Out of Time: The Merlin Chronicles
(Book 3)
Author: Daniel Diehl
Genre: Epic Fantasy SagaLength: 328 pagesRelease Date: April 1, 2015ISBN-13: 978-1508614685SYNOPSIS:
This is bloody awesome!! I was gripped from the start and can't wait for MORE. ~ Orchard Book club (UK)
Merlin the Magician, Jason Carpenter and Beverley McCullough return in the gripping conclusion to The Merlin Chronicles trilogy. Catapulted back and forth through time and space the trio is forced to confront their arch-nemesis, the spectacularly evil Morgana le Fay, yet again, after embarking on a spectacular quest to save Merlin’s homeland, the ancient kingdom of the Britons, and no less than King Arthur himself. ‘Out of Time’ is in the finest tradition of urban fantasy, classic wizard fantasy and Arthurian legend all rolled into one. Don’t miss it.
Daniel Diehl has created an adventurous blend of Arthurian legend, biblical prophecy, classic wizard fantasy and contemporary urban fantasy. ~ SpecFic Daily
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Characters interviews
DD – I’m Daniel Diehl and I’m here today with two of the characters from my ongoing trilogy ‘The Merlin Chronicles’. Would you please introduce yourselves to our readers?
JC - “Hi. I’m Jason Carpenter and until I met this man I was a grad student studying archaeology at the University of York.”
DD – “The University of York is in England but you have an American accent.”
JC – “Yeah, I’m from Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, but York has the best archaeology program there is. I just wish I would have had time to finish my doctoral degree. Actually, considering how things have gone over the last few months, I think I should have stayed in the States.”
M – “That’s not true, Jason. You have loved every minute of it, and you know it.”
DD – And you would be…?
M - “My given name is Myrrddin Emrys ap Morfryn, it is a name of ancient origin, taken from the language of the Wealas; the Welsh to you. I have also been known by many other names, but you probably know me as Merlin.”
DD – Merlin. As in the wizard?
M – “There is no such thing as a wizard. Wizards are a creation of fantasy. It is just that science in my day was based on a different understanding of nature; that’s all.”
JC – “Don’t let him kid you. He’s a wizard alright. He can make himself invisible, he can throw fireballs from his fingertips, he can levitate himself…you wouldn’t believe the crap he can do. He’ll even crawl inside your head and mess with your brains if you don’t watch him.”
M – “That’s not fair, Jason. I taught you to speak Mongolian in one night and in our upcoming book I will teach you several more languages.”
JC – “Oh, goody. More languages. I just wish you would ask first.”
DD – Ok, ok. Please, guys, let’s get back to the interview. Mr Merlin…
M – “Just Merlin.”
DD – Ok, Merlin. You say science was different “in your day”. When, exactly was your day?
M – “I would have been born around four-ten. I’ve never been sure of the exact date.”
DD – As in four hundred and ten A.D.? That’s the year you were born?
M – “Of course. It was a very good year.”
DD – So why did you choose to come to the twenty-first century?
M – “I assure you, I am not here of my own choice. Young Master Jason seems to have dug me up and it nearly caused the end of the world.”
JC – “You know that was an accident, damn it.”
M – “No matter now, Jason. We set it right, didn’t we?”
JC – “Ok. You’re right. Everything worked out alright. I just wish we hadn’t nearly gotten ourselves killed…five or six times…in half a dozen different countries.”
M – “But we didn’t die, Jason. We’re fine and you have a lovely young lady in your life, thanks to me.”
JC – “Thanks to you!? What in the hell did you have to do with it? You almost got me sucked dry by Morgana le Fay, got us both smothered in a sand storm, almost got us and about a hundred monks eaten by dragons.”
M- “I didn’t choose to come here, that was your doing. Although I will admit that your world does offer some very attractive benefits…like pizza and a wonderful selection of whiskies.”
DD – Gentlemen, please. I seem to be getting two very different versions of the same story here.
M – “All truth is in the eye of the viewer. Suffice it to say, Jason, his lovely lady-friend Beverley, and I are all safe. And thanks to our little adventures your world is also safe…at least for the time being.”
DD – The world is safe “for the time being”? What’s that supposed to mean?
M – “I guess you’ll just have to read the first two books in the trilogy and find out for yourself.”
JC – “Those books don’t tell him the full story and you know it.”
M – “Then he will have to read the final book, as well.”
DD – And when does the final book in the series come out?
M – “I have no idea; it’s your book. What did your publisher tell you?”
DD – She said it will be available in April of this year.
M- “There you are. April. And that was a very nice plug.”
DD – Thank you.
AUTHOR INFORMATION & LINKS
Daniel Diehl has been an author, writer and investigative historian for thirty-five years. For nearly twenty years Diehl has been involved in writing for publication and documentary television production. Mr. Diehl’s work has won awards from the Houston (Texas) Film Festival, the National Trust for Historic Preservation (US) and the City of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Arts Foundation. Working alone and as a part of the multi-award winning team of Daniel Diehl and Mark Donnelly, Diehl has produced work in two main categories; trade publication and television documentary scripts. His canon of work includes twenty non-fiction books (which have been translated into ten foreign languages), one previous work of fiction and scripts for more than one hundred and seventy hours of documentary television primarily for A&E Network, The History Channel, History International, Biography Channel and Discovery Network.
Which Merlin is this? –
Since my most popular character seems to be Merlin the great Magician, I would like to move away from fat King Henry for a minute and talk about how I, as an historian, came to write a fantasy series about a man how only exists in myth and legend…or does he?
Students in one of my writing classes asked me if any of the characters in the Arthurian romances were based on real people. While the standard answer is ‘maybe, but we just don’t know’ there is really a lot more to it than that.
While Arthur himself may or may not, be based on any one or more people, and others like his adulterous wife, Guinevere, and his numerous knights are certainly fictitious the most implausible of all, Merlin, was actually a very real person and it is on this man that I based my Merlin. Much frustratingly incomplete work on tracking down the historical Merlin has been done but, briefly, this is pretty much what we know.
The real Merlin, like the character in my ‘Merlin Chronicles’ trilogy ‘Revelations’, ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’ and ‘Out of Time’, was of Welch origin, was named Myrddin Emrys ap Morfryn (Myrddin, or Merlin, translating as Eagle), lived roughly between 480 and 570 A.D. and he was either a Christian monk or a priest. Among the verifiable historical characters that he seems to have known was the Saxon warlord known as King Vortigern, who we meet in ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: book two of the Merlin Chronicles’. Merlin would have been just a boy when he encountered Vortigern sometime around 490 – 510 A.D although I have placed their meeting half a century earlier to coincide with the Arthurian legends.
It seems that, like my own Merlin, the historical Merlin attended a battle to give spiritual support to his liege lord and that the sight of the slaughter drove him mad. What, precisely, he raved about as he wandered through Wales, northwestern England and southwestern Scotland is unknown but, like my own Merlin, villagers were frightened by this half wild man and drove him off in a hail of sticks and stones and calling him Myrddin Wyllt, meaning Merlin the wild. Supposedly, in his madness, Merlin had gained the ability to ‘see’ or make prophecies and the belief in his power to foretell the future brought him to the attention of many in high places.
Whatever it was that the old man was raving about it seems to have hit too close to home for a petty war lord named Rhydderich Hael (translated as Roderick the Generous, which he obviously was not). Hael fancied himself king of Strathclyde and kept his ‘castle’ – actually a fortified hill fort – at what is now Dunbarton, Scotland and seems to have been, at one point, a friend of Merlin’s, possibly inviting him to court as an advisor. What Merlin might have said, or why it upset Hael, we will never know but there is some surviving evidence that Hael ordered the old man’s murder which took place near the mouth of a Strathclyde river at the point where it emerged from an underground cave.
In the third and final installment of ‘The Merlin Chronicles’ – which will be released by Ravenswood Publishing in April 2015 – I bring in a host of new characters who are, or more correctly were, real people during the Arthurian period. Chief among them are Ambrosius Aurelianus, who is purported to have been Arthur’s uncle; Colgrim, chief warlord of the Saxons; Hoel, King of the Bretons and Duke Aegidus, leader of the Franks.
There are still numerous writings which purport to have been executed by Merlin but unfortunately there is scant evidence to support these claims. But the historical Merlin retains deep roots in his homeland of Wales. The oldest inhabited town in Wales is named Carmarthen, which is a corruption of two words; the first being ‘caer’ often used to mean castle but actually translating as ‘place of refuge’. The second part of Carmarthen came from, as you may have guessed, Myrddin. Hence, Carmarthen literally means Merlin’s place of refuge.
To learn more about the real Merlin I recommend the following two books in the order they are presented ‘The Quest for Merlin’ by Nikolai Tolstoy and ‘Chasing Merlin’ by Sarah White. To read my Merlin Chronicles trilogy go to the Merlin pages at the Ravenswood Publishing website at: http://gmtapublishing.com/bookpages/revelations.html or http://gmtapublishing.com/bookpages/thesorcerersapprentice.html or http://gmtapublishing.com/bookpages/outoftime.html
BE SURE TO CHECK OUT DANIEL’S OTHER WORKS WITH RAVENSWOOD
What the Buzz
This is bloody awesome !! I was gripped from the start and can't wait for MORE. ~ Orchard Book club (UK)
Merlin the Magician, Jason Carpenter and Beverley McCullough return in the gripping conclusion to The Merlin Chronicles trilogy. Catapulted back and forth through time and space the trio are forced to confront their arch-nemesis, the spectacularly evil Morgana le Fay yet again, after embarking on a spectacular quest to save Merlin’s homeland, the ancient kingdom of the Britons, and no less than King Arthur himself. ‘Out of Time’ is in the finest tradition of urban fantasy, classic wizard fantasy and Arthurian legend all rolled into one. Don’t miss it.
Daniel Diehl has created an adventurous blend of Arthurian legend, biblical prophecy, classic wizard fantasy and contemporary urban fantasy. ~ SpecFic Daily
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