Near the end of the Terminal Classic Mayan period, a high priest commits a murder where a sacrifice is needed. The events he sets in motion are far more sinister than he ever imagined.

In our own time, Lydia Rosenstrom is a master translator working with an archeological team in the Yucatan, in the ruins of Pakabtún. She's also over-seeing a Virtual Reality simulation of Pakabtún at the Howland Museum in Portland, Oregon. Her discoveries are becoming more interesting—but much more dangerous. This tightly woven, action-packed tale blends mysticism, technology, archaeology, authentic Mayan history, and Mayan prophecies for 2012 into an engrossing story. Available in 2012 from Plays on Ideas.

mystery glyphs, deadly mysteryThe Maya Interface
Four roughly carved glyphs hold the key to a mysterious and deadly reality. Can Lydia translate the strange symbols fast enough to prevent more deaths — including her own?

Mayan stone arch, Eye of the MacawDownload the essay on Maya glyphs
Download the authors' comments on writing
Download an excerpt from The Maya Interface

Researching the Maya
When we started working on this story, we visited the Mexican Yucatan Peninsula, talked with people there, and took lots of pictures. (We also read every authoritative book we could get our hands on and attended a workshop on glyphs.) At right is the huge stone arch at Kabah, a monumental gateway to the past — much like the one that Lydia gazes at and wonders, "Where will this gateway lead me?"
chac sculptures, Eye of the Macaw
  
Uxmal, similar to Eye of the Macaw
   Xocen straw hut, Eye of the Macaw
"They’re Chac masks. Images of the rain god, but they look like monsters to me." … "Monsters, yes. But not as in our monster movies. These are `monstrous’ in the sense of being marvelous, extraordinary, supremely powerful." (Photo from Kabah, quote from The Maya Interface.)   "Caan sees a ruined city, empty of human souls. Many of the temples and palaces are crumbling and half-consumed by the encroaching, low-lying jungle. Some have been reduced to piles of rubble as serpentine vines tug and pull at loose boulders and stones." (Photo from Uxmal, quote from The Maya Interface.)   "Like most of the other houses in the village, Lydia's hut consisted of one room with a clay floor and walls made from straight, slender tree-trunk poles with flexible branches woven through them like a giant basket." (Photo from the village of Xocen, quote from The Maya Interface.)

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