Well, in first draft, anyway.
The Guardians Awaken is the tentative title of a fantasy novel I’ve been working on for a couple years now. I originally pictured it as a YA novel, but since the characters would technically be adults in a medieval-style fantasy world (they’re about 17 or 18), I’m no longer certain that it has to be. It’s a gay romance, of course, but the sex isn’t explicit — it’s more focused on romance and the actual plot (go figure). Though, technically, it doesn’t have to be an “adult” novel, either. I may have to see how my readers feel on that issue.
My biggest concern is vocabulary. Erich and I came up with three languages for the humans and the two warring factions of gods in the novel, which is great, in that it gives the world a bit more depth. But it’s potentially irritating for readers. I suspect I overdid the various words for different things.
The next concern is originality. I think the story line is good, if not radically different from other fantasy novels. Hopefully, there’s enough going on to keep it interesting, and the characters are good. I think that’s the case. Every time I go back over it, it catches my interest, anyway. Again, we’ll see how readers feel about it.
But the big problem is the two factions of gods. One is off-screen, for the most part, but they’re based upon the legends of the Norse Aesir and Vanir. Not precisely, but certainly inspired by them. And what makes this a problem is the Vanir. Tolkien was inspired by Norse legends, as well, and his elves are very much inspired by the Vanir and the Alfar of Norse mythology. I’ve been struggling to make my Taaweh not the same as Tolkien’s elves, but it’s a challenge. The Vanir were gods of the earth, vegetation and water…as are Tolkien’s elves. There are some major differences between my Taaweh and Tolkien’s elves, but they aren’t really apparent in the first novel. (Yes, this is just the first part of a trilogy.)
I was using my work on the end of this novel as my NaNoWriMo “novel” this year, only counting new word count, of course — nothing that I’d written before November. I was intending to then continue past where this one ends and segue into the second novel in the series. But unfortunately, I haven’t had a free weekend this month, until now, and I’ve only managed to get about 12,000 words done towards my NaNo count. I’m pretty much doomed for this year. But finishing Book One is the important thing!
And now I have a bit of time to at least get a start on Book Two.
Jamie Fessenden's Blog 