Book Excerpt from The Tattered Banner ~ Bookish Madness

Bookish Madness is hosting an excerpt today from fantasy novel "The Tattered Banner". Enjoy the excerpt!

Book Excerpt

‘Stop there! Thief!’

For a moment Soren hoped that the shout had been directed at someone else, but a glance over his shoulder proved that it had not. The merchant had pulled a long thin club from underneath his counter and was striding purposefully toward him. One of the smaller side alleys that ran off the square was his best chance; they led to the warren of tight twisting alleys that riddled the city like veins, a web that anyone who had grown up on the streets was intimately familiar with.

With eighteen years under his belt, Soren had found over the last couple of years that his body had become inconveniently large. The small spaces between adults at leg level that had once provided free passage when he was younger were now closed to him. Instead he had to use his size to try to bash people out of his way to clear a path ahead. It was not the most economical of escapes, knocking from person to person.

With each bump and curse, the merchant got a little closer. Just as one of the laneways came into sight and with only a few heads bobbing between him and it, he felt a firm hand grab a handful of his shirt between his shoulder blades. He spun around, and the first swing of the merchant’s club cracked him on the back of the hand and knocked the precious loaf of bread from his grasp. He watched with agonising hunger as the loaf hit the smoothly cobbled ground and was quickly trampled into oblivion.

About The Tattered Banner

Title: The Tattered Banner

Author: Duncan M. Hamilton

Genre: Fantasy

Self Published

Word Count: 124,000

ISBN: (paperback) 978-1481013222

(Kindle) 978-1-62347-203-0

Release Date: March 2013

Format: Paperback and e-book

Available from Amazon, Amazon UK, Barnes & Noble, Nook UK, Kobo, iBookstore, Smashwords.

Unique talent always attracts attention…

In a world where magic is outlawed, ability with a sword is prized above all else. For Soren this means the chance to live out his dreams.

Plucked from a life of privation, he is given a coveted place at Ostenheim’s Academy of Swordsmanship, an opportunity beyond belief.

Opportunity is not always what it seems however, and gifts rarely come without conditions. Soren becomes an unwitting pawn in a game of intrigue and treachery that could cost him not just his dreams, but also his life.

Author Bio

Duncan is a writer of fantasy fiction novels and short stories that are set in a world influenced by Renaissance Europe. He has a Masters Degree in History, and is particularly interested in the medieval and renaissance periods.

He doesn’t live anywhere particularly exotic and when not writing he enjoys cycling, skiing and windsurfing.