Familiar Acts, Unfamiliar Places

There is such strange comfort in going through the patterns of creating a language; in figuring out from sounds and grammar and syntax the character of a people lost from the world. The Sun Wizards are gone, though a few artifacts from their wondrous culture remain. I’ve been building backwards, from a city, a handful of doors, the echoes of a few disembodied voices, to extrapolate the culture of the people who left those things behind.

I bumped into the Sun Wizards’ leavings only briefly in The Ruby Key—not enough to get anything but the most ephemeral of hints of who they had once been.

This time, their echoes are ringing more loudly through the world of MOON AND SUN, and the act of sitting curled up on the couch, scribbling on paper, writing down my discoveries in neat little rows and columns on language worksheets, gave me as many mysteries as it gave me answers. And gave me, too, the fun of knowing that I get to chase after those mysteries.

Started writing for the day just a few minutes ago. I have a new map, though. The Sun Wizards’ words, the things they spoke and the things they wrote, are leading me into places I didn’t know the story had. I’m glad to be going there.

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By Holly

Novelist, writing teacher, on a mission to reprint my out-of-print books and indie-publish my new ones.

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Mo_olelo
15 years ago

Thank you, thank you, thank you Holly. You can’t know what a boost reading your reply to Jess, was to me.

Jess
15 years ago

This might be a stupid question but I’ll ask it anyway. You’re an outliner/plotter, right? So wouldn’t you already know the mysteries? 😀 I just thought with a series, you’d have done that as worldbuilding beforehand or something. Or is it more on a by-book basis? Just curious!

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