Late Bronze Age Stories
Thutmose
In Amarna during the time of the heretic pharaoh Akhenaton, the master sculptor Thutmose meets a mysterious woman who is is the pharaoh's service. She has wandered since her people were killed, but is haunted by memories. Drawn together by his art, their love commences. The pharaoh sickens, there is danger from the political turmoil. With the death of the pharaoh, Thutmose knows Amarna will be deserted and his art works destroyed.
Pregnant, she leaves Amarna and travels north along the Mediterranean. She is adopted by a clan that trades and makes jewelry. Her son, greatly talented, becomes a master jeweler. Her new family, though menaced by robbers and bandits along the trade route, flourishes. She yearns for Thutmose still, even as her son reaches manhood and establishes his own family. She ages, weakens, and still is waiting for Thutmose, her great love. This is a story of yearning, of the way love is passed through the generations. Will Thutmose ever leave Egypt to be with her?
Lukenow
"The short chapters provide an irresistible pace, enabling the pressure to build effectively to the characters' final decisions."
- Fred Shafer, Lecturer in the School of Continuing Studies at Northwestern
In the late Bronze age, Lukenow, a trader and seaman from Minos (Crete), and Sardow, the ceramicist of the clan of artists, traders and warriors, see each other at a young age and enter each others dreams. Sardow is burdened with the far-seeing eye that shows her of the coming destruction of the palace based cultures from Crete along the Levant coast to Egypt. She and Lukenow have a child but Sardow does not long survive. Her clan leaves Ugarit and moves to the east away from the coming destruction.
Lukenow returns to Minos along with his child and Serena, Sardow's sister. They found a colony in the west. Serena and Lukenow become aware that the colony is failing and that their family is in danger from those who are gaining in power. They leave to rejoin Serena's family. The clan holds itself together by passing down stories and holding open meetings where all of the kin are consulted. They protect and cherish their artists from the outside world and have from the times of Thutmose, the artist founder from Egypt. As more artists are born and cherished, how will they survive the dangerous times in which they live.
Petros
"Your new book Petros... is elegant in every way, both inside and outside."
- Fred Shafer, Lecturer in the School of Continuing Studies at Northwestern
Part 3 continues the stories of the descendents of Thutmose, the founding Egyptian artist. Little Petros grows into a man who loves adventures and the life of traveling. He comes upon the nomadic Bedouin and their cherished war-mares and loses his heart to them. He cannot live with them for he owes duty to his kin. He and his brothers are sent to Egypt to purchase gems, gold and linen and discover if the old trade routes remain.
They come upon an Arabian war-mare, and her companions; a girl disguised as a boy and a man who might be her father who are also on their way to Egypt.
Nothing is as it appears, and surrounded by old animosities, old grudges, and old feuds, the three brothers barely escape Egypt with their lives. They are pursued to their new home by distant kin and old grudges. Petros grows into his manhood, discovers in himself the ability to innovate in an uncertain and changing world, forges new friendships and embarks on a tender love story.
The Bedouin
After the great destruction which obliterated the palace cultures of Minos, Ugarit and many cities along the Mediterranean coast, the trade routes that connected the late Bronze age cities were disrupted.
Set in the late Bronze age of the ancient middle east, this set of stories follows the one family founded by Thutmose, the Egyptian artist. The kin, composed of warriors and traders, nurture and protect their beauty makers. They have been displaced many times by the wars and catastrophes, but always live close to or upon the trade routes that have still exist even in tumultuous times.
Part 4, The Bedouin, continues the story. Serena and Petros the Wise and their companions and family set out to the land of Thutmose to seek out and destroy the evil that lives there and menaces them. The Bedouin comes along with them on this mission, seeking revenge for the mistreating of the Arabian horses, the war mares. The Bedouin and his people are accepted as brothers by the kin, as the kin are accepted as brothers by the Bedouin’s tribe.
During the long journey, many discoveries are made. Courage is doubted and confirmed in war fare, the young discover who have captured their hearts, the Bedouin learns to honor the women of his new friends, to respect the courage that they share with their men. The Egyptian descendents of Thutmose reconcile with the kin who live along the trade routes. All learn from each other.
Gold of the North
Alimah, torn between her love for Kaliq and her need to develop her gifts for song and dance, stays in The Land of the One River. With her Uncle Bakiri and a small band of protectors, they stay near the school where she can learn more of her arts. Enemies lurk at the school but neither she nor Bakiri can tell who they are or why Alimah is the target. At the school she and The Golden One, who comes from the far north, are dazzled by each other and both shunned by the other students, become friends. Attacked, he escapes to warn Alimah and her protectors of her danger. Still not knowing the reasons, Bakiri, The Golden One and Alimah and all their protectors seek refuge in the homes of those who breed and protect the famous war mares. They are hunted by those who wish to capture them. Thrown together by violence and constantly on the move, Alimah and Havardr witness the savage forces let loose by the Great Destruction. They come together. At the end of the late bronze age, where the world that they knew is being destroyed, these two lovers must make hard choices between the desires of their hearts and the duties that they owe to their own kin. If they part, as it seems they must, they will never hold each other again. But, unseen by others, deep in their hearts the memories will endure.
Dalil
After their adventures in the land of the one river, the kin set out to return to their families. Along the great green sea, they shelter in a valley from a sudden storm and come upon a fever ridden traveler, who under Dalil's care survives and regains her heath. A band of rough men arrive intent on capturing her, for reasons that are mysterious.
She needs protection but finds it hard to trust the people whom she has fallen among. They protect her time and time again from those who would seize her. She gradually comes to trust Dalil and to see that she must tell him and all their companions why she is being hunted. The girl tells them of her past and her name. Knowing her story and why she is in danger, the kin devise strategies to insure her safety. If she wishes to remain with them, they vow to protect her.
Dalil discovers that she is the true partner in his craft of story telling and that she, like he, can change her appearance and speech into that of another. On the journey to Ugarit and then on to where the kin reside on the ancient trade route, they develop their story telling gifts. The rest of the kin look at them with wonder, and then appreciation. Petros and Kaliq, the protectors, plot as to how their emerging gifts can be of use to the kin.
Nahid
The Late Bronze Age Stories part seven, Nahid, continues the story of this family who are descended from Thutmose, the eighteenth dynasty Egyptian artist.
It is unsafe for the kin to remain in northern Mesopotamia for a tribe led by an ambitious man threatens their very existence. Petros the Wise and Kaliq have devised an intricate strategy to move the outnumbered kin to a safer place, but because they have a traitor in their midst, they can tell no one of their plans. Nahid, a young jeweler, sets out along the trade route to locate and bring back lapis. Will his great gifts for jewelry be damaged by the violence he sees?
Much is changed during the course of the adventures. Nahid matures as a man and as an artist. The Bedouin and Serena thrown together by his injury become closer, their lives forever intertwined. The kin have to decide whether to honor the traditions of their kin or succumb to the surrounding violence and chaos.
Amarna
Part Eight of the Late Bronze Age Stories has Nahid, driven by prophetic dreams, leaving the hills above the Great Green Sea. With Bakiri and his band of protectors, he sets out for Egypt, Bakiri's home, and then to Amarna, where their ancestor Thutmose created his greatest work.
Amarna was dismantled when the heretic pharaoh Akhenaten died, but Nahid is sure that a treasure still exists for him to find. Bakiri's daughter, Rabiah, and Nahid fall in love, and they meld his jewelry and her linen garments. He has found his mate, and perhaps the treasure he was meant to find. She insists on being a part of the trip to Amarna. In the course of finding the treasure, Rabiah is put in great danger, and they have to flee Amarna to save Rabiah.
Nahid further matures into a wise and protective mate to Rabiah. All are astonished at the secrets revealed by their quick journey to Amarna. The artists will forever have the images of the great art they have witnessed, in their minds and hearts.
Two Brothers
Part Nine of the Late Bronze Age Stories has the brothers, Diripi and Arudara, returning to the kin in the season of storms acquire a mysterious passenger. Diripi knowing himself to belong on the sea wonders if loneliness is his fate. Arudara, a gifted artist as well as a sailor and trader, needs to spend time on his art. Maeve, from the north country, is conflicted by her haunting past and her present duty.
At the close of the bronze age all is in flux, trade routes are destroyed, empires are being dismembered, danger and bloodshed is everywhere, trust is dangerous. How does the kin survive in these hard times? How can Diripi, Arudara and Maeve make a living and live their lives?
Trygve
Part 10 of the Late Bronze Age Stories has the kin near the great trade route in what today is Northern Lebanon. Times are desperate. Predators attack from both sea and land. Trygve of the Northerners has to decide about joining with the Kin. The leaders of the Kin have to decide about joining with Trygve and his people. Dalil, the storyteller, has returned to the Kin after many years of roaming. The two groups learn each other’s languages and stories, as they prepare for what may be another great migration.
Sigride
Part 11 of the Late Bronze Age Stories has Sigrid, a Healer, after enduring rapes and beatings in her captivity cannot bear to be touched, until an Egyptian soldier wins her trust. is volume again meditates on the nature of heroism, how myths are made, and how this small tribe survives and attracts the talented in the midst of the tumult of their time.
