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The Throne of Deep Roots: Book 2 of The Command of the Worldhold Series
The Throne of Deep Roots, the second book in Morven T. H. Borthwick’s The Command of the Worldhold series, is a sweeping work of dark epic fantasy built around ancient powers, political betrayal, war, and the consequences of choices made under pressure. The story begins in the shadow of a supernatural disaster, when the Black Sea rose as though answering an unseen will. From there, the novel follows several connected conflicts involving Eron, Belor, Seth, Elia, and the rulers of Dovaryel and Yorthmere. At the center of everything is The Command, a tiny stone with the power to make the sea obey, whose awakening attracts forces far older and more dangerous than the people carrying it fully understand.
One of the book’s strongest qualities is the depth of its world. Dovaryel, Dravarûyn, the Kor lands, and the southern mountains each have their own histories, customs, political tensions, and supernatural traditions. Borthwick doesn’t treat the setting as decoration. The world’s old wars and buried grudges actively shape what the characters believe and how they respond to one another. Titles such as Boundhand, Rootmaker, Vowblade, and Orathë also carry real social and spiritual weight. This gives the story the feeling of a history that began long before the first page. The formal, almost legendary prose suits that approach, especially in scenes involving prophecy, ritual, and ancient beings.
The characters are most compelling when they’re forced to decide what responsibility means. Belor’s Binding Art makes him powerful, but his real strength comes from his understanding that guilt can extend beyond the person who performs an act. His warning that “The blood of the fallen does not name the hand alone, but the will that sent it” captures one of the novel’s central concerns. Commands, bargains, and political decisions leave marks on everyone involved. Seth’s escape from execution, her discovery that she’s carrying Sathor’s son, and her refusal to return to the people who condemned her give her storyline a sharp emotional edge. Elia’s struggle to lead while dealing with fear, pride, and the limits of her gift makes her feel human even when the events around her reach a mythic scale.
The novel’s pacing is deliberate and immersive. Conversations, councils, journeys, and preparations for war receive nearly as much attention as battles, allowing tension to build gradually across the book. When violence arrives, particularly around the Field of Dravarûyn, it feels like the result of decisions that have been accumulating for hundreds of pages. The large cast and extensive terminology ask the reader to pay close attention, but the appendix provides useful support for navigating the Worldhold. The descriptions are often rich and solemn, creating an atmosphere in which forests, rain, stone chambers, and mountain caves seem to remember the events that happened within them.
By the end, The Throne of Deep Roots has expanded from a struggle among rulers into a confrontation with powers that reach back into the foundations of the world. Eron’s bond with The Command, the pursuit of the Thavurwyns, and the revelations beside the Deep Mirror all point toward a threat larger than the characters first imagined. Belor’s observation that “The ancient powers, once awakened, are not easily returned to sleep” works as both a warning and a summary of the book’s direction. This is a substantial, lore-heavy fantasy novel for readers who enjoy layered histories, morally complicated alliances, supernatural dread, and stories in which every victory creates a new burden. Its ending closes the immediate journey while leaving a chilling question hanging over the series: whether Vaelthar’s prison is beginning to fail.
Pages: 402 | ASIN: B0H45RJZR7
Supernatural Gift
The Skull of Wenceslas follows a gifted New York medieval literature scholar who visits Prague for an academic project that takes a dangerous and paranormal turn. What draws you to the historical fantasy genre?
In Prague, the history is always present, especially to an American (and in my case, Australian-born). The Charles Bridge alone, with its cobblestones and ancient towers, never lets you forget it. Every Czech child knows the legend of the founding of the city, when the Slavic princess Libuše looked out over the river valley and made her prediction that she saw “a great city whose glory would touch the stars.” It’s almost impossible to write a story about Prague and not include the history!
What made you want to give Kat both an academic mind and a supernatural gift?
I have some of Kat’s interests myself – languages and ancient manuscripts in particular. I’ve always been intrigued by the skills of calligraphy and illumination (lots of books about it on my bookshelf). The story started with bringing Bruncvik to life, and Kat’s supernatural gift was a way to explain it. It grew from there, with the idea that she could step back in time into the mind of someone in the past and see the world through their eyes.
Many of the ghosts in the novel feel like characters with their own motivations rather than simple supernatural threats. How did you develop their personalities and roles in the story?
Their stories just grew. A line from the Oprah show always stuck in my mind. “Everyone has a story.” If we could communicate with someone in the past, what could they tell us? Turned out, quite a lot! But like everything else, they don’t tell you their story in neat chronological order; they tell you what is important to them. Which lends itself to a tale of mystery.
If readers finish The Skull of Wenceslas wanting to visit Prague, what are a few places from the novel that you would encourage them to see first?
A lot depends on how much time they can spend there. Too often, it’s “three days in Prague,” which mostly limits you to what the guides call “the Castle, bridge and clock tour.” Starting at the castle and the St. Vit Cathedral, crossing the Charles Bridge, and following the crowd along the King’s Way to Old Town Square and the Astronomical Clock. You’ll want to see all of those, but I have my own favorites. I love to start at the Strahov Monastery, which is Kat’s first stop. The restaurant with the view, where she meets Mike, is gone now, but there are plenty of others. If you climb the stairs to the Library (it’s magnificent), you’ll also see the weird little museum, full of odd sea creatures (remember, the Czech Republic is land-bound, so these must have seemed exotic). There is also a Museum of Miniatures, which is fascinating – everything is viewed through microscopes. From the monastery, you can walk down to the castle. My other favorite place in Prague is the Letná Beer Garden, where you can sit under the chestnut trees and gaze at an amazing view.
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Kat Schneider, a New Yorker and medieval literature scholar, arrives in Prague to translate a centuries-old manuscript. The first night, she sees the ghosts of a knight and a lion patrolling the ancient tower outside her window.
In Prague, her hidden gift of Sight pulls her into a world where history is alive, and the past collides with the present. On the Charles Bridge, Kat inadvertently summons a fourteenth-century prince into the modern world, forcing her to navigate a realm where the supernatural and human desires intertwine. With a mysterious local man and her charismatic client, she uncovers hidden truths, explores new powers, and discovers that love and loyalty are never straightforward.
Yet danger looms: a vengeful outsider plots to devastate the city on St. Wenceslas Day. To protect her friends, the city of Prague and even the Czech nation, Kat must embrace the Sight she has long hidden—and confront betrayal, ancient magic, and the haunting shadows of history.
The Skull of Wenceslas
The Skull of Wenceslas, by Marion Deland, is a paranormal mystery with a strong historical fantasy thread, set in a Prague that feels both lived-in and haunted. The story follows Kat Schneider, a New York medieval literature scholar with the Sight, as she comes to Prague to help translate an old manuscript tied to the legendary Prince Bruncvík. What begins as an academic project soon turns into something stranger and more dangerous, involving ghosts, Czech legends, a possible terrorist threat, and Kat’s growing sense that the city’s past is not finished speaking.
What I enjoyed most was how grounded Kat feels, even when the story steps into the supernatural. She’s smart, funny, guarded, and sometimes too quick to trust her own logic, which made her feel believable to me. I liked that Deland lets Prague do more than sit in the background. The city becomes part of the book’s pulse, with its bridges, statues, trams, old stones, and layered history all pressing in on Kat’s choices. The paranormal elements work best when they feel tied to place, and here they do. Bruncvík and his lion are not just spooky figures. They feel like part of a city still carrying its myths in the cracks of the pavement.
I also appreciated the author’s choice to let the book be messy in relatable ways. Kat’s relationships with Freddie, Mike, Queenie, Susie, and even the ghosts are not simple. People misunderstand each other. They get defensive. They bring old fears into new situations. That gave the story more weight than a straight adventure would have had. The plot takes its time getting where it is going, especially when Kat is absorbing the culture and history around her, but I didn’t mind that much. The slower moments help build the feeling that Prague is opening itself to her one street, one legend, and one uneasy revelation at a time.
I recommend The Skull of Wenceslas to readers who enjoy paranormal mysteries that lean into history, atmosphere, and character more than nonstop action. It should especially appeal to anyone drawn to haunted cities, old manuscripts, folklore, and stories where the past keeps reaching into the present. If you like your supernatural fiction with a thoughtful narrator, a touch of romance, and a deep sense of place, this book is easy to settle into.
Pages: 332 | ASIN : B0H26T1RLZ
Mariella
Mariella, by Jonathan Kind, is a Gothic novel set in late Georgian Britain, following Mariella Vangard after a violent supernatural attack leaves her family ruined, orphaned, and dependent on reluctant relatives. What begins as a story of sisters trying to survive poverty and scandal soon widens into a darker tale of vampires, ambition, marriage, betrayal, and moral decay. At the center is Mariella herself, a woman who is not simply haunted by evil but increasingly drawn toward it.
I liked how patiently the book lets its darkness gather. Kind leans into the pleasures of the Gothic genre: ruined churches, moonlit roads, locked rooms, family secrets, and danger that feels both physical and emotional. The atmosphere is rich without becoming too heavy, and the historical setting gives the horror a sharper edge. These characters live in a world where women have few good choices, where reputation can be a prison, and where money is often as frightening as any monster. That makes Mariella’s choices more interesting, even when I found myself recoiling from them.
I also appreciated that Mariella isn’t softened too much for the reader. She can be clever, wounded, practical, selfish, and chilling, sometimes all within the same stretch of story. That makes her difficult company, but never dull company. The novel is candid about hunger, not just for blood, but for security, status, control, and escape. The plot moves with the sweep of a melodrama, full of reversals and heightened emotion, but it feels right for a Gothic novel. It has that candlelit sense that every desire has a cost, and sooner or later the bill will be brought to the door.
I recommend Mariella to readers who enjoy Gothic fiction with strong historical texture, morally complicated women, family drama, and vampire horror that is more seductive and tragic than purely gruesome. It’s not a cozy read, and it doesn’t offer an easy heroine to cheer for. But for readers who like their Gothic novels stormy, strange, and emotionally tangled, this one has a strong pull.
Pages: 328 | ASIN : B0FKYDCHDS
An Act of Survival
Two Hearts Within One Soul: Volume 1 frames love not as coincidence but as cosmic decree, a bond the gods designed before the characters were born. What drew you to that metaphysical architecture rather than a conventional romance structure?
Conventional romance is about the ego, but I focus on the Return. My architecture is built on the 888 frequency—a mathematical heartbeat that proves love is a cosmic decree. I am exploring the ‘Zeus Theory’: the idea that we were once eight-limbed, invincible beings split into four-limbed fragments. We aren’t looking for a ‘partner’; we are survivors of a divine accident looking for our own missing limbs. It is a biological and spiritual necessity to find the only person who holds the rest of our original symmetry.
Classical music and ballet are woven into the novel’s emotional fabric. Why did those art forms feel like the right language for this love story?
Words are ‘four-limbed’—heavy and limited. Music is the rhythm of the soul captured through thoughts, allowing us to hear beauty in a lyrical tone. If the eyes are the windows to the soul, then the ballerina’s movement is the art that allows us to see that soul’s rhythm move through the physical body. A Mozart aria or a pirouette is an ‘eight-limbed’ reach back toward our lost divinity, allowing the characters to communicate in a frequency where the split hasn’t happened yet.
The idea of becoming “habitable to yourself again” after devastating loss is the emotional core of the book. Was that theme the origin of the novel, or did it emerge through writing these two characters?
It was the origin—an act of survival. When you lose the love that made you whole, you feel unoccupied, like a house with no one inside. Writing this was my way of ‘rebuilding the temple,’ proving that the missing rooms of the soul are still there, held in the vibration of the other half. To be ‘habitable’ means making peace with the four-limbed skin we are trapped in while we wait for a reunion (oneself) that is already written in the stars.
This is Volume 1. What does the series hold that this book is only beginning to reveal about these souls, this bond, and the cost the gods mentioned?
The series is a grand odyssey through the entwining of Heaven, Hell, and Earth. Volume 1 was the ‘Phantom Ache’ of the split. Volume 2 explores the resilience of the caterpillar—the quiet strength required to endure the weight of the human form and the darkness of grief.
Finally, Volume 3: ♾️888, reveals the Source.
We journey to the African Baobab tree of life and the Egyptian Underworld, mirroring Isis’s search for the pieces of Osiris and the Southeast Asian myth of the Sun and Moon to prove that no love is impossible. This journey doesn’t just take a lifetime; it takes eternity after eternity. Across time and space, love that is made of Heaven and Earth belongs to the end of time. It reveals that the circle of life is the Art of the Heart: ‘LOVE.’
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Centuries ago, the gods bound King Marici’O and the ballerina Dahli’a with a single soul, two hearts destined to find one another across lifetimes. Set against the opulent backdrop of eighteenth-century Europe, Marici’O is a grieving king torn by the loss of his queen. Across the continent, Dahli’a, a luminous ballerina, mourns a love she cannot explain—until fate begins to stir.
On the edge of death, their souls meet in a dream, urging one another to fight for life. Neither believes the encounter is real—until a chance performance of Le Papillon in Austria changes everything. Marici’O recognizes the ethereal dancer on stage as the woman from his vision. Dahli’a freezes mid-performance when she sees the man who once pulled her back from the abyss standing before her.
As dream becomes reality, their bond deepens, defying worlds that separate them: royalty and art, tradition and freedom, past pain and present hope. But love forged by gods comes with a cost. Will they surrender the lives they’ve known—or embrace a destiny shaped by divine design?
The Seeker
The Seeker, by SJ Snel, is a medieval historical fantasy and the first book in The Hidden Truths Saga. It follows Deanda, a young silk weaver in 1203 Constantinople whose gift for revealing hidden truths places her in danger when politics, prophecy, faith, and war collide. After a vision tied to the Fourth Crusade, she is pulled from the fragile safety of her life and sent on a journey toward England, where her gift becomes entangled with King John, Sir Richard, and the brutal power games of the age.
I liked how the book treats truth as both sacred and dangerous. Deanda’s gift sounds simple at first, almost fairy-tale-like, but Snel makes it feel heavy. Every answer she gives has a cost. I liked that tension. The story is not just about seeing the truth, but about deciding when truth helps, when it harms, and who gets to use it. Deanda can be trusting to the point of frustration, yet that innocence also makes sense. She has been raised to believe in duty, faith, and obedience, and watching those beliefs get tested gives the novel much of its emotional weight.
Snel’s writing is rich and visual, especially in the Constantinople scenes. You can feel the heat, smell the incense, see the silk strips moving in the branches of the Judas tree. The prose leans into description, and some moments might feel slower for readers who prefer a leaner pace. Still, I found the detail useful because this is a historical fantasy that wants the past to feel lived in. The author also makes a bold choice by mixing real medieval figures and political events with Deanda’s supernatural ability. That blend gives the book its spark. It’s grounded in history, but there is always this shimmer of the uncanny just beneath the surface.
I recommend The Seeker to readers who enjoy historical fiction with a mystical edge, especially stories set in the medieval world where faith, power, and personal conscience are all fighting for space. It will appeal to fans who like a patient, character-driven journey. If you enjoy books about women with unusual gifts trying to survive in dangerous times, this one has a clear pull. It’s thoughtful, dramatic, and sincere, with enough unanswered tension to make the next book feel worth seeking out.
Pages: 449 | ASIN : B0DY61GYZ3
Where Reality Tips Into Wonder
Shinbone Lane follows a runaway teenager in 1974 San Francisco who finds refuge and a found family in a hidden street of artists, misfits, quiet magic, and a wisecracking pigeon. What first sparked the idea for Shinbone Lane as a hidden pocket of San Francisco?
When I moved from San Francisco to Sonoma County about 20 years ago, I was looking for additional freelance writing work. I answered a Craigslist ad and met a young man at a coffee shop for an interview. The ongoing work he had in mind would have required more time than I had, so it wasn’t a good fit. Still, we enjoyed talking and shared things about our backgrounds.
He was a Gen Xer; I’m a baby boomer. I told him about arriving in San Francisco in the 1970s with about $200 in my pocket. I thought I’d visit for a couple of weeks and wound up living there for almost 30 years. He said my early adventures in San Francisco sounded like a fairytale to him—something a young person couldn’t replicate so easily anymore. Housing had already become so much more expensive.
That conversation stayed with me. The idea of writing about that time sat on the back burner for years, gradually taking shape as I returned to it from time to time, until Shinbone Lane emerged.
San Francisco does have many real hidden pockets—places so beautiful they seem magical, and people so inventive and intriguing they seem magical too. I just followed my imagination where it wanted to go. As a storyteller, I’m drawn to spaces where reality tips into wonder. This is true for both my written work and for stories I tell live in performance.
Shinbone Lane almost feels alive. Did you think of the lane as a character?
Yes, I did. The area where I situated the lane is one I’m very familiar with. I lived near the corner of 29th and Sanchez streets for eighteen years, so I walked our dog up the 29th Street hill and drove up to Diamond Heights to shop routinely. That steep hill feels like a part of me now.
Shinbone Lane, an imagined side street easy to miss when driving by, became a living, breathing presence with its own rhythms and moods.
Place has always been important in my work, and Northern California continues to shape my imagination. It was a great amount of fun bringing the lane to life and letting it influence the characters who find their way there.
Found family is central to the story. Why is that theme important to you, and why was it important that the community be imperfect, messy, and sometimes conflicted?
I think almost all of us have some issues to work out with our families when we grow independent as young adults. For some, the issues are minor and family support is a constant. For others, too much trauma stands in the way of family ties being anything but harmful at the time. And there are many shades in between.
It’s a blessing that people can find each other and build a supportive base that becomes a different kind of family. How lucky we are to be able to do that for one another.
As for the community being imperfect, messy, and sometimes conflicted, that reflects both life in this world of ours and my approach to storytelling. And while I want love to be the most powerful force in the end, I don’t shy away from the complications that come with being human.
I lost both of my parents by the time I was eleven, so there’s an undercurrent of loss and darkness that finds its way into my work. At the same time, I am optimistic and delight in my connections with loved ones, as well as the beauty in the world. That tension between light and shadow, hope and hurt is something I return to often, and I hope it resonates with readers.
What is the next book that you are working on, and when will it be available?
I’m at work on another magical realism novel, Ripplewood, set in an out-of-the-way town of that name in Sonoma County, California. The town was named for a forest of ripplewood trees that once existed, though now only one remains, deep in the woods. It’s the same kind of tree that appears in front of Ted’s home on Shinbone Lane, but this book is not a sequel.
The story begins with Emlyn Grady driving home. She was raised in Ripplewood and has been attending San Francisco State University for six years, changing majors along the way and still not quite finding her footing. When she receives a text from her father urging her to come home immediately because of a crisis, she drops everything—including an important meeting her boyfriend has arranged with investors interested in his startup—and heads directly to Ripplewood.
There she finds out her mother is missing, but she’s gone missing before. So what could have happened is a mystery in a town where family roots and history are imperfect, complicated, messy, conflicted and unresolved (of course). There is folklore unique to Ripplewood, but how much is real, how much is fiction and what effect it has had on the town is a topic debated without resolution by the locals. In this setting, the story begins to unfold. And like Shinbone Lane, the story’s layers reveal themselves over time.
I’m interested in how place, memory, and inherited stories shape us, and how we decide what to carry forward. I’m still in the process of writing and discovering the full shape of the book, which is one of the things I love most about the work. I hope to finish the book this year and publish it in 2027.
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San Francisco, 1974. Sixteen-year-old runaway Maddy is escaping the blame for a crime she didn’t commit. Miles from home, she is taken under the wing of the elderly Clara and her neighbor Ted, and soon finds a place among the kaleidoscope of personalities on the oddly named Shinbone Lane.
Ted’s three-story Italianate Victorian house overflows with travelers, free spirits, and artists. His backyard is a haven for all who are willing to see its magic. But burdened dancer Eloise Watkins can’t tolerate the transient “riffraff” in her neighborhood. Their frivolity flies in the face of her grief over friendship lost and her daughter who’s missing. And nobody — nobody— understands.
But like all who tread on it, Shinbone Lane has secrets of its own. And like all secrets, they lie uneasily in the dark, until the truth emerges to lay the past to rest.
At the intersection of magic and reality lies Shinbone Lane and its lively cast of characters who intertwine in the mesmerizing brew of life.
Click ‘buy now’ to step into Shinbone Lane today!
Alchemy and Mirrors
The Name and the Key follows a woman grieving after her mother’s disappearance and death, who experiences visions and finds herself pulled into a magical world. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
As a very visual person whose brain likes to mash things together, I was inspired by a combination of images: John Everett Millais’s painting of Ophelia, and the nightmares I had after my father suddenly died while I was in graduate school. For the magical world itself, filled with demons and alchemy and mirrors, I was inspired by the anime Fullmetal Alchemist and the young adult novel Sorcery of Thorns by Margaret Rogerson. I’m also interested in medieval and Renaissance art; the colorful paintings of St. Michael slaying the devil or knights killing demons have always stuck with me. I thought there was a way to tie all these strange things I loved together, and that’s how I started developing the story.
This isn’t actually the first go-around with The Name and the Key. It was my graduate thesis in 2013 from the Writing Popular Fiction program at Seton Hill University. Lots of things were happening in my life during graduate school that made their way into the book, although the version you have read that will debut July 21, 2026, has been rewritten considerably to be developed into a trilogy.
Lily’s first-person narration feels very intimate and emotionally immediate. How did you develop her voice?
I’m so glad you feel that way about her! She was a challenging character to write. Some of her voice came directly from me when I’d reflect on certain feelings or situations from my life that were written into The Name and the Key; sometimes Edward Elric’s voice from Fullmetal Alchemist popped in there. But overall, whenever I wrote Lily, I did hear a distinctive voice in my head when I was working through her narration.
Mirrors play a particularly haunting role—what made them the right symbolic and narrative device for this story?
Mirrors have fascinated me for a long time. When I was a little girl, I used to stand in front of the mirror, either in dim light or almost total darkness, and make hideous faces until at some point I no longer resembled myself or a person, but a monstrosity. This is a legitimate phenomenon known as the Caputo Effect. In addition to trying to frighten myself as a child, I had heard over the years the stories and history of mirrors being portals or ways to see the dead. According to Kate Golembiewski of Atlas Obscura, “Ancient Romans believed that mirrors had the ability to trap the soul.” There are countless other cultural beliefs like that in existence. Mirrors are also a symbol in alchemy, suggesting the mirror of the soul in transmutation, and also relating to the mirror’s historical affiliation with mercury, which represents the spirit. I could forever go down a rabbit hole about this stuff. But the most important thing was tying alchemy together with my world of death and spirits and mirrors, and I was able to find a precedent for it, so I could do it.
Can you give us a peek inside the next installment of The Darkening Gate series? Where will it take readers?
The Step and the Walk is the second book in The Darkening Gate, written as diary entries from the perspective of Andresh, whom readers met in book one. It centers on his time at university, where he first learned about demons and dark magic. Andresh has a lot of secrets, and while readers think he might have come clean with them in The Name and the Key, they would be wrong. The Step and the Walk fills in all of the blanks regarding Andresh’s recent past right before the events of his reuniting with Lily in The Name and the Key. For example, readers will see how Andresh met and made a pact with the demon Isabelle. It’s been so much fun to write. I just finished drafting it at the end of March and am working on the second draft now. I hope to submit it to my publisher at the end of this month, if not in early May. Please look forward to it!
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Some doors are sealed for a reason—and some names should never be spoken aloud.
At thirteen, Lily Bellamy finds her mother’s body in the marshes. What haunts her afterward is worse.
A corpselike spirit that looks like her mother follows Lily through every reflective surface—mirrors, glass, still water—whispering for Lily to open the door and let her out. Lily has no idea what the door is, how to stop the visions, or whether saving her mother is even possible. The haunting stretches into her young adulthood, eroding her sanity and dragging her closer to a breaking point she can feel but cannot escape.
When Lily is eighteen, Andresh Zatavier returns—the boy who once knew her better than anyone, and perhaps still does. Changed by years overseas, Andresh confesses his study of dark magic and forbidden knowledge beyond human limits. He believes he knows the key to Lily’s curse—and how to end death itself.
But every secret Andresh carries comes at a cost.
As Lily is drawn deeper into a world of dark gates and dangerous names, she must decide how far she is willing to go to save the woman she lost… and whether opening the door will free her mother—or unleash something far worse.
Kristina Elyse Butke launches a chilling new dark fantasy series with The Name and the Key, weaving grief, forbidden magic, and aching connection into a story where love tempts fate—and some doors should never be opened.
