Many things surprise me as I write. One of them is the structure the story seems to have chosen. I thought the party going exploring would give me a set of chapters about, well, dungeon exploration. Fighting monsters. Finding treasures. That sort of thing.

The original notion I had for Merrynight was “The Thin White Duke of Hell.” That changed a fair bit as I worked on the chapter, but I think traces of the original idea are still there. Just, you know, a bit darker than what I first had in mind.

It’s funny the things that you pick up here and there. I wrote a story for the historical magazine Old News some time ago about porcelain, and the European who figured out how to make the stuff. It was highly-desired, literally worth its weight in gold due to its beauty and hardness. So having it […]

This chapter grew a bit as I worked on it, to the point where I ended up dividing it into two shorter chapters. Part of that growth, I feel, I should have seen coming. There’s something that happens with a lot of writers, in which a theme or image or idea recurs in their fiction. […]

I’ve been wanting to get into the habit of writing down thoughts on the chapters of The Fell Gard Codices as I publish them, and as I’m beginning to figure out the time commitments involved with the story and how to make it all work, I figure it’s time to get started with that. Herewith, […]