The Jikaida Cycle by Alan Burt Akers is now available from all good bookstores worldwide in paperback.

Get The Jikaida Cycle from Amazon.co.uk

Get The Jikaida Cycle from Amazon.com

The Jikaida Cycle by Alan Burt Akers will be available on 21 July in a hardcover edition from all good bookstores. Published by our sister imprint, Bladud Books, this is the latest of the Saga of Dray Prescot omnibus editions and contains books 19-21:

A Life for Kregen
A Sword for Kregen
A Fortune for Kregen
A Victory for Kregen

The back copy:

Four hundred light years from Earth, Kregen is a marvelous world, peopled by wonderful beings, filled with light and clamor and furor of life lived to the hilt. But Kregen has its darker side, where horror and terror batten on innocent people, where sorceries rend reason, where injustice denies light.

Here, in the unforgiving yet rewarding world of Kregen, struggling through disaster and triumph, Dray Prescot has made his home. He has acquired a number of titles and estates but now the people of the island empire of Vallia, which has been ripped into shreds by ambitious and mercenary invaders, have called on him to lead them to freedom as their emperor. Reluctant to accept the imperium, he shoulders the burden because, rightly or wrongly, he sees this as the lesser evil…

Volume 22 in the long-running saga of Dray Prescot, of Earth and of Kregen, is now available from all the usual places online, or soon will be. It is called A Victory for Kregen, by Kenneth Bulmer, writing as Alan Burt Akers, and is the final instalment of the Jikaida Cycle, which consists of four books: A Life for Kregen, A Sword for Kregen, A Fortune for Kregen and A Victory for Kregen.

Here goes the blurb…

The ending of Prescot’s stark adventures as a living chess piece in the city of blood games was to be as terrifying as the perils that had gone before. Because now that transposed Earthman had to fight his way back to his embattled Vallian homeland across a sky full of danger and a sea full of death. And when he returned – if he could – he would find the combat joined, his son at doom’s door, his troops up against superior odds, and a battle he must personally fight that would be two battles in two different places at the same time!

Volume 21 in Alan Burt Akers extraordinary saga of our hero from Earth, Dray Prescot, is now published and available from all the best bookstores online, such as Cyberread.com and Mobipocket.com. A Fortune for Kregen may take a few days to appear on some other sites, like Fictionwise.com. The next title, A Victory for Kregen, will appear next week.

Here is the blurbette:

Fame and fortune may await the winners of the life and death game called Jikaida, but for Dray Prescot his triumphs seemed only to bring infamy and misfortune. An Earthman transposed to the distant world that circles the twin suns of Antares, Prescot had to find a way out of his Jikaida City exile – for his homeland needed him in its hour of danger. But it seemed that fate now would place him in an even more terrifying game – a treasure hunt played out in the illusion webbed catacombs of a haunted valley where desperate men came to find fortunes at the risk of their followers lives and their own sanity.

The wonderful and exciting saga of Dray Prescot of Earth and of Kregen continues apace with book twenty, A Sword for Kregen. This is the second book of the “Jikaida Cycle” by Kenneth Bulmer writing as Alan Burt Akers, and sees Dray taking part in Kazz-Jikaida and Death-Jikaida in Jikaida City.

The back-of-the-book blurb:

The most popular game among the many peoples of Kregen, world of Antares, is one that resembles chess, called Jikaida. Jikaida is a battle of wits and war game pieces that suited well the tension charged atmosphere that enveloped Dray Prescot. For reconquering Vallia was assuming the aspect of such a game – move versus countermove, horde against horde! Then Dray Prescot found himself no longer in control of just a game – he had become a living chessman on a real-life board at the dreaded arena of Jikaida City. There every move was accompanied by bloodshed and behind every game might hang the fate of a city, an island, or even a nation!

About Dray Prescot (from the preface by Alan Burt Akers):

Dray Prescot presents an enigmatic picture of himself; reared in the inhumanly harsh conditions of Nelson’s Navy, he has been transported by the Scorpion agencies of the Star Lords, the Everoinye, and the Savanti, the superhuman yet mortal people of Aphrasöe the Swinging City, to the demanding and fulfilling world of Kregen orbiting Antares, four hundred light years from Earth, where he has made his home.

He is a man above middle height, with brown hair and level brown eyes, brooding and dominating, with enormously broad shoulders and superbly powerful physique. There is about him an abrasive honesty and indomitable courage, he moves like a savage hunting cat, quiet and deadly. He has struggled through triumph and disaster and has acquired a number of titles and estates, and now the people of the island of Vallia, which has been ripped apart by ambitious and mercenary invaders, have called on him to lead them to freedom as their emperor.

His story, which he records on cassettes, is arranged so that each volume may be read as complete in itself. There have been many questions about the role of Prescot on Kregen and particularly about the nature and purpose of his antagonists. I am firmly convinced he does see far further ahead than perhaps he is given credit for. His words inspire our belief, particularly in what he has to say about the Star Lords. He implies they are not as malefic as at one time we might have been led to believe.

Whatever the outcome for Dray Prescot, we are aware that he is conscious that he struggles against a far darker and more profound fate than is revealed in anything he has so far told us.

Title number 19 in the epic and amazing saga of Dray Prescot is now available from all good ebookshops. A Life for Kregen by Kenneth Bulmer, writing as Alan Burt Akers, is the first volume of the Jikaida Cycle, chronicling the history of Dray Prescot on the fascinating world of Kregen four hundred light years from Earth. Reared in the inhumanly harsh conditions of Nelson’s Navy, he has been transported through the agencies of the Star Lords, the Everoinye, and the Savanti nal Aphrasöe to the terrible yet beautiful world of Kregen under Antares, where he has struggled through disaster and success to make a home.

Here be the blurb:

The world Kregen circles the twin suns of Antares, far distant from the skies of Earth. Yet Kregen is the ground on which the Earthman Dray Prescot must stand and fight for all he holds dear. For Prescot is the unwilling battle arm of the mysterious Star Lords who contend for that planet with the powerful Savanti. Yet Prescot’s ambitions are his own, for he has inherited the remnant of a shattered empire and must fight to bring hope and freedom to all its peoples. By his side stands his princess, Delia of the Blue Mountains, and a band of stalwart companions of many races and species. But arrayed against him are flying armadas, armed hordes, the wizardry of a super scientist, and, most shocking of all, the fury and steel claws of his own daughter, Dayra!