First Lines from An Anthology of Battle—‘Jalaya’

‘Jalaya’ was started in 1999 and completed in 2012, specifically for this anthology. It was difficult to write, until I conceded that it needed to be a lot longer than I had originally intended. The compromise was worth it. ‘Jalaya’ is the fourth short story in An Anthology of Battle and is approximately 14,500-words long. It is currently available for stand-alone purchase, and it starts like this:

Michael looked down at the town in the sand. Red, flat roofs of clay interspersed by the elegant, wooden gables of buildings from northern climes, still stood in a basin of protective hills. From where he stood, the rotting boards were invisible, as was the sand that swirled along the unkempt streets.

An Anthology of Battle is scheduled for upload to Kindle and Smashwords between the 22^nd and 26^th of May, 2012.