Tag: YA fiction

Another Great Review for A Cold Wind Blows

“A slice of fantasy brilliance”

Always great to get reviews out of the blue from someone who so clearly gets it. This one from AndrewSarahBookReviewer. Yes, that’s their mysterious handle. Have a read and see if you agree by reading it yourself. Links to Amazon at the end of this blogpost.

“A Cold Wind Blows doesn’t read like something written by a man testing his first dip into children’s fantasy. It reads like someone who knows how to pull history, myth, and magic into one big imaginative storm, and then quietly pretend it’s all casual. But here’s the catch, it’s almost criminal that a story this rich, this layered, and this cinematically British isn’t stirring up more noise online.

Let’s start from the top.
You’ve got Silas Cummerbund, a name that sounds like it belongs in both a Dickens novel and a secret magical agency. The man’s half mentor, half mystery, and fully fascinating. Then there’s Princess Gaia, trained to harness her hidden powers, facing danger, betrayal, and probably more character development than most fantasy heroines get in a trilogy.

The world of Yngerlande isn’t just imagined; it’s constructed, with history breathing beneath the soil, loyalty and treachery doing a slow, deadly waltz, and danger watching from the kitchen (because, of course, there’s a suspicious kitchen boy named Shrike ). You’ve got everything, a sharp mind for structure, a love of lore, a solid moral compass, and that old-school narrative warmth modern fantasy often lacks.

It’s classic fantasy craftsmanship, the kind that brings back that old-school sense of wonder and storytelling gravitas. You can feel the teacher in you on every page, that precise attention to pacing, that clean sentence rhythm, the moral backbone hiding beneath the adventure. There’s something deeply nostalgic about your writing, it’s the kind of story that whispers “just one more chapter” until the reader realizes it’s 3 a.m. and they’ve stopped pretending to be an adult.”

Many thanks to Sarah for such a wonderful Review!

See for yourself – click here to buy: https://shorturl.at/HYY27

Book 1 in the trilogy, The Yngerlande Variations, is available here. The Watcher and The Friend: https://shorturl.at/4OAZK

More 5 Star Reviews Coming In for A Cold Wind Blows!

It’s always lovely when positive reviews keep coming in for a new book. This one is from Rebecca De Figueiredo from the Online Book Club. There are also some great reviews on Amazon too. You can buy the book and see the reviews here:

https://shorturl.at/Xp55K

Following is an official OnlineBookClub.org review of “A Cold Wind Blows” by R J Barron.]

Book Cover

5 out of 5 stars

Title: A Cold Wind Blows
Author: R J Barron

How captivating and otherworldly this book is! The reader will soon find out how apt the title is. It was well balanced between reality, shape-shifting, and magic. There were people and places that are actually real, such as King James’ Palace and the River Ouse, included in a deep and mesmerising story. I don’t usually enjoy this sort of genre, preferring more adult drama, but there was something innocent and entertaining about this one. In my experience, books of this genre have a tendency to be all over the place, with far too many characters and words that are difficult to pronounce; some even have a glossary (which child is going to refer to a glossary every five minutes?!). The only word that took a bit of time to get used to was ‘Yngerland’, which is the kingdom in question. The characters were likable, with the usual malevolent dark characters and holier-than-thou good ones. There is also a character who is neither on one side nor the other: the reader will find out.

At just the right length, with an inviting introduction, chunky middle, and mysterious ending, this book takes the reader on a magical adventure. The magic is fairly subtle.

I would have loved some illustrations: pictures of the steedwings, or huge mansions, or a character or two, but perhaps it’s better for the young mind to create its own images.

I found the editing to be perfect and did not notice any typos. The prose was cleverly written in that most older children will be able to read it, and it would be a marvellous book to read out loud. I will award it five out of five stars.

******
A Cold Wind Blows
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon

A Cold Wind Blows – published on Friday May 30th

Book 2 in the Yngerlande Variations trilogy published by Burton Mayers books

The long awaited sequel to “The Watcher and The Friend” by R J Barron is published this Friday by Burton Mayers Books. “A Cold Wind Blows” is the second book in the trilogy, The Yngerlande Variations, set in the parallel world of Yngerlande in 1796. Here is the synopsis of the story so far. Warning! Spoiler Alert! Don’t read the summary if you have not yet read the first book and want to do so.

Tom has been summoned to help Silas and his allies defeat the relatives of the old King, Oliver and Jacob, who want to overthrow Queen Matilda and take the country back to a time when racism and discrimination were ever present. His task is made more complicated by the fact that he discovers that his sister, Grace, is alive and well in Yngerlande and is living there as a reward for her service when she was the Friend of Yngerlande. After many adventures and dangerous scrapes, they succeed, and Queen Matilda maintains her rule of peace, love and equality.

In “The Watcher and The Friend”, the first book in the trilogy, thirteen-year-old Thomas Trelawney is spending Christmas at an old Rectory on the North Yorkshire coast. It is the family’s first holiday since the death of Tom’s sister Grace. Here, Tom discovers a portal to another world and travels through it to Yngerlande, in 1795, with his cousin, Dan. Yngerlande is a parallel world to England, but is a much more diverse, equal society.

He meets Silas Cummerbund, who is The Watcher, the mysterious character who guards the portal between the two worlds. He tells Tom that he is the new Friend, the person whose role is to act as the link between the two worlds. This second book continues the story, as Oliver and Jacob return with another attempt to take back the crown of Yngerlande, only this time they are more dangerous and better prepared.

Silas has spent the summer training Princess Gaia, aka Clara to use her magic powers to their full extent, to be ready for any further threats to Yngerlande, but they are taken by surprise by the boldness of Oliver and Jacob’s new plan. A mysterious new character, Shrike, is introduced. He is by turns charming, dangerous, and duplicitous. Whose side is he really on? Even by the end of the book, that question is not clearly answered. One thing is certain, however. Thomas Trelawney is recalled from England to Yngerlande when everything looks lost. He does not trust Shrike, not least because Grace has fallen in love with him. Does Shrike have feelings for her, or is he just playing a clever game for his own ends?

“A Cold Wind Blows” begins eight months later.

The story takes in the wild North York Moors, Runswick Bay, Mulgrave Hall, the crumbling ruins of  Hard Crag Towers, with its menagerie of bats, steedwings and owls,  and the ancient city of York. It’s full of adventure, peppered with cross dressing, betrayal, vengeance, disguise and murder, with a liberal sprinkling of romance, friendship and love.

This is a must-read YA adventure, that is aimed at everyone from 9 to 90 who loves Fantasy novels. It’s available from the following links:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=a+cold+wind+blows+r+j+barron&crid=H08N4ZNJ851M&sprefix=a+cold+wind+blows+r+j+barron%2Caps%2C176&ref=nb_sb_noss_1

https://www.waterstones.com/book/a-cold-wind-blows/r-j-barron/9781917224116

https://www.brownsbfs.co.uk/Product/Barron-R-J/A-Cold-Wind-Blows/9781917224116

To buy Book 1, The Watcher and The Friend, use these links. Please note: the Amazon link gives you a free preview, but shows the old cover

https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-watcher-and-the-friend/r-j-barron/9781838345921

The Return of Telling Stories

Regular readers of this blog will know that, if nothing else, it is eclectic, covering the highways and byways, the nooks and crannies of human interest. Fiction, Politics, Football, Writing, Theatre, Film, Music, original short stories – all human life is here. So you will forgive me, I’m sure, if this latest blog is unashamedly devoted to self-promotion. After a hiatus of a couple of years, my podcast Telling Stories has returned. When the kids move back out, the old recording studio moves back in. I’ve used it to contribute to Librivox, which in essence is an audio book version of The Gutenberg project. Anyone who passes the technical recording test can volunteer to read books that are out of copyright, and there is a vast library of free audio books, produced by said volunteers.

If you like listening to audiobooks, give this a go. It’s barely publicised, and the quality of the readers is varied, but with a bit of trial and error, you’ll be able to find something to your taste, that doesn’t offend your rigorous standards of fiction, technical specs and reading voice. It’s a really worthy project and deserves more support. Check it out at Librivox

Another project even more worthy of support is my Podcast. I’ve resumed the momentous task of turning my YA book, The Watcher and The Friend into an audio book, via regular recordings on my podcast, Telling Stories. I’m trying to post a weekly chapter. Have a look at the ones I’ve done since the new studio arrived. The links are here.  Try it and pass it on if you like it. Or even if you don’t.

Make Sure you listen to the episodes in the right order! If you havent started yet, follow the links to the beginning and click follow on the Spotify Podcast page

https://open.spotify.com/embed/show/5rzqeF7AI29UTktP9T62sG?utm_source=generator

Chapter 6

A Cold Wind Blows – Book 2 of The Yngerlande Variations

Finally, some exciting news. The sequel to the book is scheduled to be published later this year. It’s called A Cold Wind Blows, and I’m very pleased to be able to give you a sneak preview of the new cover – designed by me and produced by the very talented Youness Elh. More on this later!

New YA Children’s Author – first novel available to pre-order.

Find out more about this exciting new YA writer by clicking the link below.

http://rjbarron.co.uk

The Culture wars that are so current today (think Black Lives Matter, the furore over statues, Gender and Sexuality issues) remind us that the liberalisation of social attutudes to discrimination and privilege can not be taken for granted. Battles that seem to have been won have to be constantly refought as the Right and Hard Right appear to be ever more emboldened to turn back the clock and erode hard won gains.

Just at the right time comes a YA novel that addresses these issues through depicting the same battles being fought in a parallel world to ours.

Anyone with a passion (or even a mild interest) for children’s literature, especially YA novels, should have a look at this exciting new writer, R J Barron.

His first YA novel, “The Watcher and The Friend” is due to be published on June 11th and is currently available now for pre-order.

The book tells the story of Thomas Trelawney, a thirteen-year old boy on a Christmas holiday in an old rectory on the North Yorkshire coast. It is the family’s first holiday since the death of Thomas’ older sister, Grace. On his first night there, Tom finds himself mysteriously lured through the Grandfather clock in his room, to the parallel land of Yngerlande, an eighteenth century version of a land nearly, but not quite, like England. He meets the Reverend Silas Cummerbund, the Watcher, whose responsibility it is to guard the passage between the two lands, and discovers that he is the new Friend, the person in England with the power to travel between the two worlds.

Yngerlande is a land of diversity and tolerance. There is a black queen on the throne, Queen Matilda, and women and races of all kinds are in positions of power and influence. Silas has discovered a plot by the grandson of the old mad King, Oliver, to violently depose Matilda and restore the old ways: racist, elitist, sexist. He needs Thomas to help him thwart the plot, because of the strange powers he possesses, including his ability to use the mysterious and powerful Sounding Stones.

Runswick Bay, North Yorkshire

At the end of every night he returns to his bedroom in the rectory in England, before going back through the clock. He visits on five nights, ending on Christmas Eve. Tom discovers as much about himself as he does about this strange new world, particularly when he meets the mysterious girl with stars in her hair. Who is she and what explains the powerful connection they have from the moment they meet?