BOOK TOUR: The Sword In The Street by C.M. Caplan

BOOK INFORMATION

Title: The Sword in the Street

Author: C. M. Caplan

Publisher: Self-published

Cover artist: Felix Ortiz

Cover designer: Ken Dawson

Publication date: 03 March 2021

Age group: Adult

Genres: Fantasy

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Synopsis

Trial by battle is a holy rite on Hillside. Hired blades bleed their foes in savage duels, settling everything from petty grievances to the corporate laws that keep their citizens in line. Embroiled in these cutthroat political games is John Chronicle, an impoverished swordsman with no better prospects, seeking the duel that will free him from the Dregs.

Meanwhile, John’s boyfriend Edwin, an autistic university student, befriends a fellow scholar who claims to study the arcane art of thaumaturgy. When she offers to teach Edwin this subtle magic, he hopes that he can use it to bolster John’s skill with a blade. But thaumaturgy is a dangerous magic, and the forces that drive it have other plans.

The couple soon find themselves entangled in the web of intrigue surrounding the swordsmen and their sponsors, and they’re forced to question how bloody they’re willing to get to escape poverty — and they don’t come away with the same answer.

On-page Representation

• Mental disability
• Neuroatypicality
• Queerness
  • Bisexual
  • Gay
  • MLM

Trigger and Content Warnings

• Shown on Page:
  • Profanity
  • Violence
  • Ableism
  • Self-Harm
  • Addiction/Withdrawal
• Alluded To:
  • Abuse – Never shown on the page, but an important aspect to the backgrounds of each main character, and talked about between them
  • Rape –  It is never directly depicted, though the victim recounts the events during a monologue about halfway through.

AUTHOR INFORMATION

C.M. Caplan Is the author of The Sword in the Street. He’s a quadruplet (yes, really), mentally disabled, and he spent two years as the Senior Fiction Editor on a national magazine – while he was still an undergrad in college. He has a degree in creative writing from Salem State University and was the recipient of the university’s highest honor in the arts. His short fiction also won an Honorable Mention in the 2019 Writers of the Future Contest.

Caplan’s introduction to fantasy came through J. R. R. Tolkien and George R. R. Martin. He has a tattoo that roughly translates to Valar Morghulis, as written in Tolkien’s Elvish script, in an acknowledgment of that fact. Other influences include Robin Hobb, Ellen Kushner, N.K. Jemisin, Katherine Addison, John Irving, Ann Petry, K.S. Villoso, and Neil Gaiman.

He currently lives in New England, where he works remotely for a social justice theater company.

Author links

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