World Building Mundus: An Atypical Wizard

If you needed an old Sage with a flowing white beard and tomes of forbidden lore, that was not Leon. If you wanted to see a fabulously dressed courtier working to bring political revolution, that was not him either. 

Leon was the one to call when your magic mirror broke.

From the unpublished novelle The Odd-Job Wizard, Loren D. Selby

 

Unlike Celabramar who grew from a doodle, Leon the Wizard is was inspired by a real person, my late father Dwayne Leon Selby. The character is not a one-to-one translation and has developed his own mannerisms and quirks. However, his core concept, a highly educated man with a knack for a repair, a blue jacket, and odd social blind spots, has my father's fingerprints.

No, Dad did not practice magic or befriend dragons. He just loved learning and developing new skills. He was also well educated, a Bachelors in geology, and only worked in that field a handful of year during my life-time.

Having the skills and certifications doesn't assure you work. Dad also taught me that there is no such thing as a job 'beneath' you. Work doesn't care who does it as long as it gets done.

Leon's repair skills are strongly inspire by Dad's hobby of learning new things - car restoration, bee keeping, sew-machine repair, baking, small part fabrication, and wine-brewing. Dad could fix nearly anything, and what he couldn't he would find a book or manual for future study.

Another thing Leon took from Dad was being aware that you can accidentally scare people just by existing. My father had an intense personality, a booming laugh, and a love of debate. He also stood over six foot tall, with a barrel chest and a thick neck. People regularly thought he was a former high-school jock. Between his physical build, unfortunately shaped eyebrows, and some facial nerve damage, Dad's non-verbal cues were often misread.

Leon isn't physical threatening. However, he knows that it is all to easy for people to come to fear magic-users. He hides his frustration with his co-workers behind a mask of professionalism. He takes a walk to settle his temper. He takes every chance he gets to be honest about his powers and limits. He works hard to not be the typical aloof Wizard.

Ironically, this level of familiarity and permissiveness backfires on Leon. It often did on Dad. In the real world, people would take my father's desire to be liked and abuse his boundaries. When you hide or mask your frustration, people don't realize they are making you uncomfortable.

In The Odd-Job Wizard, the townsfolk become used to Leon's services. Some of this is driven by the situation. They live in a town that's falling apart. However, there's a large gap between expecting someone to led a hand, waking someone up to demand instant repair work. They fixate on “what can Leon do for me?”

The current draft's opening features Leon being woken up by an unpleasant neighbor because the hot-water tank needs work. When Leon finally gets a paying project from Celabramar, the cracks in these toxic relationship widen. There is a difference between being valuable and being appreciated.

All of this makes Dad's middle name, Leon, fits the fictional character well. Leon means 'lion' in many languages. Lions have complicated relationships with humans. One one hand, they are easily demonized as threat to our bodily safety. On the other, we've seem so many videos of them behaving like big goofy cats that we forget to respect their boundaries.

On the journey to publication, I fear that the name, Leon, may be a problem. My own name Loren, has many of the same letters in it. However, I would honestly rather get a pen name than change the character's name.

Leon the wizard is a work of fiction. Dwayne Leon Selby was a father who valued creativity. While he is no longer present to read The Odd-Job Wizard, he read and commented on many of the earlier story lines. He would have loved how the character has developed and laughed himself silly over the idea of a wizard building a hot-air balloon out of patchwork fabric and leftover wallpaper.

Doodling Dragons

 

One of the driving forces in my novelle The Odd-Job Wizard is Celabramar the dragon. He has an intense personality, big appetite, and a quick temper. He has also been living in my head since I was thirteen years old and doodled him during my one year in private education.

I started one class with a pencil sketch of a chess piece. Later that drawing became a tower on a lake. Yet another class later I decided that tower needed a dragon. That dragon would become Celabramar.

Doodle of a Dragon and Tower
Pencil on lined notebook paper
by
A 13-year-old Overthinker with wobbly penmenship and poor spelling skills

Celabramar is fun to write. His wants are simple, a full stomach and a warm quiet place to nap. The conflict comes from the fact his is a large obligate carnivore with no need for human norms. He doesn't have to be malicious to cause problems.

The backstory conflict in The Odd-Job Wizard starts because ranchers settle in his hunting ground. Celabramar still needs to eat. The native prey is gone, so he just eats sheep. This is reasonable in his mind. However, much like in the U.S.A.'s Great Westward Expansion, the settlers freak out about 'marauding savages' threatening their lives and livelihoods.

Thankfully, Mundus is not America. Celabramar is not a human facing the combine forces of colonialism and the federal government. He is a fire-breathing dragon. Young, inexperienced, but still a dragon.

In human terms, he's just moved out from his parents house for a steady job. His 'job' for lack of a better term is managing his hunting territory. Keeping the land stable and reporting problems to his elders. I drew inspiration from interactions with ranchers, wildlife management, and my own education in environmental engineering. Celabramar acts as a key-stone species. He hunts mega-fauna and keeps the dangerous monster population in check – one bite at a time.

Madam Vircroc, the dragon diplomat, and Sage Owdigee, didn't exist before I started writing this novella. Originally, they were just to provide exposition. However, they quickly became an excellent way to contrast Celabramar's maturity and hint at the greater culture of the Dragon Nation.

The Dragon Nation is a, hopefully, polite nod to the First Nations of America. They have a different culture, a different society, and so treat the land differently than their neighbors do. The history of Oklahoma contains repeated clashed over ecological use and management between colonists and indigenous people. My story mentions fencing off water sources and how ranching, farming, and mining changes the land. This are the least horrifying things real people use to hurt each other. Illegal settlements due to misread maps, corporate interests, and misinformed pioneers was endemic.

Homesteaders having to abandon their claims and return to civilization actually happened. Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder ends with the family having to leave the Osage Reservation because Pa Ingalls was too eager to get a choice location for his homestead.

Celabramar, much like the average citizen of the Osage and other First Nations, is in a painful situation Anything he does can spiral into a political disaster. He still needs to hunt and eat. He has random people wandering into his cave hoping to become 'glorious heroes' by picking a fight. It's exhausting.

And so, Celabramar decides to move. I expect some readers to mixed feelings about the message it sends. Traditionally, when the native population gets displaced, they don't get to come back.

However, Celabramar is a dragon, not a human. The Odd-Job Wizard is a fantasy fiction. To dragon, moving a few valleys inland is more like changing your phone number and buying new locks. He's not giving up. He's keeping himself from escalating the problem.

The young dragon with a literally fiery temper wants to be the bigger person. This is the core of his character. Over decades of daydreaming and writing, his mannerism, appearance, and even name have changed. However, the silver scales and lake island remain in honor of that first doodle.

My Second Draft and Internet Search History

 

As an chronic overthinker turned writer, I walk a delicate balance between attention to detail and spending too much time nit-picking things that the readers won't care about.

My brain is such, I need a degree of confidence to add anything into the narrative. This has led to long researchers sessions for my WIP (possible title changed to “The Odd-Job Wizard”). As I wrap up the second draft, my internet serach history had gotten very werid. Here are some of the highlights and an explaination for them.

Historical Building Design

The most notable example in the story are three 'sets' the water channel for the mill, assessors offices, smokehouses. Swindlers Bounty is a frontier colony. I needed a technology level that fit. Also, I had to see if it was possible for the characters to up-cycle the building. Leon's smokehouse was based of one from a Ante-Bellum plantation. They could cure multiple carcasses as once.

An invaluable resource were the illustrated 'If you lived in a __' books that were popular with Usborne and Scholastic in the 90's. The cutaways made it easier to get a sense of scale for the character. This helped with the water mill scenes. It also gave me the technical name for breakable-yet-could-be plausibly-repaired pieces.

How Big Is It?

Animals also required a bit of legwork. Mostly to check size and weight. My problem once again was getting a sense of scale. I ended up writing down numbers and pacing out the size with a tape measure.

The first draft had Celabramar's politically fraught snacks being cows and the ranchers more like old Western beef barons. This was changed to sheep as they were smaller and easier for a dragon of his size to lift off the ground.

I also fact checked the size of a moose head trophy through a taxidermist website. They are big, but surprisingly light. (Makes sense in hindsight.)

Unit Conversion and Geometry

The biggest time sink was converting units of measurement. I cracked open the old geometry book to figure out the size of Celabramar's horde. I used the length of the dragon as the diameter of a cylinder and figure out the average height of the treasure pile.

From there I made a guesstimate of the value, by creating three equations for treasure piles made of mostly gold coins, mostly silver coins, and most copper coins. For fun, I also looked up the market value of beef cows and calculated how many cows each would buy.

All this work was to figure out how much Celabramar was willing to spend on moving his lair. It also lead to the plot device of his horde having more value as an coin collection than raw metal.

There were also other equations. However, they were before I settled on the idea of hot air balloon travel.

Red Meat or White Meat?

One of the last, and perhaps silliest, bits of research was about meat.

Throughout the story, Celabramar hunts several different prey animals for trade or food. I felt confident writing about deer, goat, sheep, crab – I've eaten them. The two I have not are rabbit, which is expensive if you don't raise or hunt it yourself, and swan.
Swan used to be a commercial meat. However, the bird was granted protected status in the U.S.A. Unlike with rabbit, I had trouble finding repeatable and ethically sources descriptions swan meat.

In my first draft, Celabramar declares that swan is “Good red meat, lots of fats for the brain.”

My editor Meg Dendler was very confused by this. She replaced the the line as white and lean, more in line with a traditional poultry. I can safely say she had never eaten swan either.

However, I have eaten duck. Duck is dark meat, darker than turkey. It's also lean muscle fiber but the skin has a protective layer of fat that keeps it moist when cooked. I assumed, correctly, that swan was as to duck as turkey is to chicken – bigger with darker meat. My researched backed it up.

Nevertheless, the goal of a editor is to help the story make sense to readers. Duck is not a common dish in the U.S.A. However, turkey is a holiday tradition. With this common ground, I reworked the description to

“Nice dark meat, good bit of fat too. Excellent for the brain.”

This one line took about an hour of fact checking and world building. There are more detailed descriptions of swan like 'rich,' 'moist,' 'gamey,' 'fishy mutton,' etc. However, it's mostly for cooked swan and varies by dish. The dragon is describing raw, uncooked swan. He'd cares more about its nutritious value than its optimal wine pairing.

This is why it takes me so long to write anything! My brain overthinks everything.

Overthinking: Dragons, Fingers, and Math

When most people world build fantasy tales, they try to follow in the footsteps of Tolkien, Le Guin, and other great world-builders. They invent landmasses, history, languages, and art.

Meanwhile, there's me. My dragons have math.

All math starts with a counting system. In the real world, this comes from by counting fingers on the hand. We have sets of five, ten, and twenty (for when you add toes). From there you develop digit symbols - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 0. Through out history, humans have favored ten-digit systems. It appeals on an instinctual level.

In a fantasy story, people use assume that everyone uses the same math. Typically, it's not something that matters in a plot. Nevertheless, I overthink everything.

An elf or even a centaur has the same hand as a human does. They likely use a similar system with different symbols. Meanwhile, dragons are decided not human or human adjacent.
To complicate things, there are multiple types of dragons in Mundus. One of my draft notebooks has a scribble that dragon in Mundus treat gravity and other natural laws as 'suggestions.' Celabramar is a a massive quadruped with wings. Madam Vircroc is biped like a velociraptor with vestigial wings. At the end of the story, yet another dragon uses the knuckles of their wings and short hind legs to walk like a bat.

All this biodiversity means that there isn't a standard set of twenty digits on a dragon. A dragon with wings and two back legs would only have digits on their feet. That number of digits could also vary from dragon to dragon.

If the feet are built like a bird's for grabbed and perching, there would be three forward and one pointing back. (There could also be just three or just two.) If they are more like a dinosaurs, say a sauropode, there will be five. Some dragons don't even have feet. The dragons of Mundus need a counting system that works for them, not for humans.

My solution was to have them use a base-five system. Four-toed dragons count your claws – 1,2,3,4. Most other dragons will count the longest four fangs. If you have more than four toes, the short extra acts like the zero when you write ten '10.' Short fangs also fill this round. Two long and one short means one group of four plus two, our six. (Base-five, the quinary number system, is a real thing. It used in Astralian First Nation languages like Gumatj.)

The biggest difference is that dragons won't name all the numbers that humans name in a ten digit counting system. For example in English, we have unique names for the first twenty numbers and then name the groups of ten up to hundred – thirty, forty and so on.

My dragons name their numbers up to sixteen and then name groups of eight digits. Numbers five through nine don't have special digit symbols just like our eleven is written as '11.'

So what does this mean from a storytelling angle? Well, in Mundus, it means that some people foolishly think that dragons are stupid because they 'don't know what twenty it.' However, it's really a translation error. Dragons have math, advanced math even. It's a necessity when you are a nation of large carnivores managing wild food sources. Averages, perimeters, rate of change, and probabilities- these aren't just things in a textbook for dragons. Dragons are scary good at math.

In my W.I.P., Celabramar converts volume from square feet to bushels without a reference table or calculator. He also converts pounds of silver to the market price of sheep. He also reads and corrects Leon's math, which was written in human numbers. Celabramar lives in a cave, can't hold a pencil, and can do algebra in his head. 

Leon is a Wizard. He's basically the guy who went to college and finished a Master's Degree. That doesn't stop him from making mistakes because he is tired or focusing on the wrong things. 

I did this on purpose. It's been in my notes for years. I wanted the reminder that technology and culture isn't a sure indicator of education and intellegent. If you judge only the surface level, you miss so much of the world. 

On a lighter not, the story has yet another dragon math Easter-egg. Through out the story, Celabramar uses several techniques to mange his temper – deep breaths, shredding a tree, and self-talk. Celabramar stops himself from yelling at a bigot by counting in his head.

He counts to eight, not ten.

Do Mermaids use Wheelchairs?

My least favorite classic fairytale is "The Little Mermaid." I hated the original ending and felt the mermaid had a stupid death. The Disney animated film gave me nightmares.

Despite that, merfolk provide endless fuel for my overthinking imagination. Why make a deal with a sea witch when human have options for getting around without legs?

The Ipswich Mermaid, George Courage, Acrylic on canvas 8"x10".

The idea of merfolk using a wheelchair is not original to just me. In “Roverandom” by J. R.R. Tolkien there is an underseas adventure that ends in a wizard and his merfolk wife getting banished to the surface. The wife becomes a small business owner and very famous swim instructor. She is described to go around in a horse drawn 'bath-chair.'

As charming as that character concept is, I am not Tolkien. He made a living as an English college professor and ploy-linguist. I have an incomplete environmental engineering degree and chronic health issues. My creative approach takes another angle.

Overthinking

When I imagine merfolk in wheelchairs, my first instinct is “I hope wherever they are going is ADA compliant.” While I don't yet need mobility aids, my dodgy joints and low blood pressure make like accessibility toilets, ramps, handrails and rest benches a boon. Unfortunately, many space designers forget or outright sacrifice those features. Smaller bathrooms means more floor space for making money. Ramps and comfortable benches are never seen as 'bold artistic expression.' You can have the best wheelchair in the world, and there are still places you can't go.

If a merfolk uses mobility aids on land, they have to deal with all the accessibility issues that we humans face.

Another thing that comes to my mind with any mobility aid – chair, cane, brace – is long term comfort. I have friends and family who have used all of them at one point or another. Each comes with a unique set of challenges. Chair and braces can cause bruising and circulation issues from long use. Double crutches require training so your wrists and shoulder can take the pressure. Even a walker or a cane requires a degrees of mindfulness.

This is all assuming you're a human whose used to living on land and in the air. Merfolk live in the water. The buoyancy and resistance change is going to be as tricky learning to swim is for us.

Merfolk also have the complication of having *just* a tail. Human do have tails (the tiny bones at the base of our spine). However, we sit on our hip bones. Aquatic mammals like whales, dolphins, and manatee, lack hipbones and the pelvic bone is all but identical to the surrounding spinal vertebral. If a merfolk where to 'sit' upright like a human, all that weight and pressure goes onto a handful of vertebral. (This doesn't begin to touch on if the mer using a lateral tail flick like a shark. That spine isn't going to bend into a chair posture.)

Merfolk would not be able to use a standard mobility aid comfortably. It would take training and modifications.

The last element to consider is cost. Good mobility aids are expensive (especial in the U.S. where making a deal with a sea witch is a less daunting process than dealing with healthcare industry, insurance companies, and out-of-pocket costs.) Even if you use magic to 'cheat,' land mobility aids are going to be more of a tool than a toy. You aren't going to spend all that money and time training unless you are serious about making it part of your life.

All these elements will shape what kind of merfolk can afford or want to spend time on land. Yes, transformation magic is always an option, but that means giving up the sea. Most people are not bubble-brained princesses willing to give up their family, culture, and body over a man they met for a few hours.

One of the core guidelines when I put fantasy beings in my stories is that people are people no matter their shape. People are curious, people are creative, and most of all people find ways to overcome obstacles. Humans want to explore the sky and sea, because it's there. Merfolk want to see what's on the land. Finding other people and sharing ideas is part of how we grow. The land and sea would not be separate worlds. People learn from and inspire each other.

In Mundus

I imagine that merfolk communities do business with the 'terrestrial' neighbors. It's common to see a floating fish market or pods of off duty pilots and divers by a riverbank or city docks. These mers do leave the water for short periods of time, business meetings, trying a meal at a local pub, rolling over to the next stand for a bit of hot gossip. However, tourist merfolk are rare.

Merfolk curious enough to travel on land sort are more akin to people going on a long vacation with curated experience packages. They travel up a water channel and make group trips to see famous on-land sights. The most luxurious trips use magical aids like levitation rings or transformation potion for the live on land experience.

It's expensive, and some foolhardy mers have gotten themselves in debt over those trips. However, the general consensus is that if you want to go have a look at how the people up top live, you can.

My Troubles with Naming Dragons

 

As I continue rewrites on “Don't Fireball the Neighbors,” I've made several tweaks to the plot and characters. One was the dragon's name.

The dragon has lived rent free in my head since I was thirteen and had run out of books with dragons to read aloud to my younger brother. I named him 'Celebramar' because it sounded like a high fantasy name and was easy to write in cursive.

The trouble was they way I write that name and the way I have said that name don't match.

This is not a unique problem in my life. Despite being an early reader, English was the ban of my school day. I had solid grammar and composition skills. My spelling skills on the other hand brought back lots of red ink.

I could read and recognize words. However, if you asked me to write out those same words five minutes later, you'd get back a mess. I passed several tests by single points and would write the lists until it was muscle memory. Spelling orally like you see in competitions was impossible.

I don't know if this is a brain issue or just confusion from growing up in a region were you can hear the word 'pecan' said three different ways in the same town. “Just sound it out” doesn't work for me, not in English.

The Latin classes in grade school and the Spanish classes in highschool complicated my issues. When I saw I word I didn't know, my poor brain would switch phonetic systems.

'Champagne' 'defenestrate' 'legumes' I knew what they all meant and how to use them. However, if I heard them on the street, I would have thought it was a different word with a similar meaning. Like 'cool' and 'cold.'

First time I tried to read out loud to some who was not my brother, I got repeatedly corrected by a child five years younger than me. Cimorene, Kazul, Gollum, Smaug – all the names were wrong.

Needless to say, creating original names runs into the same issue. The way someone reads a name's spelling don't always match how it sounded in my head. 'Leon' was short and safe. The same held for most of the characters name. The troublemakers were the dragons.

The current draft of "Don't Fireball the Neighbors has three dragons, each with a unique name. Madam Vircroc, the diplomatic liaison of the Dragon Nation. Mahgister Wodigee a dragon of few words and a short role in the plot. Finally, Celabramar the co-protagonist who is trying very hard not to start a diplomatic incident for the other two dragons to clean up.

The 'vir' in Vircroc's name was taken from Latin meaning green or living. However, Vir in English reads more like 'Vur' than 'Vear.' I let this be because it makes a fun growling noise.

Wodigee gained an extra 'ee' to avoid confusion on if the 'i' was long or short. Their title 'Mahgister' also gained an 'h' to make the first vowel sound good and breathy.

And of course, there's my dear problem child who started this all, Celabramar. It took listening to recording of myself, checking with my now grown little brother, and a page of scratched out combinations for me settle on the new spelling. 'Cele' to 'Cela.'

Over all, I am happy with these changes. However, one little issue remains.

My muscle memory has had years to program the old spellings. When writing 'Celabramar,' I regularly catch my self typing or moving through the pen loops of that second 'e.'

Imprinting on Dragons

 

Image by AlviaAlcedo
DeviantArt 2021

They say 'write about your passions.' So, it should be no shock that I write about dragons.

Like many things in life, you can blame my dad. He wasn't a sporty father. His talents lay in bedtime stories, giving each character an expressive voice. Dad was also a die-hard Tolkien fanatic. 

Several weeks into The Hobbit, I meet Smaug. Dad's voice went low and gravely, smirking as the dragon tried to catch Bilbo with his magic eye and voice. I'd meet dragons before, but none this terrifying or enchanting. Smaug was evil. He had that deliberate wrongness that comes from hurting others for the fun of it. He had power and reveled in using it.

Sadly, Smaug only got two, maybe three nights of reading. The Hobbit soon became our most requested read-aloud. However, Middle-Earth wasn't the only nightly destination.

I watched in awe as poor Eustace became a dragon from sleeping on dragon gold, thinking dragon thoughts.

I giggled as the clever Farmer Giles fast talked the dragon into carrying his baggage.

I found book after book of folktales, watching heroes trick, fight, and tame forces of nature.

I decided, with all the surety of a child, the best sort of stories had dragons. Fantasy became my go-to genre.

Unfortunately for Smaug, he quickly found himself sharing the spotlight. He was still 'The Scariest Dragon' in my mind. However, I found room for more than one type of dragon.

Pete's Magic Dragon introduced me to Elliot, who because 'The Surprising Dragon.' He was shy, a bit naïve - I nearly hyperventilated laughing when he mistakenly drank liquor and belched a fireball. However, when his friend Pete is in danger, there's no doubt Elliot is a fire-breathing, building-smashing dragon.

Coming from Patrica C. Wrede's Enchanted Forest Chronicles, Kazul quietly took her place as the 'The Best Fanged Friend.” I envied Princess Cimorene. Move-in with a dragon, study Latin, sort treasures, and tell pushy boys to shove off.

Finally, there was Draco, voiced by Sean Connery. Dragonheart was one of the first PG-13 movies I was allowed to watch. The ending broke my heart and firmly titled Draco as 'The Heroic Dragon.'

All these stories distilled into one idea - dragons can be anything. Villains, heroes, friends, pranksters. Of course, when I went to write my own stories, my overthinking took it a step farther. Dragons can be anything.

In Mundus, dragons don't have a single body type or attitude. Celebramar walks like a quaruped, and also had a massive set of wings. Mentality, he is a young adult who just moved out from his parent's nest – self-confident, branching out, enjoying life.

Madam Vircroc, on the other hand, comes off as a mature, professional business lady. She walks on her back legs like a raptor, can't fly, but has an impressive vertical jump and a venomous bite.

(Also in my notes, is an Asian “Lung” Princess, who may or may not come 'a courting' in a later story.)

All this diversity makes writing an interesting exercise in world-building. How does dragon culture work? How you make a written language when half your population lacks thumbs? What about raising a family? If the mother breathes fire and the father spits hail, what will their offspring do?

A wiser author might prune back the details (or try to stop overthinking everything). Unfortunately, imprinting on dragons means I have several of their habits. When it comes to shiny trinkets or ideas, I can't make myself let go. 

 In the end, I just adopted the attitude that if a bumblebee can bend aerodynamics' known laws, Mundus dragons will gleefully twist the laws of genetics into Non-Euclidean shapes.

Why do I write about dragons?

Dragons can be anything; that gives me the freedom to tell whatever kind of story I want.

Overthinking: Fairy Godparents

 

Rough Drafts and Rough Truths

As I work through rewriting 'Tales of Mundus,' I keep stumbling over my younger self's thought patterns and prejudices. Some of it is pretty random. However, there's several ideas that just need a little polish.

Recently, I rediscovered one of my characters - Maman Josephine, retired fairy godmother. This pint-size fearless woman embodies the best in all the 'Old Southern Gals' I've met. She homesteads, keeps goats, and is more than willing to smack a snooping dragon away from the gumbo pot with her ladle.

Maman Josephine doesn't do tiny wings, bubble travel, or sing Bibbty-Bobbity-Boo. There's actually some question to if there's anything 'fairy' about her. However, she is definitely a right, proper godmother for my world of Mundus. (She's more likely to shame the evil-step family in public than turn vegetables into carriages.)

In hindsight, I can see that my over-complicated childhood left deep marks on the idea of 'how godparents should behave.' Unlike many children, I KNEW the original purpose of godparents. It's not just a religious tradition, or  two of your parents friends that give you extra presents.

Godparents are the people who protect you if something happens to your parents.

Some Perspective

I remember serious talks with Mom and Dad about, “what do I do if you die?” Yes, four is a bit young to want to know about those things. However, thirty-three is a bit young for a daddy to develop colon cancer. I actually remember the paper signing that would give 'Uncle Art and Aunt Susie' custody of me and my baby siblings. We would not be orphans or street rats trying to outsmart evil adults (like half the protagonists in the Disney movies).

God-parenting wasn't something in a fairytale. I had real life people making real life plans. Those plans did not include leaving children to struggle. Art and Susie would fight tooth and nail for me.

In comparison, Ms. Bitty-Boppity-Boo, and even Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather were all flash and no follow through. Yes, they fixed the crisis with magic, but they broke the first rule. Don't leave the kid to flounder - not just physically, emotionally counts too.

Changed her name. Shattered her worldview. Left her crying in a dressing room
Not how you do a sixteenth birthday, ladies.

Good Drama vs. Good Parenting

As I grew, the media portrayal of godparents didn't get any better. There was Nickelodeon's Wanda and Cosmos, the magic vending machines. Sirius Black, from the Harry Potter series, also gives gifts, and then dies. The adults weren't doing their jobs.

The one gem I found was Mandy from Gail Carson Levine's Ella Enchanted. She helps Ella find the loopholes in her 'gift' of obedience, negotiates with the step-family, and comforts Ella when things fall apart. She's a bulwark and advisor to a growing woman.

I've thumbed through the old stories, and Mandy is actually the closest to the original archetype. God-parents and helpful 'old folk' do not typical show up in the middle of the quest. They advise the hero at the beginning of the journey. They even the odds when the villain asks impossible riddles or sets impossible tasks.

Godparents are protectors. Mundus isn't as perilous as some stories, but competent adults are always scare. As a veteran, Maman Josephine has dealt with everything - from christening curses to the everyday nastiness of other people. A dragon trying sneak a taste won't make her blink.

At the rewrites continue, I don't know how Maman Josephine's powers and backstory will change. However, her character is here to stay.

After all, to a child in need, a loud woman with a lock-cutter and lawyer can be more powerful than a wandering mage with a knack for creating formal-wear.

Q&A with Sarah Soon

Special Update!

My lovely writing coach Sarah Soon is hosting an authors showcase on the 14th. I'm taking part in it. This also means on the 15th I'll be in introvert burnout mode. However, all 5-ish of my followers don't deserve an empty month.

As part of the event, I did a Q&A for Sarah's blog. It talks about my work in progress Don't Fireball the Neighbors. It has been reposed here for your viewing

Special Content!

Remember that Mary Poppins drawing from last month? Well, Mrs.Soon managed to coax another sketch out of me.
Below is a self-portrait with my two main characters, Celebramar the dragon and Leon the wizard.

Celebramar, Author, and Leon

Q&A with Sarah Soon

1. What inspired you to write your WIP, Don’t Fireball The Neighbors? Share briefly how it came about.

Leon, Celebramar, and the world of Mundus started as an oral story I told to my kid brother. As I grew, the stories grew with me. Before I left for college, I had five short works. Life then got complicated.

Skipping over the traumatic back-story, I now want to become a paid, published writer. However, the older stories aren't quite a series. There's lots of inside jokes specific to my family and childhood. That means rewrites. Lots and lots of rewrites. Somehow ended up writing a brand new pilot story. Don't Fireball the Neighbors is the story of how Leon and Celebramar met.

2. You’ve shared on your blog that growing up, your parents encouraged you to read, re-enact scenes from your favorite stories, and write. How did your childhood spur your desire to write stories as an adult?

Truthfully, that the desire never stopped. Stories have always meant safety for me. As a child, I was very bright, but very socially awkward. However, through stories, I could see different ways to behave and act. Make-believe isn't just escapism, it can be a learning tool.

Also, telling stories, was much, much easier than “just get out there and play with the other kids.” I didn't have to triple check my words and tone. The tale had already picked them out. Listening to other people's stories was easier than voicing an opinion on clothes I didn't like or a sport I didn't play.

I socialize by telling stories because I've had years of positive reinforcement from it. I use the written word because it translates my ideas better than me trying to speak or draw. Becoming an author is just trying to turn a lifestyle into a career.

3. What’s a major factor to writing for Middle Grade readers vs. Young Adult readers?

Officially, the difference between the the two genres are how romance, profanity, and violence are shown. I don't cover those in my work. Instead I touch on fraud, prejudice, and bureaucracy. It's hard to use some these themes without draining all the whimsy out of Mundus. (Readers that come for light entertainment don't like it when you soapbox at them.)

Also, I don't know if I can get away with putting 'grown-up' issues in the background of a Middle Grade book. I doubt it'll be an issue for my preteen readers. However, I worry that the parents of those preteens won't buy my work because how I present these issues offends them.

3. You’ve got intriguing protagonists in your WIP, Don’t Fireball The Neighbors. Tell us about your two main characters especially with the Middle Grade reader in mind.

Celebramar is a large dragon with a larger appetite. Normally, he has a “live and let be” view about humans. However, they won't let him and his pile of treasure be. Imagine someone swiping the quilt your grandma made and sell it at an antiques auction. Celebramar's patience is about to go up in smoke.

Leon is a wizard who wants to open a magic items repair shop. He would be happy to spend the rest of his life sharpening enchanted swords and patching flying carpets. Instead, Leon is stuck as an unpaid handyman in a half-finished frontier town. Shortages abound and the townspeople are getting frustrated. Leon's weary of demands to “just magic it fixed.”

4. Madeline Engle said, “You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children.” What is the main lesson you want your MG readers to take away from this story?

Without spoiling too much of the plot? Basically, walking away is sometimes the better option.

Both Leon and Celebramar deal with several 'rude' neighbors. Both main characters have the power to be very dangerous. Leon is a professional wizard. Celebramar can literally spit fire when mad. However, setting your problems on fire isn't always the best way.

5. What do you have next after you publish this story?

Take the criticism and reviews with a grain of salt. Focus on the next story.

I want to expand on the world of Mundus. So I'm actually rewriting that first oral story. Celebramar and Leon will visit the big city... and Celebramar will mistake a zoo for a buffet.

My Imaginary Friend... Never Showed Up?

I did not have an imaginary friend growing up. This is a bit shocking if you consider I'm an aspiring fiction writer and when you know my backstory.

Growing up, I lived in an 'older' neighborhood with no kids in walking distance, plus I was homeschooled. Not that I minded making friends with grown-ups, but there's only so much sitting and listening a young child can manage at once. There just wasn't any one my age to play with me. (I later gained a little sister at age two, and a baby brother at age five. However, siblings aren't exactly playmates.)

Also, through no fault of my parents, I had a heaping helping of stress and emotional upheaval. Years 2-6 were Dad's 'Chemo-Years.' While Dad survived, the struggle and ripple effect on the household's social, emotional, and finical status was something a young mind could not just 'roll with.' I had lost that feeling of safe and stability.

It would have been perfectly natural for an invisible friend or pet to show up. I was lonely, overwhelmed, and highly, highly imaginative. Instead, autism, the 90's boom of Disney VHS, and a dress-up bin opened a different option – I call them Personas.

Like many autistic children, I had a noticeable period of monkey-see monkey-do and speaking in T.V., quotes. What most people don't realized, I wasn't simply 'playing.' Constantly testing dialogue and behavior helped me create a 'manual' for being understood. (Yes, there were cringe-worthy mistakes made.)

Also, what kid doesn't daydream of being the hero or princess? When you can quote the entire movie, watching the film quickly becomes acting alongside with it. A dress-up box of props and old hats let me fence with Peter Pan, whistle alongside Snow White, and steal the golden arrow with Robin Hood.

Also, it was natural for an overwhelmed child to borrow bit and pieces of her favorite heroes. Peter Pan could sass mean adults, Snow White could do housework without whining, and Robin Hood looked out for others. Full costumes were scaled back into a wooden dagger, a princess bangle... or an old felt hat.

I think the imaginary friend never came because I didn't want a make-believe person to help me cope. I just pretended to be someone who could cope. These Personas grew, changed purpose, or were stored for later. It depended on what I was facing (and what my current favorite shows were). By the time I was a preteen, I'd long stopped talking in quotes and carrying props. I'd just tailor the 'theme' of my behavior as best I could.

Personas might have just become an quirky coping tool, if I hadn't started creative writing in junior high. 

One day the doodle of a chess piece turned into a tower. For some reason, I felt the tower needed a dragon on the roof - because everything is better with dragons. Later, I wondered, “What kind of person would live inside that tower?” The doodle became a short story which became two, then three, then a whole world by the time I hit college.

I'd had years of practice designing other mannerisms and speak patterns. The main characters Leon and Celebramar quickly developed strong voices and a new set of Personas. I found my inner-wizard and inner-dragon through writing. No, I am certainty not a enchanted-item repair specialist or a carnivorous reptile. However, I know their reactions and mannerisms as well as my own.

I know Leon loves that little 'aha,' moment you put the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle together. I know he thinks the pomp and gaudiness of 'court magicians' miss the point of learning magic in the first place. I know Celebramar likes trying cooked foods, even vegetables. I know he views treasure hunters like antique dealers who try to steal that quilt your grandmother made and auction it for money.

Stepping into a fictional viewpoint feels no different that pulling a costume of the dress-up box. Sometimes, it seems like I'm writing a family newsletter instead of make-believe short stories. Both Leon and Celebramar feel real to me.

Now, when I say 'real,' I don't mean living and breathing real. They don't talk to me or typically have opinions on my daily life. Occasionally, I feel dragon-ish but I seldom find myself thinking “What would Celebramar do?”

My mind is an interesting place. It's full of random facts, memories, daydreams, and more Personas that I can list; however, there's no question that it's all me in here. I don't think there's any room left for an imaginary friend.

Overthinking: Mermaids (...and their male counterparts)

Mermaids are a fantasy staple. The charming, Atlantica princesses who romance sailors and their dark counterparts in Peter Pan who will 'sweetly drown you if you get too close,' they embody beauty and the mystery of the ocean.

Of course, my brain had to ruin the moment, “Why don't the human bits go all pruney from soaking in the water?” 

Much like the centaur question, this thought won't go away. If Tales of Mundus was to have any type of Merfolk, I needed for them to make sense. 

The more I thought about it, the more problems I found. Mundus is a situational comedy. A wandering Disney heroine won't make it three steps through the woods before tripping into a prickle bush or a hidden gofer hole. My merfolk need a proper epidermis to put up with sand, silt, litter and toothy creatures.

Unfortunately, the first scaleless fish I thought of was the catfish. They are smooth; they're also snotty. (Not to be confused with snooty) The attractiveness of a mermaid princess with a protective coat of mucus is well below sea-level.

Shark skin is a bit better. It looks smooth and counts for the exotic factor. Texture wise though, sharks are rougher to the touch than humans.

So I turned to aquatic mammals, dolphins and seals. However, the merfolk mystic still suffers when they're rubbery to the touch or covered in a waterproof fur, respectively. Whales are reported to have a very smooth skin. (Apparently the bumps and barnacles develop like teen acne.)

I can work with shark or whale skinned merfolk. However, my runnaway brain isn't done nitpicking. The next target - hair.  (T_T)

My personal experience from swimming with long, loose hair is that it's a tangle hazard. To make Ariel's flowing locks work, I'd have to design Mundus merfolk with 'hair' that's a semi-responsive collection of micro-tentacles, like jelly fish.

Eye lashes and eyebrows are yet another problem. They're not as effective at protecting an underwater eye. However, a ingratiating membrane, like frogs have, pushes mermaids from exotic to creepy and alien.

I feel like I'm playing Frankenstein. However, just can't make the classic mermaid make sense. It's not a functional for life in Mundus. My merfolk need to hunt and farm, build fish traps, trade with land dwellers for refined metal tools, plus develop arts and written language. Yes, they're just side characters, but this is a functioning civilization! 

…somedays, my brain doesn't just follow the overthinker stereotype. No, it sticks a marshal hat and baton on the stereotype and gleefully plays 'Oom-pah! Oom-pah!” with a full band. (-_-;)

Overthinking: World Building

Great fantasy books come with gorgeous maps – Lord of the Rings, The Wheel of Time, Game of Thrones. My WIP, Tales of Mundus does not.

It's not from lack of trying on my part.

On the mirco-scale, I have 'mapped' bits of Mundus. I know what's around Leon and Celebramar's lake and the general direction to big cities and different ecological zones. (Mainly so that I can keep track of what the dragon Celebramar eats.)

On the marco-scale, I keep tripping over my education. I try to map out anything bigger than a neighborhood and I start thinking like an environmental engineer.

A typical world building exercise challenges the storyteller to think about plant and animal life, terrain, and seasonal weather cycles. In my mind, that's just window dressing. The land itself is shaped by plate tectonics, glacier drifted, and the ocean tides. In short, I can't just doodle a coast line and it feel 'right.' (As much as I enjoy Middle Earth, Tolkien had a habit of using mountain ranges like picket fences.)

There's also the anthropological side to consider. Cultures are shaped by the land. Oklahoma folklore has no sea monsters or vampires. We have Thunderbirds, heralds of the storms, and the trickster Old Man Coyote who laughs in the night.

Mundus is a magpie collection of mythos and characters. They need their native habitats, or they lose something in translation. Centaurs don't work in boglands. Everyone also needs plenty of space. Being 'culture siblings' doesn't mean any two races will get along. Imagine Elrond the Half-Elf trying to share space with Tinkerbell. Those picket mountains are starting to look attractive.

I've started, scrapped, then restarted the 'map' of Mundus several times. It's an exercise in frustration. Frankly, I'd rather spent time writing about the characters than fighting my brain. I have notes on which races and cultures are neighbors with how easy it is for people to travel. Anything more than that and I start building bio-domes (Start at both ice capes and work to match along the equator.)

There's also part of me that thinks it is good for parts of Mundus to remain Terra Incognita. A blank spot on the map is a challenge and promise that you haven't see everything.

My education emphasized structure and systems, but a good scientist has a strong sense of curiosity. All my good ideas come from letting my mind wander off the beaten path. Do centaurs wear horseshoes? Can dragons get sinus infections?

Tales of Mundus won't be published with a typical fantasy map. However, if it does get one, I pity the artist/cartographer who get roped into helping me.

First Draft Analysis and Other Unpleasant Things.

About a week ago, I finished the rough draft of Tales of Mundus: The Gingerbread Incident. I then realized why it had been such a bear to write. It's the wrong story.

Short stories are very demanding in how you use the reader's attention. You're on a tight format. A big sprawling neighbor picnic is good for exploring the world, but not for building a connection with the main characters. It's definitely the wrong story.

There also the matter of trying to write slice-of-life comedy. The Gingerbread Incident introduces too many topics at once. As a short story, it's a rushed read. There's a difference between rushed narration and quick paced humor.

Basically, it's the wrong plot to be a 'pilot' episode.

Another point against this draft, it that is won't hook an agent. The conflict and plot are solid, but don't stand out.

While I'm not sure if I want to go the traditional publishing route, attracting an agent is a benchmark to me. Getting an agent means there's at least a niche market out there. That means multiple readers who would enjoy the series. (It also means I become a PAID storyteller.)

To add insult to injury, the characters are needling me. They want to show off.

“I'm a dragon,” Celebramar points out, “People see that word and expect a thrilling story. If you don't follow through, they'll flame you.”
“You also didn't establish us as complex characters,” Leon pipes up, “You kind of just attached the camera over my shoulder and filmed the picnic... not that it wasn't interesting. But... you can do better.”

-_-; (My inner world is a very busy place.)

Mental health aside, I've come to an unpleasant conclusion. I need to put this draft into the maturing bin, hunt down my good pen, and start anew.

Why Mundus doesn't have Dark Lords... or Dark Ladies

Short stories are challenging to write, however Tales of Mundus doesn't work as anything else. Stories are about conflict, and Leon and Celebramar just don't do epic quests.

I've TRIED to create longer plots, really. (Writer's block should not involve my own characters forming a picket line around the imagination part of my brain.) The closest thing Mundus has to an antagonist is a Fey queen with a grudge against the dragon. However, she just isn't 'wicked' enough to be a re-according problem.

Mundus refuses to have Big Bads. It's not a utopia or even a violence free world. Nevertheless, I just can't work an Dark Lord into current events.

There were Evil Empresses and Mad Sorcerers, but they got vanquished at least thirty to forty years before Leon was born. I also don't see the people of Mundus letting more take root. (You try setting up a dictatorship when a nosy fairy-godmother can wander though and befriend your serfs.)

Also, the whole point of Mundus was to watch how wizards and dragons live when there's NOT an epic quest. What do they do with all that extra time? Do they have hobbies, steady jobs? Order groceries, homestead? (Plus, the thought of Celebramar trying to visit a butcher shop is much more interesting than him fighting a frost giant or whatever.)

Tales of Mundus feels right as a semi-connected short story anthology. The only way I think it will every be a long plot with a set villain is if Disney manages trick me into a contract -_-;

Overthinking: Magic in Fiction

As a self-described cultural magpie, I shamelessly grab any interesting ideas. My current project 'The Gingerbread Incident' has a European dragon (four legs, wings, horns, breathes fire) eating gumbo along side a centaur and retired fairy-godmother.

However, the other half of my brain demands order. Good thing too. If I want to avoid writing myself into a corner or creeping power thresholds (think about Dragonball and DBZ), I have to sort my horde of ideas and pick how to weave them into a whole.

Writing fantasy is both simple and complex. As a writer you can do anything but the audience may not buy it. Fantasy is an agreement for the reader to suspend disbelief on 'x' 'y' or 'z' in exchange for entertainment.

When you world build a fantasy, ask yourself two questions. What is the plot purpose of magic/science/etc? Is the system understandable to my audience?

In the old European folktales, heroes only get magic as gifts or punishments from 'wise old people;' instant and dramatic karma. Meanwhile the alchemy of Fullmetal Alchemist is both McGuffin and a morality play added plus a lovely helping of visual whoa. The users' power is only limited by their investments and wisdom. In Star Wars, the Force is a mystic energy that amplifies and refines the wielder's emotion; it takes the story's heroes and villains to galaxy changing levels.

All of these are nice systems, however Mundus includes...

...fairy-godmothers, werewolves, genies, treenuts-stuffed-with-dresses, fey music, lucky numbers, umbrellas that become sentient after a hundred years, colleges of mages, hermit sages, fire-breathing dragons and repairmen wizards.

My options were to drop ideas or tailor Mundus so everyone could fit. I'm not going to just wave my hand and say 'it's make-believe' - I hated stories like that as child. However, even my overthinking brain baulked at developing an origin/creation back-story. (Mundus is a whimsical world and Tolkien did it better.)

I've always known how I wanted the magic to work, but it's been a long while before I could put the idea in sensible(ish) words.

In Mundus magic is like math. It's a tool, it's effects everything people do and not always obviously. It goes from simple addition and subtraction to complex theoretical equations. Anyone can learn it – most people give up after the basics and some are just weirdly good at it.

Now, how math works makes a very poor story; thankfully, Mundus is about people. The people of Mundus react to magic the same way a group of college students react to statistics: “Better you than me,” “Thank goodness, my career doesn't require that,” “I just have to know enough to pass,” “It's worth the time it takes to master,” and, of course, “Why is everyone fussing, can't you see the patterns?”

Leon (the co-protagonist) falls into the 'studied hard' category – most wizards, witches, and human magic users do. Naiads who control streams or a hunter who can smell curses use 'knack' magic – they have with an unteachable instinct that they refine over time.

This system isn't perfect, or particularly original. However, my organized brain is happy enough to let the creative side go wild. Now if only the characters' dialogue was half as cooperative -_-;

Overthinking: Names

The human co-protagonist in Tales of Mundus, Leon, has been part of my imagination since 2003. He originally had a long and complicated fantasy name, but nobody but Dad and I could pronounce it right. Picking a new name should have been simple...

...of course I over-thought the whole process.

In genre fiction, names are a two edged sword. It cues the reader into the world type. Gandalf the Grey is a title as much as a name. It fits in a world of descriptive names and foreign languages. Mundus is not high fantasy – I needed something a bit more causal.

On the other hand, I didn't want a diminutive like Tim, Will, etc. or worse something that could turn into a nickname. Timmy the wizard sounds like a preteen boy running wild around the castle with the royal children. That just wouldn't do.

I also didn't want a name that symbolized something weird. Every name has roots in real words. Loren comes from Lorene which tracks back to the Latin word for the laurel tree. There's also cultural baggage with names. Consider about the surname Lear. Most of my generation will either think about King Lear from the play or Learjet the airplane makers.

All this factoids and names requirements made quite the mess out of my notes. For a while, Leon didn't have a 'name.' I just thought of him as wizard-who-needs-a-new-name. (It was very awkward to talk about my projects during those days.)

Finally, I went with my gut and used my dad's middle name, Leon. Surprising, it passed all my tests. Leon is not overly common or formal. It's suitable for a grown man in most cultures. If you break it down it's either a translation of 'lion' or a variant of of Leonidas. (I only though about the Greek version because of all the legends I read.)

Most importantly, people can pronounce it right.