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Sleeping Soldier Saturday
Jul. 15th, 2023 07:25 amThe Sleeping Soldier’s release looms ever closer! So I thought I would post the first few chapters here, as I am wont to do.
I posted a version of this chapter a couple years ago, and it hasn't changed too much, though the rest of the book has morphed enormously in that time.
***
Chapter 1
Mr. Krause did not believe in fairies. In fact, although he liked to pretend he was a pious man, he believed in nothing but himself. He had come from nothing, a German immigrant who fled the draft in his own wretched principality and landed on the shores of America with no money and no English in the year of 1820.
He went west, and made his fortune cutting virgin timber in the wilds of Ohio. After twenty years he had enough money to build himself a beautiful house, a mansion in the style of the schlosses owned by the German landowners he had hated in his youth.
Once the house was built, he decided that he must find a wife who would be a jewel in this crown. Soon enough he wed a Welsh beauty with black hair and blue eyes and an adamantine heart to match his own; and she was the only thing he ever loved.
Neither of the Krauses cared for children, but of course there was need of an heir. So in the course of time Mrs. Krause had a baby boy, and they invited all the best society around to a great party after the christening.
The fairy arrived uninvited. She stood and watched a while, and smiled, because fairies like pretty things; and it was a time of elaborate ball gowns, wide skirts and low shoulders, the plainly-dressed men mere stalks for the shimmering flowers that were their partners.
Then the fairy lifted her hands, and the candles flickered and died. The orchestra stopped, and the dancers stopped, and there was no light in the ballroom except the silver glow of the fairy herself.
( Read More )
I posted a version of this chapter a couple years ago, and it hasn't changed too much, though the rest of the book has morphed enormously in that time.
***
Chapter 1
Mr. Krause did not believe in fairies. In fact, although he liked to pretend he was a pious man, he believed in nothing but himself. He had come from nothing, a German immigrant who fled the draft in his own wretched principality and landed on the shores of America with no money and no English in the year of 1820.
He went west, and made his fortune cutting virgin timber in the wilds of Ohio. After twenty years he had enough money to build himself a beautiful house, a mansion in the style of the schlosses owned by the German landowners he had hated in his youth.
Once the house was built, he decided that he must find a wife who would be a jewel in this crown. Soon enough he wed a Welsh beauty with black hair and blue eyes and an adamantine heart to match his own; and she was the only thing he ever loved.
Neither of the Krauses cared for children, but of course there was need of an heir. So in the course of time Mrs. Krause had a baby boy, and they invited all the best society around to a great party after the christening.
The fairy arrived uninvited. She stood and watched a while, and smiled, because fairies like pretty things; and it was a time of elaborate ball gowns, wide skirts and low shoulders, the plainly-dressed men mere stalks for the shimmering flowers that were their partners.
Then the fairy lifted her hands, and the candles flickered and died. The orchestra stopped, and the dancers stopped, and there was no light in the ballroom except the silver glow of the fairy herself.
( Read More )
