Scott Telek's Blog: The Swithen Blog

Greetings interested parties–

Two major items of note.

It is quite possible to get a view of what to expect in Book 7 of The Swithen series with this exciting new piece, Book 7 Preview. I like this book but it is different… it adapts a different souce, one with a lot of spookiness and magic, and a lot of horror and the emergence of several villains. It also shifts into a different phase of the saga, in which we start following an interconnected cast of characters as their paths cross and connect with oine another. I’ll be interested to know what you think.

It is also well within the realm of possibility to pre-order an ebook of Book 7 right this very second, saving a whopping $4 off the price it will have once it is released.

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With all the introductory material out of the way, we now begin our guided reading of Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur with Book 1, Chapter 1.

if you’ve ever wanted to read this but been intimidated, I will literally read it to you and we will go chapter by chapter discussing what is happening, what it all means and the larger context of the story and how it all came together. I think it will offer many people a new way to approac h the work, especially hearing it read with the intonations making more sense of it and getting the wider context.

Check out the guided reading now > > >

Alrighty, that’s it! Hope you are well and surviving, you know, like everything with aplomb!

Greetings, delightful ones…

Remember how I said I was going to start a video/article series taking you through Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur chapter by chapter?

Well you know, it’s all a bit of “before you can do this, you have to do that, and before you can do that…” most of which involved getting the companion book of the entire series up and available before the series started. Where can you find it, you ask? Why, right here:

Companion Book
Paperback
EBook

Anyway, the first article and video sets up what Le Morte d’Arthur IS, like what were the circumstances under which it was written and how did it all come to be. It’s not just fluff, it’s very crucial to understanding all the articles that follow, so if you plan to follow along with the series, check it out!

So without futher ado, here is Part 1 of the Guided Reading of Le Morte d’Arthur: What is Le Morte d’Arthur?

Greetings folks! It’s been a long time, but I have been busily working away. I am almost done with Book 7 of The Swithen and that will be going to the proofreader soon, but in the meantime I have worked on another project. A new translation and guided reading of Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur.

If you’ve ever tried to read Le Morte d’Arthur and not gotten very far, this is the book for you. I walk you through an easy new translation of the text, stopping every few paragraphs to explain what’s happening and what it all means. It’s also aimed at the average person who likes Game of Thrones and Lord of the Rings and maybe just wants to check out what this King Arthur stuff is all about—so it’s not pretentious and lofty, it’s casual and funny and really just about helping you get through.

P.S. This is just Book One of the Twenty-One Book work, but it still amounts to 183 pages and still includes the sword in the stone, Merlin, the Lady of the Lake and Excalibur. I will continue moving on to the other books in time and by the end will have one huge new translation and guide to Malory’s monumental work.

This is a project that definitely evolved from a small idea. On my YouTube channel @theswithenbookseries my videos do okay… but the one called How to Read Le Morte d’Arthur outperforms them all by thousands of views. So I thought, “I’ll do a series that goes through Le Morte d’Arthur chapter by chapter.” Then I realized that I couldn’t include any of Malory’s text, because it is a copyrighted translation. So I thought it was time to do my own translation. And then I thought it should be a book. And then I thought there should be an intro and a afterward… so it all just started and continued to grow. 

Anyway, if you’ve ever wanted to read Le Morte d’Arthur but been intimidated by the text, give it a shot! It is only ebook now, but the paperback will follow soon. Thanks, and Book 7 of The Swithen should be out in the Fall. 

Greetings happy ones…

I made a playlist that expresses the atmosphere of my Arthurian book series The Swithen. It’s an hour and 15 minutes of dark, brooding, mysterious and moody music that captures the mood I’m trying to create in my books. It will work even if you’ve never read the books!

Listen below or go to this page where you will find track-by-track discussion of what I hear in each song.

Preview tracks below. To listen to full songs, click the three dots and right and select “Play on Spotify.”

Greetings lovely ones—

So much going on I can’t even make one blog post about one thing! In the interest of your time, here are the links, then we’ll have more detail below.

Book 6 author interview – on the Children of Arthur blog

Book 6 is on Kindle Unlimited – Read it for free if you’re on KU

King Arthur Basics article – A new article for the total newbie to King Arthur

And now more detail:

Book 6 author interview

First and most exciting is an interview focusing on Book 6 with fellow Arthurian author Tyler Tichelaar. This is a good and very in-depth interview that gets into the nuts and bolts of interpreting the centuries-old legend while maintaining fidelity. Here’s a sample:

Tyler: Do you ever feel too constricted or limited in your writing by having to stick so closely to the legend? Does it become somewhat tedious to write as a result, or do you feel you have enough leniency to deviate and make up your own interpretations?

Scott: Actually, I love it! That has been the gift that keeps on giving, because the original Arthurian legends stand up to it and continue to reveal new depths as you investigate further. It also makes it interesting and like a puzzle for me to look at what we know and don’t know and think of a way to make it work.

For example, all we know about Ulfius is that he was Uther’s friend and ended up arranging Uther’s marriage to Arthur’s mother Igraine, and that later he accuses Igraine of being false. So, it becomes a game to think of what his character might be like, based on the few things we know and what kind of story might make sense and feel honest between the plot points. So, I have to create a character that will work within those strictures, and that is a fun challenge.

The downside is, as people say, “we all know the plot,” and knowing that if I am sticking to the legend, a certain number of people will know what is coming. That hinders the amount of surprise I can offer, but on the other hand, I also think about new readers who do not know the Arthurian legend and might discover it through my books. So, they may have heard about the sword in the stone, for instance, but don’t know the entire story that brought us to that point. So far, each novel has presented its own challenges and has its own focus and tone, so that keeps me interested. It is far from tedious, for sure!

Go to the interview > > > 

Book 6 is on Kindle Unlimited

If you have Kindle Unlimited, you can read Book 6 for free. If one of your friends you have been trying to start the series has Kindle Unlimited, they can read for free. There are few on ramps to the series since it is so dense and based on accumulated history, so I am advising people that they can start at Book 6 with relative ease, since it begins the story of Arthur’s reign, makes a pretty good self-contained adventure, and there won’t be too much confusion for those new to the series. 

Find Book 6 on Kindle Unlimited > > >

King Arthur: The Basics article

I am in the process of sprucing up the website for The Swithen, which is in pretty desperate need of some loving attention. I am going to re-organize it to focus more on resources for readers of the novels, like character lists and insights about the books and Arthurian legend, and one of the first things to do is revamp some of the stale articles. This one is a basic orientation to King Arthur for the total newbie, which can still be interesting to read if you already know it all. 

Read King Arthur: The Basics > > >

Thanks so much for supporting the book series! Feel free to let me know anything else you’d like to see. 

Greetings delightful people! I’m quite excited because the next book in the Swithen series will be released this Wednesday, August 28th. And the reason I’m excited is because I think this one is pretty good! This is where the King Arthur story begins for most people, and it has lots of magic and battles and action and intrigue.

You can order the ebook here.

Here’s a video where I take you through the main points of what to expect and, in short, why it’s awesome.

I thought the book was pretty good, but you know how you lose perspective as the author, so I was thrilled when my proofreader, who has read them all, said: [edited for spoilers:]

“Scott, I’ve gotta say I think this book is my favorite so far. I love Arthur’s progression, his range of emotion in having to deal with everything happening to him both externally and internally… Those extremes would make any person go a little nuts. His [scene] with Merlin at the end was so valid and real. 

I also like how you handled Arthur and Guinevere’s first encounter over those few days after the battle. You managed to capture that funny teenage awkwardness without making it seem icky, if you know what I mean. I’m excited to see Guinevere become more fleshed out as the books progress.”

Yay! I am already fairly far into Book 7 because I’m so into the continuing story right now and basically, from now on we have continuously evolving stories that will just keep going all the way for 19 more novels!

You can order the ebook here.

Greetings good samaritans,

Wondering about Merlin? How he developed? Where his figure originated and how it evolved through various rounds of storytelling over hundreds of years and through the work of several different authors? Wonder no more! Because my new article Who is Merlin? His Legendary Origins is here.

I have had an article on my website since the early days, but it was entirely inadequate, so I gave it a huge revamp and included a lot more information and background to make it a worthy entry. Now it has a lot more detail about where the first figure of Merlin originated in legend and how each version iterated on his myth, and when he was added to the Arthurian legend… because he wasn’t always at Arthur’s side! I find it fascinating to follow the various iterations and permutations these characters that we all think we “know” went through before they became the characters we are familiar with.

The piece now also talks about how Merlin appears in my Swithen novels, where I decided I had to take seriously the idea that he is the son of the devil and can’t just drop that little detail and move on like it never happened! And it’s all waiting for you in:

Who is Merlin? His Legendary Origins

Speaking of Merlin, the forthcoming Book 6 is where Merlin and Arthur are finally together and having to learn to work side by side, which may not be the smoothest pairing at first. I’m super-psyched about Book 6 because I think it’s really good and it’s only a buck if you pre-order it for Kindle (or the free Kindle app that lets you read on any device). The price will go up once it’s released. It’s also a great place to join the series if you don’t want to fuss with all that messy backstory. So why not pre-order now????? 

Pre-order Book 6: Gifts With Hard Swords

Greetings everyone, I’m very excited because Book 6 of The Swithen Arthurian novel series, called Gifts With Hard Swords, is now available for pre-order! I am doing the last look-over now before sending it to my proofreader and I’m getting really eager to have it out there!

This one begins where Sir Thomas Malory began his Le Morte D’Arthur, which means that all of the stuff in the previous books was incorporated from another early Arthurian source or my own invention. Here we begin the very first years of King Arthur’s reign, his first battles, his meeting with Guinevere, his learning to deal with Merlin, etc. For this reason, this is not a bad place to start the series if you were curious. You’ll be able to understand what’s going on, but if you want the additional background on each of the characters and how they got here, the first five books are always waiting out there.

That said, this book is where–if it works!–the promise of this series begins to play out. For one, readers who have been following the series will have a whole bunch of additional history and resonance for all these characters as they see them come together for the first time, so they will have a huge additional sense of meaning. In this book we start to have material from the longer Arthurian sources than were covered in Le Morte D’Arthur, so if you have only read Malory, there is a fair amount here that is from the pre-1485 material, but will be new to you. 

I wrote a piece on my website offering a glimpse at what to expect in the new book, and you can delve into it here:

The Swithen Book 6 Preview

You can also pre-order a Kindle copy here for just 0.99… the price will go up once it’s released. The free Kindle app makes it possible to read on any phone or tablet you have. Paperbacks will follow after release.

Pre-Order The Swithen Book 6: Gifts With Hard Swords

And that’s about it! Thanks for reading and I hope you like the new book!

Greetings delightful people…

I have just launched a new Substack. What is a substack? It is a newsletter where an author you like [in this case, me] writes about what they want.

In my case, I will write about the Arthurian Legend, about my book series The Swithen, about the process of writing itself and indie publishing, and also about books, music, movies and culture in general. 

There will be discussion of tech, but I promise, NO POLITICS! I want to keep it fun and a refuge from all that.

It will also be FREE (for now, at least). Most substacks are paid subscriptions, but I want this to be a place to get word out about my books, so if you like something there, please share it!

There are four posts up now that will give you a sense of what to expect. 

Go there now! 

https://writerofarthur.substack.com

Greetings delightful people!

Let’s keep it short: I posted an excerpt from Book Six in progress. I am only at the first draft stage and we’re probably looking at Fall 2024 for final release, but I got excited and wanted to share!

This book corresponds to Chapter One of Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur, and if you’re familiar with that you probably remember the scene in which Arthur learns who his parents really were and Ulfius make a pretty serious accusation against Arthur’s birth mother, Igraine. That’s what happens in this scene.

Another thing I like about this book is that all the characters from all the storylines converge here, and this scene certainly demonstrates that as we have Arthur’s foster family, his birth family, future knights like Gawain, kings making war on him… basically everyone.

Take a look and let me know what you think!

Now read: EXCERPT FROM BOOK 6: ARTHUR’S PARENTAGE REVEALED