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Quests… The Chase… and Inspiration…

by Unknown's avatar

What is it about the chase? What is it about going on a quest that makes the journey as (if not more) enjoyable and rewarding than the prize that hides at the end? Why are we as humans so addicted to such endeavors?
Does it improve our lives? Not always… in fact in many cases, we’re made worse. Often a quest for knowledge or destiny causes us to lose someone or find out something we’d be better off not knowing. This is part of the reason I haven’t always enjoyed stories I’ve read… the characters don’t wind up better off than they were before they started their journey.

As writers, we often are confronted with such stories and we have to weigh out how much our characters can (or should endure). In one of my stories, my loving wife read over a few of my chapters and strongly cautioned me on putting my characters through too much. There is only so much the human mind can take… well she was right, so I reigned in a lot of the things that my lead was going through.

Another theme we have to touch on when deciding how a quest will go is the main characters level of obsession. How far are they willing to go to win? How much time are they willing to donate to it?

Why do I bring this up? Well… because I have to admit to an obsession that was also kind of a hobby for a very long time.

18 years have gone by…

Almost two decades since I heard that incredible song on the radio, but I’ve never been able to identify it. I would whistle it to friends and they would shrug, saying that it sounded familiar, but they didn’t know it. Keep in mind, this was before YouTube and shazam. This was when recreational use of the internet was still in its infancy.

I would give up searching for a while… and then would hear it on the speaker at Wal-Mart or another store. I could never make out any of the lyrics to look it up… all I had, was the tune. Then I hit a breakthrough. The song was featured in a commercial for an upcoming movie:

Ever After… PERFECT!! I had somewhere to start looking. So at that point, I went onto Angelfire and started searching for the soundtrack…

Well… it wasn’t on the soundtrack. Movies in the mid-late 90s loved featuring music in movie advertisements that had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with the damn movie!!!

Years went by and I had forgotten the song until I heard it again at a store that was kind of like Spencer’s Gifts… don’t remember the name of the place, but it reignited my desire to find it. By now, youtube still wasn’t around, but google was. I started my search again… unfortunately, by now, I had forgotten which movie it was in. So while I could whistle the tune, all I had was a vague description:
New Age music…
Mid-late 90s…
Featured in a Medieval movie…
Sounded like something Enya would do…
Still, no one knew it. No one could find it. Once again, I’d hit a dead end. On days when I was alone, bored, and had nothing better to do, I’d resume the search, in hopes of stumbling across something, but I never got anywhere with it. I admit to being greatly frustrated.

More years went by… YouTube was now around and thus a new tool to help me in my search. One by one, I resumed my search through soundtracks and new age greatest hits from the time period. Nothing…
Well today, as I lay here completely snowed in, suffering from writers block as my family sleeps, I decided to try one last time. I posted my description on Facebook. One friend suggested using Shazam. So I tried it and hummed the tune… nothing… it didn’t work! The app couldn’t recognize it. I was so mad, I almost tossed my phone across the room.

I continued my search until I rediscovered the above commercial. My heart froze in my chest. THAT’S THE SONG!!! I had it and I wasn’t about to let it get away. I searched the comments to see if anyone had identified it, remembering now that it wasn’t on the soundtrack.

Nothing… no… not again! I was so close, I was not going to give up now! I posted the commercial on my page, but got nowhere. I was afraid that I’d hit another dead-end… then I remembered Shazam! OF COURSE!!! Play the commercial for the app and let it figure out the name of the song! That should work… if it can decipher the song from the talking in the commercial.
Given my history with this mystical song… I didn’t have high hopes. A song came up with an odd-looking background… ‘The Mummer’s Dance’ by Loreena Mckennitt. Ironically, I’d looked through some of her music in my search, but never came across this one. No way… could I have come so close so many times, but just not found it? There was no way. Plus a title like that? There’s no way this song charted. Not expecting anything, I plugged the name into YouTube.

The first video to come up wasn’t anything official… just something someone had put together. Again, not expecting much. I clicked on it… New Age… violins… instrumentals… drums… It could be… no way… It can’t be…

Then the vocals came on. At first it was nothing more than a hum. When Loreena began to sing… my eyes watered and goose bumps traveled down my spine. THIS was my song! I couldn’t believe it! It took almost two decades, but the song had been identified and located!

I quickly (and legally) downloaded it and saved it to my playlist, where it will remain forever on my playlist for when I need inspiration for my writing, or need to be able to relax. It will never escape me again.

Thus ends a quest that has gone on too long. On this night… I found the song that I had been searching for.

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Dwarves

by Unknown's avatar

So I’ve talked in great detail about one of the main feature races to my story, elves… but what about dwarves?

Physical description. 

So there are various descriptions of them. Most agree that they have long beards, are very stout, deceptively strong, and seem to have an odd fixation with mining. Other descriptions suggest noses and ears that match, or are even larger than those of humans and elves.

Classic literature such as the Elder Edda lists them as being violent creatures not unlike trolls. One might draw that a troll is part of their lineage, or a less-developed member of the same genome, but again, that depends on what version of troll lore you subscribe to. If we’re talking Harry Potter trolls, then forget I said anything.

The females… well there are theories that dwarves are asexual given the lack of reference in almost any literature to females of the species. Personally, I don’t think that this is the case. This is covered somewhat in Lord of the Rings Two Towers movie where Gimili states that the womenfolk are often mistaken for men because they are so similar in appearance. This could account for the lack of female mention, but again that’s just a theory.

Their weapon of choice seems to be a large ax, though many have been known to use crossbows as well. They have no real 6th sense and can’t use magic (that we know of), but they have a keen sense when it comes to geology.

Living environments.

This has been a point on contention for many fantasy writers. While most agree that mountains and/or underground mines are dwarves dwell. They build massive underground cities out of stone. Many stories say that they move so much stone building these cities, that dwarves may have been responsible for many of the mountains that appear in the world.

Here’s where things get hazy; many have said that dwarves are somewhat xenophobic and hide away from the rest of the world. They prefer to borrow deep into their mines. Others even go so far as to suggest that dwarves fear being out in the open because they are afraid they’ll fall off the earth.

We’ve seen the xenophobic mentality in many versions, including much of J.R.R. Tolkien. However, more modern pieces seem to disagree with this take and say instead that while yes the dwarven cities are underground, many prefer to venture out and either conduct trade or become skilled blacksmiths, thus joining the rest of society.

Personality traits.

Dwarves have rather consistently been the comic relief in most modern literature. They drink hard, they play hard, and they swear a lot. They are known for being blunt and not afraid to tell it like it is. Thus they tend to come off as extremely abrasive and poorly mannered.

Diet

Dwarves seem to contrast elves in this manner. While elves consistently tend to prefer lighter, more vegetarian-style means with only the finest wine as their choice of drink, dwarves are the exact opposite. By many accounts, dwarves eat large, and often many, meals in one day. Their primary diet seems to be meat, potatoes, and malt beer. Many have noted their extremely poor dinner table manners and eating habits.

So with all that in mind, what’s my take on them? How have I characterized them in my writings?

Well… I’ve tried to keep close to the source material. Personally, I’ve seen too many people, myself included, who shy away from anything that strays too much.

In my writings, dwarves do not hit 4ft… ever. They are very stout with short arms and legs, but larger torsos. Their facial features are far closer to humans so they are not all that different in that aspect. They are fiercely loyal to their friends.

In many cases, they have left their underground homes and live as equals with human beings as contributing members of society. They share mankind’s disdain for elves and are known to verbally bash them to the point where humans have even become uncomfortable.

Female dwarves are very demanding, yet kind-hearted individuals. They genuinely care about the people around them, even if it means giving someone a slap upside the head when needed.

Though it’s considered stereotyping and a dwarf will take offense if anyone mentions it, dwarves tend to flock to careers such as jeweler, archaeology, appraisals, geology, masonry, construction, demolition, and mining. Pretty much anything that involves stone.

Most of them do not posses the long beards for which they are known. By this point, civilization has evolved and so have they.

Anyway, that’s pretty much it for me on Dwarves. Let me know what you think.

Catch you on the flip side,

Jim

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What makes bad people tick?

by Unknown's avatar

As a writer, this is something that I’ve explored for a long time now. Why does a bad person become bad? Why do they do bad things, what is the motivation?

Just the other day, I was walking to my car from work. I was wearing my normal leather jacket. In Boston it’s very cold at this time of year. As I neared the garage, two girls wearing NE Patriots uniforms, no older than college students passed me by. I don’t know if they were intoxicated or not… though judging by the way they were skipping about, it’s definitely possible. Anyway, I was walking by, one of them looked at me, and in an extremely sarcastic tone said ‘You look really good in that leather jacket’ before skipping off with her friend laughing.

I shook my head and kept walking. ‘Idiots…’

But as I sat in traffic later, I thought to myself… why did she do that? What was it about me that she felt the need to put me down? Would she have said that if I were thinner, shorter, or had a more threatening appearance? What was the motivation or was there even one?

Now in many stories, it’s explained, and explained well… Bad people are bad because of…
Past traumatic experiences,
Mental issues,
Revenge,
Blindly following a faith or political leader,
Betrayal,
Circumstances,

There are a plethora of other issues as well, but those are the general ones that usually explain villains. My question is what about the bad person. The person who wasn’t a good person that bad stuff happened to. The person who is intelligent, lived a good life, and had no explicable reason for becoming what they did. Where is the motivation for it and why?

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Angels

by Unknown's avatar

You will notice that I am hesitant to call angels ‘mythological creatures.’ This is mostly because of my christian belief… so I do actually think they truly exist.

What is an angel?

Simply put, an often-winged creature that is a servant of a God. Their jobs include messenger, voice, soldier, guide, and many more. Unfortunately, most depictions of angels are not accurate per the original descriptions. The angels we see depicted in paintings that look like human adults or babies… with the exception perhaps of the archangels, this is pure fantasy. (I know… I know… I’m criticizing my own writings on angels, I’ll get to that below, I promise.)

So then what do they look like? Well in some accounts, just like humans. In others… um… they’re actually kind of scary.

In Daniel 10:5-6 there is a clear description of a more ‘human’ nature.
“I looked up and there before me was a man dressed in linen, with a belt of the finest gold around his waist. His body was like chrysolite, his face like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and his voice like the sound of a multitude.”

Other descriptions vary, giving credence to a variety of difference species perhaps?

For example you have the Cherubs:
“(Ezekiel 1:5) Each of them had four faces and four wings, with straight feet with a sole like the sole of a calf’s foot, and “hands of a man” under their wings. Each had four faces: the face of a man, the face of a lion on the right side, the face of an ox on the left side, and the face of an eagle.”

Then you have the Seraphs:
These ones are a little bit harder to classify, so I’ll give you the consistencies… They each appear to have four to six wings; with two covering their faces, and with two covering their feet. The ones with six used the remaining two for flight… yeah weird…

Other descriptions include multiple heads, weird creatures covered in eyes… I could go on all day, but I’m not writing horror novels. At least not yet.

All right, so with all that in mind, where does my story fit in? Well to be honest… I like the fantasy, and since I’m a fantasy writer, that’s sort of what I went with… sort of. My angels are not androgynous, though now that I think about it, giving them sexes is somewhat pointless given that they can’t reproduce. Still, one could argue that giving them human characteristics would make them more sympathetic to humans, and easier for the Most High to deal with as they are close to his own image.

Angels in my stories live in a cast system, so let’s explore each one, what they do, and what they look like, starting from the top:

Archangels: Direct servants to the Most High. They include his voice, the general of his army, his direct messenger, etc. Their word is above reproach and they are unquestionably respected by all others. They appear in red and brown garments with armor as shiny as silver over them. Their two wings sparkle as though their feathers had been polished. They look like humans.

Choirs: 

Seraphs: So far, of the Choirs of Angels, this is the only one in my story that really get’s a physical description, though other angels in my story are mentioned and described, I never really assign them a choir, so take that as you will. Seraphs have four red, fiery wings that are on their backs. They are capable of speeds greater than any other angel, even that of archangels. Their skin glows like gold shining on the sun. They are considered among the highest ranking angels below the archangels.

Duty Angels: Yes even among angels, there is a ‘working class.’ These angels are assigned behind the scenes duties. Among those duties are being the guiding light to souls destined either to Heaven or the underworld, some are servants to the Most High, others are soldiers. They have two large white wings each and appear as normal humans. However, the ones that serve as guiding lights may appear in any form they wish. This is especially useful should a wayward spirit need ‘convincing’ to go to the afterlife he or she has earned.

So I guess one could say that my description doesn’t fray too far as the angels that can appear in other forms could feasibly appear in the very forms listed in the Bible… so I don’t know. Take that as you want.

Dark Angels: These angels fall outside of the angel cast system. Some might say they are demons, but I prefer to keep demons in a separate category, giving them more of an impish appearance. Dark angels are angels that, during the Celestial Wars, sided with Lucifer in his attempt to overthrown the Most High. They believe that their service to the Most High is nothing short of slavery and that they deserved the world that was given to humanity. Their wings are black, indicating that they have been cursed with a heavy burden. This makes it impossible for them to ever return to the Celestial Realm, as to do so would result in them being crushed under the weight of their wings and unable to fly. The more powerful ones have dark eyes and pointed ears. They retain their immortality and divinity, but it has been greatly corrupted.

Though these ones are forbidden to leave the underworld, one or two has been known to make its way into the mortal world and either attempt to hide or wreak havoc on the people.

Anyway, let me know what you think. Feedback is, as always, welcomed and appreciated!

Catch you on the flip side,

Jim.

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Character Interview

by Unknown's avatar

So it is my greatest pleasure to introduce everyone to a character from a new and exciting story, Divinity. Ladies and Gentlemen, Adalyn, the mighty Angel responsible for saving all of existence during the Celestial War and a hero among her people.

Adalyn: Hello, thank you for inviting me.

:Thank you for accepting. We’ll try not to take up too much of your time as we know that you’re a very busy woman.

Adalyn: Well I appreciate that.

:So Adalyn, tell me, how did you get mixed up in the war?

Adalyn: Believe me, I’ve asked myself the same question several times. Well to start off, before the war, I was a duty angel.

:A duty angel?

Adalyn: Correct. In the Celestial World, there are different casts of Angels. They start up at the top with the Archangels, who report directly to the Most High, then you have the Choirs whom each have a specific job, they report to the Archangels, then you have the duty angels.

:So what’s the difference between a choir angel and a duty angel?

Adalyn: Realistically, not much. Duty angels essentially are assigned one task to perform and they don’t deviate from it. Whereas each choir has a specific job, but there’s are often more complicated, unspecific, and often deal with interfering in corporeal matters.

:You mean humans.

Adalyn: Not just… but yes, your race is the one they deal with most.

:So what was your job?

Adalyn: I was the guiding light to damned souls that were lost at sea. They needed guidance to their afterlife.

:You were the angel of death?

Adalyn: (Laughs) No. Realistically there is no true grim reaper or angel of death. No one person runs around collecting souls. Duty angels are assigned to make sure that each soul get’s to its specific destination. Mine was unfortunately the underworld.

:But I’m confused, you said that this was before the war?

Adalyn: There really wasn’t much going on before the war. Angels were being assigned their tasks when the war broke out. At that point, my job was to ferry the souls of those who fell during the Celestial War to their destination.

:That couldn’t have been easy.

Adalyn: No… and I’d rather not talk about it.

:Understandable. So how then did you get tapped to fight in the war?

Adalyn: Well… it was really necessity more than anything. The initial battles had taken their toll on the Choirs to the point where they had lost significant manpower. That and I had friends in the Choirs, my friends Roselyn, Azrael, and Ariel. They pushed for me and so Michael promoted me to soldier angel. I wasn’t a part of any Choir at that point, but at least I was no longer hanging out in the underworld.

:So you were promoted and thrown into the heat of battle?

Adalyn: Not exactly. I only fought in a few major engagements. No, I was assigned to Azrael as his apprentice. They wanted me to learn infiltration tactics and quick strike techniques.

:What for?

Adalyn: The war needed to end, quickly. Angel blood was staining the land and we were fighting to extinction. The Archangels under Saint Michael’s command devised a plan to knock out Lucifer and his leaders. It was his hope that we’d be able to sneak behind their lines, assassinate most of his generals and force Lucifer to surrender. Lucifer was a good warrior, but he was not tactician. He would not be able to lead his men without help.

:The plan worked, I take it.

Adalyn: Not entirely, one of his generals got away, but that’s something we’re still looking into so I can’t elaborate on it.

:No problem. So now that the war is over, what are you doing?

Adalyn: Well for now, I’m still Azrael’s apprentice. I don’t think the Archangels know where to place me at the moment. They seem to still be looking into where I could do the most good…. it’s taken them billions of years just to get everything figured out, but such is the life of an angel. So at the moment, I’m still the guiding light for damned souls.

:Well I hope you the very best in that, but tell me, what is your opinion of humanity?

Adalyn: I can’t say I care for them. I understand why Lucifer rose up, though I don’t think it was the correct approach. Giving a new world to a child race where they can kill and destroy one another as opposed to the people who have served loyally for uncountable generations doesn’t seem fair.

:So if you ever met a human in the flesh?

Adalyn: … I don’t know how I’d react. I’ve encountered their damned souls, but that’s it.

:I see… well Adalyn, I think you for your time. I don’t have any other questions.

Adalyn: Thank you, it’s best I go anyways, Azrael will be meeting with the Most High soon and asked that I be there.

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Prologue

by Unknown's avatar

Hi All, check out this new and exciting online serial!

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Half-elf description

by Unknown's avatar

I’ve looked through the different works and various forms of elves and what their half-breed children are like.

Half Breeds in some stories look like their human parent, almost completely and I’ll explain why below… In other stories, they are mixed, though in most, they have slightly pointed ears, but otherwise look like humans.

So far, there is one consistency; elven genes are recessive when combined with those of humans. Given what we typically see of elves, I can understand that theory. Elves tend to have light skin, light eyes (Blue, green, hazel), and light hair, all of which are recessive traits in humans.

2014-07-26_00002

However, one point of contention that I would make would be the ears. Generally, the most pronounced features of a person would show up on their offspring, and those features tend to be more dominant. So with that in mind, I do believe that the stories that say that half-elf children would still retain SOME of their parents’ features.

In a story I’ve been working on for some time, an elven child can pass for a human as long as they keep their hair long enough to cover the more rounded points on their ears. Other prominent elven features aren’t apparent in the offspring. They have some extra-sensory perception which they receive from their elven parent, but they are nowhere near as powerful nor as easy to control. In most cases, these abilities would manifest as dreams or ‘feelings’ and nothing more.

Their hearing can be trained to be as powerful as their elven parent, but it would take much effort to train their senses and they would need to focus much more than their elven parents to detect faint noises.

Half-breeds would be less susceptible to both human and elven disease, having immunities on both sides, however diseases that affect both would have a stronger impact on a half-elf child.

So do you agree or disagree? I’m not a biology major so I could be way off, but this is my interpretation of inter-species mating. Let me know!

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The Redemption of Erâth: Book 3, Chapter 8

by Unknown's avatar

Hey all, please check out the latest work from a fellow author. I admit I just started reading tonight and already got hooked!

Satis's avatarSatis Writes

Chapter 8: The Council of Erâth

It was several days before such a meeting could be arranged, and he spent his time wandering the wondrous streets of Viura Râ, or deep in conversation with Ermèn. He learned much of the world of Erâth, and of the great city in particular. Viura Râ, it seemed, was a great hub of the world, a place where all the races of Erâth could meet and speak, without fear or violence.

Yet for all of that, there were folk missing, he now knew. Men were by far the most populous here in Viura Râ, but among them were to be found many tall, thin pale figures: the Illuèn. Every so often Brandyé caught glimpses of black-robed folk, and knew them as the Namirèn. Yet the Mirèn, whose likeness Brandyé knew only from the great statue at the center of the city, were nowhere to be found…

View original post 6,512 more words

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Don’t write while sick…

by Unknown's avatar

I’m not kidding.
Write when you’re sad, it’s when the best poetry comes out, often.

Write when you’re angry… you’ll be surprised how much you get done rage writing… though you may have a lot of editing to do.

Write when you’re frustrated, it’s therapeutic to take out your frustrations on your characters who have done nothing wrong to you. :\

Yes, write in most situation and it will be fine… but not when you’re sick. Last week, I came down with a bad fever and couldn’t get out of bed. So I went to work on a story that I’ve been slowly writing over a while.  Page after page appeared and I was thrilled. I got a lot more done than I thought I could.

Then I came back and re-read what I wrote… and had to completely undo everything. Seriously, half of it was complete gibberish. So yeah, no writing when your sick. It will take you to weird places…

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Killing off a Character…

by Unknown's avatar

This is a tough thing to do sometimes, unless you’ve set that character up to die from the start. If you have an Obi Wan Kenobi just waiting to be sacrificed for the main character’s development, that’s one thing, but what about a character whom you may not have initially intended to kill off? What about a character that’s had significant development and may have actually survived the first story as you write the sequel?

That’s where things get a little more shaky. The first thing you should ask yourself is ‘why?’

Why do you want to kill this character off? Has their story gone as far as it can and there is no other way to out that person? Will the plot be furthered by killing that person off? How will your audience react?

Killing a character has a sense of permanence about it (unless you write for Marvel or DC, in which case you kill a character off to bring them back a week later). Should you decide to do this, think very carefully on how it would affect the rest of the cast. Is it someone who needs to be killed off?

In my writing, I came to a point in my stories where I knew that I had to make this move. One of my characters had to die off… and I knew I was going to get in a lot of trouble for doing it because the one that I had in mind was one that had been with my readers since the beginning.

So when the time came and I killed off one of my characters… I can not begin to describe the angry emails I got. I seriously thought that I was destined for a ‘Misery’ episode… good lord!

I guess in the end, what I’m saying is that if you’re going to kill off a character, ESPECIALLY A POPULAR ONE, just be ready for the storm that will follow and make sure that the fans understand why you did what you did.

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Divinity in Hardcover

by Unknown's avatar

After a long time of waiting, the Hardcover version of Divinity has finally made it to circulation!

It can be purchased at (hopefully) all major retailers and online. Here is the Amazon listing. 

Divinity:
Giovanni was a poor fisherman living in 16th Century Venice. His entire family had been lost to the white plague. He suffered through their deaths only to discover that he too was infected with it. He is now alone and questioning his faith. The angel, Adalyn, was a hero of the Celestial War against Lucifer. All knew and admired her until she uncovered a plot to overthrow the Most High. In an attempted cover up, Adalyn is betrayed and cast out of Heaven. She is sent to the mortal world to face torture and death at the hands of the creatures she most fears: humans. Their worlds become intertwined when, by chance, Giovanni rescues her while out fishing. Injured and blind as the result of her expulsion, Adalyn has little choice but to rely on this primitive creature for protection against the Church, Lucifer, and God’s own decree if she is to expose the true traitor and save all of existence.

  • Hardcover: 412 pages
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 057815434X
  • ISBN-13: 978-0578154343
  • Product Dimensions: 6 x 1.1 x 9 inches

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Indirect Sequels…

by Unknown's avatar

So I know I’ve touched on this already, but given how much I love this and how much thinking of it sooner may have saved me time and frustration during the publishing phase, I thought I’d go into a bit more detail.

When I finished writing Divinity, I thought to myself, “Now it’s done, perfect, an epic story that will no doubt catch the minds and attention of readers.”

I began submitting queries to literary agents, with some modest interest. One of the few that actually set up a phone interview asked me one simple question; Do I plan to write a sequel?

Like an idiot, I said no. It was a complete story and there was no way I was going to trash the ending by coming up with a forced narrative for the characters to follow. I knew the moment that those words left my lips, I had lost this agent’s interest. To the agents, book publishing isn’t about the art of the story, it’s about making money and how profitable a book can be. Which is exactly what you want an agent to be all about as they’re the ones who are going to bring you in profits on your book.

I knew that if there were any chance of getting Divinity published, I’d have to adjust my strategy, like it or not. So I went about trying to write a sequel. The first attempt saw the two main characters from Divinity on a side adventure that wasn’t mentioned during the first book… it didn’t make sense and chronologically didn’t fit. Having no suspension of disbelief in timeline errors, I moved on.

The second one basically dealt with the church secretly seeking revenge against characters from the first book for past events. I abandoned that one almost immediately as when I create a happily ever after, I keep it happily ever after… damn it!

The third attempt dealt with the descendants of a few of the characters… which I’ll be honest, I still have a copy of and may make that a sequel at some point down the line. However, certain elements didn’t make sense and I really need to completely rewrite it.

I admit that I became frustrated and was about to abandon the whole idea… So at that point, I sat down and started playing Final Fantasy, an old favorite of mine. One thing I noticed about the game was that, while some characters continued to appear from one game to the next, the story was completely different and the main characters weren’t carried over from one game to the next. Could Square-Enix be on to something there?

That’s when I pulled out an old fan fiction story I wrote a long time ago and looked through it. As I reread it, I began to think, “If I changed the time period to Italy, during the 1500s, changed a few points about the characters, names, and a few super natural elements… could I make this a sequel to Divinity?

At first, I thought that I was absolutely crazy! There was no way that it could ever work… was there?

I took that story and began to rewrite it. The more and more I added, the more it became a reality. That’s when I started adding in characters from the previous stories for brief cameos.

BOOM! I had my sequel. It was a story that was influenced by the previous book and shared many of the elements, but was otherwise a completely independent story that augmented some themes from the first, while creating brand new ones.

Characters from the first book would make appearances and influence the story, but their appearances would not tarnish the first in any way and would be relatively short. Some may just get an honorable mention whilst other, more significant characters would take up an entire chapter, and the rest may not make any appearance at all.

Another major shift this second story would take would be in the overall tone. Where the first story would lean more towards a heroic, clear cut, good guy story, the second would be a far more dark and grotesque. In the second story, we would would be dealing with anti-heroes and villains suffering from the Darth Vader Complex (See my post on Character Complexes.).

So if when you ever write a story and attempt to get it published, if they want a sequel out of you, this is a very easy work around if you don’t want to ruin the first story with a forced sequel.

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