Sunday, October 25, 2015

BU Blog Tour: Moons and Months in the Country of Challen






Read on for my post:

My fantasy Season Avatars series is set in the quasi-Victorian country of Challen. Although Challen has locomotives and steamboats, it's still very much an agricultural country. Agriculture influences many parts of the Challen culture, from their names (some nobles take part of their family names from the most popular crop grown on their estate) to their calendar. The calendar starts with the spring equinox, which is considered the first day of the first moon, or month. Each moon has a different name. The list is below:

Spring: Changemoon, Rainmoon, and Flowermoon (corresponding to March, April, and May)

Summer: Rosemoon, Cornmoon, and Heatmoon  (June, July, and August)

Fall: Harvestmoon, Leafmoon, and Graymoon (September, October, and November)

Winter: Snowmoon, Coldmoon, and Lambmoon (December, January, and February)

Admittedly, the first day of each month would not always be a full moon. The night of the full moon, however, would still be an important time, since the moonlight would allow people in the rural areas to visit each other or perform other activities. I'm still debating whether or not there should be exactly twelve moons in the Challen year or if there should be a day or two of holidays at the end of each season.

To learn more about Challen and its Season Avatars, please check out the first two books in the series, Seasons' Beginnings and Scattered Seasons. Book Three, Chaos Season, is currently in developmental edit and won't be ready until 2016. I'm already writing Book Four, Fifth Season, but the series won't be complete until I finish Summon the Seasons.

You can win copies of Seasons' Beginnings and Scattered Seasons in the Rafflecopter below.


















a Rafflecopter giveaway

6 comments:

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Reading the first one now!

Sandra Ulbrich Almazan said...

Thanks, Alex! As a heads up, Scattered Seasons will be part of a Kindle Countdown Deal next month.

Anna_esq said...

I like the idea of months named after moons instead of outdated roman gods :-)

PT Dilloway said...

I already read the first one. I guess if the second will be on sale I'll wait until then to buy it.

Sandra Ulbrich Almazan said...

I'm glad you like it, Anna! The Roman gods never existed in this world, so it doesn't make sense to use their names.

Pat, I appreciate your support!

Pippa Jay said...

Interesting twist having a quasi-Victorian setting.

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