Author's Note and Acknowledgments
It is conventional that foreign words and phrases be rendered in italics. I have purposefully disregarded this convention for three reasons. 1) These are not foreign words to the society in which D'hara resides. They are the common language which the Ifarsadhii use every day. In so using these words I have tried to keep a balance between the Ifarsadhii terms and the English ones, in the hope that the reader does not lose the meaning. Perhaps when D'hara visits a foreign country (as she will do in Assassin's Flower) I will render some of those words in italics. 2) I've always found that convention rather irritating as it gives what I see as unnecessary stress to words that are not being stressed. 3) Had I gone with the usual convention, this story would have been booby-trapped with italics left right and center, rendering the few italicized stresses nearly invisible. I hope you will forgive me my writerly foibles, and that this choice will enhance rather than diminish your experience of my novella and subsequent novels.
This story was started years ago with a flash of vision regarding a young woman standing on tower steps and looking out at a sunset. As I began to commune with her, she told me that she was an assassin by trade. Naturally, I was curious and began to explore D'hara and her world.
At the time, a 10,000 word novella was a hard sell. Too long for a short story in a magazine, too short for a full length novel.
E-books didn't yet exist. In fact most folks didn't even have personal computers!
After despairing of finding a home for it, I sent Nenfari to Marion Zimmer Bradley for hopeful inclusion in her latest edition of Sword and Sorceress.
Well MZB rejected it. And it was the best rejection letter I've ever received in my life. Probably the best one I'll ever get!
An actual personal note! She said she loved the story, but it was just too damn long even for her series. At the same time, she said she couldn't see editing it down, as it was a complete work the way it was and she didn't see a thing she could chop. Her suggestion was that rather than trying to shorten it, I turn it into the beginning of a full length novel.
Meanwhile other projects such as Dark Moon Gates and Spellcraft Secrets began to take up my life. I wrote about 8 more chapters for Assassin's Flower, most of which were destroyed in a house fire and will need to be painstakingly remembered and rewritten.
Nenfari was relegated to a few files on my computer which I would get around to eventually.
Assassin's Flower has now been moved from back-burner to an important work in progress. D'hara is being sent by her Khalji father to marry a man she's never met, the ruler of a nearby kingdom and a threat to the Khalji's trade and political plots. D'hara's job? Kill her future husband. And the last thing she expects on her mission is to fall in love with her betrothed's brother. But her beloved nenfari Aldrar's life is at stake if she fails. And who knows what Illistanirda's machinations will be.
So thanks to MZB who encouraged a young writer. You gave me a belief in myself that I would not have had otherwise. The fact that you bothered to send me something personal meant everything. Rest in Peace and know that you have changed many lives for the better.
Thanks much to my Mom who has been with me from D'hara's birth. (And well before!) She was my first (and best) editor. I promise that she is NOT Illistanirda in any way except that I have always looked up to her as my writing tutor/master. There the resemblance ends. Mom is majorly supportive and way cool!
Thanks to the folks of the SI Writer's Guild--you had no idea what a monster you created!--and to my beloved and well-missed writer's group in New Paltz. Carley, I miss you. R.I.P. Special thanks go to Diane ( my "surrogate mother") and my Mom for pushing a young writer from the very beginning and providing an environment where I was encouraged from the start. How may twelve-year-olds get invited to adult writer's groups and classes?
And of course no writer would be complete without her wondrous life companions who help keep her sane along the journey. Thanks to my beloved husband, who kicked my butt and kept me in front of the computer, supplying me with tea and encouragement and an endless font of love. And who is working on the cover pic as I write this. And to my loving critters, Squeaky, Zen, Raz, Bushi and Karma who give me not only the impetus (read that as landing on my chest at dawn and licking my face till it's raw) to start every day, but the cuddles and love to know that life for its own sake is worthwhile.