Website: Promised Valley
Twitter: @RonFritsch
E-Mail: ronfritsch@sbcglobal.net
LinkedIn: Check Out LinkedIn
Author Description:
I grew up in rural northern Illinois. My father and mother were hard-working tenant farmers who loved to read. So did my siblings (one older sister, one older brother, one younger sister) and I.
I obtained a bachelor's degree with honors from the University of Illinois (major: history; minor: English literature) and a law degree cum laude from Harvard Law School.
I became a public-service attorney representing indigent and disabled adults and abused and neglected children. All during my life as a lawyer, I spent most of my time writing arguments on behalf of my clients, in the trial courts as well as the higher appeals courts.
For many years now, I've lived in Chicago with my partner who has picked me up when I've fallen, and driven me home again, possibly as many times as I have him.
I'm writing and publishing a four-book series of novels asking whether history and civilization might've begun and proceeded differently than they did.
Promised Valley Rebellion is the first novel in the series, and Promised Valley War is the second. The titles of the two following novels will be Promised Valley Conspiracy and Promised Valley Peace.
SPOTLIGHT Questions and Answers with the Author
You started as a Lawyer. Why did you switch to writing?
I worked as a public-interest lawyer but had too little time to write the kind of fiction I wished to create. I therefore lived a somewhat frugal life, saved my earnings (not having children to raise and put through college helped with that!), retired early, and began the writing I always wanted to do. I'm glad I had the first two books ready for publication just as the self-publishing revolution was changing everything for authors like myself.
When will you be publishing your next book in the Promised Valley series?
I intend to publish Published Valley Conspiracy in the autumn of this year.
Author's Book List
Promised Valley Conspiracy
Promised Valley Conspiracy is the third novel in Ron Fritsch’s four-book prehistoric Promised Valley series. Fritsch continues to ask if history and civilization, which prehistory gave birth to, could’ve begun differently. US Review of Books: “There is a traditional, epic tone to the book that is reminiscent of Homer’s Iliad or Odyssey. It is a story whose firm, relentless action is the narrative drive of this novel. It fascinates with pages filled with excitement and drama. Fritsch’s world is one filled with wondrous surprises, where there are no damaging thoughts among the people toward same-sex unions. It’s refreshing to see the disappearance of negative cultural trappings found in today’s world.”
Kirkus: Promised Valley Conspiracy “explores the ongoing conflict between the valley people, who are prosperous farmers occupying all the richest Promised Valley lands, and the hill people, who inhabit the sparser uplands and live bitterly, believing that their gods promised the valley and its comforts to them. Since the valley people have a similar belief about themselves, a state of dangerous friction exists between the two groups. Savage warfare and desperate diplomacy marked the well-orchestrated events of the first two books, and tensions continue to boil to the surface in this volume.
These books continue to be an intelligent and involving look at the personal sacrifices of making war and keeping peace.” Reader Views: “The author’s creativity in writing a series such as this is to be admired. I noticed as the two different peoples learned to see similarities amongst their differences, it is the same in our world today. Lack of understanding of the beliefs of others creates a disconnection and fear among people. Learning to understand and respect the differences makes for a better world whether it is prehistoric or current. There are many valuable lessons to be learned in this story.” Feathered Quill: “I highly recommend the captivating and interesting Promised Valley series. Quill says: A thought-provoking tale of intrigue and ‘what ifs’ had life played out in Promised Valley fashion.”
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Promised Valley War
In Promised Valley War, the individuals among two prehistoric peoples most curious about their “eternal” enemies, and most willing to treat them as their equals, nevertheless set the stage for what they’ve feared more than anything else: another horrifying war. Promised Valley War is the second in Ron Fritsch’s Promised Valley four-novel series, in which prehistoric farmers inhabit a fertile river valley they believe their gods promised them in return for their good behavior and obedience. Their enemies, hunters roaming the mostly barren hills beyond the mountains enclosing the valley, believe their gods gave it to them.
In the first book in the series, Promised Valley Rebellion, the farmers’ king refused to allow the marriage of the coming-of-age prince to the daughter of the farmer who’d saved the king’s life in the last war with the hunters. The daughter’s outspoken brother decided he had to help his sister and the prince, his boyhood friend, correct the flagrant injustice. That decision led them and their youthful allies into a rebellion against the king and his officials who ruled the kingdom from their bluff-top town. The far more numerous farmers in the villages below, who despised the highest officials but not the king, and who admired the prince, were in a position to determine whether the rebels would succeed or face execution for treason.
Kirkus said this about Promised Valley Rebellion: "Fritsch's debut novel . . . encourages the reader to ponder the universal elements of the tale. . . . Fritsch . . . grant[s] his characters an easy, unforced humanity that is instantly inviting. His people . . . sound like individuals, and . . . make the story memorable. A strange, primitive world that feels winningly real." Kirkus said this about Promised Valley War: "War erupts in a peaceful prehistoric valley. Tensions were already brewing in Fritsch's Promised Valley Rebellion (2010), in which a group of young people living in the relatively benign and loosely organized prehistoric community of Promised Valley rebelled against their king and his council in reaction to a seemingly arbitrary, tyrannical ruling the king had made. That rebellion revolved around the hidden past of Rose Leaf, the beautiful young daughter of war-hero farmer Green Field, and it led to war with the hill people whose marauding ways are a constant threat to the inhabitants of Promised Valley.
In Fritsch's latest novel (which is given depth by a reading of the first book but can be enjoyed as a stand-alone book), despite the best efforts of that same group of young people, war between the valley people and the hill people has erupted again. The author’s well-rendered descriptions of the creeping onslaught of war and winter give the reader a visceral feel for the endangered paradise that can occur despite the best intentions of the best people, and readers will be surprised by the twists he gives his tale. Alongside the careful plotting and natural-sounding dialogue, there's a refreshing amount of deeper resonances in the Promised Valley series, a steady undercurrent of commentary of the present day. The treatment of the young hero Blue Sky's attraction to other men, for instance, is straightforward but nonconfrontational, and characters at several points grapple with their society's primitive theology. “Could gods who were good-hearted … allow humans to go to war with one another?” the narrative at one point asks. '[I]f they, like humans, had no choice in the matter, why did humans call them gods?' The novel will leave readers eager to find out what happens next in Promised Valley. Luckily, Fritsch has plans to add two more volumes to the series. A captivating novel that will transport readers back to prehistory times—while reminding them of their own."
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Promised Valley Rebellion
Prehistoric farmers inhabit a fertile river valley they believe their gods promised them in return for their good behavior and obedience. Their enemies, hunters roaming the mostly barren hills beyond the mountains enclosing the valley, believe their gods gave it to them. When the farmers’ king refuses to allow the marriage of the coming-of-age prince to the daughter of the farmer who saved the king’s life in the last war with the hunters, her brother decides he has to help his sister and the prince, his boyhood friend, correct the flagrant injustice. That decision leads them and their youthful allies into a rebellion against the king and his officials, who rule the kingdom from their bluff-top town. The far more numerous farmers in the villages below, who despise most of the officials but not the king, and who admire the prince, are in a position to determine whether the rebels will succeed or face execution for treason. As the story unfolds, the world in which it takes place reveals itself more …
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Order the Book From: Amazon
- Barnes and Noble
- Smashwords
Author Recommended by: HBSystems Publications
Publisher of ebooks, writing industry blogger and the sponsor of the HBS Author's Spotlight plus the blog: eBook Author’s Corner. Check out the index of other Spotlight authors. Spotlight Index.
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