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

Contest(s) and News

Riv Re is having an exciting contest where she's giving away excess YA Book swag. Check out Riv's contest here: http://fantasticfantasyfan.blogspot.com/2010/06/nineteen-followers-plus-one-brother.html

Meanwhile...

According to Twig, International Fairy Day never ends. I guess I will have to keep giving away free passes to Faerieworlds in Eugene OR until I run out. Buy a copy of the Triskaidek and email me that you have (with your address) and I'll send you some free passes. Be sure to tell me: what day you bought your copy of The Triskaidek and whether it was on Amazon or Lulu, your address, how many passes you want, and what day you want to attend.

Thanks!
13asil

International Faerie Day

Today is International Faerie Day. In celebration anyone who buys my book today on Amazon.com (either the physical book or the Kindle download) AND decides to follow me on this blog, I will give FREE PASSES to visit Faerie Worlds in Eugene Oregon this summer.

Here's a link to Faerie Worlds:
http://www.faerieworlds.com/

Here's a link to my book on Amazon.com:
The Triskaidek (both versions) on Amazon

Enjoy!

13asil Sprig

So much news, so little time

Wow, there's so much news I don't know where to start.

First of all, thanks to one of my followers (stalkers) I discovered that The Triskaidek is actually available already through Amazon.com (even though I haven't approved the proof.) I don't know if this means you will be pre-ordering the book if you buy one, or if they will be selling the version I had temporarily available for about 15 minutes last week before I discovered a fatal flaw in it and pulled it back off the market.

Go check it out at:
http://www.amazon.com/Triskaidek-1-Basil-Sprig/dp/145288689X/

The second most important thing in the news is that I posted late last night (or was it early this morning?) our next Camp Fae video trailer called "Mischief." It is available at Fairy Mayhem Films on YouTube. Here's a link to FMF:

http://www.youtube.com/FairyMayhemFilms

And here's the actual video embedded:



The next piece of important news is that The Triskaidek Global Book Launch Party went great! When I say that, I feel like I'm walking on water. I could feel let down that hardly anyone showed up, but I'd rather tell you at how psyched I am at the enthusiasm of the guests who were there. It was awesome! When I think about "what am I doing all this for" - it is all for YOU, my readers. You are a great bunch of people.

Let me tell you how it went. To begin with I asked my daughter and one of her friends to dress up in their fairy costumes (from the videos.) The idea was to draw attention to ourselves since we were in a public place. I was there in my cape, and my beard alone is generally enough to draw attention to myself. But when all the other kids started arriving, they were in their costumes too, and they wanted to put on jewelry and get all decked out as my particular type of fairy (you've got to read the book to understand.) You can look at the photos on my main web site if you haven't read the book and you've never seen what my fairies look like. www.campfae.org

So, by the time I started reading to the crowd there was a flock of fairies on my left, and a flock of their parents on my right. It was like there was some sort of official segregation going on that prevented kids from sitting with their parents.

I read the first chapter, and everyone clapped, and I took a dramatic bow. Then I opened it up for questions and the kids went wild. I won't tell you what they asked, because they've all read the story (many of them several times) and that would spoil things. But we had a lot of very interesting dialog. It is great these kids are so passionate about this world I've created. They were even arguing about things. I will be posting some photos of the book launch on the Camp Fae facebook page so you can see what I mean.

The kids, and their parents, and the hand full of other guests who came all got to preview the second video trailer. We had it mostly complete at the time. The only thing that wasn't finished yet was the credits. These kids were all so excited to see themselves in the video that they didn't even care about the credits.

All-in-all the book launch was an enormous success. I say it was a success not because I sold a ton of books, and not because tons of people came. I'm grateful for those who did come! I say it was a success because it was mostly a bunch of kids celebrating a story, and you can't get better than that! Inspiring young people to dream is what it is all about.

~ Basil

Video Update

Video editing is moving along, but unfortunately very slowly. We are all busy people and have real lives too! But part of it was that I needed a new voice-over introduction to continue the story a bit, and I we needed a voice-over for some parts that you couldn't hear the actor when we filmed.

Thankfully, I met with Anya (my main actress) this weekend and got about 2 hours with of voice-over recording. Unfortunately there's only one sentence, plus 3 words! :) Now I've got to spend several hours weeding out all the junk and finding the best recordings and then deliver them to my video editor. The short version is: hopefully we will have the next video ready this weekend.

Hopefully!

Stay tuned.

Writing About Fairies

When I'm out and about and people get me talking about my books, the question often comes up: "is it difficult writing about fairies?"

I have to confess, yes, it is difficult at times writing about fairies. There are days when I wonder if anyone believes anything I have to say about them.

Triskaidek Global Book Launch

The Triskaidek Global Book Launch will be at the thirteenth hour of the thireenth day of June at the Shoreline Library in Shoreline WA.

Here's a public Facebook page you can go to and RSVP to the event or get more details.

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=118560611508167

The public is welcome and invited, especially fellow writers, authors, readers, and so on.

I hope to see you there.