James R. Vernon's Blog: The Three Moons Realm, page 5

Three Moons Realm Vol 1 Free Today for the Holiday Week!

I just wanted to let everyone know that my collection of short stories is free today on Amazon.  The Three Moons Realm, Vol. 1 (Amazon link) gives a glimpse at five different and distinct lives that reside in the Three Moons Realm.  The 50 some page set of short stories would be a perfect read to break up that long car ride/flight as you travel around for the 4th of July.  And if you don’t celebrate the 4th, its still a nice read as your sitting out and enjoying the summer!

I only ask that if you download it, please leave an honest review on Amazon’s site / your blogs / and anywhere else you think would be beneficial!

 

Three Moons Realm Cover2

How much info is too much?

Now that I’ve released a set of short stories set in the Three Moons Realm here, I’m back to focusing on my full length novel set in the same world.  The hope is that the short stories get people interested in the world, start following my blogs (both this one and the one specifically for the Three Moons Realm which can be found here), and I can really build a fan base as well as receive seem helpful insights into being an author in the digital age.

So the first step again is getting people interested in the world.  To do this, I plan on giving little insights into the world on my second blog.  But this idea in itself has created a problem.  How much information do I provide and how much do I leave for my readers to find on their own?  I’ve explored a few other authors blogs, which hasn’t really helped.  Some only have blogs that focus on the author themselves, which doesn’t help me at all.  Other authors have heavily detailed blogs about the worlds they have created that really give you insights, but seem like a bit much.

My question to you, as hopefully both authors and readers, is how much information do YOU want to know going into a book?  And, more importantly, what kind of information do you want to know and what kind would you rather discover as you read?  As always I would love to hear your thoughts on the matter!

Release of my First Set of Short Stories

I just released on Amazon my first set of short stories that go along with my first full length novel set in the Three Moons Realm.  For a brief synopsis you can check out my other blog here or you can look over at the page on Amazon here.  As this is more of my author blog, I don’t want to go to much into detail about the actual stories, but I did have a great deal of fun writing them.

As I mentioned in my last post, these five characters started off as minor pieces of the world I created and were just a pet project that I worked on when I didn’t have enough time to sit down and really right for my first novel.  But as I developed their characters and integrated them more into the cultures and lives of the Three Moons Realm, they became just as important to me as the main characters in my main novel.  I always try to have an idea of what my minor characters are doing as my main character moves through the plot, but now I’m looking at those minor characters backgrounds, motivations, and desires which in turn helps me understand my main characters more.

So again, these short stories I hope have helped me become a better writer.  How knows, before my first novel is done I might have another set of short stories to release.  Overall though, I am happy with these stories and am starting to finally feel like a real writer.  Please check them out and if you do, please leave your honest feedback.  The best way for me to grow as a writer is to hear where I’m going right and where I’m going wrong.  Thanks!

Short Stories: Building Backgrounds

I recently read a short story called Wothlondia Rising 1: Distant Familiarity by Gary F. Vanucci.  It’s a short story that leads up to the events that take place in his full length novel Covenant of the Faceless Knights: Beginnings.  I really enjoyed the story (you can read my short review on Amazon here) and it made me even more interested in reading his full length book.  Of course as an aspiring author, this got me thinking.  Are short stories that give a glimpse into the world an author creates more beneficial for how they can draw a reader into the world or are they a better tool for authors to really develop their own worlds before writing a full length novel?

Distant Familiarity did a great job of drawing me in as a reader in the short twenty-some pages of material.  The story was able to develop the characters identities in my mind, as well as hint at their varied and complicated pasts.  This alone was able to draw me in and from the other reviews he has received I believe I’m not the only one.  In that aspect the story is a great way to get fantasy readers interested in the world the author created.

While writing my own story, I also have been writing a few short stories that focus on individual characters in the world I’m creating.  These stories started out being written just so I could help develop the characters personalities as well as provide practice in writing interesting and descriptive stories.  They were little blurbs that I would work on when I only had a few minutes to write or when I wanted to get down an interesting idea.  After reading one (there are a total of five short stories set in the Realm of Ashenclaw) of Gary Vanucci’s stories, I started taking my own short stories more seriously.  So now the short stories I have been working on have become a side project, something that I might finished up and put out there before finishing my own full length fantasy novel.

Its been fun taking breaks from writing my novel to work on the short stories and vice-versa.  My question to you is what do you think of short stories?  If you’re an author, do you write them to help you flesh out characters and worlds for your own use or do you also think they help draw readers into the world you’ve created.  As a fantasy novel fan and reader, do you find short stories as a good way to get more involved with a world or do you look for short stories that are more one-offs reads that have no connection to anything else you are reading?

Please leave your thoughts and opinions!

What hooks you?

The best part about fantasy/science fiction novels is how they can take you out of this world and drop you down somewhere new, surrounded by interesting characters, strange magic/technology, and new races or cultures.  Sometimes the most interesting thing about reading the first novel in a series is not what you get to see in those 300 – 600 pages, but the things that are hinted at that exist outside of the small area that the protagonists show us.  Maybe we only hear bits and pieces about a grand city of magic or technology while our lead character moves about in the surrounding villages. What if our atheist hero(ine) witnesses the after effects of a God(ess)’s wrath on a sinful village.  Or maybe villagers tell our group of travelers about an all powerful mage that fought off a whole pack of bandits with “amazing and deadly spells”.  We get hints of a much bigger world that keep us interested in seeing what happens even after we turn that last page.

My question to you is what part of the worlds you have explored do you find hooks you the most?  Is it the characters, both main and background, that you read on to learn more about?    Do new races, with their unique abilities and characteristics, keep you wondering what they will do next?  Does the running of a kingdom and the political intrigue that goes on behind the main character yet influences their lives make you turn the pages a little bit faster?  Or does an author’s creation of a system of magic that shapes a world or the strange technologies its citizens use make you preorder the next book in the series before you’ve even finished the first book?

Of course a combination of all of the above would make a very engaging world, but even having one can be the backbone for an excellent series.  For me its cultures that pop up and change from kingdom to kingdom.  Please leave me your thoughts on what parts of a story really draw you in.  I would love to hear them!

Hello world!

Hello to everyone not following my blog!  I just wanted my first post to say hello and give a general idea of what I hope to express in this blog.  For the past year I have been slowly writing my first fantasy novel.  I say slowly because with my job as a teacher and now having a almost 7 month old son, my free time has been severely limited.

But that was in the past!  I have now stepped up my game slightly, setting a goal of two pages a day minimum to start me moving.  As of now I have completed eleven first draft chapters of my novel, with my hope to have the entire first draft completed by mid- to late-summer.

In the near future I plan on updating my blog with a plot synopsis, possibly add some short stories connected to the world I am creating, and also some background to the world itself as well.  I hope to keep you entertained and interested, and would love to here from other authors and avid readers of fantasy, so feel free to say hi!

Thanks again, and welcome!