Changelings: a Novel

An ancient language. A missing artifact. A truth buried beneath ice, stone, and centuries of silence.When linguist Jack Dempsey’s briefcase vanishes inside a pristine five-star hotel, it seems like an ordinary—if maddening—crime. But the stolen item isn’t just paperwork. It’s a priceless replica of a newly unearthed stone tablet—one that could challenge everything we believe about the origins of civilization.Soon, Dempsey is drawn back into the orbit of a high-altitude archaeological dig on a remote Himalayan ridge, where a team of scientists and students, led by the enigmatic Orsaki and fiercely intelligent Frederica, work against time, superstition, and the looming threat of extremist violence. As the team uncovers stone carvings and fossilized symbols etched in languages that don’t belong together, they begin to suspect that they’ve stumbled upon more than a forgotten people—they may be unearthing a lost chapter of human evolution.But the deeper they dig, the stranger things become. Unexplained sounds echo from the cliffs at night. Supplies go missing. The locals whisper of changelings—creatures who walk among us wearing human faces. And under pressure, the team’s fragile alliances begin to crack.Part literary thriller, part archaeological mystery, and part meditation on language, identity, and what it means to be human.Changelings is a gripping intellectual adventure set against soaring altitudes and even higher stakes, Guy Herman’s genre-defying novel poses urgent questions: Who really writes history? What stories do we silence to keep our own alive? And how much of what we call “progress” is built on forgetting the past?