At last, the second book in our Last King of Shang series is finished and available for purchase!
The title is, not surprisingly, The Last King of Shang, Book 2. It covers the events in chapters 18 through 34 of the original epic Chinese novel Investiture of the Gods.
Here is a short blurb from the back cover:
In ancient China, the Shang kingdom descends into chaos as Daji, the beautiful thousand year old fox spirit, bewitches the king. Opposing him, the brilliant strategist Jiang Ziya navigates political intrigue and divine machinations to protect the kingdom. Mortals and immortals intertwine in alliances, betrayals, and sacrifice, as they grapple with fate, love, and the power of destiny.
The story has more mature themes than our Journey to the West books, and is suitable for adults and kids age 14+.
The total vocabulary used in this book is 1300 words, just a few more than the first book in the series. In terms of reading difficulty, it’s roughly on a par with the last few JTW books. As before, there is a full glossary, and all new words are defined when they occur. And there is pinyin and English as usual.
One new feature of the book is that we’ve included the short poems that start each chapter. The poems in the original Chinese text are quite difficult to understand, so we have rewritten them to express the same ideas but using a much simpler vocabulary. We have included all of the original poems in an appendix in the back of the book, in case you want to try your hand at translating them yourself!
The book is now available on Amazon in paperback and ebook format, and will be available soon at most major (and minor) online booksellers.
We are still workin on the audiobook, which will be published for free on YouTube around October 15.
Book 3 in the series is in development, and we hope to publish it before the end of the year.
