(Click on the image of the cover to embiggen)

Candlemark & Gleam is known for finding exciting new voices. Yet an equally integral part of our vision is to give shuttles to bold experienced astrogators.

I first became aware of Jo Graham when I read Black Ships, an absorbing take on the Aenead with a young sibyl as its narrator. Since then, Jo has gone on to create twenty-five speculative fiction novels (including the historical fantasy series The Order of the Air with Melissa Scott and tie-ins for Stargate series), two books on pagan spirituality, and two online games; and has garnered a slew of SFF and Romance awards.

So I was thrilled when Jo chose Candlemark as the launch pad for her mythic space opera series The Calpurnian Wars, a conflict of human cultures flung between the stars that awakens powerful mythic avatars of advanced technology that have become indistinguishable from magic. With echoes from Minoans, Celts, Romans and Alexander’s successors, the first two works got glowing reviews in Publishers Weekly. Sounding Dark appeared in December of 2021, Warlady is getting ready for lift-off. Here’s the latter’s appetite-whetting synopsis:

The Warlady of Morrigan has been assassinated, and it’s up to her military attaché, Sandrine Dal-Vesta, to find the killer. For Sandrine and her former secret lover, the electromancer Jauffre Castal-Edo, it’s a race against time with control of the planet hanging in the balance. From the snow-scoured peaks of the north to the imaginary deserts of virtuality, from the lost tomb of the Warlord Khreesos to the battlestations of tidally-locked Morrigan’s space fleet, Sandrine and Jauffre must trust in each other and the dangerous gift of electromancy. But the ruthless killer isn’t the only threat to Sandrine’s world. The Calpurnian Navy has been waiting for a moment of weakness to strike Morrigan with all the power at their command!

You will agree that such a riveting work calls for a cover artist of equally potent talent. Today I get to share the haunting, evocative cover of Warlady, created by Eleni Tsami. Eleni’s stunning, painterly work has graced many previous Candlemark efforts, including Melissa Scott’s Finders and Water Horse, and Jo Graham’s Sounding Dark. As with its older sibling, the back of the cover for Warlady shows the mighty Lady of the Void—but equally beguiling are such marvelous touches as the magnificent depiction of tidally-locked Morrigan, and the subtle embroidery on the protagonists’ garments.

Warlady will launch on August 15. Keep this frequency open, fingers on engine buttons, and meanwhile visit Sounding Dark and Warlady at GoodReads!