Maitri Quest

Oh boy what a week it's been. Monday was fantastic because I received my first feedback on my YA fantasy novel from my writer's group. I just joined it four weeks ago and it's been fun getting to know everyone and the projects they're working on. I have my own novel (Feronia's Fire) completely plotted out and rough drafts of about ten chapters, but last week I turned in the first half of my complete first chapter.

The most rewarding experience was that the readers enjoyed my world, they got it (except in one case where the reader just does not get fantasy at all). Considering I've spent such a long time creating this world it was gratifying indeed! I almost danced all the way home. I even reserved the domain name for the novel. It felt so good.

The rest of the week was tough. It was a week of a three day migraine for me, and very sad family health news, and just a general feeling that I didn't know what the heck I was doing with myself. Ever feel that way?

I have been so busy lately I've let my little studio become more a cave than a home, with stack of magazines, and papers and books everywhere. I laughed at the photo image on @NovelNovice's page on twitter because it looks a bit similar to the stack sitting at my feet in height, but mine includes Beautiful Creatures (@mstohl for co-author Margaret Stohl on Twitter), Incarceron, Foundling, Lamplighter, Dreamhunter and Dreamquake and more.

Yesterday was the first day I felt some light returning, and to fan that flame I've been focusing on what has inspired me to create my "Feronia's Fire" world in the first place, and what I've been so inspired and captivated by in the world's of other fantasy writers.

My book starts with a girl on a horse, because I was often a girl on a horse myself. I loved it. I took riding lessons both when I was young, and returned to study dressage (an ancient way of training horses, and an Olympic sport). It is a challenging, exacting discipline, a marriage of the skills of horse and rider, but oh the feeling when you get things right (and I must say they wear the coolest attire to complete in).

Horses, and dressage both play a role in "Feronia's Fire" and I've been having a lot of fun on the internet doing research and delving into a world I've enjoyed so much in the past.

So yes, I'm thrilled with fantasy books that include not only horses, but horses treated with kindness and respect and skill.

I am also totally thrilled with Twitter these days and how it allows me to connect with and read up on other fantasy-writers-in-process, favorite authors, agents, publishers and more. Here are some of the very cool people I just recently started following: @haleshannon (writer Shannon Hale, I loved "The Goose Girl"!), @reverieBR (a very talented photographer Vania S who has created some beautiful book covers and promo teasers and is running a great contest for writers right now), @lisamantchev (who has written "Eyes Like Stars" - which I'm going out and buying today! I love the style of her website and the look of her book and am excited to read it.)

So how about you? What's inspiring you to creative your world, whether it's for a book or your every day life?

After a couple of months of chewing over a different story I'm back to my YA story (current working title "Feronia's Fire) with a personal commitment to complete the rough draft by the end of the year. I've joined the Long Beach Writer's Group that meets at Border's on Bellflower every Monday and am excited that there sci-fi and fantasy buffs in the crowd.

I haven't had the energy to write as much as I'd like to of late because I've been working on a big PR project, but I have felt particularly blessed of late with my own personal reading selections. I'd like to share four books with everyone that I have particularly enjoyed and from which I've been very conscious of great staging, tone, pace and character growth each book set forth. They are all set in the YA fantasy genre (the genre I'm writing in).

The first is "Court Duel" by Sherwood Smith (I think I've mentioned already that I tracked down the Long Beach Writer's Group because Smith mentions them in her book, "A Stranger to Command" which I enjoyed very much as well). I'm not sure I recall another book where the heroine is so headstrong and yet so introspective. I found young Countess Meliara so refreshing because she's not only bold and courageous, once she recognizes where she's ignorant, and how it's led to disasterous results, she really wants to learn and grow and change, but like most of us she finds it easier decided than done!

I'm also especially fond of the banter that takes place between the hero Vidanric, and Meliara, how the reader understands his intention better than Meliara does - and yet, Smith is so very good at showing us just how easily two people who want to do the right thing, can so very misunderstand one and other - again and again - and yet, again, the characters constantly have learning and growth. I also greatly appreciated that the hero and well as the heroine is introspective. And I love that on her own site Smith shares short stories from the hero's point of view. Very wise in this day and age. She is keeping her readers true fans by giving them more of what they want.

My second example, is D.M. Cornish's "Lamplighter" which I just finished (no one had the first book "Monster Blood Tatoo" when I checked so I'll have to go back and buy it on Amazon now). I must admit at times Cornish's world was a bit over the top for me with its complex and extensive glossary of particular vocabularly words, and after awhile I stopped flipping back and forth and just went with it (hoping I wasn't missing important plot points) because the story is just so excellent and the characters so very compelling.

I want to say amen and bravo to so many of the male fantasy writers like Cornish who write interesting, complex female characters like the young Threnody who can be a huge pill but is a crack shot with a pistol. And I adore the hero, little unfortunately named Rossamund (who is a boy), who is undersized, and awkward at many things, but oh so valient and polite and kind. I love that Rossamund loves. He has a place in my heart next to my hero Harry P.

Cornish has created a unique world as individual as the "Lord of the Rings," "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell" and "Harry Potter." It would be fabulous if an animated movie could be created on it based on his superb drawings, but I imagine it would be easier (yet still fabulous) as live action now that CGI does so many marvelous things.

My final example are "Dream Hunter" and "Dream Quake" by Elizabeth Knox. What a compelling duo of books! Unlike the other examples, the world Knox has created is almost recognizable, almost. Set at the turn of the last century it offers an alternative world both reassuringly familiar in its old fashioned-ness and tantilizingly foreign with its magic. The mystery of it all, and the way those in power want to control the magic (even when they can't wield it themselves), and the terrific cast of characters of all ages makes for some of the most memorable reading I've had in quite some time. Indeed, all of these mentioned books are.

I also enjoyed the closeness of the cousins, Laura and Rose and the love between them (and the family as a whole), yet how they need to both go on their own individual hero's journey in the books separate of each other in order to grow up.

Feeling quite inspired I look forward to getting down to some serious writing this week, but first I need to read some writing of other's to be prepared for tonight's meeting!

I have wanted to write a fantasy novel since I was in third grade. At that time I had a writing partner named Jennifer (who was a year older and much more tough and sophisticated than I, and wasn't afraid of dodge ball), and we had a wonderful time creating our magical world. Our protagonists were deer, I believe, and we were greatly inspired by our teaching having read "The Hobbit" to us. We never wrote very much of the actual story (it was quite an epic), but we did create art work for it, and have a wonderful time discussing the characters and plot lines.

In High School I went so far as to buy a special journal for the next fantasy novel I wanted to undertake. It was called "The Bird" and my heroine's name was "Avis." I mapped out quite a bit of the story and wrote scenes but that effort stalled as I was more consumed by my parent's ever more dramatic relationship, school, and yep, boys.

Still the thought of one day writing a fantasy novel has lived carefully at the back of my mind, waiting for the right time to flourish.

Finally a few "perfect storm" scenarios came together to begin setting up the right framework. The first was that I heard the "Lord of the Rings" movies were being made so I read the books. My last attempt had been in something like fifth grade and I hadn't done so well after "The Hobbit." But this time I enjoyed them thoroughly and was thrilled with the movies (except for the sad decision to cut out Faramir and Eowyn's wonderful romance). During the same time I was also becoming an avid fan of Harry Potter, and that led me to the realization that there was now a plethora of fantastic fantasy novels for young adults unlike when I was young - when we had LOTR, "The Sword of Shanara" and that was about it (I'm exagerating, but not much, and I loved them so I'm not complaining about them being choices at all). Over the past decade I've had the great joy of discovering Tamora Pierce, Holly Black, Orson Scott Card, O.R. Melling, Sharon Hale, Cassandra Claire, Melissa Marr, Sherwood Smith and many many more.

And every time I've read something that I loved, that made my heart sing, I've thought "I can do this. I have something to share. I want to make a girl feel as inspired and happy and exuberant as I feel right now reading this by reading something I've written."

Or it can be a full-grown woman, I'm not picky, heck it can even be a guy.

Last year I finally began to seriously map out a plot and two characters who I'd been chewing over, a girl and a boy. I gave them names. I decided what they looked liked. I gave them friends with their own distinct characteristics, and I came up with a pretty darn serious and far reaching plot that would need at least two books.

This is the year I'm vowing to complete the first book. I've even joined a writer's group!

But of late I've stepped back a bit and have been looking at my characters and my plot and realizing that the theme is bigger than I'd originally intended, and that the themes are universal - passion for good and for evil, prejudice, the subjugation of women and slavery. I've taken on very serious subjects indeed! But so do all of the fantasy books that I adore so much (whether they are for youth or adults). That is the secret of sci-fi and fantasy that many people just don't understand, like the fairy tales in the days of old, they allow us to digest and deal with difficult and challenging topics in our own modern world in very dynamic ways, by setting themselves up in strange different worlds.

The Harry Potter books are about many things, but above all they're about the amazing power of love. If you haven't had the time to watch J.K. Rowling's speech at Harvard in 2008 on the "Fringe Benefits of Failure" I hope you'll click here and hear about her own journey to becoming a writer, and how failure can be a good friend. She so inspires me.

I also adored this talk by the enchanting author Isabel Allende who spoke at TED in 2007 on "Passion." TED roles into Long Beach tomorrow and I am so excited to see who will be inspiring me next!

So my question is, who and what is inspiring you?