Hello all,

Welcome back! Let’s dive right in.

(OBLIGATORY SPOILER ALERT HERE:)

“Hello,
I’m part way through Drakin CPR and wanted to know if DLX supposed is to be in reference to COVID? You mentioned Wuhan in your book and inferred that something bad happened there.
Thanks,
Ian”

Hi Ian,
I can certainly understand why one might think that. However, if you remember, I first mentioned Wuhan in the Story of Raiya during the final battle. That book was written long before COVID and by Cataclysm, I wanted to expand on that and what happened to that city in my book. The unfortunate circumstances around COVID happened well after a lot of what I planned. I had thought about changing the location, but as it had already been specifically mentioned in the Story Raiya, I figured that I should just go with it.

As a side note, I do my best NOT to reference real life events in my books. I’ve long been an advocate for escapism and allowing for people of all backgrounds, creeds, ideologies, etc. to enjoy my books. Nothing in there should be perceived as social commentary. I hope that helps, DLX was something I created as a byproduct of the Dragon’s Bane vaccine, nothing more.

Readers, if you liked the book, please take a moment and leave me a quick review or if you’re pressed for time, some simple stars will suffice!! I wouldn’t ask, but the more exposure my book gets, the more copies it sells. Word of mouth is everything in this business! Thanks so much, all! I greatly appreciate it!

https://a.co/d/fvwmK1H

Thanks, friends! I’ll catch you on the flipside!

-Jim

Readers,

Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.

jhwriting@proton.me

I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.

I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.

Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.

Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU

Note:
If you have read my books, PLEASE log into Amazon and post a review. I really love to hear everyone’s thoughts and constructive criticisms. Reviews help get my book attention and word of mouth is everything in this business!

Thanks friends!

Catch you on the flip side!

-Jim

Hello all,

Welcome back! Let’s dive right in.

(OBLIGATORY SPOILER ALERT HERE:)

“Hi Jim,
I was wondering about the airships you put into your stories. Why would they be necessary? It seems with modern military technology, the idea of massive lumbering giant battleships would actually be a massive step back. Can you go into a little more detail about them?
Thanks,
John”

Hi John, thanks for the question. You’re right, in terms of modern times, the airships would not be practical. However, let’s remember something very important here; this is NOT the same world. The story does not take place in the modern world. The world that we know and… mostly love, died when the Red War began. Keep in mind, a lot of what we take for granted was lost. Of 8 billion people, only 1.5 survived the war. Humanity essentially had to relearn a lot of its technology and innovation. Couple that with the fact that you now have another species living on the planet, one that can grow very large and fly very fast, and you’ve got a whole new philosophy of defense.

Many in the UPW Senate, thanks in no small part to the influence of the Church of the Predestined, feared another potential dragon uprising and by The Orphans of Haven, had already put plans into effect to take away the main advantage that dragons had; aerial superiority. That took the form of massive armored warships capable of flying. What’s more, they would have massive cannons capable of ripping through the tough hides of dragons in ways that conventional weapons could not.

Qira opposed the creation of such warships and wanted to focus on society and internal struggles. She wanted funding to go to education, societal infrastructure, and things that would benefit people. She meant well, but it quickly became apparent that she was being very naive, especially because the emerging Eastern Empire was growing in strength and had gotten their hands on the plans for the Charleston Class Battleship. As a result, an air navy became essential.

Now, keep in mind, the air battleships aren’t the same thing we see with conventional modern battleships like say the USS Missouri (retired in the early 90s).

These battleships don’t use projectile weapons, they use neutron, laser, and (in the case of the UPWS Raiya) particle weapons. For defenses, they have EM fields that dissipate weapons fired directly at their hulls.

I’ll leave out the technical details as I explained how they fly in my books. However, I will also say that they also pack a full wing of fighters for defense and attack. Their bays are large enough to accommodate medium-sized skydrives as well.

Now, I know that we see the battleships constantly beating away at each other, but the truth is that ships like the Kali, Nagato, Colossus, Akagi, and the other battleships are more meant to act as mobile command posts while their fighters, in conjunction with the cruisers, destroyers, and aux craft do most of the fighting. They are more than capable of defending themselves, and would likely be called up against larger targets, but realistically, they’d be coordinating their task forces and ferrying their fighters from one location to another.

Anyway, I hope this helps you better understand the thought process behind the construction and proliferation of the global air navies.

Readers, if you liked the book, please take a moment and leave me a quick review or if you’re pressed for time, some simple stars will suffice!! I wouldn’t ask, but the more exposure my book gets, the more copies it sells. Word of mouth is everything in this business! Thanks so much, all! I greatly appreciate it!

https://a.co/d/fvwmK1H

Thanks, friends! I’ll catch you on the flipside!

-Jim

Readers,

Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.

jhwriting@proton.me

I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.

I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.

Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.

Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU

Note:
If you have read my books, PLEASE log into Amazon and post a review. I really love to hear everyone’s thoughts and constructive criticisms. Reviews help get my book attention and word of mouth is everything in this business!

Thanks friends!

Catch you on the flip side!

-Jim

Hello all,

Welcome back! Let’s dive right in.

(OBLIGATORY SPOILER ALERT HERE:)

“Hi Jim,
I was actually curious about what society would look like on the planet you created. With so many human/dragon couples that have come about and given how long dragons live, do you think that at some point the human race would become extinct on Earth as a result of this?
Thanks,
Terry”

Oof, Hi Terry! Um… that’s a tough one. By Empire of Ashes, which is a few hundred years after the Red War, humanity numbers about 5 billion people. Keep in mind, we went from almost 8 billion to around >1.5 billion during the war. Now, keep in mind, there are much MUCH fewer dragons. Five (six) of them arrived on Earth. Over time, they were able to increase their numbers to the thousands, to a few million by the end of the war. I’m not going to get into the logistics of how that happened, but it took a lot of continuous mating and managing by the dragon horde. A chunk of those left Earth after the war, so by the time of the Tale of the Frozen Heart, there’s several million, and by the time of the Empire of Ashes, their numbers are probably around 3-4 billion. Keeping in mind, having only one child is a human thing. It’s fairly rare for a dragon to have only one child.

(For anyone wondering, yes, Qira has siblings. I actually wrote a story about one of them that unfortunately went nowhere. I’ve debated publishing it, but at this point, I doubt that’ll ever happen.)

So dragons are a minority population, one that is significantly increasing in numbers, especially when you factor in how long-lived they are. Now, you asked if humanity would eventually go extinct. I think that could happen on the world I created, however I think it far more likely that dragons would go extinct before humans.  A dragon mating with a human means several young that would never be born as opposed to 1-4 human children.

There is another issue that we have to consider here; inter-species relationships. Joaquim and Nayeli won’t be the last to have a child. It’s implied in Rule of One that more cases like theirs would soon pop up around the world. What people like Majko Changwei Fei and Aritek wanted, was already impossible. So to answer your question… I think that in the coming centuries, we’d see three species pop up; humans, dragons, and half-dragons. As the number of half-dragons increase, the numbers of dragons and humans would likely decrease.

Readers, if you liked the book, please take a moment and leave me a quick review or if you’re pressed for time, some simple stars will suffice!! I wouldn’t ask, but the more exposure my book gets, the more copies it sells. Word of mouth is everything in this business! Thanks so much, all! I greatly appreciate it!

https://a.co/d/fvwmK1H

Thanks, friends! I’ll catch you on the flipside!

-Jim

Readers,

Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.

jhwriting@proton.me

I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.

I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.

Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.

Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU

Note:
If you have read my books, PLEASE log into Amazon and post a review. I really love to hear everyone’s thoughts and constructive criticisms. Reviews help get my book attention and word of mouth is everything in this business!

Thanks friends!

Catch you on the flip side!

-Jim

Hello all,

Welcome back! Let’s dive right in.

So the next question I got was a Qira question… because of course it was. Thankfully, this one is a bit different than others.

(OBLIGATORY SPOILER ALERT HERE)

“Hi Jim,
I’m curious. In your books, Qira seems to have chosen a life of celibacy. Can I ask why? Wouldn’t her getting with someone else fix her problem or at least maybe give her some relief?
Thanks,
John.”

Well, that’s a good question. The answer is a bit complicated. First, you have to understand, biologically, Qira is attached to Radley after having secretly imprinted on him during the brief moment when they held each other and confessed their feelings. She hid it, for multiple reasons, not the least of which being that it was considered a taboo and that there was no other record of a dragon imprinting on a human. A dragon only imprints on one mate, she can’t imprint on someone else later on as I talked about in the book. So while I guess some physical contact would give her some small relief, it wouldn’t solve her problem.

The second reason is because she views taking Radley’s name as an honor. She loved him more than anything and thought the absolutely world of him. He was her hero. After taking his name and having her marriage to him affirmed by both the human and dragon governing bodies, to then find another would have been dishonorable in her eyes. As she stated in Cataclysm Protocol: Red, she was mated to an incredible man and that was enough for her. A dragon heart only has room for one mate.

Thanks for the question! Greatly appreciated!

Readers, if you liked the book, please take a moment and leave me a quick review or if you’re pressed for time, some simple stars will suffice!! I wouldn’t ask, but the more exposure my book gets, the more copies it sells. Word of mouth is everything in this business! Thanks so much, all! I greatly appreciate it!

https://a.co/d/fvwmK1H

Thanks, friends! I’ll catch you on the flipside!

-Jim

Readers,

Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.

jhwriting@proton.me

I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.

I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.

Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.

Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU

Note:
If you have read my books, PLEASE log into Amazon and post a review. I really love to hear everyone’s thoughts and constructive criticisms. Reviews help get my book attention and word of mouth is everything in this business!

Thanks friends!

Catch you on the flip side!

-Jim

Hello all,

Welcome back! Let’s dive right in.
(OBLIGATORY SPOILER ALERT HERE)

“Dear Jim,
Can you go into a little bit more of Tar’Mortha? How is she able to exist without food or water for so long?
Thanks,
Lindsey”

Oooo… that’s a very good question. A VERY good question. Here’s the thing you have to understand about Tar’Mortha, she’s existed for over ten thousand years. That’s significantly longer than even the lifespans of the average elder dragon. What’s more, she was gifted with enhanced telekinetic abilities. Not only is she able to partition her mind to create illusionary beings with their own thoughts and feelings that she… can’t exactly control, but can watch and influence. Her prowess gave her the ability to slow her own aging and degradation, as well as increase her overall size. I don’t really cover this in the book, but even on Drakiur, the planet would not be able to sustain a creature of her immense size. It would be an ecological nightmare. This meant that Tar’Mortha had to seek other means of sustaining herself. She discovered a way to essentially ingest energy in other forms; primarily radiation from the sun. Unfortunately, because of the sun of our world is so much different from the red one around their’s, she was unable to get the same nourishment she needed. Thus she remained encased in ice, not only keeping her hidden, acting as a puppet master behind the scenes, but also slow her degradation, however much possible until she could find another source of nourishment.

Hope that answers your question!

Readers, if you liked the book, please take a moment and leave me a quick review or if you’re pressed for time, some simple stars will suffice!! I wouldn’t ask, but the more exposure my book gets, the more copies it sells. Word of mouth is everything in this business! Thanks so much, all! I greatly appreciate it!

https://a.co/d/fvwmK1H

Thanks, friends! I’ll catch you on the flipside!

-Jim

Readers,

Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.

jhwriting@proton.me

I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.

I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.

Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.

Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU

Note:
If you have read my books, PLEASE log into Amazon and post a review. I really love to hear everyone’s thoughts and constructive criticisms. Reviews help get my book attention and word of mouth is everything in this business!

Thanks friends!

Catch you on the flip side!

-Jim

Hello all,

Welcome back! Let’s dive right in.

So the next question I got was to dive a little bit more into the biology of the dragon race.

(OBLIGATORY SPOILER ALERT HERE:)

If you have not read past An Empire of Ashes, you may want to skip this piece.

So we have people asking how it is possible for humans and dragons to conceive a child. This is nothing new, half-dragon children have appeared in other fantasy stories, but I guess this question came up when I tried to explain how it could happen with two species that… admittedly, should be incompatible.

Well let’s remember that the entire basis for the series surrounded a half-dragon character named Raiya. Yes, she was a freak of nature that technically shouldn’t have been possible. However, because of the aggressive dragon immune system, drakaeic DNA did manage to impregnate a human woman.

Now, let’s address the elephant in the room first. Leaving out copulation, how can a dragon and a human even mate without the human becoming infected. The answer to that part is quite simple; evolution. The vaccine that Dr. Castillo created worked better than anyone ever expected… arguably too well. The vaccine used a weakened dragon DNA to create immunity in the human body. Because of the nature of the vaccine, it only required one dose to create complete immunity. After a few generations of vaccination, natural immunity took over and human DNA had been altered so that human cells were no longer susceptible to the dragon immune system. However, it had an unexpected result; the human genome was forever altered.

Let’s talk about the dragon side of things. Almost immediately, dragons were having trouble adjusting to our atmosphere. The nitrogen-oxygen in our air was slightly different from that on the Drakeas home-world. Not only that, but our yellow sun emitted different rays from the red giant that dragons were used to. The end result of this was immune-compromised dragons, stillborn children, among other issues.
Now, in most science fiction dealing with creatures on a world that is different from Earth, the colonies often fail because human biology is quite fragile. Either they quickly become ill and die from their biology being unable to adapt to the new environment, or contract some kind of disease that ravages the entire colony. (Think the Native Americans when diseases from Europe were introduced.)
This is not the case with dragons. Dragon biology is far more resistant as their evolution is far beyond that of humans being an extremely ancient race by comparison. As such, their biology is able to adapt and “evolve” over the generations to be able to handle our world. Qira is the first example of this. The first gen dragons look considerably different from others; hairy manes instead of bony spikes, reduced maturity size, and softer skin. What’s more, their internal biology started to change as well.

Finally, let’s talk about dragon mating rituals. It’s quite a bit different from humans. As mentioned in the books, when a dragon reaches maturity, and becomes enamored with a partner, intense emotions, coupled with physical contact, trigger what they refer to as ‘imprinting’. Essentially, a dragon’s biology becomes more in-tune with their mate. both dragons biology alter to make mating more likely to produce healthy offspring. In addition to that, dragons become more in tune with their partner on an emotionally level, able to sense their partner’s feelings. This comes with certain risks. If, after the imprinting is complete, the pair does not mate, the effects in the best of cases will be painful, lasting throughout the dragon’s life, or at worst, can be lethal. This becomes even more of a problem when a dragon imprints on a human. Because a human doesn’t go through the same process, a dragon’s internal biology changes far more radically. In most cases, for many generations, rendered the dragon infertile.

So the question was about conceiving a child. Well, take the alterations of the vaccine in humans, the environmentally-triggered evolution in dragons, as well as the changes which result from imprinting, and eventually,  thanks to all these factors, dragons and humans become biologically compatible. Now, we only see this going one way, human male, dragon female. Now, it is ASSUMED that it could work the other way, but I don’t really go into that. It’s not impossible though.

In any case, I sincerely hope that this helps answer some of the questions surrounding what’s going on with Joaquim and Nayeli.

Readers, if you liked the book, please take a moment and leave me a quick review or if you’re pressed for time, some simple stars will suffice!! I wouldn’t ask, but the more exposure my book gets, the more copies it sells. Word of mouth is everything in this business! Thanks so much, all! I greatly appreciate it!

https://a.co/d/fvwmK1H

Thanks, friends! I’ll catch you on the flipside!

-Jim

Readers,

Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.

jhwriting@proton.me

I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.

I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.

Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.

Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU

Note:
If you have read my books, PLEASE log into Amazon and post a review. I really love to hear everyone’s thoughts and constructive criticisms. Reviews help get my book attention and word of mouth is everything in this business!

Thanks friends!

Catch you on the flip side!

-Jim

Hello all,

As always, when it comes to new readers, new questions come about, and boy have I been getting some good ones. I reply to those emails, typically, directing them here. Because I figure if one person has a question, chances are more people have questions. I do my best to answer ALL my fan mail (God help me), so let’s get started. I’ll try to post once a day where possible.

Anyway, let’s start tackling the questions. The first one that popped up was about Qira, because of course it did! She is both my blessing and my bane. LOL! All right, so I’ll just say this right now, we’re going to have SPOILERS! So if you haven’t read past The Orphans of Haven, stop, don’t go any further!

The question from the reader was regarding Qira’s encounter with Radley in Cataclysm Protocol: Red. Did she actually see Radley’s ghost? Was it actually him or a fever dream, and who was the powerful being responsible if it was him? There was some speculation that it was Taryn. However, let’s remember that Taryn had just realized a few weeks earlier that she was connected to the dread lord. Her powers were still very much dormant.

So was it him? Was he actually there? That’s up to you to decide. I intentionally left that ambiguous. Among my goals of escapism and creating a story that everyone from all walks of life can enjoy, I also like to give my readers some leeway to figure things out on their own.

Do you think it was Taryn? Then it was Taryn.

Do you think that because dragons have a bit of extrasensory perception and can sense the residual spiritual energy of those who have past, so she was able to see him? That’s pretty cool, go with that.

Do you think it was a fever dream? Sure, that works too.

Sorry to disappoint, but I have no answer to give you. I want my readers to form their own conclusions. Using your imagination is so important and it is something that is being regrettably lost in this day and age. I believe we call it ‘Head Canon’, which I am fully in support of!

Anyway, I hope this helps! (Probably not, but at least you have an answer!)

Readers, if you liked the book, please take a moment and leave me a quick review or if you’re pressed for time, some simple stars will suffice!! I wouldn’t ask, but the more exposure my book gets, the more copies it sells. Word of mouth is everything in this business! Thanks so much, all! I greatly appreciate it!

https://a.co/d/fvwmK1H

Merry Christmas to all! Happy Chanukah! Happy Solstice!

(And to my atheist friends, have a great night!)

Readers,

Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.

jhwriting@proton.me

I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.

I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.

Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.

Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:

http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU

Note:
If you have read my books, PLEASE log into Amazon and post a review. I really love to hear everyone’s thoughts and constructive criticisms. Reviews help get my book attention and word of mouth is everything in this business!

Thanks friends!

Catch you on the flip side!

-Jim