Who Paints the Sky - Why I wrote it
Some stories arrive quickly. Others wait.
This one has been waiting for years.
I have long been fascinated by history, all the way back into prehistory, including the work of Graham Hancock. We know that humans existed during the Younger Dryas period, but we have no written records from that time, only bones and Clovis point stone tools. However, there are some puzzling structures such as Derinkuyu an underground city and the older Göbekli Tepe.
During the latter part of the Younger Dryas, the Earth was coming out of an ice age when an asteroid struck the planet. The climate shifted, and the familiar world collapsed. Entire civilizations disappeared into legend. I’ve written about survival for most of my writing career, but those stories have taken place in imagined futures. This time I wanted to go back to a distant past and ask a familiar question:
What did it feel like to live through an apocalypse?
Who Paints the Sky began with that question and with an image that stayed with me — a scholar watching the signs of change and realizing that knowledge alone might not be enough to save the people he loves.
At its heart, this is not just a story about Atlantis, climate, or catastrophe. This narrative delves into the themes of family, duty, and the decisions we make in the face of uncertain circumstances. Scholar Galen of the House of Furia has spent his life studying nature and the troubling signs that the world’s climate is changing. When the Imperial Senate finally approves his long-awaited expedition to the frozen north, Galen boards the great airship Behemoth with his son Jason, a Praetorian officer sworn to protect him.
But the journey quickly proves more dangerous than anyone expected. Political enemies plot assassination, border tribes clash with Atlantean cities, and powerful forces seem determined to stop the expedition before it reaches the mysterious ice cliffs.
Traveling with them is Ida, a young woman born among the northern tribes but raised in an Atlantean household. Caught between two worlds, she begins to question everything—power, civilization, and the many gods her people worship.
When strange lights appear in the sky and the natural world grows increasingly unstable, the travelers must confront new questions about the future and the fate of their world.
My decision to finally write this story came from a personal place. As the years pass, I am increasingly aware that some stories should not be left waiting. They deserve to be told while there is still time for me to tell them.
This novella is different from my earlier work. It’s quieter in some ways, more reflective in others. Yet it still asks the same question that has always driven my fiction:
How do people endure when everything they depend on begins to fall away?
This book has been long delayed but it has finally been scheduled for release on May 4, 2026. I am grateful that I can finally share this story with you.