With the discovery of a campaign journal from an American Revolutionary War officer who fought against the Iroquois Indians, the U.S. Army calls in their top field historian to assess its contents. Jake Tununda, combat vet and half-Seneca Indian, is stunned when he gleans from the journal’s cryptic Masonic passages clues to the location of an ancient shaman’s crown once protected by the White Deer Society, a secret cult of his forefathers.

What happens next?
Jake soon realizes why his ancestors’ history was best kept buried. And why peaceful, rural central New York’s Finger Lakes region can be deadlier than any battlefield he had ever faced.

Crown of Serpents, a mystery thriller set in the former heartland of the Iroquois Empire, takes Jake on a fast-paced hunt to find the elusive crown – and protect it. He teams up with Rae Hart, an alluring state police investigator, as they snake their way across a politically turbulent landscape marked with murder, arson, lies, and deceit. Deciphering codes, digging up war loot, and fending off the henchmen of billionaire Alex Nero, a ruthless Indian casino magnate, Jake and Rae’s survival skills are put to the test. The clues to the crown ultimately lead them deep within sacred Indian caves hidden under the abandoned Seneca Army Depot where the magnitude of the crown’s power is revealed.

You say it’s a mystery thriller?
Some say it is called “Faction” meaning a mixture of historical fact with fiction. It’s also been described as “high concept” in that the story has a mixture of genres: mystery, suspense, action, adventure, touch of romance, some paranormal, military history, treasure hunt, police procedural and even Freemasonry. So it is difficult to narrow it down to one category. Probably thriller if down to one category though.

Although the story touches on true historical figures and lots military and Native American history and lore, this is not a historical novel that is based in a certain past time period. The prologue takes you back to 1779, but the rest of the book is all set in the present day.

What kind of readers will it appeal to?
People who’ve read Clive Cussler, Steve Berry, James Rollins, Dan Brown, Tony Hillerman, Raymond Khoury will love this book.

If you like the movie National Treasure, you’ll love my book.

Which makes Jake your Nicholas Cage.
Jake Tununda is a U.S. Army officer, combat vet, now working for the Military History Institute as a military historian. He is also a Freemason and a Native American of the Seneca Nation. He hails from Western New York and the Tonawanda Indian Reservation. Attended Cornell University in the ROTC program and has well over twenty years in the Army in infantry combat roles before pursuing his dream to become a military historian. Jake is single, great on the eyes, brash, rebellious, confident, holds no fear, loves history, hates politicians, hates political correctness, and loves adventure, especially a treasure hunt.

It’s a good thing that Jake is such a charismatic character since this is the start of a series, isn’t it?

Yes. Book Two of The Tununda Mysteries: Map of Thieves was released in early 2014. A must read if you’ve read Crown of Serpents as Jake and his girlfriend Rae Hart are carried over into this new book as a couple now. The readers demanded it. They also are drawn into a Cherokee Indian treasure hunt opposed by a corrupt politician. The story takes place in Georgia with scenes in Savannah, Atlanta, rural Georgia and the north Georgia mountains. Lots of Civil War history, Nazi artifacts, some more Freemason characters and a new tough guy from the Delta Force.

Tell us about yourself.
I am a native of western New York and a graduate of the Rochester Institute of Technology. I’ve worked in the graphic design and marketing field for over twenty years as an award-winning art director and map illustrator. I now run my own independent design and publishing firm called Karpovage Creative. I live in Roswell, Georgia and am a Freemason.

Karpovage Creative? Where can other independent authors find out more details?
http://www.karpovagecreative.com/

How can we follow you on Twitter and/or Facebook?
Facebook links: https://www.facebook.com/michaelkarpovage
http://www.facebook.com/crownofserpents
https://www.facebook.com/mapofthieves.

What’s next?
Working on conceptualizing Book Three in The Tununda Mysteries. Thinking about Geechee culture of slave descendants on coastal Georgia mixed in with voodoo magic and of course some kind of lost treasure.