Читать книгу The Oathsworn Series Books 1 to 5 - Robert Low - Страница 27

Top of the list of people who made this book a reality are the Oathsworn – all the crew of Glasgow Vikings (www.glasgowvikings.co.uk) who, wittingly and unwittingly, have ended up sailing on the Fjord Elk through these pages. Thanks a lot Colin, Aeneus, Jill, Eric the Tight, Gail, Helen, Presto and others too numerous to mention – and a huge shout to Boj, Einar the Black himself and the best swordsmith around (www.armourclass.co.uk).

There are even more Norse around than that and much of what has been uncovered, discovered and recovered in this book is down to The Vikings re-enactment group (www.vikingsonline.org.uk) who are unstinting in their efforts to bring the authentic flavour of Viking, Saxon, Norman and Celtic life back to the 21st century, including drinking entire communities dry.

None of which would matter if James Gill, my agent at PFD, had not spotted the potential in this – full marks to him and to Susan Watt, my editor at HarperCollins, who took the unruly band of Oathsworn, trimmed their hair, blew their noses and pointed them in the right direction of a proper saga. She and the rest of the HarperCollins team are brilliant.

A big thanks, too, to all those on the Khazaria Fiction group who gave of their time and expertise to make sure I got that part right, especially Kevin Brook, author of The Jews Of Khazaria. Also to Norm Finkelshteyn, whose own website on The Red Kaganate is a wealth of treasured info on the steppe tribe (www.geocities.com/kaganate).

Lastly – thanks to Largs, my home town and the place where the Vikings were finally kicked out of the UK by the Scots in 1263. So surprised were the Largonians at this victory that they have been waiting for them to return ever since and are so apologetic they have created an entire tourist industry round them, just to say sorry. I know – for ten days every year, I am part of it, at the annual Viking Festival and that is what inspired my interest.