Dragon-gods of Hantida

Posted on February 7, 2020 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

Last week, I emailed my newsletter subscribers a note about the Hantidan dragon-gods. Since I was about to announce the release of Sovereign Night, I thought a bit of intriguing trivia might be something fun for my subscribers’ in-boxes.

The thing is…you, my blog readers, might enjoy it also. So here it is for your perusal.

(To those of you who are both blog readers and newsletter subscribers, my apologies for the duplication.) 😉

The Hantidan gods are more truly shapeshifters than dragons. They can take any living shape—man, woman, child, or beast. But in Hantidan belief, the native essence of dragon is shapeshifter. Hantidans describe the dragon form as one in which the god assumes the physical nature of nine beasts all at once.

The dragon’s head resembles that of a stallion, the eyes those of a hawk, the ears a cow’s, the antlers a stag’s, the neck a snake’s, the belly that of a tortoise, the scales those of a carp, the claws an eagle’s, and the soles those of a tiger.

The Hantidan pantheon consists of nineteen dragon-gods, seven of them “greater” and twelve of them “subtle.” Each one possesses a characteristic color when in dragon form, and preferred forms when walking as a human or prowling as a beast.

For example, Enyakatho—the god of intelligence and the spirit of inquiry—bears green scales in dragon form, but might stalk the jungle as a lynx or visit an outlying village as a skinny and wizened old man.

Gael and Keir first attempt to scope out the Glorious Citadel by attending an offering ceremony held for Enyakatho in the public Court of Earthly Order.

Enyakatho is considered the patron god of Hantida’s royal family, as well as of scribes, poets, and philosophers.

Here’s a list of the “greater” dragons and their attributes:

Name—Attribute—Symbolic Hue—Preferred Beast—Human Appearance
Orunal—will and power—gold—lion—queenly old woman
Enyakatho—intelligence and inquiry—green—lynx—wizened old man
Okegiga—commitment—red—dog—young man
Eningizimu—inspiration—blue—eagle—woman of middle years
Imfanelo—life or vitality—bronze—bull—18-year-old youth
Bochabela—luck—silver—cat—5-year-old girl
Bophirimela—beauty—white—horse—2-year-old child

The Hantidan dragon-gods play no active role in Sovereign Night, but rather form a pervasive part of the physical and cultural landscape.

The ruler of the city is called the “Dragon Blessed.” And much of the art—paintings, sculptures, vases, scrolls, and architectural ornament—depicts dragons.

When one such artwork is damaged during events in Sovereign Night, the nobles of the royal court speculate that whoever did the deed should have targeted the bronze Imfanelo—patron of peasants—rather than the gold Orunal—patron of the Dragon Blessed himself.

For more about Sovereign Night, see:
Timekeeping in Hantida
The Baths of the Glorious Citadel
A Townhouse in Hantida
Hantidan Garb
Quarters in the Glorious Citadel
A Library in the Glorious Citadel
Following Gael & Keir: a Photo Tour

Following Gael & Keir

Posted on January 24, 2020 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

I’ll be announcing the release of Sovereign Night very soon.

While we wait…I thought it might be fun to take a photo tour, following in Gael’s and Keir’s footsteps as the first few chapters of the story unfold.

* * *

Sovereign Night starts in the city streets of Hantida. They’re narrow, with a lot of foot traffic, some rickshaws and palanquins.

But soon enough Gael and Keir enter the formal northern court of the Glorious Citadel. Tourists are welcome there, as well as pilgrims to the temples located within its vast sweep of stone.

A ceremony sponsored by the priests of the green dragon-god—Enyakatho, patron of scribes, scholars, and the royal family—provides Gael and Keir their ostensible destination, but an accident intervenes before they can observe it.

The residential southern court of the Glorious Citadel is more intimate and welcoming in style. It features numerous courtyards and gardens.

Walkways rim the gardens, giving access to suites of rooms occupied by palace functionaries and pavilions inhabited by favored nobles.

Gael and Keir meet someone very important to their quest in a wilderness garden featuring a waterfall.

Following this fateful meeting, they are escorted to the guest quarters reserved for them.

I hope that whets your appetite for the novel! 😀

* * *

Cover Reveal: Sovereign Night

Posted on January 10, 2020 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

In just a few weeks, you’ll be able to snap up your copy of the sequel to The Tally Master. Look for Sovereign Night at the end of January!

On the hunt for a magical lodestone to empower Keir’s gift for healing, Gael and Keir must tackle and solve the dangerous mystery plaguing the river city of Hantida.

For some fun trivia from the setting of Sovereign Night, see:
Hantidan Garb
Quarters in the Glorious Citadel
Timekeeping in Hantida
The Baths of the Glorious Citadel
A Library in the Glorious Citadel
A Townhouse in Hantida

Covers from the Ney-Grimm Catalog

Posted on December 20, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

Some days after I gathered bundle covers for review en masse, it occurred to me that I’d ignored an entire category of recent work: the covers for my own books!

In 2017, I gave new covers to nine of my backlist. I released Blood Silver in 2018, and Journey into Grief this summer—for both of which I designed covers. And now, as I prepare to release my first boxed set, I have another freshly created cover.

If we want to be complete regarding cover creation, there’s another bulletin board’s worth. 😀

Blood Silver I Journey into Grief I Livli’s Gift
Sarvet & Livli I Skies of Navarys I The Troll’s Belt
Kaunis Clan Saga I Troll-magic I Winter Glory
Fate’s Door I Devouring Light I Sarvet’s Wanderyar

Clearly I’ve been having too much fun with Photoshop!

For the other two bulletin boards of covers, see:
Covers, and More Covers
A Boatload of Covers

Wishing for a Boxed Set

Posted on December 6, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

For nearly a year, I’ve been longing to create boxed sets of my books.

Wouldn’t it be fun to have a Lodestone Tales set or a Kaunis Clan set? Really I’ve been envisioning variations in my mind’s eye ever since I saw the cool 3D images created for bundles by Chuck Heintzelman at BundleRabbit.

Adding fuel to the inspirational fire has been the urging from Kobo, both in their newsletter for indies and in their promotional opportunities. There have been special promos for boxed sets at least three times this year, and, oh, but I wished each time that I had something to offer.

I didn’t. But I put “create boxed set” on my to-do list.

Between surgery, complications from surgery, and twins applying to colleges, I fell very far behind in doing all those items on my to-do list. For a long time I kept adding more items without crossing any off! Yikes!

But in October I began to make progress, and while I’m not yet caught up, I’m getting there.

So I tackled making a boxed set of the Kaunis Clan Saga.

Creating the interior was routine. I’ve grown very experienced with the program I use to produce ebooks. (Jutoh.) Creating the cover was fun.

Creating the 3D image of the boxed set? Well…that’s complicated.

First of all, several of the e-tailer sites strongly discourage 3D images. Kobo claims that the flat 2D covers sell many more copies than do the 3D ones. Since I want to sell some copies on Kobo, and since I hope to be selected for promos on Kobo (the promo slots are curated), I figure I’d better follow their guidelines.

I could get by without any 3D image, but I’d like to have one for Amazon. And I thought I’d found the perfect resource for easily creating one.

Mark of CoverVault.com sells an awesome template for boxed sets of any size up to 25 books. You just drop your box cover and book spine images into the template, and out spits your perfectly rendered 3D image.

I headed over to CoverVault, all prepared to snag the goods, and—

—hit a different kind of snag.

You must have Creative Suite 4 or better. I have CS2. So I set out to build my 3D image from scratch.

I was surprised that I managed as well as I did, because I’m not experienced at creating 3D images. Cover design as practiced by me is a very 2D endeavor.

But I’m not satisfied enough with the result to publish the boxed set on Amazon.

At first I thought that lack of precision was my problem. If you zoom in very close, some of the details do look clumsy. But zoomed out to thumbnail size, any lack of precision is pretty well camouflaged.

So why wasn’t I satisfied?

I browsed through the boxed sets offered by other indies, and found my answer.

Bundles have a rainbow of book spines showing, and it works—probably because it visually illustrates the multitude of authors contributing stories to the bundle.

But boxed sets of books by one author have book spines designed especially for the set that harmonize with each other and the box cover.

So the next item on my to-do list? Create book spines that possess the same visual theme exhibited by my boxed set’s cover.

I’m crossing my fingers that I’ve identified the problem and its solution correctly! If my 3D image still doesn’t look right…I’ll have to come up with a plan B. Either way, I’ll let you know how it goes. 😀

Covers, and More Covers

Posted on November 29, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

These days I commission cover designs for my novels from Deranged Doctor Design. Their designers are true artists, able to take half a dozen stock images and combine them to create beautiful, unique art that hits the genre conventions of today. I love what they do, and I love the covers they created for The Tally Master and A Talisman Arcane. This month they’ll start work on a cover for my upcoming release, Sovereign Night.

You might expect that my own cover designing days were over, but they’re not, and I’m glad of it. Photoshop still feels like a playground to me, and I’d be sad to give up playing there.

Luckily, I have short stories, novellas, and bundles to design covers for.

It’s been more than a year since I last collected my most recent covers together in one spot to look at them. I tend to lose track of all I’ve created, so I enjoy making a sort of virtual bulletin board where I can see everything at a glance. Since I’ve made it, I figured I might as well share it. 😀

I hope you’ll enjoy perusing it, too.

Here Be Fairies I Here Be Unicorns I Eclectica I Here Be Merfolk
Here Be Magic I Blood Moon I Might Have Been I Here Be Ghosts

For more bulletin boards of covers, see:
A Boatload of Covers
Covers from the Ney-Grimm Catalog

Am I Daring?

Posted on November 15, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

One lone idea sparked my short story, “To Haunt the Daring Place.” I wanted to tell about the founding of a monastery that will feature in the ninth book of my Gael & Keir series.

That was all I had.

There was a monastery. It had an unusual founding. Gael and Keir would visit the place a hundred years (or two) later.

My logical self informed me that this was a slim spot to start from.

My storyteller self felt serenely sanguine. There was a story already present, hiding in my subconscious and ready to be revealed. All I needed to do was trust in its existence and tell it.

I mused upon my protagonist. He was a scholar and a mage, possessed of great world-wonder. He felt curious about everything, but he’d taken a break from the scholarship he loved to rebuild his fortunes, which were decimated by the troll wars. Now he was reclaiming his curiosity.

His name was Coehlin, and he was an especial fan of ancient North-lands philosophers such as Kleomedes the Younger and Aglaia of Seleucis.

I envisioned the story appearing in my collection, Tales of Old Giralliya.

The time period seemed to fit, and I envisioned a sort of fairy tale style for its telling.

But after I wrote the first scene, it was clear that I wasn’t using a fairy tale style at all. It wasn’t right for the story I wanted to tell. Nor would the length be comparable to that of the other stories in Tales of Old Giralliya. They fell in a range between 700 and 4,500 words. “To Haunt the Daring Place” would be at least 6,000 words, maybe more.

My next plan was to submit the story to SFF magazines.

I’d received a nice comment from a magazine editor when I submitted “Crossing the Naiad” to him. Recently I learned what a personal comment like that meant, aside from, ‘It’s good!’ It meant that he’d read the story all the way to its end. And editors don’t do that unless either: 1) they think they might buy the story for their magazine, or 2) they are enjoying the story so much that even though it is not right for their magazine, they can’t bear to stop.

That put my editor’s comment in a new perspective. Getting a story accepted seemed like it might truly be possible!

But as I wrote “To Haunt,” I began to worry that it would be too long for any magazine. Wasn’t 6,000 words the top limit for many? And it was becoming ever more certain that “To Haunt” was going to cross that 6K limit.

In fact, the first draft of “To Haunt” came in at 13,714 words. Yikes!

If 6,000 were the top edge, then my story was more than twice as long. Cutting it down a little to fit wouldn’t be feasible. But I could (and should) check that limit. Maybe my memory was wrong. Maybe, even if I remembered right, there might be a few magazines that would take a novelette. Or, if there weren’t any magazines that would, maybe there would be an anthology call permitting longer lengths.

What I really wanted was to get my story into a magazine with a circulation of thousands or an anthology with an editor possessing an established audience of thousands. The readers who read my work seem to love it. But their numbers are, as yet, few. I want readers who have never heard of me to have a chance at reading my stories.

So…is there a potential venue for “To Haunt the Daring Place”?

Yes!

I checked the word limits for the top magazines, and two of them accept submissions up to 20K. Two more specify 15K, and one 10K.

Obviously the 10K rag won’t work for “To Haunt,” but I have several options. Yay! I’m pretty thrilled about it.

So…did the monastery get founded?

W-e-l-l…not exactly.

The magical architectural element that leads to the founding of the monastery is indeed created in the events recounted in “To Haunt the Daring Place.” But the monastery itself? No. It’s never even mentioned.

But it will be a fun Easter egg for readers of both “To Haunt the Daring Place” and Book Nine of the Gael & Keir Adventures. I assure you that the architectural element is not something that can be missed!

Wish me luck in getting the story accepted. 😀

Edited to add: “Daring” received some words of praise from the magazine editors, but none of them chose to include the story in their magazine. Not to worry, though—I’ll publish it through Wild Unicorn Books, which means that you will be able to read it!

For more about Tales of Old Giralliya, see:
Rebirth of Four Fairy Tales
Two Giralliyan Folk Heroes
Caught Between Two Armies
Tales in a New Bundle

Caught Between Two Armies

Posted on November 1, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

Before I embarked on writing “The Kite Climber,” I possessed only the haziest of ideas for the story I wanted to tell.

It involved kites and civil war.

That was all I had.

I knew very little about man-lifting kites. I knew they existed historically. I knew they’d been used in times of war for signaling and observation. I had this vision in my head of a gigantic diamond-shaped kite with a man lashed to its cross bracing. That’s actually not what man-lifting kites look like, but I didn’t know that then.

Nor did I go seeking such information.

I felt like I needed the emotional heart of my story more than I needed technical details.

I trawled through my memories of my backlist books in hope of finding inspiration, and find it I did in a passage from Troll-magic.

Lorelin . . . embarked on the story of Emoirie’s great grandmere, the remarkable lady who’d saved her village when it was caught between opposing battalions in the Wars of the Tree Wands; and then for an encore went on to boss around the most influential Giralliyan Paucitor of her times. All before the age of twenty years, when she returned by choice to her humble origins and lived happily to become matriarch over innumerable grandchildren.

I loved the possibility of telling the story of Emoirie’s great grandmother.

There was only one problem with that, but it was a serious one. Emoirie lives in the Steam Age of my North-lands. Her great grandmother would have lived in the Age of Sail.

The story I wanted to tell took place long before then, at the end of classical antiquity when much of Giralliya was war-torn and falling into the barbarism of the Dark Ages.

I teetered on the edge of dismissing my feeling of inspiration, and then decided I’d be bold and uphold my inner artist. Surely Emoirie’s great grandmother wasn’t the only woman who’d been faced with saving her home when it stood between opposing armies.

I would tell the story of a girl confronted with exactly that circumstance, but living in the violent period of history that I wished to chronicle.

I was so excited by my decision, that I dove right in!

No research, no hesitation, just a quick sweep for names (people and places), and then I began.

I’d imagined starting with the girl who’d been stolen to climb the kite tethers, carrying reports from the man aloft in the kite to the forces on the ground. Instead, I delved into the source of the armed conflict. Only after I’d recounted the story of the three hostile ducal brothers did I turn to Andraia, my heroine.

But it was going well, and I was loving it.

I never did check into the man-lifting kites—not until after I finished the story.

The fighting brothers were all mages—powerful troll-mages. They were more than capable of using magery to give their colossal diamond-shaped kites a boost, if the technical aspects really required more lift than a diamond-shaped kite could provide.

“The Kite Climber” is one story of six in Tales of Old Giralliya.

For more about the collection, see:
Rebirth of Four Fairy Tales
Two Giralliyan Folk Heroes
Tales in a New Bundle

Two Giralliyan Folk Heroes

Posted on October 25, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

“The Hermit and the Smith” is the first of two new stories I’m writing for Tales of Old Giralliya.

I was inspired by a passage from the appendices of Hunting Wild.

The Holy Hermit Cathal was born into the social unrest and turbulence of this time. As a young man he pursued the course of an ascetic, withdrawing from human contact to pursue a life of simplicity and meditation. Later in life, one of the destined human sacrifices escaped to Cathal’s lonely hut in the hills and changed Cathal’s outlook.

Cathal realized that withdrawing from tumult was cowardly, and he emerged to challenge the disgusting practice of human sacrifice, speaking nearly every day to crowds in the realms of Istria, Eirdry, and Ennecy.

I wanted to write about Cathal. Not his full story, but that moment when he was confronted by the fugitive running for his life.

If I could just capture that scene, it would satisfy some longing in my writer’s heart.

But a story is more than just a vignette or cameo. The scene I was longing to paint with words needed more than one man fleeing and another offering him refuge.

So I put on my thinking cap.

Who was the fugitive? What was important to him? How did he come to be destined for blood sacrifice?

As I pondered these and other questions, I found myself wondering if I could connect my holy hermit with some of the events forming the backstory of The Tally Master.

That proved to be the concept that would ignite my creative fire.

I imagined the dry hills and the olive orchards around the city of Castarre. I discovered the name of the man—a metal smith—outracing the hounds. It all became very real in my mind’s eye.

And then I started writing!

For more about Tales of Old Giralliya, see:
Rebirth of Four Fairy Tales
Caught Between Two Armies
Tales in a New Bundle

Rebirth of Four Fairy Tales

Posted on October 18, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

You may have noticed a new progress bar over there in the sidebar of my website. Yes, the one entitled Tales of Old Giralliya. That’s the one.

Where did it come from, and what’s it all about?

It all started back in 2012.

In 2012, I wrote several North-lands fairy tales for my blog.

I had a lot of fun with them, and at least one of my readers told me that she was really enjoying the flash fiction. (The fairy tales were short, under 1,000 words.)

I remember brainstorming a bunch of ideas for future fairy tale blog posts, and I developed a list of a dozen possibilities. I imagined myself checking the list at intervals, writing and posting the next story from it, and eventually writing all of them.

The fourth story on the list went long—to 1,500 words instead of the usual 700 or so.

I was okay with that. Really, anything up to 3,000 words seemed a manageable length for a blog post.

The fifth story was 8,000 words long.

That was a problem.

Oh, I had fun writing it. And I think my readers enjoyed reading it. But 8,000 words deserves to be published as more than a blog post. This one was, eventually. In the ramp-up to publication, it grew, because I discovered as I worked that the story needed a bit more development, which added scenes and word count.

When the draft was complete, it had reached 20,000 words. I named it Hunting Wild. 😀

So far, so good.

But what about fairy tale #6, Fairest Trickery?

I never wrote it, because it is a more complex tale than Hunting Wild, and since Hunting Wild required 20,000 words, Fairest Trickery would probably require at least 50,000 words. It would be a novel.

Obviously, I like writing novels! I love writing novels. But Fairest Trickery would have to get in line behind the ten other novels I wanted to write first!

Aegis and Mage and Mirage—the stories following after Fairest Trickery—are probably novellas, but this whole sequence—Blood Falchion, Hunting Wild, Fairest Trickery, Aegis, and Mage and Mirage—forms a series telling of the events occurring around a cursed blade as it passes down through history. And I would need to write the books in order. I still think I might one day; we’ll see.

But the Blood Blade series brought my fairy tale telling to an end, back in 2012.

Occasionally I toyed with reviving my list. I could skip past the Blood Blade series and tell some of the other, unrelated fairy tales.

I could, but somehow I never did. Until now!

What happened?

A. L. Butcher, bundle curator extraordinaire, invited me to contribute to a fairy tale themed bundle that she plans to release this November.

Oh, how I wanted to be part of it!

But I had a problem.

Troll-magic, a re-telling of East of the Sun and West of the Moon, is already in the Here Be Magic bundle.

Crossing Naiad, a re-telling of The Three Billy Goats Gruff, is in the Here Be Ghosts bundle.

The Troll’s Belt, a re-telling of Hansel and Gretel, is in the Here Be Fairies bundle.

Some of the earliest bundles to which I contributed are no longer in print. But these three are. I didn’t have any new fairy tales for the new bundle. That made me sad.

Then I remembered the fairy tales from my blog! They are not re-tellings of fairy tales from our own Earth’s cultures, no. They are brand new fairy tales emerging from the cultures of my North-lands. But they are fairy tales.

I could collect them together and contribute the collection to the bundle!

I emailed A. L. about the possibility, and she liked it. So I set to work.

The first part was simple. I copied-and-pasted from those old blog posts. Then I ran through the files with a light edit. And that should have been enough. Legend of the Beggar’s Son, Ravessa’s Ride, and The Thricely Odd Troll, when gathered together form a nice little trio.

But, but, but!

Re-reading the stories inspired me. Wouldn’t it be fun to tell a few more of the stories from my old list? I was sure I could make the November deadline. Oh, oh, oh! It was irresistible.

Last week I finished The Hermit and the Smith. This week I finished The Kite Climber.

I also re-visited my decision not to include Blood Falchion. Why had I decided that? I re-read it. Wouldn’t it be nice to give the story the visibility the bundle would confer on it? Yes, it would. So what if it’s the beginning of a series. The story is complete in itself. It stands alone. I would include it!

So Tales of Old Giralliya will have seven stories in it: four from my blog plus three new ones. I’ve loved working on the project, and I’m excited about the next story I’ll write for it.

I’ve done the brainstorming and taken a bunch of notes. I want to do a little outlining and a little thinking, and then I’ll dive in!

I plan to blog a bit more about the process of creating this collection. In the meantime, watch the progress bar to see the words piling up! 😀

For more about Tales of Old Giralliya, see:
Two Giralliyan Folk Heroes
Caught Between Two Armies
Tales in a New Bundle

Edited to Add: The seventh story, when I actually sat down to write it, proved to be too long for this collection and told in a different style. It’s not right for Tales of Old Giralliya, but you will get to read it. I plan to release it as a standalone novelette.

Edited 24 October 2022 to Add: I did release that novelette! It’s called “To Haunt the Daring Place” and you can find out more about it here.