Sword of the Ronin

Book excerpt: In 13th-Century Japan, a land of ancient spirits, shapeshifting animals, and demons, Ken'ishi is a warrior without a master. Orphaned in infancy, he has only one link to his past - Silver Crane, his father's sword. When Silver Crane is stolen, Ken'ishi must go on a quest to recover his very identity. The crime lord known as Green Tiger holds the key to Ken'ishi's past. With intrigues stretching to China, where the Mongol emperor Khubiliai Khan builds an invasion fleet, Green Tiger knows of Silver Crane and dreams of the day when he can destroy the shogunate and restore his shattered clan. With a wooden sword as his only weapon, Ken'ishi descends into the shadowy world of flesh houses, Chinese smugglers, and Mongol spies. To succeed and unleash Silver Crane's power, he must face the darkness in his own soul. "From the first sentence, Travis Heermann weaves a tale that sucked this reader into a rich Japanese tapestry full of ronin, samurai, and magic. It was hard to put this book down to sleep." - Patrick Hester, Hugo-Award Winning SFSignal.com and the Functional Nerds Podcast "Travis Heermann takes everything I loved about Heart of the Ronin (adventure, intrigue, sympathetic characters), puts it in a pressure cooker and serves it with a side of Awesome. Sword of the Ronin is his best novel yet and won't disappoint." - Shaun Farrell, Adventures in Sci-Fi Publishing "Sword of the Ronin is a raw and energetic adventure that explores deep and eternal themes such as honor, love, and betrayal while maintaining a engaging, humorous, living world. It also has an awesome ronin hero who hacks lots of bad people to bits, if you're into that sort of thing. Which you definitely should be." - Rich Wulf, author of The Heirs of Ash Trilogy "A rich, engaging, morally complex historical fantasy, deeply embedded in Japanese culture." - E.C. Ambrose, author of Elisha Barber, The Dark Apostle series "Those interested in Japan's culture and history, including ancient mythology will find this book an extraordinary read. It is certainly not a story for the fainthearted, but which touches you with its truth-drawing and starkly poignant meaning. As a work of fantasy I enjoyed it very much, although at times it did cause shivers to run down my spine and turned my blood cold." - Goodreads Reviewer