Kevin – The Princelings Books: Jemima Pett

I’m still waiting on my edits for Book 7, Willoughby the Narrator, but since I’ve made a new badge for the site, I thought I’d better reveal the cover for The Princelings of the North, book 8 of the Princelings of the East series.

This is the story that finally brings Dylan and Dougall away from their beloved Castle Haunn, where they have appeared in stories for younger readers in the BookElves Anthologies. Now they are gallivanting around the Realms with their own major story, firstly rescuing Kevin from exile, then helping to restore him to his birthright. That’s the plan, anyway. Since they meet up with a rebel called Locksley in the forests on the way, and then fall in with his brother named Ludo, you can bet things aren’t going to go well. You may need to reread The Princelings and the Pirates to place that pair!

So… here goes… Ta-da!!!

Thanks as always to my marvellous illustrator, Danielle English, and thanks also to Rebecca Douglass for providing me with the perfect picture reference from her hiking gallery.

The eagle-eyed among you will notice this is based on one of my #Inktober sketches – Castle Vexstein from the north.

And that is the heart of the trouble in this story, as it is in Willoughby the Narrator, due out now on April 27th. Vexstein has been trouble from day one of book 1, really. Or maybe day seven of book 1;)

I anticipate bringing The Princelings of the North out in the winter, but it may slip.

Starting today, I move onto the chapter illustrations for The Princelings of the North, Dylan and Dougall’s tale in the Princelings of the East series (Book 8). The Prologue shows the dastardly Lord Colman shipping Prince Kevin, the rightful heir of Castle Deeping, off to an isolated island. Then Dylan finds a map inside a bottle washed up near his home, which is a story I wrote as far back as 2013, in the A to Z Challenge on Jemima’s blog.

The illustrations for the first two chapters re-use Castle Deeping from Talent Seekers and Castle Haunn from the free short book Dylan’s Yuletide Journey. The rest will be new. They’ll be published on my Pinterest site, just like the Willoughby the Narrator pictures. You can see them all in the previous post here.

But to set you off, here is the abandoned Castle of Derisaig, where Kevin is holed up wondering if he’ll ever be rescued.