What if you woke up in a crumbling mountain castle with the beast of your nightmares? Then discovered this kindly dragon speaks like a man and reads books? And, whether literary or not, how would such a dragon—the mascot of traditional fantasy—fare in a battle against spaceships? That’s the burning question behind this week’s book “battle” between E. Stephen Burnett as well as Rachelle Nelson, author of the new Enclave release Embergold.

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2. Enclave Publishing: Embergold by Rachelle Nelson
   
3. Sunrise Publishing: Lord of Winter by Jill Williamson and Andrew Swearingen
   
4. Fragments by J. A. Webb
   

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• Lorehaven: Oxygen sci-fi retro-review, new Darkfell fantasy review
  
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Backstory: author Rachelle Nelson

Rachelle Nelson grew up reading fantasy novels and getting her clothes muddy in the pine forests of Idaho. These days, she still loves hiking through forests and libraries, though she’s a bit less fond of mud. Her debut novel, Sky of Seven Colors, released in 2023 through Enclave Publishing, and was a recent Carol Award winner and Christy Award winner. Embergold, her newest standalone, released March 18, 2025. Rachelle doesn’t write true stories, but she does write about truth. When she’s not doing that, she sings in a band with her husband who makes her happier than should be legal. If you like good food and honest conversations, you’re her favorite kind of person.

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• RachelleNelsonAuthor.com
  
• Instagram: @‌rachelle.nelson.author
  
• X: @‌RachelleNelson_
  

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• Surveys of famous dragons that fantasy fans remember well
  
• Dragons, of course, feature in Job 41 and in the St. George legend
  
• In other countries, dragons have different entangled mythologies
  
• Smaug the Terrible and other dragons from Tolkien’s Middle-earth
  
• Godzilla and other creatures are arguably derivatives of dragons
  
• Dragons from classic fairy tales, Disney, Harry Potter series, Dreamworks
  
• Rachelle’s own literate dragon who speaks kindly, from Embergold
  

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• Surveys of famous spaceships that sci-fi fans remember well
  
• Jules Verne’s cannon-fired capsule in From the Earth to the Moon (1865)
  
• Zarkov’s rocket ship from Flash Gordon movie serials
  
• The Enterprise (and many later ships) from Star Trek
  
• The Millennium Falcon and others from Star Wars
  
• Reasons why fans love the ideal of fictional spaceships
  
• Stephen’s own ship, the Alpha Omega, from Above the Circle of Earth
  

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• Rachelle: points for the home team of kindly, powerful dragons
  
• Stephen: points for the challenger of kindly, powerful spaceships
  
• Zack: must mediate or else declare that both get participation trophies
  

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• Who won the battle: fantastical dragons vs. awesome spaceships?
  

You spoke about how we might find underground secrets on Mars that might teach us about our humanity. As a teen in the 80s, I read Dream Thief, published in 1983, in which the main character travels to Mars and there encounters the underground remains of an ancient Martian civilization. … Anyway, I thought that this novel deserved mention in Chapter 3 of this episode, especially since apart from Lewis there are not many Christian-made stories set on Mars from the past 50 years. BTW, I am finding the first 2 chapters of ACE intensely exciting! Thank you for your book, Lorehaven, and this fantastic podcast!

What happened to the once-popular Western genre? As a prospector doll put it, “Once the astronauts went up, children only wanted to play with space toys!” And yet the Western legend lives beyond the Earth, often mixed with the sci-fi genre. What is a sci-fi Western? We invite raygun-slinger and After Moses sci-fi Western author Michael F. Kane to ride into the studio.