It’s time for my annual “looking back / looking forward” blog post.
In which I glance back at the dreams I had for the past year and see how I did, and then we discuss some of the new (or recurring) dreams I have for the new year.
Read More
When writing a book, knowing what themes you want to explore is generally a good idea.
But I almost never start with that. My writing is driven by a weird mixture of world-building, character, and plot. Plot usually comes last. The world and the characters come first… and which one comes first varies from story to story.
An Echo of the Fae was no exception to the rule. As I explained earlier this week, a lot of the story came together after I had figured out who the players were and what the world looked like.
For me, the themes usually stand out to me more after the story is written, and one of my jobs is to pull those themes out and polish them off in the editing stages.
Some of the themes in this story surprised me, but I am quite pleased with how they wove themselves through the plot.
Read More
“Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!”
Some of you know this already, but An Echo of the Fae was supposed to be a Rapunzel retelling. In its very earliest stages, it was simply the glimmering of an idea as I tried to come up with something that would work for Kendra’s Fairy Tale Retelling Challenge and multi-author-release. She told us that the theme would be Rapunzel back in… I believe it was 2018. And while I didn’t quite make it in time to be part of the release, and my story really didn’t end up being a retelling… like… at all… that is where the first flickers of idea began. That’s where it all started.
Read More
“Even in the midst of darkness, there is always a shard of light if we will but search for it hard enough and believe in it strongly enough.” ~ Minstrel's Call
Read More