The Origin Key

The Treasures of Dodrazeb chronicles the sword-and-science adventures of Persian warrior-prince Rasteem when he discovers a secretive kingdom inhabited by descendants of an ancient, scholarly society hiding powerful technology. Peacefully hidden in a remote valley for millennia, Dodrazebbians are the guardians of advanced science that the rest of the third-century world mistakes for evil magic. Understanding that their strange and wondrous technology has potentially sinister applications, Rasteem chooses to protect Dodrazeb's secrets in order to protect the Persian Empire from villains who would use it to conquer and destroy. After an assassination attempt on his royal father, Prince Rasteem vows to track down the dastardly Chudreev the Viper. After he and his brother lead the Persian army to victor in an invasion of the mythical Dodrazeb, Rasteem begins to suspect that they may not be on the right track. As he searches for Dodrazeb's fled King and his beautiful daughter, he learns that a powerful artifact has also gone missing. With the help of new allies, he must track down his father's true assailant, and prevent him from recovering The Origin Key.

About the Author :
S.D. McPhail spent years writing technical documentation and developing marketing materials for high-tech engineering firms. Even though she enjoyed working with genius engineers, she always suspected that writing fiction would be more fun, and she was right. Susan is now a fantasy/science fiction author living in Huntsville, Alabama (aka the Rocket City) with her husband. Her love of creating plausible fictional cultures is rooted in her early college days as an archaeology/anthropology major. Articles and documentaries on the ancient Hittites, Egyptians, Mayans, or other extinct cultures still make her eyes light up. Susan's mind is usually wandering around the intersection of Ancient Aliens and Indiana Jones searching for nuggets of inspiration for a new story. Once while letting her imagination roam freely, Susan invented a children's board game called Zombies at the Zoo, just for her family and particularly for a precocious little guy who had been watching The Walking Dead with his mom since he was four years old. It's good, old-fashioned, non-terrifying, Zombie Apocalypse Fun. It may not be much competition for video games or an iPad, but it reinforces basic counting, matching, and alphabet recognition skills. Chocolate chip ice cream is her personal Kryptonite. When she's not reading or writing, she's binge-watching television mysteries and period dramas or going to the movies. Sadly, Susan's cherished collection of nearly 400 Star Trek paperbacks and Star Wars collectibles stopped growing when she ran out of shelf space, but her children still quibble over who will inherit which items. When her schedule permits, Susan enjoys handcrafts like crocheting and quilting because it looks like she's doing something useful while in fact she is pondering how to work out tricky plot points. S.D. McPhail's Treasures of Dodrazeb series has been called "the best third century Persian historical sword and science series you'll ever read." You can find her online at www.sdmcphail.com and on Twitter @susan_mcphail.