75. Last of Autumn

Writing Journal 28 Nov. -11 Dec. 2022

I would love to say that this will be an interesting and great post. That work on the novel has started again and that I’m moving forward with a vigor. But as of right now I think that I won’t be back to the keys until January.

Considering that Xmas and New Years are both Sundays, and that is the day I usually write these blog posts, this might be the last post of the year. Though I do intend–as of this writing—to do blog 76 next week.

But plans are all for nothing.

Or so I’m learning the hard way.

This summer I lost my brother and this last week I lost another close friend. I write this a day after his memorial service, and I’m thinking to all of the friends I’ve lost over the last two decades. Makes me realize that it might only become more frequent as I get older.

Makes me realize that all our plans can be stopped with a snap.

I will try to keep the tone light. But I intend to talk about my friend for a little while and then talk about writing, outlining, and hobby stuff after. I’ll understand if you want to skip ahead.

Kenneth R Lewis

We first met at a gaming store that concentrated on Warhammer and Magic… back in the late 90s. I made a comment that I wanted to work there and this thin, just out of army fellow stepped up to me and said that he’d gotten there first and that the job would be his if it existed.

Funny aside, that store lasted in the mall for a handful of months before he moved out to a smaller store in a plaza by mu house and that skinny army dude did in fact get the job.

Over two years I learned to paint minis with Ken, building a massive Skaven Army and always planning to get back into 40K but not really playing that as fantasy was awesome back then. I wasted a lot of money on magic cards, we hung out all the time and we met a whole new circle of friends.

Big Jan, Mr. Manny, Reenie, Dave G, Mazza, Dave P, Dave B, my brothers, my buddy Rob, and more all came together and we played lots of games. We ran second edition D&D in the store, we played GURPs (probably one of the most brilliant games I ever played in… but it was a product of the DM and the time it was played).

Sadly, a number of the people on that list have already passed, and some were less friends than they claimed to be.

Dragon Fall, and Roommates and Beyond.

The store was called the Brass Dragon and it only existed for a couple of years before it dissolved. But from the ashes of that store, long term friendships were made, games were held. The very first version of the Shadow Elf Invasion was run here, though in Forgotten Realms it created many of the key concepts and characters that would become a part of that story. And part of my current novels. It was the place where Ken said I should run games in my own world… the one he always saw me working on… instead of taking my stories and placing them in other worlds.

A year or so after the Dragon fell, Ken needed a roommate to keep his apartment afloat and I took the leap and moved in. During this time, we started a massive game in our home, the very first campaign had 8 players and was me running my Shadow Elf Invasion for a second time, but now in the world it was meant to happen. Draklon.

We lived together for 7… 8 years and it was always about games, watching horrible Kung Fu movies, and just having a good time.

Even after moving away, we still gamed together every week. EVERY WEEK. For 10 more years, and then covid hit and we started gaming online and for some reason Ken didn’t really want to do online.

For the last three years I didn’t see or talk to my friend. I kept thinking as we started each new game, he’d jump in on that one. But he either declined or just didn’t show up. We had some ideological disagreements over the last years and I wouldn’t say we grew apart. But we weren’t hanging out on each other’s social media.

Before I knew it three years had passed and suddenly, I saw Ken for the first time, at my brother’s memorial. It was so good to catch up and put the politics aside for a while.

New Dedication

Really tried to talk him into coming online and gaming again. And this time he seemed a little more interested. But we were mid-game at the time and he brushed us off and told us to invite him when the new campaign started.

It never happened.

It’s because of Ken that I have a “Fantasy Egypt” in my world. The Forgotten Realms actually has the Egyptian Pantheon incorporated into it and a country called Mulhorand. Ken created the character of Tessic Glorming, a lost Pharaoh of that land who was frozen in a statue for thousands of years. He ended up getting awakened by the other characters in the game and with his home long turned to ash and dust he just became a wandering hero. He took fighter and cleric levels to showcase his divine right to rule and along with a band of misfits he survived the shadow elf invasion and stopped numerous evils before they could manifest on the world.

When I wrote my thesis novel for my Master’s I wrote a prequel to the shadow elf invasion where a bunch of characters triggered the events that would summon the invaders and drop the “domino” that would lead to dozens of other problems erupting across the world.

The first novel in the invasion series is about a bunch of tomb robbers discovering a pharaoh locked in a statue… they free him and work to put him back on his throne while the land of Aegyptus is being ruled by tyrant sorcerers and it’s invaded by an empire to the west.

Three of the characters in the novel are based on three characters played by my friends in that very first campaign.

The new dedication to the first book now reads as:

Dedicated to the Memory

Anthony X. Miron aka Kem the Homicidal Ranger

Kenneth R Lewis aka Tessic Glorming, Last Pharaoh

I will admit to being worried that using Egypt has cursed my novel, and now I wonder how that third friend is doing. Poor joke aside, it does hurt that two characters I placed in my novel will not be witnessed by those who helped create them.

No Segue…

I didn’t have a decent segue in mind and I would have become even more maudlin if left to it.

I haven’t been writing. But I have been working on maps. And with the maps I have started working on world building and developing the areas mapped. The city of Dusk and the country around it are becoming a living and breathing place.

Now, that work does not help the current novel, but it does help the next. So, in a way I feel like I’m working forward still. The words might not be on the page right now, but the future groundwork is being laid. I have maps, characters, politics, history, religion all written on the page and I am ready to move on. I just need to pause and come back to the keys and knock out the rest of THIS novel before I start outlining the next novel.

I have determined that I will be changing up the style of the next novel and concentrating on other characters. This is also partially pushing me in a direction that might require me to rewrite the Aegyptus and Current novel as well. I might change up the pov to be more narrated and spend time in more characters’ heads. It’s a very daunting thought and huge task.

I might write a test chapter or two and see how they compare.

Hobby, Comics, other thing…?

I haven’t been reading many comics. They’ve been on hold as I funneled money into car repairs. The car is ok now but the funds need to be replenished. So much so, that most of my freetime has been spent doing side work.

The new office/gaming space is now at a point where I can start moving stuff in. We still need to build shelves and work on finishing a few things. But I’m building the desk today and there will be a lot of time spent moving materials and putting stuff away.

I’ve been watching toku again. I finished an Ultraman series and started watching them in chrono order again. I also started a Sentai series, Ninniger. Both are ok. I will admit that Ultraman usually bores me a lot. I really want to love it but sometimes its hard. This might be a product of the fact I’m back watching the stuff from the 60s… but idk, seems to be hit or miss for me.

I have still not started any of the videogame stuff I keep talking about. I don’t know why I resist it so much. But I do. Sooner or later I will start Nocturne and this blog will have a whole bunch of me gushing about that on it.

But for now. I need to go build a desk and start planning on what to move where.

Thank you for reading.