Blog Entry #1

“Hey, Dad…how come you don’t write anymore?” The question came from my 11-year-old daughter in the middle of a round of spring cleaning, and I didn’t really have a good answer for it. We were going through some old boxes, and happened upon a collection of plays, short stories and even an unfinished novel or two from my days in high school and college. Back then my head had been swimming with ideas, and writing had been a therapeutic way of dealing with the stresses and complexities of life. But other things constantly got in the way, especially when it came to actually finishing a full-length novel. Everything got shoved down in the bottom of a box and forgotten. Confronted with it once again, the only answer I could think of was “I don’t know.”

“Well, you should,” she said matter-of-factly. “I think you could come up with a really good idea for a book.” God bless the honesty of children. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that she might be onto something. It couldn’t hurt to try again. The worst thing that could happen would be another unfinished novel tossed into the box. It stood before me like a challenge, beckoning me forward. All I needed was the proper inspiration. And then it hit me…my daughter Sarah loved reading works of fantasy, especially things like the Harry Potter books. What if I wrote something that I thought might appeal to her and other kids her age? Something set in a magical fantasy world, with mythical creatures and powerful spells…heroes and goblins and swordfights aplenty. That’s where the idea behind The Fortana Chronicles came from.

To be clear, Fortana is not the name of the world in which these stories take place, merely a small village that serves as the home base for main characters Amelia Bell and Gabriel Smith. Most of the action in the first book, The Starlight Crystal, takes place in and around the village itself. This choice was deliberate on my part, in order to introduce the principal players and keep them grounded in a smaller conflict that would neither overwhelm them or the reader. The second book in the series, The Dragon’s Fury, takes the story far beyond the limits of Fortana and expands the conflict considerably, taking advantage of the first novel’s cast of characters and developing them further.

The Starlight Crystal was a joy to write, and the characters seemed to take on a life of their own as their story progressed. Amelia quickly grew from a sheltered and somewhat impulsive young woman into a confident, capable mage. Her relationship with the enigmatic warrior Gabriel also developed rapidly, becoming a defining aspect of the entire series. Before I knew it, I had a complete narrative in place…and I finally fulfilled my lifelong dream of finishing a full-length novel. Now, with two books under my belt and a third nearing completion in the very near future, it feels like the sky’s the limit! I thank you for joining me on this journey, and I can’t wait to give you a deeper dive into the world of The Fortana Chronicles!

Dave