Wednesday, January 22, 2025

Blog Tour: The Rune Stone by Julia Ibbotson



Join The Coffee Pot Book Club on tour with…


The Rune Stone

Dr DuLac Series #3

by Julia Ibbotson


March 17th - 21st, 2025

Publication Date: December 2021
Series: Dr DuLac Series #3 (can be read as standalone)
Publisher: Archbury Books
Pages: 294
Genre: Historical Romance / Timeslip Mystery


A haunting time-slip mystery of runes and romance.

When Dr Viv DuLac, medievalist and academic, finds a mysterious runic inscription on a Rune Stone in the graveyard of her husband’s village church, she unwittingly sets off a chain of circumstances that disturb their quiet lives in ways she never expected. She, once again, feels the echoes of the past resonate through time and into the present.

Can she unlock the secrets of the runes in the life of the 6th century Lady Vivianne and in Viv’s own life? Again, lives of the past and present intertwine alarmingly as Viv desperately tries to save them both, without changing the course of history.

For fans of Barbara Erskine, Pamela Hartshorne, Susanna Kearsley, Christina Courtenay.

~~~

The Dr DuLac Series:

A Shape on the Air
The Dragon Tree
The Rune Stone



Praise for Julia Ibbotson

“A rich and evocative time-slip novel that beautifully and satisfyingly concludes this superb trilogy. The story is woven seamlessly and skilfully between the past and the present and the reader is drawn deeply into both worlds.  Her portrayal of the 6th century and its way of life are authoritative, vivid and memorable.”
~ Kate Sullivan

“Dr Ibbotson has created living, breathing characters that will remain in the reader’s mind long after the book is read … The characters are brought to life beautifully with perfect economy of description … fabulous!”
~ Melissa Morgan

“Julia does an incredible job of setting up the idea of time-shift so that it’s believable and makes sense.”
~ book tour reviewer

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This series is available on #KindleUnlimited, and in ebook & paperback formats.

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Julia Ibbotson


Julia Ibbotson is fascinated by the medieval world and the concept of time. She is the author of historical mysteries with a frisson of romance. Her books are evocative of time and place, well-researched and uplifting page-turners. Her current series focuses on early medieval time-slip/dual-time mysteries. Julia read English at Keele University, England, specialising in medieval language/ literature/ history, and has a PhD in socio-linguistics. 

After a turbulent time in Ghana, West Africa, she became a school teacher, then a university academic and researcher. Her break as an author came soon after she joined the RNA’s New Writers’ Scheme in 2015, with a three-book deal from Lume Books for a trilogy (Drumbeats) set in Ghana in the 1960s. She has published five other books, including A Shape on the Air, an Anglo-Saxon timeslip mystery, and its two sequels The Dragon Tree and The Rune Stone.

Her work in progress is a new series of Anglo-Saxon mystery romances, beginning with Daughter of Mercia, where echoes of the past resonate across the centuries.

Her books will appeal to fans of Barbara Erskine, Pamela Hartshorne, Susanna Kearsley, and Christina Courtenay. Her readers say: ‘Julia’s books captured my imagination’, ‘beautiful story-telling’, ‘evocative and well-paced storylines’, ‘brilliant and fascinating’ and ‘I just couldn’t put it down’.

Author Links:
Website • Twitter / X • Facebook • Instagram • Bluesky




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Join The Coffee Pot Book Club on #WriterWednesday as award-winning author Juliane Weber talks about negative Reviews #HistoricalFiction #WritingTips #WritersLife

 



Dealing with Bad Reviews

by Juliane Weber


As any author will tell you, writing a book is a labour of love. It takes hours, months and even years of hard work and dedication to construct a novel, not to mention the enormous amount of research required for something like a historical fiction book. And then there’s the emotional toll of getting into the characters’ heads as they experience adversities and heartache, a very personal and sometimes challenging journey that allows the characters to come alive on the page. It’s no wonder then that most authors are filled with a strange combination of elation and terror when their “book babies” go out into the world. While we want our masterpieces to be read there’s always the fear in the back of our minds that our readers might not like what we’ve written.  

Especially as a new author this idea can be daunting and, indeed, getting that first one-star rating can be terribly upsetting (I know it was for me!). But, if you are fortunate enough to get your book into readers’ hands, bad ratings and reviews are inevitable—there is not a single book that is loved by everybody who reads it. This realisation is the first step in dealing with negative feedback. In fact, to perk yourself up if you’ve gotten a bad rating or a bad review I recommend checking out the Amazon pages of a few successful books. You will find that all of them have multiple one-star ratings (sometimes even thousands). Further, if you look at the reviews attached to those poor ratings, you will see that readers who didn’t like a particular book bemoan the plot, the characters, the writing style and any number of other things, which will usually be the exact same features that fans of the book say they love.  

Clearly, it’s all a matter of opinion. Assuming you’ve done your utmost to eliminate errors from your manuscript before it’s published, just about everything about your book is subjective—some readers will love it and some will, unfortunately, hate it. It simply comes with the territory.

But knowing this and being able to deal with bad ratings are two different things. Even with the best of intentions we can find ourselves becoming dispirited when a reader posts a scathing review. I myself have had moments when I’ve wondered why I bother writing at all and was seriously tempted to unpublish my books and pretend I’d never written any. To prevent myself from doing any such thing I decided on a very simple tactic: I no longer read bad reviews. While some authors might consider all forms of feedback constructive I find this not to be the case. After all, what is constructive about a reader telling you you’ve written a terrible book? I couldn’t write a different book if I tried, as I can only write the story that comes into my head. I therefore choose to read only reviews from readers who actually enjoy what I write—to motivate myself to continue doing so.



Now, if you find that you’re getting a disproportionately high number of three-star ratings and below, it might be a good idea to have a look at those reviews after all, to see if there’s an issue with your book that needs to be fixed. Perhaps professional proofreading and editing are required to polish the manuscript and increase readers’ enjoyment of your story? But if you’re getting a mix of the good and the bad, with a decent flow of glowing reviews in between you can rest assured it all comes down to reader preference. And if you still find it difficult seeing your overall rating take the occasional nosedive, consider simply stepping away from everything to do with ratings and reviews for a time, since there’s nothing you can do about them in any case. Not looking at your Amazon or Goodreads pages for a few weeks or months might help you remember why you started writing in the first place, and get back to working on your next book.   


Thank you for your insightful article, Juliane. Great advice to follow. We cannot please everyone, but gaining a loyal following of readers who enjoy our novels makes it all worthwhile.




Juliane Weber


Juliane is a scientist turned novelist. She holds degrees in physiology and zoology, including a PhD in physiology.

During her studies she realised her passion lay not in conducting scientific research herself, but in writing about it. Thus began her career as a medical writer, where she took on all manner of writing and editing tasks, in the process honing her writing skills, until she finally plucked up the courage to write her first historical novel, Under the Emerald Sky. The book is the first in the Irish Fortune Series, which takes readers on action-packed romantic adventures amid the captivating scenery and folklore of 19th century Ireland around the time of the Great Famine.

Juliane was born in Germany, but spent most of her life in South Africa. She now lives with her husband and two sons in Hamelin, Germany, the town made famous by the story of the Pied Piper.

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Have a sneak peek between the covers of The World Turn'd Upside Down by Seth Irving Handaside #HistoricalFiction #AmericanHistoricalFiction #RecommendedReading



The World Turn'd Upside Down

Volume 2 of 4 of Creating a Republic the American Way

by Seth Irving Handaside


"The World Turned Upside Down" takes readers on an exhilarating journey through one of history's most transformative periods.


​This masterful work of historical fiction follows the audacious British-American colonists, known as the Founders, as they boldly rise against the mightiest empire of their time: England. Their unprecedented struggle challenged the status quo and reshaped the foundation of global politics and human rights, ushering in the era of democracy. As the narrative unfolds with rich, immersive detail and dynamic characters, the story poses a profound question: after securing their hard-won liberty, could they preserve and nurture the fragile promise of a new world?


This compelling tale captures the spirit of revolution and the enduring quest for freedom.




“I thought you would like a narrative,” wrote Alex to Reverend Knox, “of my late involvement in a battle.”


“Asked by the hard-drinking Lord Sterling to help man some cannon, I went to Long Island on Monday morning, August 26.


Quickly, we learned by the return of some of the scouting parties that the English were in motion and coming up the Island with several fieldpieces.


Three thousand men received orders, chiefly from the Pennsylvania and Maryland troops, to attack them on their march.  About sunrise, they meet up with a very extensive body of them. 


The assault from this flanking force began amid a clear and cloudless sky at nine A.M., the 27th.  This unopposed force under Howe outnumbered the whole American army.  It was now in the rear of the American detachments under Sullivan and Sterling, who rushed forward to defend the direct western routes.


Yours truly and my men, with few cannons to defend ourselves, set up in an orchard.   


On the enemy's approach, we gave them a very severe fire. 


We kept this up for a considerable time until we were near surrounded. 


We then retreated to the woods.


The overweight and rheumatic Lord Sterling, who commanded, immediately drew us up in a line and offered them intense battle in an authentic English taste. 


The British army then advanced within about three hundred yards of us and began a heavy fire from their cannon and mortars, for both the balls and shells flew very fast, now and then taking off ahead.


Ordered not to fire until the enemy came within fifty yards; the patriots stood their fire coolly and firmly, but the British declined to come any nearer, although treble in number.


In this situation, my men and I stood from sunrise to midnight, the enemy firing upon us most of the time.


By a route never dreamed of, the main body of the British army surrounded the rebels and drove within our lines.  Ordered to withdraw, we fought through the enemy on every field and road.  We retreated a quarter of a mile before being fired upon by an advanced party of the enemy.   In our rear, we received fire from their artillery.  Our men fought with more than Roman courage, and I am convinced they would have stood until they were shot down.  We forced the advanced party, which first attacked us, to give way.  Through an opening, we got a passage down to the side of a marsh, seldom before waded over, which we passed, and then swam a narrow river, all the time exposed to the enemy’s fire. 


The whole of our battalion’s right-wing, thinking it impossible to pass through the marsh, attempted to force their way through the wood.  They were almost to a man killed or taken. 


The Maryland battalion has lost two hundred and fifty-nine men, amongst whom are twelve officers: Captains Veazey and Bowie, the first certainly killed; Lieuts. Butler, Sterrett, Dent, Coursey, Muse, Prawl; Ensigns Coats and Fernandes; who are killed, or who prisoners, is yet uncertain.  Many of the officers lost their swords and guns.





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Seth Irving Handaside


Growing up in Putnam County in the town of Putnam Valley, named after General Israel Putnam, Seth Irving Handaside walked its roads.

He explored the hills and valleys that American rebels tread. But, he often thought, what would have done when the head of the state, King George III of England, ignored his rights and the rule of law?

Would he have marched to the tune of the revolution and been in a regiment commanded by General Putnam or sided with the loyalists?

Fascinated by American history since elementary school, politics runs in his veins. He has spent the last ten years researching and reading about the founding fathers and settled on six men, three boys not yet twenty, and three Virginians who risked having their necks stretched to make the American dream a reality.


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