empty minds...

In front of you is a castle with a 2 walled fortress surrounding it. Battle hardened swords men, coupled with archers lay in strategic wait as catapults are set and oil boiled. The turrets are packed with knife and spear throwing warriors. It's a fortress not easily taken, but one ruled with cruelty and injustice. If taken as prisoner, you will be fed, like a rat, to the sea serpents that occupy the cove, better known as the castle's dungeon.

Behind you is a young army, willing and ready for your command to charge. It's tired, worn, weary and knowingly has to cross a mile of open meadow before even the 1st wall of the fortress is reached.

This is your last battle in this bloody war, the troops behind you are loyal to the death, but some never, till yesterday, had seen the horrors of hand to hand combat.

Your duty is to say words that will incite the courage and passion necessary, to fire the adrenaline thru their veins, enabling them to spur on and overcome the incredible and horrible odds that face them.


Hum, do you grasp the desperation of this situation? Well, Mansur (the dragon king) is in this very position, ready to lead his army to what could be a glorious victory, but feels like a horrible mistake which very well could lead everyone to their deaths.

Mansur, for the life of him, has a senior moment, which isn't fair because he's not that old for a dragon. But his mind is blank at this very crucial second when all eyes are on him to deliver that blood boiling cry of the pep yell before the charge.

So.... He needs YOUR help. actually, I need your help. I'm the one with the blank mind. I need you to share with me your favorite speech... or cry of passion. When, in history, did great men share words of passion that inspired loyalty and action? What were they? It can be a short sentence or a paragraph. you can share a tidbit or a link, I just need your thoughts!

Remember, Mansur needs to think of something quick, his whole army is counting on it!

vampire bat pitted against a Bald eagle...wait a minute!

Up until now, the "bad guy" in my book was a Vampire Bat and the ultimate "Good Guy" is a Bald Eagle. As it stands now, I am tossing around the idea of changing the Vampire bat to something more challenging for a Bald Eagle... such as perhaps a vulture/turkey buzzard or a yellow headed vulture. That, of course is helping with the whole "bad guy" feel of things since picking a vulture would be obviously a good fit for the overall appearance of a bad guy.

So, i set out to find pictures of vultures and stumbled across a fantastic picture of a King Vulture. To tell you the truth, i don't know that i had ever seen a picture, let alone even know there was such a thing as a King Vulture. With a wing span of 4 to 6.5 feet, the King vulture is the largest of all New World Vultures. Here is the link for Wikipedia... so you can see just what he looks like! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Vulture

I think, in all my wanderings, i have found the perfect guy to fill the shoes of my bad guy character: The King Vulture. He's actually slightly handsome, yet you still want to say, "Yuck" or "Blah" when you see him because you know what he is, a vulture that feasts on rotting carrion.

I will still retain, Gaster, the Vampire bat as the general of the vampire bat army, who quite possibly will be the right hand of our King Vulture. Now, this lead me to another question: What is a good name for the King Vulture?

oh, decisions, decisions... why do i do this to myself?! lol...

First Drafts...

First Drafts are always rough. For me, they end up having a plot with as many holes in it as a piece of Swiss cheese. But my characters... i fall in love with my characters. They push me, encourage me to go forward with that second draft because i know they are worth it.

That's where i am right now... working on the second draft of my novel. I would call it "The Silver shore" But I'm pretty sure that isn't going to be it's title. I don't know what will...but I'm still working on that. I'm pretty excited about my book.

In my last post, i introduced you to the two Griffon Brothers. Jasper and Montoya. Today, I want to introduce you to Basil. He is a dwarf, fully trained and versed in the art of medicinal herbs. His people may be simple, small minded, but have big hearts and knowledge of healing. Some could even say they have magical powers of healing. But ever humble, Basil will tell you that tho they find the right mixture of herbs to bring about the proper results...it was the Eagle himself who planted the herbs.

Yes... "the Eagle" is still nameless. I haven't come across an amazing name yet. I think it will be a quest of a lifetime to find the right mixture of letters that pronounce such a magical name that will give the creature the justice he deserves.

I'm still waiting for ideas... so if you have one or several... let me know!! I'd love to hear from you!

the world of creatures...

So, you can pretty much let your imagination rule while you are writing a fantasy. The characters can have any power you want them too, providing it's believable;)
For me, the biggest challenge for me is remembering every little thing each of my characters can do, on top of creating a personality to fit them. Some creatures can fly, like the griffon for instance. Actually, I LOVE griffons. They are the cross of an eagle and lion, the combination of the king of the beast and the king of the sky. The stand for the protection of the divine. In my book, there are 2 griffons that you meet, face to face. The happen to be the body guards of the respected Mansur, who, as it turns out, is of royal dragon blood.

Meet our Griffons: Jasper, is a jester, laid back, but loyal and protective. On the other hand, his older brother, Montoya, is much more serious, uptight with the same amount of, if not a little more, loyalty and protectiveness.

The other day, I went to the library and got some books out. I was pretty excited to rent a novel about a dragon family. I've been reading it and some things are interesting... but at the same time, it's a book of love and treachery. I almost could envision it as a Jane Austen, only with dragons who eat their deceased relatives. I think i was shocked when the Father died and the parson picked his eyes out, eating them as the allotted fare of the blessed parson. Even more shocking was the fact that his family was hovering in the rooms above, waiting to devour his flesh as soon as his life was gone from his body. The book is named :Tooth and Claw by Jo Walton. I am not sure that i will finish it. But it has been interesting in the least. The image that all dragons are horrid, blood thirsty creatures was reversed in the latest DreamWorks film, How to train your Dragon. My favorite character in the animation is Toothless, the Night Fury. The whole portrayal of the dragon was endearing. Drawing from the inspiration abound me in the world of fantasy, I hope to create something new. Something fun, exciting and fascinating. A book where fairies and dragons meet, griffins and Wolgars clash, and where ultimately, right triumphs over evil.

Introduction to my new book...

I'm not sure where I'm going with this fantastic story that has rumbled around my head for years, but I figured I would blog about it. I kind of hit a wall in my writing... they call it writer's block, but I must be the queen of writer's block because my brain is just not skipping past it.

The Silver Shore novel is a twist off of several situations in my life as well as, strange as it seems, several dreams as well.

Somewhere in the distance, there lay a country called, Silver Shore. The crystal, mint-blue waters of the rivers and sea lap on shores of silver sand. In this land of life and harmony, there entered creatures of the wasteland, Devil's pit, whose leader, a cruel and powerful vampire bat, sought after the blood of the purest creatures in the forest. The kingdom was overthrown and the animals and creatures went into hiding, until one day, a very special fairy was attacked. From then on, things began to change...

Here is where my book begins. It's perhaps, by far, the biggest book I have attempted to write and altho I only have 15, 000 words written of it, I am not even half way there. I honestly would like to get the 1st draft written by the end of this year and submit it to my publisher by Christmas of next year.

But, until i submit it to my publisher, I'm going to work on it...and you can feel free to offer any ideas or thoughts you have about it! On the bottom of my blog is the lists of the main characters, with the exception of the most important One. He's the one that I need YOUR help on!! He's a beautiful, majestic Bald Eagle...and he is the One that will ultimately right the wrong and restore peace back to the kingdom of Silver Shore.

However, he has no name. C.S. Lewis took the Turkish word for lion, Aslan and created an amazing character in his series of the Chronicles of Narnia. Using his idea, I searched for "Eagle" in several different languages. Here's a list of what I came up with:
Old Norse for Eagle: Arkell
Polish for eagle: Orzel
Turkish for eagle: Kartal
Arabic for Eagle: Nasr

Straying from the actual word "eagle" I searched for other ideas like: Norwegian word for strength "Styrke" or Hungarian word for warrior "Andor".

So far these are the best candidates, but if you're looking at them and saying, "None of them even come close to fitting a Bald Eagle!" then you are in the same boat as me. So, I would love to hear from you on what you think is a good name for an Eagle!