Tim A. Mills
Coach, Author, Trovatore
Most of you know Tim as a fencing coach and co-founder of Royal Arts. What you may not know is that he's also been writing fiction since he was a kid. You know, right before the asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs.
Fencing and fiction both live in the space between timing and instinct. Both reward patience, punish hesitation, and occasionally demand that you trust your footwork when your brain hasn't caught up yet. Tim's writing draws on both.
His most recent novel, The Day the Whimsy Died, is the first book in the Virtuosi Chronicles, an urban fantasy mystery series set in Columbus, Ohio. The protagonist, Dekker Kohl, is a musical investigator who happens to fence. He carries an instrument to crime scenes and reads the harmonic echoes killers leave behind. He's also 42, hasn't written anything worth keeping in three months, and is wearing a velvet jacket his apprentice describes as a cry for help.
The books origin also started at fencing. Coach Tim was running drills at the target wall one day when one of the students announced, "You have no whimsy."
Tim replied, "Whimsy died."
The idea was in his brain faster than the lockout time on a scoring machine. And The Day the Whimsy Died was born.
It's a book for adults who like their heroes a little worn around the edges. If you've ever enjoyed Jim Butcher's Dresden Files or Ben Aaronovitch's Rivers of London, this is that kind of book.
The Day the Whimsy Died is available in paperback, hardcover, ebook, and audiobook. Signed copies are available through Swordistry.com or at events.
For more about Tim's writing, visit swordistry.com.
