Home stretch

So I'm actually rounding the homestretch of finishing the first manuscript in the series. It feels pretty good that I have been able to jump back on the train, sit next to a muse and pin it there until I am finished.

I have decided to break the rules and start my revisions and editing before I have even finished the ending. I happened upon doing this quite by accident I assure you. Because of such a hiatus, I decided to read from the beginning to re immerse myself back in Ophelia and Julian's lives. The familiar love and protectiveness I felt for them before came rushing back with no prompt. What I did find in their wakethough, was a series of small plot holes that given time, would have quickly unravelled my story.

I took the time to isolate each one I found and stitch them back up. During the process, I surprised myself by finding areas that needed expansion and some areas that I considered obsolete. It was a neat process to start from almost scratch and still end up pretty much on the same course.

In the end, I am 2/3 the way through my already 68,000 word manuscript and figure that it will easily hit 75,000 by the time I have finished revisions and adding my ending. I have to say, I am sincerely proud of how the story has unfolded and the chemistry between the characters is so intense that even I am trying to find an excuse for them to hook up!

I guess we will have to see what happens.....will she be able to keep Shadowgate closed? Will she do it at the expense of the one man she has come to find she cant live without? Will her destiny allow for any freedom for happiness?

Guess we will have to see what she chooses! Stay tuned!

Blog? What Blog?

Wow! I don't even know what to say....Ya that's it!! I didn't know what to say for almost a full year. I cant believe that I neglected my blog for so long. I have to admit, I neglected my characters for almost as long.

I looked back and read my previous post and it made me smile. Ironic that I would blog about writing every day for fear of 'freezing' my characters in time. Yep, wrote it and then nothing but silence for a year; look at me go!

Well though I was silent on here, for the last month I have been penning the rest of the first book in the series and I have to say, I am loving where it's going. I can truly say that I love my characters and I am happy with the direction that I have set them in. I find it invigorating to see my progress and it pushes me to make more.

I knew that the story I had in my mind would require at least a couple of books, but the more I have written and revised, the more I am starting to realize that Ophelia and Julian have just put thier toe in the lakes of thier lives and are on the cusp of jumping in! It is prompting my mind to come up with new plot lines and opening the Shadowgate world so much bigger than I ever imagined.

Well I guess I had better get back to work. Ophelia and Julian are waiting to be released from the built up tension between them. Stay tuned to find out what kind it is........

The need to write

Its funny, after putting so much time into creating a storyline and characters, I tend to feel as if I am neglecting them if I dont write each day. I can only imagine them either frozen where I left off or pacing around, checking thier watches and waiting to be given the next task to either walk or talk. It is a pretty intense feeling to know that you have created an entire world that you can lay claim to. As the plot seems to unfold and you erase, re write and erase again, it gets tedious to make sure that you dont do them an injustice by being to predictable or cliche. You want your reader to see them as you do, each flaw or physical feature, and if by chance you take a day or two off, you may come back with a different feeling than when you left. That change in feeling might actually make a change in character or even plot. Its a great meditation to come and ajust your own world exactly as you like. Your own physical world could be full of stress, bills and upset, but you can just sit down and create one that encompasses everything yours may be missing. For those of you that have never tried, take the time to put pen to paper or fingers to keys and see what I mean :)

How's about a little taste!

I could just barely see Julian as I stared through the distance between two of the goons. He was struggling to lift himself off the pavement. Blood was rushing down his forehead and was dripping to a small pool on the cement by his hand. He was grasping his ribcage and I could hear him wince with every movement. It looked like this was going to be up to me and only me. As I lifted the sword for another swipe I felt a hand quickly grab my throat. I struggled to break free and in the battle, the blade made a decent incision almost directly in the centre of the dark haired outlaws forehead. What? I was totally caught off guard and confused. There was something black running down his brow. It was nothing like any blood I had seen before. It was much thicker.

Each man flanking him grabbed for my arms. In the struggle the sword dropped and I was knocked to the ground by the bleeding (if you can call it that) perp. My arms were being pressed to the ground by the two others and the grip on my throat by the third was causing my vision the blur. The pain throbbing from the back of my head was beginning to creep down my shoulders. I could feel the small pebbles on the ground digging a decent imprint into my skin through my light green jumper. I was struggling as hard as I could.

In a sheer bout of luck I was able to break my left hand free. I started lashing out and grabbing for anything I could. I grabbed the thin mans wrist and struggled to yank him down to the ground. I heard a piercing scream and the man began to flail. I didn’t dare let go. The dark haired mans eyes widened and his grip broke loose. He threw himself back from me at the exact same time that the ginger haired thug released my right arm. I looked to the man on my left. I didn’t dare let go. I was astonished to see that the area I had in my grasp resembled a barbequed steak. There was burnt flesh on either side of my hand and he was writhing in agony and he seemed completely under my control. I struggled to keep hold of him while I got to my feet.

By the time my feet were firmly planted, the other two men were making their way down the block at an expedited rate. I still had hold of their friend. I was having a hard time piecing together what was happening and believing what my eyes were showing me. The captured man was on his knees with my hand clasping his wrist. His head lurched back and all of a sudden the air around me was completely full of a thick, black smoke. In shock, I let go of the mans arm and he fell to the ground and I struggled to escape the fog. In a brief second, the smoke appeared to be gathering into the loose form of a person. I could hardly believe what I was seeing.

Ophelia Bradley....whos that?

Well the idea for the Shadowgate Series came to life after a serious night of online gaming. I had just taken to playing Guildwars (used to play WOW and LOTRO) and had created my first necromancer. I loved the idea of my new characters ability to suck energy, deal damage and animate ghoulish horrors as minions. The whole thing was just so me! Who wouldnt want to see a kick ass redhead (bottled that is) who could make you do what she wanted or she would kill you?

My origional character was Xyros, as it had been in all other games, but I had decided it was time to get more modern. In tying with the theme of my book, I did some research of local cemetaries in London and their interesting inhabitants. One story really caught my eye. It was the story of Elizabeth Siddell. She was an artist, poet and most of all a model. Though she modelled for many, her most famous portraits were done by her husband Dante Gabriel Rossetti. The most notable being called 'Ophelia'. The painting depicts a woman immersed in water, mouth agape and clutching wildflowers.

Not all that interesting right? Who gives a damn about a chick in a pond? Well folks, the story gets better. It appears that Ms Siddell had become preganant for a second time (the first time ending in a stillborn) and decided to overdose on laudanum and was found dying by her devistated husband. The death was ruled an accident, though it was said that he found a suicide note.

So overcome with grief, he burried the only copy of his poems in her red hair before she was inturned. It appears that after several years of creative failure, Rossetti's agent suggested he exhume the body and retrieve the journal. Rossetti became obsessed with regaining his origional works and applied to have the body retrieved. The process took place under absolute secrecy in the middle of the night and Rossetti, the coward that he was, refused to be present.

After retrieving the journal, his agent, who was present for the exhumation, relayed that Elizabeth was remarkabley well preserved. Howell went on to tell him that her red hair had continued to grow after death and flowed throughout the coffin. Rossetti was haunted forever by the thought and the guilt of disturbing her restful sleep.

The poems went to print and were considered mostly a failure........how many of you can recite a Rossetti poem?

So in going with the life after death theme and using a story of an actual resident of Highgate Cemetary, Ophelia Bradley has come to light.

Now I know that

Welcome to The Shadowgate Series!

Ophelia Bradley is a normal, 32 year old single cat owner....or is she? After a mysterious attack that left her unconscious on the doorstep of her bookstore, Ophelia and her new friend/knight in shining armour, Julian are led through a proverbial maze of clues, beginning with a mysterious Ouroboros pendant, that lead her to discover her true identity. She is the last in the line of the union between a Watcher and an Elite Necromancer. She is also entrusted as keeper of Shadowgate.

Ophelia soon discovers it is her duty to keep the gates shut by balancing the good and the evil. As Lunar Shades escape the gate, evil begins to throw off the that delicate balance. Will her newly genetically engrained ability to speak to and animate the dead be able to coexist with her power to carry the Light. It soon becomes apparent that her own struggle to balance her own good and evil may sabotage her ability to keep the gates shut. Will humanity suffer due to her own conflict? It begs us to question, is there truly light without the dark?