Powers of the Windemere Sky: Radical Riders

Pegasus and Kratos

I figured I should discuss the Windemere ‘air forces’ since I touched on land and sea already.  Pretty sure I have a bunch of people wanting me to get this whole thing over with, but I push for equality.  That and these might not be very long.  After all, there isn’t much up in the skies when it comes to combat and protection.  The first category alone might not take much.

Now, the ‘Riders’ are warriors that use a flying mount.  Griffin riders are the most common and are considered the special forces of Gaia.  This puts them with the army since the soldiers have guard duties and patrols.  Just so happens that they do a lot of that from among the clouds.  Special gear is included with this career, which is better than the handful of other rider-types.  There are some wild tribes that use rocs, wyverns, giant bats, and perytons for combat and traveling.  Most of these animals are difficult because they lack the friendly nature of the griffins.

You might be wondering about Pegasus and Dragons too.  Well, the first is a very rare animal that will only let certain people ride them.  It seems each one has a different preference too.  One Pegasus might only allow virgin girls on its back while another goes for veteran male warriors.  This is determined by their nature since they are attracted by hearts and spirits that are similar to their own.  Now, they might approach someone that is different, but they won’t give a ride.  As for Dragons . . . anyone riding one of those has typically been chosen and is involved in a special circumstance.  A dragon has to REALLY like you or consider you an equal or superior.  This is in regards to constant riding because they will help with a ride if asked politely.  (Note:  I only mean Nature Dragons.  Weapon Dragons will eat you no matter how nicely you ask for a ride.)

There will be griffin riders getting involved in events, but only if Gaia is part of the story.  A downside to these types of characters is that they’re on territorial beasts.  Very few riding animals wander outside of their comfort zone, which can be a city or a specific mountain range.  You need to give them a reason and they don’t care about adventure like their two-legged counterparts.  Perhaps the easiest way to have a flying mount that will travel with you is to raise one from birth and not let it interact with others of its species.  This will make it think you’re it’s family and negate some of the learned instincts.  It’s also a horrible thing to do to an animal.  If the baby was orphaned and you can’t find others then okay, but never do this for your own purposes.

A final tidbit on the flying forces.  Many tend to be at a disadvantage when it comes to navies.  They can handle armies, but once a battle goes out to sea, most winged animals tend to get nervous.  As mentioned in The Compass Key, griffins have learned that they can get tangled in the rigging of a ship.  The ropes can then break and they’ll fall into the water where they drown.  Wet wings also make it difficult to get back in the air, which leaves them vulnerable to sharks, the tide, and enemy fire.  This is why they try to stay away from even a docked ship, which means the rider has to be able to fight from afar if the battle goes away from the shore.

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Swift Six Character Interview – Spencer

eranamage's avatarLibrary of Erana

#Swiftsix #graphicnovel

Name: Spencer Abbot

CardSetTell us about yourself: (Name, race/species, etc.) Hello, there. My name is Dr. Spencer Abbot, and I (unlike most of the family I’ve married into) am mostly human. The only part of me that is not 100% natural is my lower left leg.

I’m an adventurer – why should I recruit you to accompany me? Never know when you’ll need a medic on some sort of adventure. Also, I’ve been learning magic lately, and it’s been going well. So, a mage might also be useful.

Tell us about your companions?  How do they see you? Starting with Travis, he seems to see me as a tall twig that walks and needs protection. I love the guy, but he has an even worse track record than I do in terms of staying out of trouble. Next is my wife. I’m sure she loves me, but I…

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A Perfect 10 with Ed Duncan

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Don Massenzio This week’s edition of A Perfect 10 features author Ed Duncan. He does a great job of handling the usual 10 questions. If you want to check out past interviews, you can find them in the following links: … Continue reading

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This Just In

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Return of Super Earth

Well, it took a while to unravel all of the stories, but I think I got it.  Had to drop the one story that highlighted a supporting character since I realized he didn’t have the personality to cover his own tale.  Duets and supporting cast work for Borgard, but he just doesn’t flow right as the focus.  He shows up in enough tales to make an impact and earn a spot in the finale anyway.

That part aside, I’ve moved 12 of my 43 story ideas (42 if you don’t count Dawn Addison) to Super Earth.  5 are in their own worlds like Bedlam and Dawn, so that leaves 26 Windemere tales.  14 of those are one-shots/short story collections and the rest are series of various lengths.  Legends of Windemere still takes the top spot with 15 volumes and the only ones that might come close are Sin and Clyde with their 9-10 volumes.  Sin has it a bit easier since I’ll have to pause his series whenever I hit a point where another one has to go to explain the world changes.  His books each have contained tales with a faint meta-plot and it spans a few years, so Elysium and Ruins of the Zodiac Gods have to go either in the middle of his tales or alongside.  Just look at the quote and you’ll get an idea of the chaos in my head.

Anyway, this isn’t about Windemere . . . Well, it wasn’t supposed to.  Guess the last 200+ words say otherwise.  This is to show the split for Super Earth, which didn’t take as many stories away as I expected.  Clyde and the Dawn Fangs couldn’t go back since Mab is in The Mercenary Prince.  I’m leaving the super spy in Windemere because that type of character might benefit more from being in a non-standard spy setting.  So, here we go with the division:

  1. ‘Phoenix‘-  This is the core series of 6 books/story collections that shows the heroes being awoken and getting used to being back in action.  They were put to sleep when the half-demon went berserk and nearly wiped out humanity, so him being back as a hero is a fun plot point.  He went mad when a villain killed his son.  The books are divided as their Awakening, the villains returning, new heroes appearing, monsters appearing out of nowhere, a big enemy from space that they have been preparing for, and then a final book in the aftermath of that one to close up all of the Super Earth stories.  Thinking of having ‘Phoenix’ in each title too.
  2. Savior–  This is my street level hero who stumbles onto a suit and tries to clean up a city of villains.  He has 5 books/collections and he goes through a big evolution.  I’d like to explain more, but that might be spoiler territory.  All I can say is that Savior eventually becomes a symbol more than a hero, which changes his dynamic.
  3. Jack–  Not sure how to explain him.  He’s an unstoppable fighter with a love of ice cream or soda or something sweet.  Haven’t decided.  Nobody knows about his past, but he stumbles into a bodyguard career.  This rolls out of control for a trilogy where he tries his best to not to kill anybody.  Jack is based around the Kenshin and Vash hero type that is very powerful, but refuses to take a life.
  4. Child of the Hunt–  That space bounty hunter who I could never fit into Windemere.  She currently has 5 stories, but I might give her a 6th that involves Earth.  For the most part, she stays in deep space and wouldn’t be joining the other heroes until that final ‘Phoenix’ book.
  5. Protectors–  They were the X-Men type, but now I’m not sure what they are.  This is a single book that shows a bunch of superhumans who have been gathered to protect a psychic child.  It involves a villain who wants her as a vessel and you learn that there is more to these people and their connections than you realize.  I might make this one a trilogy or longer series since it used to have a lot more stories.  Gave it 1 right now because I expected there to be more series in this one.
  6. Starlets–  Another one-shot that involves a girl who has 6 alien warrior princesses in her head.  She transforms into them to fight monsters while they try to find a way to regain their bodies.  This was always a fun, silly one that I need to check my notes on.
  7. Sutyra–  An awakened half-demon, but you don’t want to know what the other half is.  She is out to have fun and enjoy life with her pet human in tow.  Too bad her waking up is an omen for the demonic and angelic forces of Earth.  Another one-shot, but I do really want to write this character.  She’s definitely one of my more confident characters.
  8. Gearhead Princess– I’m on the fence about this one.  Originally, this story was an origin for her, but now she’s in ‘Phoenix’.  Still, I always felt that she needed her own book to handle some personal issues.  Her whole thing is being a mechanical genius who was raised on another planet by sentient computers.  So, she uses a special gun, a battle suit, a high tech motorcycle, and a giant robot.  A lot of toys can come into play with this one, which I look forward to using.
  9. Zombie Girl–  This one forced me to rewrite a Sin ally, but having necromancers and zombies in a hidden society on Earth was too much fun to pass up.  Zombie Girl herself will still be in the same mess with her being a prodigy necromancer turned into a zombie by a cursed object.  I’ll streamline this to a single book since many of her stories were drawn out unnecessarily.
  10. Lords of Hyperscape–  Not really a superhero story since it involves a video game system that puts the players’ minds in the game.  Originally, I was going to have them trapped, but .hack//sign and Sword Art Online did that.  So, I ‘m thinking of doing the ‘rag tag’ team of misfits who are out to claim the championship.  It’ll be hard to do in one book since the game works with a central hub and then you have characters for each of the genre worlds.  Might not be necessary to go into details with their avatars though.
  11. Coven of the Gray–  Witches!  Maybe . . . This was something I came up with after watching Hellboy.  It’s a group that focuses on the mystical side of Earth and the new guy in charge has no idea what’s going on.  He has help from three witches, a seer, a ghost, and a zombie-like creature.  I’m not sure what the plot for this collection will be unless I stick to ‘him getting used to his new role’.  That might be all I need for this.
  12. N.N. W.–  This stands for ‘Ninja Never Wins’ and it’s a series that mocked fighting games, but was always fun to think about.  I’d pick fighters out of a hat to set up the brackets and roll dice to see who wins.  This way, I’d never know who was the winner until I reached the end.  There might still be 6 books to this comedy series with each tournament having different rules like normal, pendants to capture, lethal, women only, duos, and world championship.  For anyone wondering about how it could keep going after lethal, it’s called cloning.  There was going to be a lot of ridiculousness in this one.  Only problem is that I have no idea where the fighter list I had has gone to, so I’ll have to do some digging.

That’s really it for Super Earth.  Sorry about the long post.  I’m still thinking about moving Tome of the Fae here.  They work in Windemere, but maybe they’ll work better as a one shot that focuses on the fairies of Central Park, New York.  Guess it’s a good thing I’ll be thinking this week.

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Swift Six Character Interview – Coel – Fantasy

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Sally’s Cafe and Bookstore – Book Reading and Interview – C.S. Boyack

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A Week of Rings, Dings, and Bings

Seriously, why was the phone ringing so much this week?  Good thing I didn’t try to pick a day to crawl back into bed after the kid got on the bus.  Wait, I did and it failed miserably, which might be why I’m a little crotchety this weekend.  It’s a 3-day weekend too, so we’ll see what happens.  Today is uneventful, birthday tomorrow, and maybe a family outing on Monday.  Depends on the weather holding.  Honestly, it just feels so draining to even think of doing stuff.

That’s why I’m considering bumming around next week and diving into the final edits of Books 14 and 15 during the first week in June.  Next weekend is the 12 year anyway, so I’ve got to focus on getting tickets to Wonder Woman.  Be nice to have energy for that, but I’ve been running on empty for a while.  Every time I gather enough focus and energy, something happens to knock me back down.  The phone rings to tear me from my thoughts, someone interrupts me for the same effect, or a mess turns up that I have to clean.  Why can’t people just think and observe before taking action?  That would make my life a little easier.

The big accomplishment was finishing the final edits on The Life & Times of Ichabod Brooks and getting some thumbs up on the blurbs.  This cleared the week for me to unravel and reorganize the superhero stuff.  It still feels weird taking them out of Windemere, but I guess they didn’t belong there anyway.  Maybe I’ll use tomorrow to show what I’ve come up with and see if anybody has any thoughts on the whole thing.  This is the last week where Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday is free.  The first 3 sections of Protecting Bedlam have been scheduled and I’m still nervous.  Will people like it?  Will people read it?  Will it give the published books any traction?  I got those ready this week too.  Oh, and all the July posts that revolve around Ichabod, including a future call for questions for him.

Guess I should mention one problem that’s come up with all of my fiddling.  There was a character who I teamed up with a Windemere secondary character, which created an interesting idea.  The problem is that she really needs to go with the other superheroes, which means she takes all of her story pieces with her.  This leaves the secondary who shows up in a few series with half a story.  It was going to be an interesting upgrade to make this villain/ally/rival/sidekick the star of his own story.  So, I have to sit down and figure out what to do because removing the whole thing means he gets blocked from the final battle of Windemere.  Even worse, the story was put in the middle of a notebook, which has it’s last grouping of pages reserved for that final battle.  I can’t fill it out until I know all the players.  Keep making more headaches for myself, so maybe next week will help me clear this one a bit.  I still have a bunch of characters who I can re-purpose for a new story to make everything work . . . maybe.

Have to admit that it does feel weird making this kind of progress.  Been a while since I worked on this type of project with any focus.  *phone rings*  Guess I can’t even say the friggin’ word.  There are still a few characters that aren’t jumping back.  Clyde and the Dawn Fangs work too well and Mab’s presence in Legends of Windemere: The Mercenary Prince locks them in.  The super spy is going to stick around because it might be interesting to have that type in a fantasy setting.  Going to miss them though, but I’m going with my gut here.  This does bring a few other series into question: Tome of the Fae, Zombie Girl (currently in Sin’s series), and Phi Beta (Might go off on its own thing) are a few.  Really launched a missile into a few things.  Yeah, I need next week for this one goal:

  1. Repair the damage!

Add-on:  Dear god, it’s worse than I thought.

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Powers of the Windemere Lands: Adorable Adventurers

Dragon Age Oracle

Don’t let the title fool you.  While some adventurers are adorable, very few of them should be trifled with.  At the very least, remember to give them a treat before petting them on the head.  Now, these characters can fall into all of the themes, but you tend to see them function predominantly on land.  A sea adventure or flying castle might turn up, but these people do a lot of walking in Windemere.  You can’t really pigeonhole them either considering they aren’t an organized group.  So, how can they be considered the third power of land?

In Allure of the Gypsies, Duke Solomon and Luke Callindor have a slight ‘encounter’ that threatens to become heated.  It doesn’t and leads to a conversation where the Duke says something that many leaders in Windemere believe.  Adventurers have the ability to change history in ways that kings and queens could only dream of.  There’s a lot of red tape and political thinking behind a ruler’s actions unless they decide to simply go charging at an enemy.  This isn’t the case with adventurers who are the ones that see a problem and set about fixing it.  Kingdoms have been altered due to the actions of adventurers, which isn’t always a good thing.  Bards have a lot of stories that involve a hero who means well and fails.

Contrary to the name, Windemere adventurers don’t always travel. It is more of a term used for people that get involved in events and have no loyalty to a kingdom or career path.  This is where they differ from a soldier who fights for country and a mercenary who fights for money.  An adventurer may be motivated by those things, but most of them want one of two things.  First, is the desire to do good by righting a wrong.  This is your simplistic hero adventurer.  Second, is a craving for adventure that tends to come with some desire for fame.  They can be spurred into action by just about anything too.  Every adventurer has their own story to tell and path to follow.

One has to remember that Windemere has a big destiny/free will system that is directed by Gabriel.  Too much of one can create an imbalance and the world will do whatever it takes to fix things.  Adventurers are the most common agents of destiny, free will, and system repair.  Here are examples for each one:

  1. Destiny- The champions who have been chosen by the gods.
  2. Free Will- Ichabod Brooks who chooses his jobs without influence.
  3. System Repair- A future character that has risen to undo destiny getting more pull than free will.

All three of these types will have some level of impact on Windemere.  This ranges from saving the entire world to rescuing a single person, which are all seen as important victories in the eyes of the adventurer.  Of course, each one has a different idea of scale in terms of adventure.  This isn’t an organized group like the armies and mercenaries.  The closest thing to this are the monster hunters who are considered an offshoot of the mercenary lifestyle.  So, the adventurers are hard to predict and both good and evil forces tend to keep an eye out for them.  It isn’t uncommon for warlords, thieves, and necrocasters to maintain lists of anyone who might wander into their territory and start trouble.  Needless to say, Ichabod Brooks tends to be in the top 3 even long after his retirement.

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Sally’s Cafe and Bookstore – New on the Shelves – Rarity from the Hollow by Robert Eggleton

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