that the dialog contains grammatical errors, but this may well be because I have tried to write as the English (and Scots) often actually talk today, or else I’ve reflected Olde English sentence constructions. Throughout the book, the common language in use across Yorp (Europe) is Truscan. William is fluent in this tongue as well as its older forms - High and Mid Ancient Truscan. He is also fluent in ancient Grecan.
I never intended to write a fantasy story, it just sort of turned out that way. For that reason, the magic system (I hate that term) of the story is probably not as detailed or elaborate as other fantasy novels. That said, the exigencies of the plot meant I had to come up with quite a lot, so here is an overview of it. Only females are able to perform magic. There are three levels of witchcraft, ranging from the dabbler who can perform relatively minor stuff, right through to the rare adept who can do a lot. The book talks a lot more about this, so I won’t go into it here. Witches come in Dark and White varieties, with the Dark type being unable to operate in or near the land of Italica–for reasons described it he book. Witches can communicate via so-called trunk-calls, which are performed using freshly cut tree stumps and work a bit like the holograms you see in Star-Wars films. Feydor uses scarab beetles to spy on the king (bugs). They scuttle into cracks and telepathically transmit what they hear to the listener. There are three artefacts of great magical importance in my world, the first of which is the Crystal of Life, Nurragù, which is hidden under a mountain on the island of Sardonica (a kind of composite of Sardinia and Corsica). The other two artefacts will emerge as the series progresses. William, being someone drilled in logic and rhetoric, refuses to believe that magic is actually magic. It’s just stuff we don’t understand yet, which is an homage to a quote by Arthur C Clarke that roughly says that any sufficiently advanced technology, to an ancient, will appear to be magic. Predictably, William’s attitude gets him into trouble. False Tidings features something I call the Minor Grimoire, a copy of which falls into the hands of the witch, Imelda Foolson, and describes the Crystal of Life. There will be another important grimoire later in the series. My relationship with Sardinia (Sardonica in the book) goes back twenty years from when I bought a holiday apartment in which to take my expanding family on holiday. I came to love the people, the culture, the food, the humour and the mythology, including the race known as the Janas.
I got a bit lazy with my world building, in that I took something very close to modern Europe and renamed a lot of actual places and figures to fit the narrative. Rome, for example, is called Trusca in the book, as a nod toward the Etruscans who were a tribe that existed at the place and same time as the early Romans. I’ve done a similar thing with old philosophers. The world I describe is called Yorpia and is a lot like Europe in that we have Anglonia separated from most of the continent of Yorpia and with Albia to the north. The capital of Anglonia is Ludnam after King Ludd, a possibly mythical king of the area around the British capital prior to the arrival of the Romans. I might play around in the future with the idea of a Yorpian Union. To the west is the green island of Emeraldia, while to the east, we have Gallia and Italica. Sardonica is a separate island close to Italica. The political system is essentially monarchistic and feudal. Cities are growing in importance and the religion of the time has a heavy influence via the priesthood.
I was keen to avoid referencing any modern religions to avoid causing pointless offence. In False Tidings, the religion is essentially pagan and focuses on Lord Sola (the Sun) as the major deity, the two moons as acolytes of the Sun, and the many stars that are sort of like the saints. Hence I’ve used imprecations such as “Sun and Moons” or “Curse the Stars”. Again, this is to avoid using the modern day cursing that is based on the prevailing European faith of the Middle Ages. In my creation myth, the moons are called Luna and Runa; Luna spins one way and Runa the other. Lord Sola has no nipples because he used them to fashion the two moons. The stars are like saints that can be prayed to individually or as a whole. Young children are warned to behave themselves so as not to “Wake the stars.” Thus, people say things like “I’ve a hunger to wake the Stars.”