Well gosh, it looks like the last time I wrote something here was when the first book in this series was coming out. Or had come out. Anyway, the series is done (or will be when this last book comes out on January 15th)! I’m really excited about this, and a little sad, because I liked writing about 19th century magic schools.
I started this series thinking about all the ways we have parental relationships in our society, whether it’s between an actual parent and child, a professional organization with a new member, or a large political body with member states (the idea of colonies has a whole other host of problems, of course). And then I invented another one, the idea of a magical race created by a human wizard and left to the stewardship of humans. Here we are four years later (more like six in-world years) and our hero, our sorcerers, and our new country are all grown up.
So this book is about what happens after that. How do you go from a newly-independent young adult, journeyman sorcerer, or whatever to a peer of the other adults in the world? How do you decide what kind of adult you’re going to be? And, especially in the case of our hero, will you ever have to actually stop proving yourself?
This book was originally supposed to bring Kip over to London where he would meet a cute fox who was Sherlock Holmes’ assistant (and the real brains behind the famous detective), never mind the sixty-year gap in when Holmes actually was supposed to have lived in London. But as the series went on, Kip went to London in the second book and met a cute fox there. Holmes fit less and less with the world and the book as it went on, and the trip to London wasn’t as world-broadening as it had seemed at first; after all, in the third book, Emily visits several other European countries. So instead of Holmes, Kip and Emily and Malcolm visit an International Exposition of Sorcery where they meet sorcerers from non-Western countries. This gave me a chance to think about all the other places in the world that would have sorcery and what their sorcerers would be like. Or–if not all the other places, a select few as representatives in the story (there’s a sequence with Russian sorcerers that I could maaaaybe have cut, but I liked the Russian sorcerers too much, so they stayed in).
This exposure to the rest of the world shows Kip and his friends that when deciding who they’re going to be, they aren’t limited to the options they grew up with. The world is growing and changing and they can be part of that change. Of course, not everyone wants to embrace the new world and leave the old one behind…
Going back to my earliest notes, this whole series has been part of my life for a dozen years now. I’m so very glad that it’s complete, out of my head, and onto the page where everyone else can enjoy it. I’m proud of this series and of this last book, and if you’re a fan of the series, I hope you’ll find this a fitting ending.
Links (it’s available for pre-order in print or e-book!):
From the publisher: https://argyllproductions.com/product/the-revolution-and-the-fox-calatians-book-4/
Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/books/the-revolution-and-the-fox-calatians-book-4/9781614505280
Amazon (US): https://www.amazon.com/Revolution-Fox-Calatians-Book/dp/1614505284/
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-revolution-and-the-fox-tim-susman/1137536166?ean=9781614505280
IndieBound: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781614505280
Powell’s: https://www.powells.com/book/the-revolution-and-the-fox-9781614505280
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