The New Blood Saga: The Story Behind the Story

People often ask me to tell them the story of writing the New Blood Saga. So let it be written, so let it be done.

When I decided to start writing what would later become the New Blood Saga, it was because I was having a recurring dream that would have me in tears when I woke. It persisted for months, and I finally realized that I needed to write it. The problem was that the dream didn't tell me enough about characters. I was in the dream, taking direct part in it, so one character was me — literally — which was not helpful. So, I had to go elsewhere to flesh out the characters.

When I was an undergrad studying philosophy, I was fascinated by Socrates. One of the things that really got me was when he would go into a trancelike state, then emerge with new answers to questions, something profound. He called it being seized by the Daemon of Philosophy. I decided then that I would one day have a character in a book that somehow embodied some facet of Socrates, if not many facets. That character became Natharr. He has something similar in his makeup, when he is seized by the Daemon of Sight, coming out of his trancelike states with visions of the future. Also like Socrates, he is a soldier of great renown, and has some other very Socratic qualities.

So that gave me another aspect of a starting point: a character and an event for the story to head toward. It needed a setting. Again, the dream did not tell me enough. The dream was all about the emotions involved, the relationships involved, the tangled skeins of fate. As it turns out, about that time, I had been experimenting with drawing maps on my computer, rather than by hand (I love maps, I collect them and I've drawn hundreds of them), and I have one that I felt good about. So that became the third piece to the puzzle, and it was enough for me to start writing, because there was enough history in creating the map for me to start.

So I did! I would write the novel that would encapsulate the dream that had been tormenting me for months.

Pretty quickly, I realized that I wouldn't be able to achieve the same level of emotional impact, the relationships, the tangled skeins of fate, in just one book, so I thought I would write a trilogy. That gave me more freedom and I got writing, reading to my wife every night (she called them her bedtime stories), leaving her mad at me every night when I had to say, "And that's where I'm at," or "And that's all I've got." And that's also when she started telling me that I rushed things in certain situations (she has a degree in psychology), or that she didn't think that a particular character would react the way I wrote it (particularly if it was a woman), and I would make revisions until she thought it was more realistic. Through that process, and just writing and making use of my supplemental research to create a rich world full of history and mythology and pantheons of Gods and mysteries, I realized that even three books would not be enough to do all that and build to the point in the dream where the same gravitas would be present enough to have the same punch … and I do mean punch.

So I gave myself permission to make it six books, but no more!

The writing continued, the research, the bedtime stories, then I was in book six, and my wife asked me, "Why does it feel like you're rushing?"

I answered, "Because this is book six."

She said, "So?"

I said, "It has to end in book six."

She asked, "Why?"

I answered, "Because I only gave myself permission for this to be six books."

She asked, "What if I gave you permission for it to be longer than six books?"

"You can do that?"

"Can't I?"

So I decided it could be longer than six books. Since the event in my dream that started it all took place in book four, I decided it would be eight books. And thus it remained … except that the books each get longer …. Rilari: Book Four of New Blood was so long that I moved four chapters to Vengeance Borne: Book Five of New Blood (forthcoming) … and I'm starting to wonder if maybe I have to pull a Tad Williams. (Remember? His Memory, Sorrow and Thorn trilogy? Then book three, To Green Angel Tower became two volumes, part 1 and part 2?)

But I digress. That may not be necessary. The story of the story is not yet complete. There's a whole lot of love to go into the New Blood Saga between now and then, and a whole lot of readers out there who can still jump onboard. Like my wife, they can just hear the name of certain characters (one in particular) and get angry, or smile or sigh.