It’s not often that something truly original and new crosses my desk — and when it does, it’s usually from a writer who ventures far from the well-trod paths of Western Fantasy, like Nnedi Okorafor, Ken Liu, or Nisi Shawl.

So I was very intrigued when I received a copy of The Oath of the Vayuputras, the closing volume of The Shiva Trilogy, which the Hindustan Times calls “India’s Lord of the Rings.” A massive, sprawling epic, The Shiva Trilogy is nothing less than a tale of ancient civilizations, gods, and a holy war for the very soul of India. It has become an international bestseller, with over 2.5 million copies in print.

The three novels in the trilogy are available in the US from Jo Fletcher Books. They are:

The Immortals of Meluha (425 pages, $14.99 in trade paperback/$9.99 digital, April 2011)
The Secret of the Nagas (414 pages, $14.99 in trade paperback/$12.99 digital, November 2012)
The Oath of the Vayuputras (653 pages, $14.99 in trade paperback/$12.99 digital, July 5, 2016)

Set in 1900 BC, the books tell the tale of the empire of Meluha in ancient India, and a Tibetan immigrant named Shiva, who finds himself caught up in a war brewing with the a kingdom to the east… you know what? I can’t really do it justice. The books were originally published in India by Westland, and those editions do a far better job explaining this than I could.

However, those versions are available only in the Indian subcontinent. Still, this is the internet, and all things are possible. If you promise not to ask where I got them, I can give you a peek at the back of the Westland editions of the first two novels:

[Click for bigger versions.]

These books look like a lot of fun — and they’re guaranteed to be a refreshing change from that Arthurian fantasy or Game of Thrones clone you were thinking about. All three are now available in digital format and paperback here in the US. Give them a look.

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