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Thanks to the recent word war, I actually finished the fifth and final book of a fantasy series I’ve had bouncing around in my head for years. The first draft is 114,107 words long, about 14K words over the word count of the other books. I have grown up a lot while writing this series. As the books progress, you can definitely see the development of my writing style. (Side note, none of these books are “On the Night of the Fire Moon,” a story which I’m still working on.)

The idea began years ago as basically a rip-off of How To Train Your Dragon, which I had just seen and was obsessed with. The story I wrote was set on an island with a group of friends, a rescued dragon, a traitor, and an epic finale: a battle to end all battles.

Gradually the idea changed as I read different books, watched different movies, and visited different places. I decided to do a full rewrite of that first 70K word story. Many of the characters were scrapped, others were given new names, but most of them remained the same as when I had first written them. The story began on an island in a new world with a different plot. Dragons were still a central part of the story, but now their role was directly tied to the theme. I wrote the story of a girl who struggled with sorrow, resentment, bitterness, and regret. I threw this poor MC into painful situation after painful situation, somehow having her come out on top in the end with a few more scars than when she’d begun. At this point I had little experience writing realistic characters, but I kept revising. My MC and side characters gradually took on more depth and their arcs became more complex.

Finally, I finished the first book. I was excited with what I’d written and had my mom, sister, and two of my friends read it. They liked it and encouraged me to keep writing. Without them, I don’t know if I would have continued to the next book. I was homeschooled at the time, so I could do a whole lot of writing while other kids were sitting at their desks doing algebra. (Not to say that I don’t know how to do algebra. I just prefer writing. 😛 )

Around this time I read the Inheritance Cycle. I was impressed with foreshadowing and complexity of the books. I realized that I wanted my own books to be deeper and more intricate. What better way to do that than to write a second story that built off the unanswered questions of the previous book? I introduced new characters, added new enemies and locations, and pretty much made it as ambitious as I possibly could. I also foreshadowed the final conflict, continued the development of the MC, and to top it off put her into a very sticky situation. That book ended on a cliffhanger.

By the third book, I had really begun to get an idea of an end-goal to work toward. This story focused mainly on the MC’s experiences during a war with the enemy. I also brought back and developed more of the side characters, introduced a few new characters (one of whom was a traitor), and gave the MC an arch nemesis. I also read the Ilyon Chronicles and was inspired by a certain ryrik to go back into my first book and add another character.

The fourth book was when things really started to pick up speed. I discovered Story Embers and began to improve my writing style, experiment with different character voices, and add more details and description to my story. This book carried the MC through the two months before the final battle. Practically all of the known world was embroiled in the war by that time, and the stakes were higher as the enemy came closer to achieving his goal. I also threw in a scene where the MC trained a baby dragon (going back to my love of HTTYD and books like Donita K. Paul’s Dragonkeeper Chronicles). Then the MC went on an impulsive expedition (I swear it was for her character arc), visited with a few old friends, reunited with a familiar blond-haired ex-pirate, and met a creepy librarian lady (I may or may not have been reading the Wingfeather Saga when I wrote that). The main conflict of the book resulted directly from said impulsive expedition.

Last but not least is my fifth book. It’s a roller coaster with many ups and downs, but it culminates with a final battle like any good fantasy book. I think I’m the most proud of this book since it incorporates everything I’ve learned over the years–plus the style the closest to how I write now. I’ve been with the characters for so long that I love them like they’re my own children. But I also added two of the most painful death scenes I’ve ever written, which were necessary to the story. As the book goes on, it switches between the points of view of many different characters, unlike the other books where I only wrote from the MC’s POV. I did this because it was the easiest way to wrap up character arcs and show all sides of this complicated story. I tied off loose ends, completed the MC’s arc, wrote the final battle, and did everything with the story that I had been envisioning for past few years. I wrote the epilogue today and I’m happy with how it ended.

One of the advantages to writing all the books of a series at once is that you can tweak foreshadowing, add new sections into earlier books, and revise to your heart’s content. I am an obsessive editor. I think I’ve gone over my first book ten times and my others at least half that many times. Still, they’re not the quality that I want. I’m considering a partial or stylistic rewrite of at least the first two books. I’ve also decided to ingrain the religion of the world more deeply into the culture rather than having it be an overt parallel of our world. In short, I want to fix the sections in my previous books that are preachy.

One day I would like to publish this series. It will take a lot of editing, proofreading, and rewriting. I will come to a point where I’ll have to give this story to beta-readers instead of clinging obsessively to it. I pray that God will help me do that just like He has helped me through the rest of the process.

These books have been in my heart for so long that they’re hard to let go of. I want to write more with the same characters and world in the future, but right now I have to set them aside. My life has gotten crazy over the past two years. Lots of stuff has changed. I have changed. That’s just how it works. The favorable conditions for writing that I have right now might disappear entirely after this summer.

My goal was to complete my fifth book by the summer, and I have just accomplished that. I think that my next goal will be to fully edit my first book for beta-readers by the summer. It’s a somewhat daunting task. That first book has so much that needs editing, and I cringe when I look at certain parts. I guess we’ll just see how it goes.

So, yeah. This is what I’ve been up to the past few months. I’d appreciate it if you guys would pray for me as I work to edit these books. 🙂 Thank you.

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