Kathryn McConaughy's Feast of Adventures

One of my favorite things about working on the Faerie Queen series is that I can explore arms and armor and call it work! For example, I found images of a really cool exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, focused on shields. You can see it here: Defensive Display Images at the Met . We've got a lot of round metal shields here, but we've also got some funny ones like the German tournament targe or the very narrow Italian targones.  I especially like the German shield, because it's largely made of wood (which a LOT of shields originally would have been, it's just that they haven't survived until today to be put in museums) and has a notch on one side to stick your lance through! The art on the front shows a lady holding a golden shield showing a rampant goat, another rampant goat leaping around above her, and a banner behind her and to the left that has the owner's motto on it: "Take me as I am..."  According to the Met listing, over the yea...

Since George's book is coming out July 1st, I wanted to share the first chapter! How do you think George is going to do against the dragon? Find the book here:  Amazon.com: George, the Shield, and the Veiled Lady (Faerie Queen Book 1) eBook : McConaughy, Kathryn: Kindle Store ***** George was humming a little tune to himself as he cleaned out the goat pen. That’s been sixteen buckets, he thought. Another nine buckets and I’ll be done. Some people might have complained about the smell of goat, but George kind of liked it. Or, at least, he liked the goats, and it would have been rude to like the goats but then to complain about their smell. Friends don’t complain about how friends smell. The oldest goat butted him gently on the hip. “Easy, Nanny!” He reached down to rub the funny little swirl of hair on her neck. Mother called that kind of mark a Faerie kiss, but George wasn’t sure that a Faerie would kiss a goat. The Fae in sister Ivy’s stories sounded much too high-and-mighty. Even...

Perhaps you thought I'd fallen into a hole during an archaeological excavation, or accidentally time-traveled to the past and ended up as a farmer in medieval Ireland or a scribe in ancient Syria. But no! I've just been finishing my dissertation and then getting started with teaching an all-new slate of classes. And, of course, I've been writing! My big project of the last few years has been the tales of the Faerie Queen, a series of middle grade/ young adult adventures inspired by Sir Edmund Spenser's poem, The Faerie Queene . As a huge fan of King Arthur, knights, and magical worlds, I've loved Spenser's work since high school. I'm really looking forward to sharing these stories with everyone! The first book, George, the Shield, and the Veiled Lady , will be available on Amazon on July 1, 2026. The ebook is available for preorder now, but the paperback version won't appear until July 1. Once the book comes out, it will also be available on Kindle Unlim...