By Nathan Marchand
June 21, 2013
Next week I make my authorial debut on Children of the Wells. The next major chapter of the CotW saga comes from my pen: a novella entitled The Fall of the House of Kyzer. Here’s a synopsis:
In Thyrion, power is everything.
But not for Jaysynn, the youngest of the Kyzer royal family who rule the city with an iron fist. He alone is unable to manipulate magic, making him an outcast in his own family. However, General Dracon, himself non-Select, sees the prince’s potential and trains him to be a warrior in his own right.
In the wake of the Cataclysm, Jaysynn is the only Kyzer to survive. Ascending to the throne, he is overwhelmed by the weight of the crown and the devastation of his city. What’s worse, he learns of a conspiracy brewing within his own ranks. Even as Emperor, he feels like an outcast.
As you can tell, this new plotline offers all the excitement and intrigue you expect from CotW but from a different perspective. (Bron and Calea’s adventures will continue soon in a different book.) The Fall of the House of Kyzer will also introduce a character I hope will become a prominent villain in future stories. I can already say that the prospect of crossovers with all the characters we’re introducing excites me.
Writing this story was fun but also quite challenging. As a creative team, we were still experimenting with how our writing and submission system worked. We had timeframes and methodologies, but life had a way of screwing all that up. We’re all busy outside of this grandiose saga. I had a deadline fast approaching and was really feeling the time crunch. Rewrites were in order. I had to cut or change some things I was proud of. For writers, that’s often like cutting off a limb!
I was reminded of a mantra Dr. Dennis E. Hensley, my writing professor at Taylor University Fort Wayne, shared often with his students: “Kill your beauties.” What he meant was that a writer may have words, phrases, or scenes he thinks are stupendous, perhaps even the best writing he’s ever done. They’re clever, memorable, and/or poetic—but they hinder the story. The piece may be too long; the flowery language might be distracting; or these elements are completely superfluous. The author will hate to delete them, but in the long run, the story will be strengthened by the edit. That doesn’t make it easy to cut them, though. Some writers might spend a few minutes going through the five stages of grief every time they do it. But when they see the end result, it’s all worth it.
Even so, it’s times like these that I wish books had “deleted scenes” like DVDs.
So, as you read and enjoy our upcoming stories, remember the writers sacrificed much to bring it to you.
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