L.L. Stephens's Blog, page 2

LORE: The Five Cities

Five Cities did the Leur folk raise, One of Sun and One of Moon…

Readers of the Triempery series have seen the Five Cities brought up often enough to have figured out a few things and maybe want to know more.

Raised by Leur during the Golden Age of the Aryati Hegeistate, when the god-race worked in harmony with their creations, the Aryati, the Five Cities are unique in the Triempery universe: eternal, living, and beautiful.

As the series progresses, these Cities begin to feature prominently ...

Character Note: Ermenthalia

Dorilian Sordaneon’s paternal grandmother is not even named in Sordaneon. In The Kheld King, however, The Gracious Hierarchessa Ermenthalia has a major part to play.

In a story with as many characters as the Triempery Revelations series, introducing them all can be a challenge. Readers can be forgiven for glazing over if they are asked to keep track of too many. For that reason, some characters get bypassed in their first appearances and are introduced when they become more essential.

Early dr...

The Scene That Gave Me Fits

I said I would talk about scenes in The Kheld King that either gave me fits or were a hoot to write. Well, that time has come.

This is another post with SPOILERS.

SPOILERS!

If you haven’t read The Kheld King yet and don’t like knowing what’s going to happen before you get to it, skip this blog post.

SKIP TO AVOID BEING SPOILED

So.

This is post about writing. I’m going to start with a sequence of scenes that gave me fits to write. The big reason for starting with these scenes is because ...

Paper Trail

This is the tip of an iceberg: a 190,00 word/540 page published novel that covers the lives of scores of characters for a period of 14 years. It has immortal Entities, blackmailed princes, a beleaguered king, an occupied empire, and a thwarted god captive in an artifact being restored by an emerging villain.

It neatly fits within a trade paperback book. You can also read it as an ebook.

Coming soon in audio (more news about that in another post).

It started with paper. Lots of paper.

This th...

Sordaneon Family Tree

This is my effort at converting my Sordaneon ancestral chart (see below) to a digital format. I could only go back so many generations before Word Smart Art got wonky on me. Fortunately, six generations of Sordaneons is enough to show the most necessary relationships.

Two relationships I want this genealogy to show, but can't make the program do, are Dorilian's first cousins: Deleus and Tiflan. Both are sons of half-sisters of Dorilian's mother, Valyane. But every time I try to add in the siste...

LORE: Gustan Manor

I have built this Manor for many purposes, but primarily for my role as a father. A man should have a solid, comfortable place in which to house his family. As I am a King and burdened with many more responsibilities than most fathers, the house is rather a large one. But it serves very well.

Marc Frederick Stauberg-Randolph, A Royal House

When Marc Frederick Randolph arrived in the Second Creation, he did so with nothing more than the clothes on his back and the titanium willpower of a Sorda...

The Author Speaks! Or... a Podcast

Here's another first. I have podcast to share!

I confess I was a little nervous to be doing a podcast. I have been told in the past that I sound like either a school marm or a Yankee, depending on who is passing judgment, and neither suggests a person to whom anyone would want to listen for an hour.

But the invitation from ,Prickly Pens was so welcoming and nice and, hey, every author likes to talk about their work! So here is my first ever podcast!

https://www.buzzsprout.com/1844753/113542...

Character Notes: Palimia

Palimia is one of those characters who sneak into a book. You know the ones, they come to your house as the guest of a person you invited, and you end up liking them. The person you know just well enough to be able to say you know they exist. And then one day your car breaks down at a local store, and you need a jump. So you look around and there they are. Waving from their car. So you ask for a jump, or a lift, or to use their cell phone. And just like that they become part of your go-to team.

...

Character Notes

I’m introducing a new category of blog posts in which I talk about some of the characters in the Triempery Revelations novels.

These posts will look like the heading above but with the character name after it.

What facets of my characters will I talk about? It could be anything, but I will try to avoid spoilers. Naturally I will be looking first at characters from the earliest books and also those characters least likely to reveal huge plot points. Because these posts are more like snapshots...

LORE: The Seven Houses

Readers encounter the Seven Houses, the Rill cartel based in Dazunor-Rannuli, in Sordaneon, early in the Triempery series. But who are these merchant families? And why are they important?

Background—The Rill

In 2/42 — in the Second Creation, the 42nd year of the Return — Derlon, called Sordaneon, one of the sons of the gods Amynas and Leur, transformed into the ,Rill. With his transformation, Derlon created an immortal Entity that united lands and peoples widely separated by the restor...