Virtual Tour + #Giveaway: The Legend of Queen Agatha by Sam Cunningham @GoddessFish

The Legend of Queen Agatha

by Sam Cunningham

GENRE:   erotic fantasy/political allegory

BLURB:

In the mythical, medieval land of Xana, Queen Julia ruled as a typical aristocratic monarch in a country whose great wealth was concentrated among the privileged few.  Her  daughter, Princess Agatha, was the champion of the commoners.  The evil sorcerer Magi comes to Xana to kill Queen Julia and ravage aristocrats and commoners alike.  Princess Agatha alone is spared, for she is protected by her fairy godmother.  Now the beautiful heiress has two challenges, first to rid Xana of Magi and then to lift all the commoners from poverty into prosperity.  To achieve her first goal she must identify her handsome prince incognito in the crowd on her first try.  She won't have a second chance.  To achieve her second she must invent and use radical political schemes even if not all her people approve.    

Excerpt:

Elias was an important member of the Queen Agatha's council of advisers, perhaps second in the whole country behind the queen.  The queen caught him embezzling royal funds.

Elias was shaken to his very core by Queen Agatha's response.  He expected a reprimand and perhaps a mild fine, but instead, she brought him before a huge crowd assembled below the palace balcony and publicly humiliated him.  She proclaimed, "Twice you came to me, not to serve our people but to enrich yourself.  You will apologize and give back to the people everything you have as atonement and compensation."

Elias cried out to the people of Xana.  "I have done wrong.  I have taken that which I did not earn.  I am sorry.  I will return it all to you.  I promise never again to violate my queen's trust."

"You will give everything you have to the people," announced Agatha.  "You will give all your land, your property, your possessions, and even your clothes.  You will keep only the clothes you are now wearing.  Everything you have will be sold at auction.  I shall use the money to find more teachers.  They will teach arithmetic to all the people of Xana so that they understand contracts.  No one can shortchange them again as you have done."

"Everything but the clothes I am wearing?" whimpered Elias.

"Everything," responded Queen Agatha, as Elias was led away, crying.  "You leave in disgrace.  May you one day regain your honor with service, humility, frugality, and generosity to your people."  Agatha repeated, "And generosity."

All the wealth that he had accumulated in a lifetime disappeared in a flash.

Interview with Sam Cunningham

What inspired you to write “The Legend of Queen Agatha?”

I have a rich imagination and scenes keep popping into my mind. For “The Legend of Queen Agatha,” I envisioned a beautiful and compassionate princess whose people are being ravaged by an evil sorcerer. She can save her people, and become an enlightened queen, only if she identifies her handsome prince incognito in the crowd on her first try. Unlike many of the scenes that appear to me, I kept adding more and more details, one sentence or phrase at a time, and decided to write them onto a computer file to save them and share with the good people of our world.


Can you tell us a little bit about the next books in (Name of book or series) or what you have planned for the future?

Maybe, if the first has some success in the marketplace, I’ll ask my own question to the readers: Would you like to learn about more of Queen Agatha’s adventures?


Can you tell us a little bit about the characters in ‘The Legend of Queen Agatha?”

Queen Agatha is the most beautiful woman in all her land. She is compassionate about lifting all of the poor commoners in her land into prosperity. She can discern the true character of any person as soon as she meets her or him. Though kind and gentle, she has an authoritarian streak, does not tolerate bad behavior and does whatever is necessary to stop it immediately and permanently. She expects her orders, always for the welfare of her people above herself, to be obeyed.

Pedro Mendez is a humble, illiterate glassblower whose insight into people and events in his country is second only to that of Queen Agatha. As a man also of impeccable personal honor and honesty, he becomes one of Queen Agatha’s most trusted and valued advisers.

Anya Mendez, who married Levinsky, is Pedro’s fifth child. When Anya is only four years old, Queen Agatha tells her father, “Anya is a precocious child. She is destined for achievement beyond anything we can now imagine.” Throughout the novel we watch Anya developing as wise Queen Agatha had foreseen.

And then there are the villains. Magi the Sorcerer uses his spells to kill Queen Julia, Agatha’s mother, ravage the land, steal all the wealth of aristocrats and commoners alike, and inflict hunger, disease, and crippling upon the people. King Ibris of Mardon leads a large army and fleet to invade Queen Agatha’s country, steal and carry home the wealth of Agatha’s people as well as many of their women to become sex slaves for his soldiers. His greatest craving is to make Queen Agatha herself sexual playtoy.


You know I think we all have a favorite author. Who is your favorite author and why?

The science fiction writer Robert Heinlein is my favorite author. He creates strong and forceful characters and exciting adventures. The background of space travel and time travel goes beyond what we can now achieve in the real world, but it fills with wonder my imaginative spirit.  


If you could time-travel would you travel to the future or the past? Where would you like to go and why would you like to visit this particular time period?

We are blessed to live in a time with the least hunger, least disease, greatest literary collection, greatest scientific and historical knowledge, and greatest ease of travel of any time in the history of the world.  I am grateful to live in this time, and would not want to go back to any time in the past. I, like many of you, are worried about troubles ahead in our world. But I am optimistic for prosperity to return in the more distant future. I would like go to this future age of prosperity when the collection of fine books, historical, and scientific knowledge is even greater than it is today. There would be so much to learn.


Do you have any little fuzzy friends? Like a dog or a cat? Or any pets?

I like dogs, cats, and pet birds, and am friends with the pets of my neighbors as I am with my wonderful neighbors themselves. But I don’t want the added burden of caring for animals in my own home.

Thanks for taking time out of your busy schedule to visit with us today.

AUTHOR BIO:

Sam Cunningham is a small college physics teacher.  He knows from personal experience with his pupils that through nurturing nearly all young people can become productive citizens.  It is an overwhelming tragedy that so many poor children are not given this nurturing.  Their personal loss, and the loss to their country of their productive ability, is a catastrophe.  As a scientist he understands that critical thinking and the ability to follow where the evidence leads are the only reliable ways to understand the real world.  Away from work he leaves the real world of hard evidence to read science fiction and fantasy.  His favorite childhood movie was the Walt Disney 1950 cartoon of Cinderella, and he greatly admires strong women.  Sam brings together all of these ingredients in this story of a princess who becomes a wise and inspired queen with a personal mission to achieve productivity, prosperity, and happiness for all of her people.

The book is on sale for $0.99.

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