Aliens, ancient gods, beautiful Valkyries, old-fashioned heroes, conniving nobles, betrayal, greed, incest, a magical gold horde; this story has something for everyone. Fafner, the most notorious criminal in the universe, is stranded on Earth after civilization has been ravaged by disease, war and pollution. He decides to hone his felonious skills by stealing the powerful artifacts developed by another alien, Alberich. But Alberich is determined to regain the artifacts or at least make Fafner pay for stealing them. Alberich's devices, made for the magical Rhinegold, give the user vast powers. The Chip, allows the user to receive information instantaneously from anywhere in the universe. The second device, called the Helm is a beanie-like hat that allows the wearer to see the life lines of every creature in the vicinity. Wotan, god of the Saxons and Vikings, has to recover the Rhinegold in order to prevent his aging. He recognizes the greatly enhanced power of the golden horde, thanks to Alberich's genius. He plans to make a big comeback and regain millions of worshippers. To take the devices away from Fafner, he needs an old-fashioned hero: one who is strong of arm and weak of brain. While these conflicts rage on, Brunnhilde, an ex-Valkyrie, searches for the meaning of true love. Despite a few false starts and some problems such as the wrath of the god Wotan and mean-spirited men, Brunnhilde struggles to understand mortal love while she seeks a good man to try it out on.
Award-winning author Hank Quense lives in Bergenfield, NJ with his wife Pat. They have two daughters and five grandchildren. He writes humorous fantasy and scifi stories. On occasion, he also writes an article on fiction writing or book marketing but says that writing nonfiction is like work while writing fiction is fun. A member of the Science Fiction Writers of America, he refuses to write serious genre fiction saying there is enough of that on the front page of any daily newspaper and on the evening TV news.
Zaftan Entrepreneurs is the first book of a trilogy. In it, an alien mining ship discovers a planet that holds promise to be a mining bonanza. Unfortunately, it is inhabited by humans, dwarfs, elves and other races and they object to the mining expeditions.
Zaftan Miscreants is the second book in the trilogy. It is awash with unusual characters and filled with bizarre plots
Hank's previous works include Tales From Gundarland, a collection of fantasy stories. Readers Favorite awarded the book a medal and EPIC designated it a finalist in its 2011 competition. His Fool's Gold is a retelling of the ancient Rhinegold myth and Tunnel Vision is a collection of twenty previously published short stories. Build a Better Story is a book of advice for fiction writers.
Altogether, Hank has over forty published short stories and a number of non-fiction articles.
He is presently working on novel that combines the plots and characters from Shakespeare's Hamlet and Othello with the character Falstaff thrown in for good measure. The working title is Falstaff's Big Gamble
He has a number of links where you can follow his work and his occasional rants:
Hank's website: http://hanquense.com
Hank's Blog:strangeworldsonline.blogspot.com
Strange Worlds website:http://strangeworldsonline.com
Follow him on twitter: http://twitter.com/hanque99
Facebook fan pages: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Hank-Quenses-Fiction-Writing-Page/102293491907?v=wall
