Until recently, I hadn’t given much thought to attending trade shows and/or conventions. With only one book “in the wild” and a hosted website, it seemed a little presumptuous. I self-published Orchids Ablaze strictly as an ebook at first. Hardcopy printing brings in new levels of complexity and planning. Just getting the cover and content to display correctly is more challenging when you have to account for a rigid spine.
How Minor is Minor?
Minor Characters That Is
I like to use minor characters to populate the setting and give the main action a larger context. I think it’s an important part of world-building. As a superheroic setting, the Jagged Earth is rife with possibilities for less-than-major heroes and villains. However, we’ve all seen movies where the supporting cast steals the show.
I don’t want to upstage the main character(s). but when a team is involved it makes for interesting dynamics. My challenge is to keep the names of multiple characters in front of the reader without making it difficult for the reader to realize which characters are the ones to keep track of and which fall into the “window dressing” category. This becomes especially true since I enjoy throwing in a few plot twists here and there. Occasionally I want to “hide” a character in the background until unveiling them for maximum effect later in the story.
Polls Anyone?
Site Polls
No, not the political kind, or even the Nielsen kind. I’m talking about the Veiled Space kind!
We put up a few polls when we first opened up the site that we wanted to get feedback on. The results of the polls are listed below. You’ll also find the impacts your choices made. We’re going to re-open the polls soon and since they are about content for the site and books, feel free to vote again if you voted on the first go-round. We love getting feedback from new and return voters.
How much story?
This is a question I struggle with: how much story do I include in the story? Background, drawings, world-building, etc. I have, but how much of it adds to a story before too much of it detracts from the story? Having that kind of detailed information not immediately tied to the story still provides a comfort level with what I write. It allows me to move fluidly from one place or event to another. Well it should anyway. I’m still working on that part. The disadvantage is my desire to drop in not just details, but entire sections of information not directly related to the story. I spent (spend) a lot of time and effort on it, after all!
Tuarsahzi Tidbits
Fair Disclosure:
The items that follow have been picked out of the X-Ray content available on the Orchids Ablaze ebook. So if you have that, there won’t be anything new here for you. Keep a lookout for other lore entries though!
TUARSAHZI:
A large desert realm inhabited by multiple semi-nomadic tribes; a generic term used to refer collectively to the inhabitants the Tuarsahzi Desert; the name of the specific tribe which historically united the disparate tribes and rules as a type of constitutional monarchy defined by long-standing custom.
Author’s note: I’ve only visited the deserts in the southwest of the U.S.A., but even brief exposure left me with an appreciation for the majesty of the environment. The Tuarsahzi Desert is not Arrakis, but Frank Herbert’s Dune stories were a definite influence.
Keeping Score Pt. 1
First book: Orchids Ablaze
In the first installment of the Lodge of the Wolf series, I tried some things outside of what I think of as a “standard” format. The poem/prophecies were one and the chapter heading quotes were another. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, then grab a copy of the book! Go ahead, I don’t mind waiting…. ….