In our continued quest to keep you all as informed as possible, we have enlisted the help of Jessica Andersen, author of June release Nightkeepers. Nightkeepers features Mayan mythology and history. Don’t know much about the Maya, you say? Well, read on (and be sure to read Part 1 as well.)

Did you know?

• The ancient Maya worshipped their departed ancestors as being next to the gods. They believed that the best way to communicate with the gods was to be close to death, either through a near-death experience or an orgasm (the little death).
• The ancient Maya built tall pyramids not only in celebration of the gods and as astronomical tools, but also so they could act as landmarks, rising up from the otherwise featureless rainforest canopy.

• The ancient Mayan empire once included portions of Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, Ecuador and Belize.

• Although called an empire, the ancient Mayan society was actually made up of loosely connected groups and kingdoms that often fought among each other, and took their defeated foes as workers. . . or sacrificial victims.

Do you feel a bit smarter? Read Nightkeepers and learn more!

Nightkeepers by Jessica Andersen, the first book in the Novels of the Final Prophecy series, just released on 3 June 2008. It is the first book in a series featuring Mayan gods and goddesses and the END OF THE WORLD! Get your excerpt here. Ms. Andersen recently guested here at TGTBTU (see here and here). The Maya, huh? Certainly an unusual element for a paranormal romance novel. Since your knowledge of this ancient civilization may be a bit rusty (or non-existent), Ms. Andersen has provided us with some interesting tidbits.

Did you know…?

• During the spring equinox, the architecture and carvings of El Castillo, the main pyramid at Chichen Itza, form a snake-shaped shadow crawling down the entire side of the pyramid, paying homage to Kulkulkan, the Mayans’ feathered serpent god.

• The ancient Maya had the only fully developed writing system in the New World.

• Despite movies depicting Mayan gold, the Maya weren’t known as metalworkers. They carved stone, particularly jade and obsidian, worked pottery, wove intricate textiles and wrote books called codices that were made of folded fig bark painted with limestone. All but four of these books were destroyed by the Conquistadors and their missionaries.

• The ancient Maya built their intricately carved temples and pyramids largely without the aid of the wheel or metal tools.

Consider yourself smarter!

Hi Duckies! Author Jessica Andersen here, hoping you’re as excited about the launch of Nightkeepers and my Novels of the Final Prophecy series as I am… or if you’re not, that maybe I can convince you to be. [Ed.: Nightkeepers releases 3 Jun 08.]

Given that it’s launch day, I thought it’d be fun to talk a little about the 2012 end date that forms the basis of Nightkeepers. First, let me start by saying that I’m not all that big on personal drama. Or if we’re being technical, I’ve got drama queen tendencies and have learned to control them most of the time, not the least because my beloved perpetual fiancé (PF), while normally a highly functional and enjoyable human being, can be prone to freaking out over random stuff.

PF grew up in the city, and although we’ve lived in the not-city for some time, he still regularly convinces himself that the enormous state forest behind our house is home to:

1. Yeti
2. Terrorists
3. Serial killers
4. Hantavirus
5. Ghosts
6. All of the above

The identity of the scourge is usually related, as you might guess, to whatever we’ve been watching on TV. And okay, the time the brown bear came up on the porch and looked in through the sliders probably didn’t help the Yeti thing. But still. Honestly.

Me, I don’t get too worked up about that stuff. I love disaster movies and end-of-the-world scenarios. I deal pretty well with emergencies. I slept through the millennium changeover, trusting that the computers would still work the next day. And I generally try not to talk myself into freaking out about Big Scary Stuff that might not be real. But that begs the question: what if it is real?

Which brings us to the premise of Nightkeepers. The basic blurb is:

The ancient Mayan Long Count calendar completes its five-thousand-year cycle on December 21, 2012. According to scientists, that’s the day that the sun, moon and earth will align at the galactic center, in a conjunction that some researchers predict could trigger cataclysmic upheavals (sun spots, magnetic reversals, etc.). The Novels of the Final Prophecy tell of the ancient Mayan myths that come to life in the last four years before 12/21/2012, and their opposition by the Nightkeepers, descendants of an ancient magic-wielding race sworn to protect mankind from the apocalypse.

In the first book, Nightkeepers, the last king of the magi is forced to team up with a Miami-Dade narcotics detective in order to reunite his scattered warriors and fight the gods of the Mayan underworld. Wielding ancestral magic based on bloodletting and sex, the king will have to choose between his duty and his love for the human woman who is the gods’ destined sacrifice.

Pretty cool, huh? At least I think so, and I had a heck of a fun time writing it. During the writing process, though, I did a ton of research into the 2012 end date. . . and I started to creep myself out, because entirely too many lines of evidence seem to point toward something happening on that day. On the scientific side, the 2012 conjunction is likely to bring massive sunspots that could very well mess up our satellites and/or burn through our weakened ozone layer. Other research points toward the earth’s weakening magnetic field, suggesting that a magnetic reversal is imminent, and hoo boy, wouldn’t that wreck havoc on the machines we depend on for our everyday lives?

We are now at the end of what the Maya called the Age of the Jaguar, which was said to be ‘a time when men turn away from the gods and look to machines.’ After the 2012 end date, the question is: will the world cease to exist, or will we enter the next age, the Age of Enlightenment, that of a more global consciousness?

I won’t go into all the arguments for and against (check out my site under the ‘Background’ and ‘References’ sections), but suffice it to say that even non-dramatic me is halfway to thinking that something Big and Bad could very well happen during the winter solstice of 2012. . . and that maybe, just maybe we’re going to need a group of heroes to help the cycle of time reset itself, ensuring that mankind will continue on toward globalization rather than apocalypse.

Or maybe that’s my own personal Yeti. Let’s just say I’ve been trying to keep PF away from my research material, and I’ve been careful to watch my Mayan documentaries after he’s conked out for the night… because the last thing I need is for him to convince himself that the 2012 doomsday is real. If that happens, I have a feeling I’ll be spending that night in a bomb shelter surrounded by canned beans and bottled water, rather than throwing a party, which is my current plan.

So, what do you think… Bomb shelter or party??

** We will be giving away two signed copies of Nightkeepers.  The winners will be taken from the comments on any Jessica Andersen post (here, any of the ‘Did You Know’ posts and the Book Alert).  Thanks **