Spiritual Elements Arise from a Prehistoric Worldview - an Editorial Review of "Singing Bones"

Book Blurb:

Nearly 8,300 years ago, a sudden climate collapse reshaped the earth. Winters grew longer and colder, harvests failed, coastlines flooded, and the ground itself became unstable. For the Téuta, a settled Neolithic village that had endured for generations, survival became uncertain.

Eini is born with troubling visions of disaster—warnings her people dismiss as superstition. As the climate worsens and violence spreads among desperate neighbors, Eini spends her lifetime trying to protect her family and preserve the fragile traditions that hold her community together. When catastrophe finally strikes, the Téuta must face the unthinkable: abandoning their ancestral home and redefining who they are in a transformed world.

Told across generations, Singing Bones follows the lives of women whose strength, memory, and resilience shape the fate of their people—from prophecy, to survival, to leadership forged in loss. Song, story, and shared history become tools of endurance in a world where nothing can be taken for granted.

Grounded in real archaeological and climate research, Singing Bones is ancient historical fiction set during the Neolithic era. Its spiritual elements arise from a prehistoric worldview in which nature, belief, and survival are inseparable. Sweeping yet intimate, it explores how early civilizations responded to climate catastrophe, displacement, and change.

Perfect for readers of immersive historical fiction, ancient civilizations, prehistoric survival stories, and epic sagas rooted in humanity’s deep past.

Book Buy Link: https://geni.us/XScAE3R

Author Bio:

Stuart Ullman retired from working after 38 years as an economist and engineering project manager at a US Navy lab. He has been an avid recreational sailor for decades, and was, for a time, the Commodore of the Sailing Club of Washington; he once sailed to Bermuda on one of the U.S. Naval Academy’s 44-foot sailboats. Since his retirement he has pursued a life-long interest in writing. He has been active in the Maryland Writers Association and for several years was president of the Montgomery County chapter. He and his wife raised two children, have a grandson, and are currently living in Kensington, Maryland.

Visit his Facebook author page at https://www.facebook.com/stuartullmanauthor/ , or his web site at https://www.sgullman.com/ .

Editorial Review:

Title: Singing Bones

Author: S.G. Ullman

Rating: 4.0

"Singing Bones" is a work of prehistoric literary fiction and the prequel to "The Téuta’s Child" by S.G. Ullman. Set approximately 8,300 years ago during the real-world 8.2k climate event, a period of abrupt global cooling following the collapse of the Laurentide ice sheet, the novel imagines how a village called the Téuta confronts decades of environmental decline, encroaching violence, and the erosion of the stable world they have known for generations. Rather than a conventional plot-driven narrative, this novel unfolds as a generational saga, following the interconnected lives of its characters across forty years of slow-motion catastrophe. It is a novel about community, memory, resilience, and the stories we tell to survive.

"It was a year, and a day, of deep consequence for the world. Far from the mountains in which the Téuta people lived, across a continent which they did not know, and across an ocean they had never imagined and would not have believed possible, great sheets of ice were breaking, tumbling down into unseen seas, and torrents of meltwater from behind the broken ice swelled the ocean and chilled the whole earth."

The prologue establishes the novel’s central dramatic irony. The reader is told of a distant cataclysm, the collapse of the ice sheet, that will eventually devastate the Téuta’s world. Yet the villagers themselves sleep peacefully, unaware of the slow-moving disaster already underway. This opening functions as a thematic overture, introducing the tension between human ignorance and cosmic forces, a theme that later echoes throughout the novel. The prose here creates a mood of poignant foreboding, where the reader is positioned as an observer who knows what the characters cannot yet grasp.

"Akesh rose in song to tell the Téuta that grief is always here, always ready to take us, that it can be deep, it can take root inside us, and it can hurt to let it go, but that joy also is here even when you can’t find it, and beauty even when it hides. Grief will never leave completely; never ask for that, her song told them. But joy and beauty will stop hiding. They will come back, they will find you again and show themselves, if you let them." "... With Akesh to help us, what harm could ever defeat us? Nothing. Nothing, they thought, ever could."

This emotionally charged moment occurs after the death of Seneks, the village healer and shaman. Akesh, a scarred woman who survived the destruction of her own village years earlier sings from the clifftop. The song truly feels like the novel’s thematic heart, articulating the central message that the characters must learn across forty years of loss. It cements Akesh’s role as the village’s spiritual anchor, a role she inherits from Seneks. The prose here is deliberately elevated, almost hymnic, with the repetition “grief is always here,” “joy also is here” giving the passage a ritual quality. The villagers’ awed response, “What harm could ever defeat us?”, creates a moment of profound communal bonding. But what's particularly striking about it all is that the reader knows from the novel’s structure, that greater harm is still to come, lending the passage a bittersweet poignancy.

"Wolves still sounded in the mountains, and they sometimes could be heard even on the plains. This ancient music helped the Téuta people settle and be satisfied on the flat lands by the river."

This is a passage set years after the survivors have established their new village on the plains. The tragedy is now a memory carried by the oldest generation, but the wolves’ howls, which have appeared throughout the novel as both omen and comfort, are heard again, now transformed into a vessel for Akesh’s enduring presence. The prose here is lyrical and elegiac, perfectly balancing loss with consolation. It is a passage that leaves the reader with a sense of closure built not on happiness, but on the quiet strength of acceptance and the enduring thread of continuity.

"Singing Bones" moves with the patient, cyclical rhythm of the seasons. It follows characters from childhood to old age with remarkable control. Its deliberate pacing brings to life a slow-burn meditation on change and resilience through action sequences that are brief and stark, framed by long stretches of daily life, conversation, and ritual. Its structure mirrors the characters’ experience most of which is ordinary but punctuated by sudden catastrophe. Ullman has employed a distinctive prose style that blends archaic simplicity with lyrical elevation. He writes in the rhythm of oral storytelling, grounding the narrative in concrete details like mud bricks and flint tools, while lifting it toward myth through passages about grief, hope, and memory.

Ullman’s achievement lies in making a prehistoric world feel intimately familiar. His characters’ concerns feel universal and relatable, while their material and spiritual lives are rendered with careful cultural and historical attention. But what is more outstanding is the integration of the 8.2k climate event as a real historical backdrop, which adds depth to what might otherwise be a purely invented setting. "Singing Bones" will appeal to readers of literary fiction and historical fiction set in the deep past. Its deliberate pace, generational structure, and philosophical depth may challenge readers accustomed to plot-driven narratives. However, those who embrace its rhythms will be rewarded with a rich, emotionally resonant experience.

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