The Crown of Light: an Ancient Legend, a Lovestruck Heroine, a Journey for Peace (Ari Ara Series -)

WINNER - 2021 NAUTILUS PRIZE - SILVER MEDAL!
Love and adventure, mystery and danger await! The next powerful adventure in the award-winning Ari Ara Series, The Crown of Light is an extraordinary story of wonder and courage.
In the jagged peaks of the Border Mountains, Ari Ara revives the ancient legend of the Peace Force, gathering friends and strangers to stop violence and prevent war. With the Way Between guiding their footsteps, they set out to wage peace. Before long, a rising threat makes them take drastic action.
Mysterious raiders are attacking villages, burning homes and terrifying families. Fingers point to the secretive Paika. For centuries, their clans have survived by double-crossing and backstabbing everyone else. But when young Finn Paikason is caught spying on the Peace Force, he swears the raiders are imposters. Ari Ara wants to believe him, but can she trust him? She can’t be certain – especially since this boy with storm-tossed eyes might be stealing her heart.
Tracking lost cattle across borders, stopping blood feuds with hermits, thwarting bandit ambushes, Ari Ara and her friends seek the truth amidst a web of lies. Old enemies come back to haunt them. Friendships are strained to breaking. Tensions heighten between the two nations. When the Lost Heir is taken hostage, the Peace Force races to solve the mystery before the sparks of violence erupt into a raging inferno of war.
Your heart will race along with the heroine’s in this exciting tale of waging peace.
Praise for The Crown of Light & the Ari Ara Series
“Pick it up. You won’t be able to put it down.”
– Tom Hastings, Portland State University
“This is an instant classic, a great read for anyone interested in peace and justice.” – Wim Laven, Ph.D, instructor of Peace Studies and Conflict Management
“I can think of no better source of inspiration (for the topics of peace and social justice) than the Ari Ara series by Rivera Sun, and this latest installation is the best one yet.”
– Dr. Seán P. Duffy, Executive Director, Albert Schweitzer Institute, Quinnipiac University
“The Crown of Light is a book that contains everything a great novel needs: a heroic female protagonist, colorful supporting characters, adventure, suspense, and most importantly, nonviolence used as a means to solve conflicts. I highly recommend the Ari Ara Series to educators and students!”
– Robin Wildman, Nonviolent Schools Rhode Island
"I have been in youth work forty-five years, and I have never encountered a more important work than the Ari Ara series to share with young people and their advocates.”
– Michael Harrington
“Ari Ara is the bedtime reading adventure for younger generations that completes my circle of peace literature.”
– Patrick Hiller, father, bed-time story reader, Peace and Conflict Studies scholar
“The entire Ari Ara Series offers students a warm, exciting, and hopeful adventure, full of problem-solving, love of life, and worthy models of personal growth and peacemaking.”
– Scott Springer, The Bay School, Maine
"Rivera Sun has done it again. She just keeps getting better and better at weaving powerful stories to remind us that courage, determination, vision, and a taste for high adventure, are all essential elements for waging real peace." – Rosa Zubizarreta, DiaPraxis founder and Co-intelligence Institute Senior Advisor
"Ari Ara is one of our favorite heroines and she inspires us daily." – Savanna Song and Opal Moon, young readers
“The Crown of Light is masterful. It is an awakening of the mind, spirit and heart that calls us all to action.”
– Natasha Léger, Executive Director, Citizens for a Healthy Community