John E Clarke

The Ancestral Warrior John E Clarke

In this innovative fantasy adventure we encounter a mysterious talking bear and a small diverse group of humans crossing a continent to rescue a distant city state from the grasp of a tyrant; but their return home is put in jeopardy by one of the defeated enemy's vengeful crea-tures. 'The Ancestral Warrior' is a unique combination of fantasy, action, mystery and adventure quest, set in a parallel universe. The eastern city state of Karwaat is ruled by a tyrannical usurper, a renegade priest who has heightened his hypnotic skills through paranormal means. A Karwaatian academic, who dabbles in the occult, sends a captive djinn called Abu Dib to faraway Norland. This academic has read a legend about a warrior bear who once lived there and defeated a similar usurper. He believes that such a bear may still exist. He instructs the djinn to find and bring that bear to Karwaat. Having reached Norland, Abu Dib meets a young sheep farmer called Jo and, through her, a bear called Boris who works as a farmhand and is no warrior. Nevertheless, they muster a team of five comrades to escort Boris to Karwaat The magical aspects of the story are firmly grounded in a precise realism. The ecological and geopolitical traditions, religions and technologies found in the different countries are described in sufficient depth to give verisimilitude to the make-believe continent across which the story roams.