My fourth novel, Duchess of the New Dawn, about an 8th-century noblewoman daring to forge her own fate at great peril, will come into the world on June 16, 2026. The ebook is available for preorder now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other vendors.

Here is the blurb:

740: Chiltrude, the daughter of Francia’s most powerful family, aspires to wed her beloved Odilo, the duke of Bavaria, and rule by his side. But her dying father forbids the marriage. As her brothers’ rivalry threatens to shatter the realm, she faces imprisonment in an abbey and fears for the baby in her womb.

Defying her kinsmen, she will risk everything to seize her heart’s desire, protect her child, and preserve Bavaria’s cherished independence. Amid the shifting loyalties of the duchy’s influential clans, she must outmaneuver Odilo’s archrival, her hostile in-laws, and most of all, her own brothers.

In Duchess of the New Dawn, Kim Rendfeld brings to life forgotten historical characters and events from the days of Charles Martel and tells the story of one woman’s determination to choose her own path.

As of this writing, I’m still working out kinks with the print edition and hope to have it available soon. If you would like to be included on my email list to know when the print version is available for preorder and to get a reminder on release day, send an email to kim@kimrendfeld.com. I promise I won’t spam you. I get plenty of those myself.

I enjoy reading books on my Kindle, but holding this first proof in my hand makes it feel real.

The inspiration for ‘Duchess’

I came across Chiltrude while doing research for my third novel, Queen of the Darkest Hour. As I read the passage in The Fourth Book of the Chronicle of Fredegar and Its Continuations (translated by J.M. Wallace-Hadrill), I thought, “She did what? Early medieval noblewomen didn’t do that!” If we are to believe Fredegar, she did.

As with other people who lived in the Dark Ages, especially women, not much is known about Childtrude. So I invented quite a bit for this novel—what the characters looked like, how they sounded, what they thought and said. You might be surprised by what I didn’t make up such as Chiltrude’s father, Charles Martel, ruling as mayor of the palace in the name of a dead king for several years.

One of my furry assistants oversees the various tweaks I’m making to the manuscript.

Why take so long to release the book

Writing the book and producing it are only part of the process. All authors, whether traditional, small press or indie, are expected to promote their books, and that requires planning, research and effort.

Things have changed since I launched my last book, Queen of the Darkest Hour, in 2018. In addition to writing blog posts and contacting reviewers (who require time to read the book and write their reviews), I will need to explore other options such as podcasts, BookTok, advertising and special offers.

And like many authors, I have a day job and need to work time for fiction around it. If you’d like to sample my other work while waiting for Duchess of the New Dawn to arrive, I got three other novels and two short stories. Check out kimrendfeld.com, my author page on Amazon, or my author profile on Goodreads.