Two hundred and ninety-five years after Jesus died on the cross, the Emperor Constantine began the process of blending Christianity with politics in the Greek-speaking world around Constantinople. At much the same time a quieter sort of Christianity was growing in the deserts of Egypt and Syria. By the fifth century something of this quieter, monastic style of Christianity was beginning to appear on the western coasts of Ireland, Scotland and Wales — We seem to have both a Political Christianity, and a Contemplative Christianity.
Destruction and death were to follow as Viking raiders crossed the sea in pursuit of gold and silver and slaves. Christian Head Office (now moved from Constantinople to Rome) lost the plot from 896 to 1049, a hundred and fifty-three years during which Pagan Vikings became Christian Normans and, after 1066, Kings of England.
The Viking Normans did not do things by halves: a new church in every village; a new cathedral in any important town, and monasteries all over the place. Huge expense. Christianity as a building enterprise! Daughters, wives and nuns all became subjected to a male-dominated Christianity for the next nine hundred years.
*****
I enjoyed this large project producing eBook, paperback and hardback formats of this engaging non-fiction book which was published on Ingram Spark so it is available via all good bookstores, as well as on Amazon.
I read the text initially and while it is not my usual reading matter, I found it accessible, entertaining and informative. John Cutting and I then set about progressing the project. There were several complications to doing this. John was exacting (just as he should be!) with his requirements over the formatting. There were many specific indents and spacing which were challenging to manage through the three different format manuscripts, so it is just as well I am a little OCD with this level of detail.
There are illustrations throughout the book which can always cause glitches when it comes to publishing but fortunately, I had my trusty cover designer, Simon Emery, available to ensure the photos were at the right colour level for John and had the correct number of pixels to satisfy the publishing platforms. The illustrations were mostly photos provided by John, but Simon Emery drew a map for him as John didn’t own the rights to use the photo he had. Simon also drew the front cover illustration from a photo provided by John, and naturally he designed all the covers too.
The other new thing I learned through this project was how to put together an Index and I was delighted with the result in the back of this book. A very satisfying experience.
John Cutting was super to work with and as we did all this through the pandemic, he was also patient. He turned 90 last year, so is proof that it is never too late to get your book published.
