This is a story about injustice and fate. It encompasses time and reality. It allows the world to be more than it is. Imagine, so many lifetimes ago, a world where we knew the gods we worshipped. We walked with them and they guided us through a turbulent but ultimately fruitful life. They were our friends and as devoted to us as we were to them. We knew each god as the bringer of life for a race of people that we may or may not know. These gods needed our love and loved us in turn for it. That is what I propose we once had in this series. Until a war broke out. But not a war in the way that we know it to be. This was a cosmic struggle. The heavens themselves turned against us. One god decided to rule as the sole God. Monotheism was born when a winner was clear among the heavens. He rules on high and is able to keep his throne by starving the other gods of their follower's devotion. He banished the very mention of the god's names and even locked them away in our plane of existence to suffer for the rest of time. A god will always be a god and being that close to the beings they have created allows them some powers. A whisper here and a cleverly placed dream there... eventually they can change the world. As time passes, stories turn to myth and myths turn to legend until all but the most desperate are willing to venture forth and do what is needed to save everything we don't realize hold dear. A Boy Remembers By Elizabeth Patrick Back Cover Our story begins with a little boy who just lost his parents. Why Him? Why this man with no name? Because He is the last hope of a starving god. Because this god needed a soldier, someone to right the wrongs of a world that does not know the true extent of its own problems. A man such as this is not born. A man like that is created. He is molded by all of the unkindness that His broken life has to offer. If that unkindness is carefully cultivated and executed by stewards of this world then who can say what is truly wrong? His story is not a happy one but perhaps His unhappiness will be worth the good that is created. That is the gamble that His patron god has chosen to wager. The gods use their chosen hard. But, do they choose unwisely at times or do they simply enjoy their intrigue? There is obviously a lot more to the story, this is just the broad strokes. Most of the information above, the reader doesn't find out until much later in the series. The first book is about a young boy named Feldun who becomes a follower of the goddess Qanna and an assassin in her name after his city is destroyed. From that point on, he is trained to kill. Revenge and hate corrupt his life and mind. He becomes a puppet for this goddess when he murders a man in cold blood. A mindless state of doing and praying to a goddess who yearns for his demise. Feldun turns into a killer for hire. An unquestioning tool for Qanna, all the while believing she is his salvation. After his mentor abruptly leaves, Feldun goes on a hunt for his aunt the only family he has left. He finds out that his father might have known a secret that caused the attack and he begins the long journey of finding out who murdered everyone he knew. Because this is the first book in the series, it's much like a pilot episode for a TV series. This is where I establish the groundwork and characters. socialization and politics. religion and zealots. There are multiple races and power structures in play. The main bad-guy of the series doesn't actually make himself known until the second book. I have been writing this series for almost 12 years now. Over the years it has changed so much that the original story does not relate beyond having similar characters. I contribute this more to my mental-growth than to anything else. With this growth, the story has grown as well. It now encompasses multiple books and plots and sub-plots. So many characters and fascinating twists and turns. I am thrilled with the progress that has been made but it has many years in the making. I thought I would be published by now but I know that this action is a long way down the road. Today was a milestone. My first manuscript's word-count is now higher than the word count for the outline of all the books combined as well as the character sheets and notes on certain subjects pertaining to the story. I find myself prideful over this small milestone. Issues that still need to be solved The most pressing issue that I need to figure out is how a large group of about 10-20 would easily and quickly travel through a dense forest without leaving much of a trail to follow. Wagons would not work obviously and horses are easily tracked. That's the fastest way of travel in this world. However, elves are interesting creatures and coexist with their surroundings in many ways. I must do more research. I have thought that maybe the elves sing to the trees and the branches form a path above the ground. This would keep people from following them to their secret places. What I worry about is it coming across as too mystic or unreasonable. There is also the religion. This requires my readers to have a bit of back story. I am trying to accomplish this by telling stories within dreams as well as the act of teaching children the stories of their race. However, I need to establish certain reasonings within the religions to make rituals and wars make sense. Lately, I have been reading about the religions of the world to help with writing rituals and seeing what extents an encompassing religion could push someone to. Politics also play a role in the books and will shape events.
I would take a look at John Milton's Paradise Lost. To say it's a dense read is a severe understatement, but all the devil parts are entirely worth it. In hell there, all the "pagan" gods are also present, banished with Lucifer himself. It paints the devil in a very different light and sounds very much like what you have here. Also, for the forest bit,the best way to have people move quickly through dense forest is either druid/elf magic (kind of negating), or I like rangers specifically taught to do just this. Fast travel in forest is only for those long trained.
Well, I have to say the premise, as you've presented it here, sounds fascinating. I like that you're working to make it plausible (like traveling quickly through dense forest) as well as mapping out the supernatural elements as well. My suggestion, about how to present the religion, is to do it through the eyes of your characters. How does Feldun see his relationship to his religion? It's easier to paint a picture for your readers if you do it with a character. Just keep track of what you're doing, so you don't end up contradicting yourself. But what does he know about what has happened to the gods. What does he need to know, in order to keep going? And what about your goddess Quana? Will you use her POV in the story? If so, how does she see the situation? It might be a good way to present the religion, if you were planning to use both of them as POV characters. One might be essentially clueless, the other is kind of in the thick of it and pulling Feldun's strings. I'd maybe use your introduction, as you've presented it here (more or less) as a short prologue. But then shift quickly into a much more personal perspective, no matter how many POV characters you might end up using. Let the readers see ONLY what these characters see. Let the reader begin to put the picture together that way. When you are all done writing (at least the first book) you can go back and tweak the thing. Fill in gaps that might need filling, when it comes to the reader knowing what is going on. But I'd say don't overexplain, especially at the start. Anything that comes across as an infodump is likely to get discarded or skipped over anyway. So use a character. What do they see happening? What do they think causes these things to happen?
Thank you for the helpful suggestions and information. It's good for me to have an outside perspective. I've found I do my best thinking when I am trying to explain the book to others rather than just sitting down and making myself think about it. Plausibility is the most important aspect of the story. I plan to tie it into today's monotheistic society and make the readers think about the world around them by the end of it. The goal to change the world haha. Or at the very least, open minds to other ways of thinking and doing. The gods don't directly interact with anyone or have their own POV until much later in the series. Even that is few and far between until one of them gets loose. The only thing the readers know in the first book is that feldun is a little boy who lost his family and becomes an assassin. The story they are reading is his quest to find who ordered his parent's death. All of the religious babble is background noise with small moments of intense questioning from the discerning reader. (at least that is the goal lol). He sees religion as a way to control himself and become better than everything around him. He uses his goddess as a moral compass. That compass is just fucked up because she is essentially the devil but she is not the god that deposed all the others So, I am needing to show just how much a life can be damaged while thinking you are following the true and moral path. Without being to pinpoint why the bad things keep occurring. I plan to paint this picture with the character of Feldun and others. It's all so interconnected that it is hard to explain without just giving my manuscript out. I'm not a subtle creature but my books are made with layers of subtly that even I am not fully aware of yet. It's like I'm putting together a puzzle and all I have are blotches of story with wide chasms between each section. I know they connect it's just a matter of how and when and why which just adds more layers to it as it goes. Not more books. Just more of this fabled story. It's been driving me mad. I'm like a dog with a bone except the bone is a mental worry-stone that slowly reveals itself.
Thank you, I just downloaded the book. I will put it in my "study pile" I have been trying to stay away from the well known concepts of elves. The elves have messed up along the way and lost their connection to their power... The best way to explain this is: The land they live in, the land the story takes place in is not their land. Not their home. They can't function like normal elves and are often taken advantage of in this society. The original elven settlers in this land were criminals of their race. They were exiled and can never return. neither can their offspring. once again, something that is not revealed until later.
All well-done, truly evil characters believe they are doing what is right, and what is necessary. If you want to find how low you can go while being on the "right" path, look no further than the bottom.
You don't need to read it in its entirety, but I would really focus on chapters three, and I think chapter five. Basically the hell chapters. The Adam and Eve business, especially the naming of the animals, is just plodding.
