Tim Mills (USA)

The old ways are sacred to the Cheyenne people; it is their way of connecting to the Great Spirit, and forms the core of traditional family life. For generations a few hand-picked people have been entrusted with the responsibility to carry the ceremonies onwards. The family Red Wolf, is just such a family, with Grandpa Ben being one of few remaining Cheyenne medicine men. A medicine man is a traditional doctor, or a healer, as the people refer to it. It is also a position of great responsibility, and importance. In the Red Wolf family the medicine skipped a generation, and Grandpa Ben has chosen of all his grandchildren, for Joey to be his successor as a Cheyenne medicine man. Everyone knows Joey is a shy, quiet boy with cerebral palsy, who needs help with almost everything.

Old memories haunting Joey Red Wolf in the night lead him to a shocking truth about himself: not only is he different from everyone around him, but he will change the future of the Red Wolf family medicine altars. What will his family think, especially his grandfather? Why do the elders and the spirits want to leave this key piece of Cheyenne culture, closely guarded for generations, in the care of a child with a disability?

AJ Big Bear, Joey's best friend, is also searching for something personal. Why all of a sudden do the spirits seem to call to him? The answer lies in the spiritual part of the old ways. However, for AJ to find the old ways, he must first discover himself.

The shocking truth awaits them in the mysterious Cheyenne Spirit Lodge! Are Joey and AJ ready to rediscover the meaning of faith?

While studying in the forest with his grandfather, Joey finds himself drawn to the activities going on down by the creek and decides to try and watch a family of beavers. As he watches, he begins to see similarities in his own life. Quickly everything starts to come apart when he discovers that something has gone wrong at a nearby ranger’s post. Suddenly, Joey must try to sort through a strange trail of clues leading back into the woods. Worried that something may have happened to his dad, Joey teams up with his friends and his little brother to find Steve Red Wolf. As they race to help Joey’s dad, they discover the real meaning of family.

Having a soul mate is one thing, working together is something else entirely. It started as a simple shared lesson on the sacredness of food, but that was just the beginning! As they try to get to know one another, and keep up with their lessons, Joey and Ashley find themselves faced with a new challenge for which they are completely unprepared. The fall harvest is one of the most important annual spiritual events on the calendar. The Cheyenne gather together from all across the reservation to honour the spirits with a huge celebratory thanksgiving feast. Guess who asked to help with the planning?

Planning is off to a rocky start as things seem to go wrong from the beginning. With each solution come new challenges. Being shy becomes Joey's greatest obstacle, when he finds himself asked to lead others in a plan so creative and unusual that only he could conceive it. Just as he begins to make progress, the spirits surprise him with another task, understanding the deeper meaning of a mysterious vision. Knowing the elders are watching, he sets out to follow a request from the spirits he does not fully understand. Can Joey and Ashley discover the lost secrets of the first altar in time to save the feast?

Jeff Pages (Australia)

A million years ago the last of the Barefooters, keepers of the peace in a far-away galaxy, crash-landed on a planet near what is now the Pleiades cluster while fleeing their Enemy. Over time they began planting the seeds of civilisation throughout the Milky Way, but a nearby stellar eruption rendered their adopted world uninhabitable and the few remaining survivors fled and disappeared.

On fourteen-year-old Peter Thorpe’s first day at his new school in the country town of Narrabri, he is befriended by a lonely Aboriginal boy named Billy Collins. Before long they discover that they share not only a love for astronomy and barefooting, but a destiny that changes the course of history. For they carry within them spirits of that lost race and a time is fast approaching when ancient prophesies are to be tested and perhaps fulfilled.

Morgoth the Enlightened has ruled the galaxy for a million years but his days are numbered, for when sixteen-year-old Mary Anderson visits the palace on a two day school excursion, she sets off a chain of events that will ultimately lead to his downfall.

Rescued from Morgoth's clutches by her friends Ron and Brian, Mary falls into the arms of the Delphinidae, the dolphin-worshippers of Bluehaven. Under their guidance and instruction, she hears her calling and undertakes a perilous journey to a distant galaxy and a planet named Earth.

There she must bear the child of a native of that world, a child destined to play a crucial role in Morgoth's demise.

For a million years the Dolphins have been at the heart of the Delphinidae creed, providing wisdom and solace along with their gift of telepathic empathy. But behind their collective consciousness lies a dark secret, a poisoned chalice threatening both their galaxy and ours.

Caught in a tangled web of subterfuge and lies, Mark, Chris, Damon and Pip, along with the irrepressible Frank Halliday, must each face their own demons as they seek the Path to the Truth, a path leading them into the dark realm of Sheol and the mysterious City of Towers.

Cornipean bunyips are small placid animals, popular as pets throughout the Meridian Empire. Frizian honey is their weakness though, a trait exploited in the outlawed sport of bunyip-baiting where just a mouthful makes them fight to the death.

On Earth, their mythical namesakes haunt the swamps of south-eastern Australia, devouring anyone straying too close at night. But are they connected in more than just name?

For Joel Morison, a quiet holiday with the Collins family in Victoria’s Bunyip State Park goes horribly wrong when twelve-year-old David disappears while bushwalking. In attempting to find him, they become pawns in a conspiracy dating back to the first settlement of Cornipus and the secret annihilation of that world’s indigenous people.

In the uncertain future of 2071, honeymooning couple Joel and Loraine are walking barefoot through France along the Paths of Saint James, but are stalked by an inquisitive blonde-headed man. In an ancient abbey the trap is sprung, shattering their dreams in an abduction that sends shock waves through both galaxies.

On a mythical river called Styx, a lone ferryman, believed to be the last of his people, hears rumours that descendants of his kin are hiding in scattered enclaves. With the re-emergence of the Barungi on Huntress, he must act quickly before a chance union can plunge the universe into a dark and endless tyranny.

Set five years after Cry of the Bunyips, this story continues the adventure begun with Barefoot Times, Call of the Delphinidae and The Mind of the Dolphins.
 

Marco Peel (Spain)

2002. Waking up naked next to a man she barely knows, after a night out of which she has no recollection, Nastasha realises she has lost something she can never recover. And it's not just her shoes. Running away, she ends up on the old pilgrim's road from Arles to Santiago de Compostela. But while walking helps her forget, she is hounded by disturbing dreams that seem to predict the future, and frightening visions of a boy crossing her path, in an apocolyptic landscape, in another time.

1348. First to come down with the plague, Dominic survives to find himself alone in a world changed beyond comprehension. Blaming himself for his father's death, he sets off to Santiago, where his mother abandoned him at birth 13 years ago, in the hope of finding out who she was, who he is, and where he belongs.

Although centuries apart, they share more than their choice to walk barefoot. More, in fact, than they may wish to find out...