About the Book
Coffee Pot Book Club's Book of the Year Awards: Silver Medal Ehli-nikkalu, eldest daughter of the Hittite emperor, is married to a mere vassal of her father's. But despite her status, her foreignness and inability to produce an heir drive a wedge between her and the court that surrounds her. When her secretary is mysteriously murdered while carrying the emperor a message that would indict the loyalty of his vassal, Ehli-nikkalu adopts the dead man's orphaned children out of a guilty sense of responsibility. A young cousin she has never met becomes a pretender to the throne and mobilizes roving armies of the poor and dispossessed, which causes the priority of her loyalties to become even more suspect. However, Ehli-nikkalu discovers a terrible secret that could destabilize the present regime if the pretender ever learns of it. With the help of a kindly scribe, her brave young ward, and an embittered former soldier trapped in debt and self-doubt, Ehli-nikkalu sets out to save the kingdom and prove herself to her father. And along the way, she learns something about love.
About the Author :
N. L. Holmes is the pen name of a professional archaeologist who received her doctorate from Bryn Mawr College. She has excavated in Greece and in Israel, and taught ancient history and humanities at the university level for many years. She has always had a passion for books, and in childhood, she and her cousin (also a writer today) used to write stories for fun. The inspiration for her Bronze Age novels came with an assignment she gave to her students one day: here are the only documents we have telling us about a certain royal divorce in Ugarit in the thirteenth century. How much can we say about what happened? It quickly became apparent that almost anything we might come up with was as much fiction as historiography! Today, since their son is grown, she lives with her husband, two cats, chicken, and geese in northern France, where she gardens, weaves, plays the violin, dances, and occasionally drives a jog-cart. And reads, of course. Sharon Freedman is an actor, narrator, producer, and international arts educator. Her acting credits include Just Beyond (Disney+), Chicago Med (NBC), Henry Danger (Nickelodeon), Cold Winter's Night (Emmy Award winner), It's Your Birfday (with Keith David), Ladies Room (official selection of Slamdance), and The Ski Trip (LOGO Network). She won a Scenie Award for best actress in a comedy for her lead role in Ensemble Studio Theater/LA's Pigs and Chickens. She's done commercials and voice-overs for everything from A&E to Volkswagen and has narrated books for PRH, Tantor, Findaway, Pink Flamingo, and Scholastic. She is the executive producer of Tisch Represents an organization dedicated to creating opportunities for under-represented voices in the television industry. She was cocreator and company manager of the play development organization The 24Seven Lab in NYC for seven years, where she developed work by writers including: Pulitzer winner Annie Baker, Tony nominee Lucas Hnath, Macarthur genius grant winner Sam Hunter, WGA award nominee Ron Fitzgerald, and Emmy nominee Cusi Cram. She was a resident teaching artist with B.R.I.D.G.E. Theatre Project, has taught internationally in Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo, and is currently at teaching artist at California State Prison. A member of the Obie Award-winning Partial Comfort Productions (NY), EST/LA, and an associate member of Sacred Fools, Sharon is a graduate of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, Playwrights Horizons Theatre School. Sharon Freedman is an actor, narrator, producer, and international arts educator. Her acting credits include Just Beyond (Disney+), Chicago Med (NBC), Henry Danger (Nickelodeon), Cold Winter's Night (Emmy Award winner), It's Your Birfday (with Keith David), Ladies Room (official selection of Slamdance), and The Ski Trip (LOGO Network). She won a Scenie Award for best actress in a comedy for her lead role in Ensemble Studio Theater/LA's Pigs and Chickens. She's done commercials and voice-overs for everything from A&E to Volkswagen and has narrated books for PRH, Tantor, Findaway, Pink Flamingo, and Scholastic. She is the executive producer of Tisch Represents an organization dedicated to creating opportunities for under-represented voices in the television industry. She was cocreator and company manager of the play development organization The 24Seven Lab in NYC for seven years, where she developed work by writers including: Pulitzer winner Annie Baker, Tony nominee Lucas Hnath, Macarthur genius grant winner Sam Hunter, WGA award nominee Ron Fitzgerald, and Emmy nominee Cusi Cram. She was a resident teaching artist with B.R.I.D.G.E. Theatre Project, has taught internationally in Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo, and is currently at teaching artist at California State Prison. A member of the Obie Award-winning Partial Comfort Productions (NY), EST/LA, and an associate member of Sacred Fools, Sharon is a graduate of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, Playwrights Horizons Theatre School.
