Claireau’s Retreat House

Posted on April 26, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

Disaster falls upon Lealle, the heroine of A Talisman Arcane, as she sits at the top of the steps to the retreat house.

She’s finished her lesson in magic and awaits her mother, who intends to shepherd Lealle home in the family brougham-landau. While Lealle waits, the bullies who tormented her in the opening scene of the book arrive and begin their taunts anew.

But it is what comes of this unpleasantness—not the interaction itself—that proves so horrible.

Lealle’s younger brother gets involved in the debacle, and the two kids eventually find themselves back in the waiting room of the retreat house, and then in an examining room.

A later scene features the courtyard garden and the colonnade that surrounds the herbs and flowers.

The floor plan below shows the layout of the retreat’s first floor. The second and third floors hold more examining rooms, as well as a library, study rooms, and personal quarters for a few of the teachers who live on the premises.

For more about the world of A Talisman Arcane, see:
Tour Nileau
The Historical Tour Nileau
The Living Tour Nileau
The Dreaming Tour Nileau
Justice in Lealle’s World
Ohtavie’s Home
Wing-clap of the Phoenix

Wing-clap of the Phoenix

Posted on April 12, 2019 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

The antiphoners of Pavelle—magic users—give flowery names to their art.

Basic techniques taught to beginners include things such as the Zephyr’s Gavotte or the Breath of the Pegasus.

Lealle, the heroine of A Talisman Arcane, is learning advanced techniques such as the Nest of the Phoenix and the Flight of the Phoenix.

All of the techniques involve the manipulation of an inner energy referred to as energea.

Aural practitioners hear the energea as music. Kinesthetic practitioners feel it as weight within the body. And visual practitioners see it as glowing, sparking light.

Lealle is a visual practitioner, and her reach within for the energea shapes the both the result (such as healing a bruise) and the pattern of the flow of light.

If you were to cut across one of these currents of light and draw the cross-section, you would see a delicate snowflake of a pattern.

I imagined the magic of my North-lands long before I ever tried to tried to draw it.

And when I first put pen to paper, I didn’t realize what I was drawing. I thought I was creating images that had lain within my imagination unrealized until the tools from Zentangle unlocked them. This was true, but incomplete.

It was only when I explored the idea of publishing my drawings as a coloring book that I realized they were renditions of energea, and that there was a story about energea and a young mage I needed to tell!

You can read about the first stirrings of my inspiration, and see two other patterns of energea in these blog posts:
Nest of the Phoenix (Story for My Coloring Book)
Flight of the Phoenix (Page for a Coloring Book)

New Book and New Cover!

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

I have a new book releasing soon! I’m really excited about it, can hardly wait to share it with my readers. I suspect I could burble on happily for paragraphs. But I won’t.

Instead I’ll cut right to the chase and do what I intended for this post. Share the cover! 😀

For images and curious facts from the world of A Talisman Arcane, see:
Tour Nileau
The Historical Tour Nileau
The Living Tour Nileau
The Dreaming Tour Nileau

The Living Tour Nileau

Posted on December 21, 2018 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

I suspect that Montbrun (the model for my Tour Nileau) must have been quite uncomfortable to live in during medieval times.

Heavy stone walls, huge (cold) rooms, few windows, drafty garderobes, and so on. But Montbrun looks to have been newly modernized for this century and our world, just as the living quarters of Tour Nileau were made comfortable—even luxurious—by the mother of my heroine Lealle, in the nineteenth century of my North-lands.

In an early scene from A Talisman Arcane, Lealle mentions the main dining hall, where her parents entertain when they hold gala occasions in their home, inviting hundreds of guests.

But Lealle dines in the ‘small’ dining room with her family that evening, not a cozy place, but certainly less imposing than the larger space.

Of course, neither the Palacio Real de Madrid nor Chatsworth House (both above) are quite right as representations of my Tour Nileau.

The rooms where Lealle and her family live have been repaired, had windows added, and been furnished with ‘contemporary’ appointments (contemporary for the North-lands nineteenth century), but they still retain their essential medieval structure and character.

Here’s the floor plan showing the dining rooms and parlors of Tour Nileau.

For more about the the world of A Talisman Arcane, see:
Tour Nileau
The Historical Tour Nileau
The Dreaming Tour Nileau
Justice in Lealle’s World
Ohtavie’s Home
Wing-clap of the Phoenix
Claireau’s Retreat House

A Story for My Coloring Book

Posted on September 16, 2016 by J.M. Ney-Grimm

Three weeks ago, when I asked folks to print out a sample page from my upcoming coloring book and give it a try, one commenter made a remark that really interested me.

I like pure abstract, but fairly soon after I settled in with pencils and coloured sharpies I found myself wanting the image to tell a story. Widdershins

Being a teller of tales, I liked the idea of finding a way to blend story with my drawings. But how could I manage it? The drawings I intend to collect in the coloring book are very much abstracts. I think of them as “modern mandalas.” The pairing I wanted between story and image did not immediately present itself to me.

But there was something tickling at my back brain. If I just let it percolate for an unspecified time…maybe I would get an idea.

Well! That idea arrived yesterday, and I’m really excited about it.

If I weren’t in the middle of writing the intense conclusion to my current novel, I’d be writing the start to a new short story. I love my idea, though, and once I send my novel off to my first reader, I know what I’ll be working on while I await her feedback.

I’ll probably publish the envisioned short as a standalone ebook, as well as in the pages of my coloring book. I took a bunch of notes. It’s hard to wait to start! But I’m not a writer who can concentrate on two stories at the same time. And my novel will be complete soon.

Edited (9 Feb, 2019) to add: Short stories so easily turn into novels for me, and this one did. As I type this note, the novel is nearly ready for its release in March. It’s title? A Talisman Arcane.

In the meantime, I’ll share another design intended for my coloring book—Nest of the Phoenix. 😀