• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer

Dancing Priest

Author and Novelist Glynn Young

  • HOME
  • BLOG
  • BOOKS
    • Dancing Prophet
    • Dancing Priest
    • A Light Shining
    • Dancing King
    • Poetry at Work
  • ABOUT
  • CONTACT

Dancing King

The Character of Michael in the Dancing Priest Novels

November 17, 2020 By Glynn Young 1 Comment

After Dancing Priest was published in late 2011, I received an email from a reader in Seattle. He liked the book. He liked the book so much that he said it should be required reading for young men under the age of 20. 

He said this, he said, because the character of Michael was all about standing firm and true in the face of adversity. “There’s a nobility in the character of Michael Kent that we should all aspire to.” That character is demonstrated in large things, like an Olympic tragedy, and in smaller things, like taking in a motherless eight-year-old boy.

By the second Novel, A Light Shining, Michael Kent has become Michael Kent-Hughes, husband of Sarah. He wears his wealth lightly. Finding his family in Italy, instead of doing the legal thing, he does the right thing. And he faces the great personal adversity of any in the five novels, when he nearly dies. In fact, for a significant section of the book, Michael is unconscious, and the focus shifts to Sarah. 

In Dancing King, with Britain in physical shambles, Michael could have walked away from family responsibilities and the royal invitation that’s fallen to him. But he doesn’t take the easy way out. Months before the coronation, he learns that he’s facing serious opposition and a pile of dirty tricks. He and the staff he’s selected to work with him meet each one head one, turning potential adversity into advantage. 

Michael, as head of the Church of England, finds himself engulfed in a church mega-scandal in Dancing Prophet. The church scandal begins to erupt at the same time the Greater London Council reaches a political impasse, budgets expire, and the transport and sanitation workers go one strike. Michael is all of 30 years old in the story, but his sense of responsibility carries him forward. 

As the last of the series, Dancing Prince, begins, Michael is 35. He’s effectively the nation’s czar, parliamentary government having collapsed some years earlier. His sense of responsibility is still carrying him forward, but there are cracks, especially in his family life. He and Sarah have grown apart; trouble is brewing in their marriage. The flashpoint becomes their youngest child, Thomas, and one incident will haunt the family for the next 20 years. 

This is a somewhat different Michael than the theology student and cycling enthusiast in the first story. He knows that the pressures of his position are allowing his family to slip through his fingers. He’s physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted. People are talking about Sarah avoiding evening activities at the palace. And one person, their youngest child, will bear the brunt of the estrangement.

Much of the younger man remains, but this is a man who’s been shaped, and sometimes mauled, by the job. In the previous stories, he was something of an idealized character. In the last one, he becomes more real. 

Top photograph by Benjamin Rascoe via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Did “Dancing Prophet” Become Prophetic?

October 13, 2020 By Glynn Young 4 Comments

In 2012, I had a conversation with my publisher about the future novels planned in the Dancing Priest series. Dancing Priest had been published in late 2011, and the publication of A Light Shining was imminent. I walked him through what I saw as the main subjects and themes of several additional books (another six, if I remember correctly, which eventually became another three). 

The fourth book was to focus on the conflict between Michael Kent-Hughes and the Church of England hierarchy, which would eventually lead to a reformation. The catalyst would be a child sexual abuse scandal, happening over decades and facilitated (as in, covered up) by the church. The inspiration for this was the scandal in the Roman Catholic Church; what I did was to transfer the Catholic scandal to the Church of England. Or so I thought.

Two weeks after that conversation, my publisher sent me an article that had just been published in Britain. It looked like the Church of England had its own, homegrown child abuse scandal, and didn’t need any fictional help from the Catholic church. 

Dancing Prophet, the fourth novel in the Dancing Priest series, was published in 2018. That year, more revelations were unfolding about the Church of England. In 2019, an independent inquiry was established to look at what had happened and why. Last week, the inquiry panel released its study. 

It sounded like the story line in Dancing Prophet. My wife says I need to stop writing about things that become true.

It gives me no particular joy that real events seem to follow several of the key events in the Dancing Priest stories. (Sometimes, the correlations aren’t horrific, like the DNA study made of Vikings that sounded a lot like what happens in Dancing Prince.) But it does seem uncanny at times. I don’t have the gift of prophecy, but I’ve asked myself, how do real events happen that mirror the stories I wrote in my five novels?

I don’t have a solid answer. I have an idea of what happens, and it has to do with the research I do for the stories and the work experience I’ve had.

The Dancing Priest novels are not historical novels in the strict sense. They’re not about the past. They are more futurehistorical novels, because they’re set in the soon-to-happen future. (One reviewer has called them alternative historical novels.) But they are based on considerable reading and research and first-hand experiences on visits to London and England.

The streets Sarah’s car has to take from Buckingham Palace to the Tate Britain (Dancing Prophet)? I’ve walked them. The visit Michael makes with the two boys to the Imperial War Museum and the Guards Museum Shop (Dancing Prince)? I’ve done both. Taking a train from King’s Cross Station (Dancing Prince)? Been there, done that. A tube ride from South Kensington to the Tower of London (Dancing King)? Yep. And the books I’ve read have ranged from Peter Ackroyd’s multi-volume History of England and a history of coronations to a domestic history of the British royal household and a history of the Church of England.

My work experience has also served as a resource. Working for two Fortune 500 companies, a Fortune 1000 company, a public institution, a newspaper, and my own business has taught me a lot about how organizations respond to crises. Almost by default, the initial response is self-protection. The ongoing response tends to be self-protection. And that response can put public relations people in very difficult positions. The fact that the Church of England responded to its child sex abuse crisis almost exactly like the Roman Catholic Church did is no surprise.

You don’t have to be a prophet when basic human nature never changes. 

Top photograph by Cajeo Zhang via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Dancing Prince Available for Pre-Order

June 20, 2020 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

A mother’s last words, a father’s final message, and a strange painting: Michael Kent-Hughes faces personal tragedy, one that leads to long-lasting damage to the relationship with his youngest child, Prince Thomas. As the young boy grows to adulthood and the estrangement from his father continues, he finds his own way in life. But in the boy’s hands and heart will lie the future of the kingdom. Dancing Prince is the moving conclusion of the Dancing Priest series.

Dancing Prince, to be published about July 1, is now available for pre-order.

Amazon Kindle

Amazon (paperback)

What readers say about the Dancing Priest series

“At least a dozen times, I had to stop reading Dancing Priest for a moment to control the tears. The story is that gripping, that real.”

“I found myself not wanting Dancing Priest to end. There was so much imagery and amazing detail in the story. As an artist, I was amazed at how accurately he understood us.”

“In turns suspenseful and heartwarming, A Light Shining has all the qualities of those classic tales that stay with you for the long journey. These characters become friends and fellow sojourners, making their way into a reader’s heart and encouraging a deeper faith – one that has hands and feet. We all need such role models as Michael and Sarah Kent-Hughes.”

“Read A Light Shining any way you can: Kindle, Nook, paper. Be prepared to leave long blocks of time to read. Guaranteed. Be prepared to be captured with this story.”

“With Dancing King, it is such a joy to be back in this world, which is so well-rendered it could qualify as alternate history. And no one writes a crowd scene like Glynn Young.”

“Themes of redemption, restoration, courage, and community run deep through the lines of Dancing King. Once again, Glynn Young exceeds readers’ hopes, showing a main character in Michael Kent-Hughes who continues to mature in his faith and leadership

“In Dancing Prophet, Glynn Young continues to weave a great story with stirring characters and plot lines that anticipate the headlines. This book gives him a chance to give more backstory to some familiar characters while moving our principals, Michael and Sarah, forward into their new roles. I only wish book 5 was already out!”

“It’s 3 am but I just finished reading a wonderful book that I couldn’t put down, the fourth book in the Dancing Priest series by Glynn Young, entitled, Dancing Prophet. Wow, it lived up to the greatness of the prior three books.”

A World Changes

January 26, 2019 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment


“My world has changed, Zena,” Josh said. “I need to move out.” He paused. “And I want you to be my wife.”

Her eyes widened.

“My time in San Francisco with Michael and Sarah made me realize that you and I are more than just two people living together and sharing a bed,” he said. “We are a life together, and I want it to be an official life together, recognized by God and man.”

“Have you talked with Michael about this?” she said.

“No, I haven’t,” he said. “I haven’t talked with him about my finding faith, either. Although I think he suspects.”

“And now I’m truly stunned,” she said. “Stunned speechless.”

  • From Dancing King 

Photograph by A.L. via Unsplash. Used with permission.

“It’s his voice that’s remarkable.”

January 6, 2019 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

“It’s Michael’s voice that’s remarkable,” said Father John. “He seems rather soft-spoken in everyday conversation, but his voice carries fully in the sanctuary. You can hear him as plainly in the back as the front, even without the microphone. It resonates with humility and sincerity. You hear him speak, and you know he believes what he says, you know you can trust what he says and that he speaks with authority. It’s a gift that very few ministers or speakers have.”

  • From Dancing King

4-Book Package on Amazon Kindle

December 22, 2018 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

The story of Michael Kent, cyclist and priest, and Sarah Hughes, artist. All four books in the Dancing Priest series are available as a package on Amazon Kindle (or individually).

  • Go to page 1
  • Go to page 2
  • Go to page 3
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Go to page 9
  • Go to Next Page »

Footer

GY



Meet the Man

An award-winning speechwriter and communications professional, Glynn Young is the author of three novels and the non-fiction book Poetry at Work.

 

 01_facebook 02_twitter 26_googleplus 07_GG Talk

Copyright © 2021 Glynn Young · Site by The Willingham Enterprise · Log in | Managed by Fistbump Media LLC