The Pirate Empress (80 page)

Authors: Deborah Cannon

BOOK: The Pirate Empress

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Acknowledgements

This book came to me because of a long ago trip taken to China with my parents Dan and Stella Yee. There we walked the Great Wall of China, glimpsed the Ming tombs on the misty horizon, explored the excavated armies of First Emperor Qin and where I, as a Canadian, experienced my Chinese heritage for the first time. To my parents I am grateful for the insights I would not otherwise have had. My writing career has been a long and tenuous road, and I must thank those who helped me develop the courage and the tenacity to write such a lengthy novel. My gratitude goes out to Carolyn Niethammer, Robert Nielsen, Antanas Sileika, Kim Moritsugu and my late agent Joanne Kellock, whose suggestions and expertise helped make me the writer I am today. I am especially grateful to my former instructor Antanas Sileika, director of the Humber School for Writers, whose advice to follow my instincts has been an invaluable aid. Thank you to all of my fans and friends who have stuck by me through the years; a huge thanks to my husband whose support of this book is priceless. And thank you to that little Chinese man, who appeared in my dreams and my imagination, to tell me this story.

About the Author

Deborah Cannon grew up in Vancouver, British Columbia. Her fiction is inspired by her career as an archaeologist, which took her from Canada’s west coast to England, the South Pacific Kingdom of Tonga and finally to the shores of Lake Ontario where she continues to be fascinated by myths, legends and cryptids.

In 2013 she won an honourable mention for her short story
Twilight Glyph
in the Canadian Tales of the Fantastic contest and in 2014 her story “Tang’s Christmas Miracle” appeared in
Chicken Soup for the Soul: Christmas in Canada
. Her career as a science fiction/fantasy writer began when she sold two short stories to Farsector SFFH magazine. She has contributed to the
Canadian Writer’s Guide
and is best known for
The Raven Chronicles
, a series of paranormal archaeological suspense novels and a time slip series for young adults
, The Pirate Vortex
. Recently she launched a fiction series of Kindle Short Reads called
Close Encounters
of the Cryptid Kind
. Her latest release
The Pirate Empress
is her first Chinese epic fantasy.