Writing from the Brink

The last time I "really" worked on book two in the Camp Fae series was back in February. After I finished Book One, The Triskaidek, I started plowing my way forward into book two. I got numerous characters developed, several sub-plots mapped out, numerous twists and turns, invented several more magical purposes of various elemental objects, and got much of the main plot worked out. Then I wrote the first 60+ pages of the book, tentatively titled "Pixie Wars."

To give you a few secrets, as mere teasers, I can tell you about several new things coming in book two. For one pixies (obviously) will be an important new group of characters, dragons will be another, we are going international for the first time, with faeries from at least one foreign country visiting Camp Fae, and we are going interplanetary for the first time, with a couple of brief scenes that takes place on the moon of one of the other planets in our solar system. We will also be encountering the game of Turtle Snap in this book, a game I described on my Facebook page about 9 months ago, before I was even finished with book one. (There was no place to fit it in book one, but it fits in nicely in book two helping me advance the plot, and helping me advance the setting when it comes to technology which is going to become increasingly important in the future books.)

Fortunately, I believe I can tell you all of that without really introducing any spoilers. Next I can tell you that Alley is going to be discovering more about her family: who is she? Who are her real parents? Why is it that she has so much more magical power than many other fairies? But, alas, right now I can only hint at the fact that these things are coming in book two.

The good news, exciting news, great news, really, is that I've finally started working really hard on book two, after taking a break since February. I haven't been idle these past several months. Many of you know I've been making videos which has been great fun, but has also helped me to design my fairy characters more substantially, since I've had real kids and real costumes and real elemental substances to play with. I've been working on creating my own little fairy pavilion, which will be my booth at FaerieWorlds festival later this month in Eugene, but the fairy pavilion is sitting in my back yard right now, and what better place for me to sit and write, no?

I've also been doing a lot of social networking with my fans and potential fans, kids of all ages (including the supposedly "grown up" type) and that has helped me get in touch with some of the more personal, even emotional, triggers of my target audience. In a word, we are going to be advancing the romantic and tragic aspects of the story too as we move forward.

What I'm aiming at here is plot-driven fiction, but with characters that are real, ring true, and "understand" what my target audience is going through. Think something half-way between 39 Clues, the Twilight Series, and the Harry Potter books.

Well, last week I had a major break-through in terms of how I was going to intertwine the more romantic and emotional aspects of the story with the plot, and I've got some great ideas. Today was the first day I really had time to sit down and work on rewriting the first 60 pages, and writing several more. I'm looking forward to more of this as the summer moves along. I feel as if I'm now on the brink of something great, something new, something yet undiscovered and unexplored, but finally starting to get fully mapped out. It's going to be great fun as I leap off this edge and soar forward across the treetops, and hopefully into your dreams.

See you there.

Basil