The challenges of writing a long series & Guardian of Monsters

Bonaventure plots

 I’ve wanted to write a long series, like forever. I am a slow-ish writer and the longest series I've written to date is the Fireseed series, only two books and a sequel novella. Finally, I'm embarking on a long series, and I’ve completed book one! I will wait to launch until I have two or three books done.

Guardian of Monsters is urban fantasy, a genre I have grown to like, having penned two shared world titles in this genre (Alpha's Revenge and Secrets of the Mermaid). It’s a private investigator series, set in Savannah, and starring two supernaturals I created in my other books, Luna Finley, a mermaid and water mage, and Celestine LeBlanc, a witch and wolf-shifter. 

I just returned from a research and fact-checking trip to Savannah. I had scenes set in Bonaventure Cemetery, where I took a two-hour walking tour and discovered mistakes in my plotting. I had Celestine just walking in there at night. Turns out there’s a huge, locked fence around it. I also went to the salt marshes where I'd set scenes. Such beauty! I went to the Savannah School of Art and Design, where I set scenes, and discovered it’s the largest art school in the country, with 70 buildings scattered around the city! And who knew Savannah is the third largest port city in the USA. 

Savannah historic district porch

Anyway, it's smart to do extensive research into your subject, whether you're a plotter or pantser. Another challenge of writing a long series with romance, is that you have to find ways to keep the love interests from totally getting together. I’m used to having them commit to each other at the end of a single title novel. And since this is a PI thriller series, I want the next client to walk in at the end of each book and hire them, to intrigue readers into reading the following book. That means I have to figure out at least the rough plot of the next novel each time! 

Here’s the VERY rough blurb for book one, and some photos from Savannah.

Guardian of Monsters (Sleuths of Shadow Salon, urban fantasy PI series, Book 1)

Celestine, witch and wolf shifter has a talent for prophetic drawings. She’s shocked when she draws her landlord Ray with his eyes gouged out and a strange winged-mermaid leaning over him. Later she finds an eyeless Ray dead on the sidewalk. All she wanted to do was open a gallery, but first she must apprehend his killer. In a posthumous note, Ray wrote he wasn’t just a leather-smith but a supernatural pirate mage. Years back, his Jekyll crew trapped the evil Demon Three Eyes clan. Ray feared they’d escaped, were stalking him, and would soon wreak havoc on Savannah.

Oryn, a fellow student in Celestine’s continuing ed art class, is a fae and a thorn in her side, when he asks nosy questions about the case. Yet, she’s drawn to him when he’s her masseur at the spa she frequents, and he’s clever at brainstorming leads regarding Ray’s case. He insists his air magic could come in handy.

When pirates in Ray’s old crew are murdered, their body parts stolen, Celestine puts more horrifying clues together. She’ll need everyone on board, including Luna, a mermaid asking to show her sea-glass sculptures at Celestine’s new gallery—and the very same mermaid in Celestine’s tragic drawing of Ray. Otherwise, the lethal monstrosity Demon Three Eyes is unleashing on Savannah will destroy the city and everyone in it. 

Have you penned a long series? If so, what were some of your challenges?

Salt Marsh

A Writing Retreat - Report from this time around

I head to Cape Cod every summer for a long-standing writing retreat. I always look forward to it long before summer, and I depend on it to power my writing long after it's over. I just returned from this year's, and I'm withdrawal, though I'm also quite inspired. How do we organize it? We share the cost of VRBO or Airbnb. Then the person who communicates with the rental folks gets taken out for dinner one night. This time it was me and I chose a restaurant in Woods Hole, where all the scientists and oceanographers hang out.

The usual suspects

The perks:
Uninterrupted writing time and meditation/flow to craft story-plot-character.
Hearing my fellow authors typing away with occasional snorts of hilarity, followed by equally hilarious explanations. Laughter is always welcome.
Brainstorm sessions with the authors during morning coffee, at dinner and at beach.
After-dinner readings and helpful critiques.
Tarot Card readings and parlor games involving writing skills.
Shared "war stories", biz tips and giggles.
We take turns making dinner so we get lots of variety, and only have to cook one night.

My morning station

My afternoon station

The downsides:
A week is too short! I've just fully hit my stride when it's already time to pack it in. Having essentially five full days makes me reluctant to take any downtime to visit the local museums or glassblowing studio. I do allow swims at the beach, but little else. As a result, there's a danger of burnout, and a sore back and neck.
A hot room with inadequate or no AC.
Bug bites when eating picnic dinners.
Going around July 4th - too many scary fireworks way too close! Too much traffic.

View from the restaurant in Woods Hole, Ma.

The solutions:
Next year, rent a place for at least two weeks!
Bring along a screened tent or rent a place with a screened in porch.
Take a strong fan.
Go later in July to avoid July 4th issues, but not so late in summer that we can't take advantage of power-boost to summer writing.

What about you? Do you ever do writing retreats? If not, how do you manage to get extended blocks of writing time?

What we needed!

 

What we had

Writing Effective Non-Human Characters

In the genre of speculative fiction, we see many non-human creatures. Yes, most of the time the supernatural creatures are humanoid and/or living in a human world. But there are also those beings from other worlds or those monsters hidden in the unseen depths of our reality that aren't human in any way.

How does a human writer go about effectively portraying such a character then? Here are five tips for writing believable non-humans.

1) The character's physical traits will affect a lot of how they behave. Your non-human may be an arachnid or an alien with no bones. No matter who we are, we are limited by our physicality and the environment we live in. What advantages and disadvantages would your character's body give them? Have they enhanced their strengths? How do they cope with their bodily limitations? How does that all work in their environment?

2) The ways the character deals with their physicality will help build their culture. Our human world is build for fragile warm-blooded beings who walk on two legs and have opposable thumbs. Most things center around the visual. What if your non-human doesn't have that sense? What sort of civilization will they have built? What if there was a world built completely upon the sense of smell? All information would be carried upon scents.

3) With culture evolves ethics. Non-humans aren't going to have a black & white view of the world. They might not even have a concept of good and evil. Your character's morals could revolve around their physical traits or some divine magic. It will be central to how that character thinks.

4) Non-humans aren't going to have emotions as we know them. How they react to a situation will depend on the three things above. It is possible they don't know fear or love. Figuring out the emotional state of your character (or the non-emotional one if it's a robot!) will guide you with how they will act and react within the plot.

5) Even considering all of this, our readers are still human. We must make them relatable to humans. We need something for the readers to hook on to, even if it's just one trait. See that sea dragon above? She wants to fly in the sky. We can all relate to a desire to be more than we are.

Have you ever written non-human characters? Care to share any tips?