Rebel King -The Last High King, is a book about an exciting and terrible time in history you will be close by to what happened in Scotland, Ireland, and to some extent England after the defeat of the mighty English army at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 by the far lesser forces of the Scottish army. In 1315, Robert the Bruce allies with his father-in-law Richard de Burgh, also known as the "Red Earl" of Ulster with the plan to set Richard on the Irish High King throne by combining forces with the Celtic-Irish and the Anglo-Irish to free the once sovereign state of Ireland from the oppressive English that had occupied that country since old Viking days. King Robert dispatched his brother Edward with 450 seasoned Scots and galloglass warriors to join Richard and his Anglo-Irish barons to begin the campaign. Daringly Edward turned the tables on Richard in one swift movement and then allied himself with the powerful King of Tyrone, Domnall O'Neil. Meanwhile, in London. Earl Thomas Plantagenet of Lancaster and five other earldoms coveted his cousin's English crown and so politically maneuvered to strip King Edward of England, from much of his royal power, virtually turning him into a toothless lion. By 1318, tens of thousands of Scots, Irish and English lost their lives fighting each other and fighting for scarce food resources at the onset of the devastating "Little Ice Age." What did grow then was stunted and meager eventually leaving the domesticated animals dead and consequently many people to suffer at the very hand of Mother Nature, herself.
About the Author: Southern West Virginia native Charles Randolph Bruce was born and raised there in the highlands in which his Scottish ancestors settled in the late 1700s. His interest in telling the heroic story of Robert the Bruce, King of Scots 1306 -1329, was sparked by his family's tradition that they descended from the great medieval warrior king. Carolyn Hale Bruce was born in the Roanoke Valley, Virginia, where her 18th century ancestors include those with the Scottish surnames Agnew, Fraser, Thompson, and Davidson, among others. She wrote and had published two pictorial histories of her hometown. The writers were panelists on the nationally distributed Book TV (C-span 2) hour and a half segment entitled "Successful Self-Publishing" at the Virginia Festival of the Book on March 29, 2008. Now, having spent the last decade in researching, writing, illustrating, and promoting the Rebel King series of novels, Charles and Carolyn have traveled tens of thousands of miles to attend scores of games in dozens of states from Florida to Maine, Texas to Colorado, to promote their works and talk with other Scots about their hard-fought history. They have appeared on local television and radio shows in diverse markets, and have been written up in many newspapers and magazines. Every year new venues are added to their nearly nationwide wanderings.