AT LAST, the epic final installment of The Warriors of Bhrea is here! Stakes are at their highest, the heroes are ragged and nearly losing hope, and the villains are on the brink of complete victory. How will Lauren and her friends prevail?
The ebook, paperback, and hardcover are all available. Order your copy today, and I hope you enjoy The Empire of Damnation! Check out the whole series HERE.
The kingdom of Bhrea is on the brink of destruction.
All that is left to defend Bhrea and the rest of the world is the small, haggard group that survived the failed attempt to retake the capital city Terrn from the clutches of an evil goddess. They are weak and on the run; meanwhile, the enemy runs rampant in a terrorized city, soon to set their sights on the rest of the world. What Lauren and the other survivors don’t know is the enemy’s final plan, nor the catalyst that will set the endgame in motion.
The heroes have one final chance to win the battle—but are they prepared for what is in store? While they gather allies and resources, Astrin and her cohort of imposters stay one step ahead. Each choice, each move brings Lauren and her companions one step closer to the ultimate checkmate. And if they lose this time…there is no coming back.
Welcome to Part 2 of my Culture Building 101 series. For the other posts, click here. For the Conlanging 101 series, click here. To see these concepts in action in my books, click here.
Metaphysics (and Physics)
Whether we recognize it or not, metaphysics plays an important part in our everyday lives. Without it, we would be unable to know anything about anything at all. It pertains to the nature of reality, the nature of consciousness, and what is existence.
Why have I suddenly waxed philosophical? What does this have to do with building a culture? Consider these questions:
Is there a God?
What is our purpose?
Who am I?
Am I the one really making choices or is free will an illusion?
You have a belief that answers each one of those questions, and there are a variety of ideas that seek to get to the bottom of all these matters. All these questions address fundamental qualities of reality such as identity, cause and effect, purpose, and, well…what is reality?
Really weird, that’s what.
Cultures and individuals will operate according to how they understand and seek to answer these questions. A real world analogy you can consider is the nature of time in different cultures. Many cultures consider time to be circular or even an illusion, whereas other cultures consider time to be a linear, progressive aspect of nature. This can influence how people of different cultures value things like punctuality or recording events. Another way metaphysics will fundamentally affect entire cultures and individuals within them is whether they believe there is such a thing as objective truth or reality at all. This can especially impact morality, leading to either a relativist moral system or a concrete one with distinguishable acts of good and evil.
Most people will choose to create a world where the metaphysics and physics, the essence of reality and how it manifests, is generally the same as ours and recognizable. Cause and effect, the direction of time, all go in the same direction as our reality. Gravity and light behave the same. It would take a LOT of work and imagination to come up with an entirely new pattern of existence, so understandably, most apples don’t venture too far from the proverbial tree.
Heh. It’s a gravity joke.
Where it can get very interesting is how a magic system might affect the laws of physics (or the metaphysics of reality itself). Are gods bestowing power upon wielders of magic, like a cleric or warlock in Dungeons and Dragons? Is there a non-sentient font of power that those with particular traits/heritage can draw upon? Are there multiple dimensions beyond what people can directly see, with other planes of existence where more powerful beings exist? Is there a multiverse that allows people to “pull” energy from in order to use in their universe, or that people can travel to? Perhaps those questions can get the noggin joggin’.
Top Down vs Bottom to Top
Depending on where you are in your worldbuilding journey, you will approach it in one of two ways. The first way is you will start with a broad (often metaphysical) concept and start creating a world from the ground up using that concept as a foundation. You might start with a question such as “what if the Greek gods were real?” or “what if our universe is a simulation?” and try to map out how those questions that concern the metaphysical reality of your world affect the rest of the “pyramid.” The second way is you have a specific phenomenon or scenario in mind, and you work backwards all the way to the metaphysical questions in order to explain the phenomenon/situation. This second way is largely how I planned the culture in my series, The Warriors of Bhrea. I had an idea about warriors who could manipulate elements such as light, water, and earth, and over time, I figured out the metaphysical mechanisms that would explain and power these abilities. The way you choose to go about your own worldbuilding is entirely up to you—there is no right or wrong way!
Okay, maybe a wrong way is just copying the entire worldbuilding schema of Star Wars and calling it Schmar Doors.
It’s the final one, the big kahuna. I think you will enjoy this exciting, action-packed conclusion to The Warriors of Bhrea.
As usual, Kiarou has done an AMAZING job illustrating the cover for this final book!
I’m excited to also announce that The Empire of Damnation ebook is available for pre-order! It is even at a special pre-order price of $1.99. It will go up to $2.99 on the day of release, so be sure to get it at the discounted price! When it’s released, it will be on Kindle Unlimited like the others.
The paperback and hardcover are not available for pre-order yet, because Amazon only lets you schedule them a couple months in advance. I will make a post when those pre-orders are up! They will be at a discount price as well.
If you haven’t read the first four books, they are on sale for 99¢ each! Check out the whole series HERE.
The kingdom of Bhrea is on the brink of destruction.
All that is left to defend Bhrea and the rest of the world is the small, haggard group that survived the failed attempt to retake the capital city Terrn from the clutches of an evil goddess. They are weak and on the run; meanwhile, the enemy runs rampant in a terrorized city, soon to set their sights on the rest of the world. What Lauren and the other survivors don’t know is the enemy’s final plan, nor the catalyst that will set the endgame in motion.
The heroes have one final chance to win the battle—but are they prepared for what is in store? While they gather allies and resources, Astrin and her cohort of imposters stay one step ahead. Each choice, each move brings Lauren and her companions one step closer to the ultimate checkmate. And if they lose this time…there is no coming back.
A little over a week ago, I finally finished the first draft of the fifth and final book of The Warriors of Bhrea. The good news is that the final book, The Empire of Damnation, will be out in the next few months! The bad news is…I’m sad. 🙁
The Celebration
Do you know how long I’ve been working on this series? Do you?? I started really writing it in 2018, but the ideas–the world, many of the characters–had been in my head for much longer, since childhood. To see the series complete (though some edits are still needed) is just. Crazy. But, crazy in a good way.
Seeing my story grow and develop over these past several years is a privilege I hope all writers can enjoy. There is nothing like being able to write the pay offs you’ve been building up for years. It is an incredible feeling to see your characters ending up where you think is most fitting. It is like attending a loved one’s graduation–you’ve been watching someone grow up from something small to something big, even helping them on their journey. And now, you get to watch them go out on their own into the great wide world. It inspires a huge sense of accomplishment and gratitude, to be able to witness it and be the architect of the whole affair.
Lastly, it’s a huge relief. It is a relief to finally have a complete idea down, a story from start to finish. It’s a relief to be able to sit back and take a break, to know that a big job is done. Especially since my son was born almost a year and a half ago, I’ve felt a lot of pressure from myself to just get! It! Done! So the final part of the series would not just fall to the wayside in the flurry of learning to be a mom. While I have many more writing projects planned, getting this one under my belt is a huge milestone, and I want to take some time to kick back and relax for a bit.
So, for those reasons, it is a cause for celebration! I’ve finished a series–and a five-part series at that! It’s not easy to write a pentology, but somehow I did it.
The Grief
But with that celebration, sense of accomplishment, relief, and happiness, there is also some grief.
The flipside of watching your loved one at their graduation, while a joyous event, can also be a sad one. It’s a time of letting go, which can be hard to do. You see, when you cultivate a set of characters in your head, you eventually develop an attachment to them, and when their journey is complete, that means it’s time to say goodbye. The characters have “grown up,” and it’s their time to go out into the world and entertain people with no further input from their creator.
The silver lining of this is that it’s not truly the end for these characters, for I have side stories, prequels, and even a sequel series in mind. But, the imaginative journey I began as a kid has completed it’s first (and largest) leg. It’s like hiking a long trail to the top of the mountain, turning around, and realizing you’ve made it halfway up . There’s relief, but there’s also a bit of sadness that the journey is already partly over. After a while, it will be all over.
The Takeaway
I won’t subject you to what is essentially a diary entry for this whole post. I have some takeaways, some things I’ve learned on this incredible ride!
First, take your time. I can’t repeat it enough. Don’t rush through something just to get it done. You will enjoy yourself, and your project, a lot more if you allow yourself to enjoy the process rather than obsess over the product.
Second, don’t procrastinate and overanalyze. Does this contradict what I just said above? No. Too many times I’ve seen writers get hung up on revising to the point of perfection, at the cost of never putting their work out there. I’m happy to break it to you–your story will never be perfect. It is impossible to reach perfection, so let that be permission to let others enjoy your story even if it doesn’t reach your perfectionistic standards.
Lastly, when you do finish your project (and you will, because you’re awesome), allow yourself to feel all the feelings–the good and the bad. It’s your story, you’re the boss, it’s your party, and you can cry if you want to!
You may have read my series on conlanging (the full series here). If you haven’t and want some pointers on creating your own language, be sure to check it out! Now, what if you’re interested not only in creating a language, but creating a beautiful home for that language to live in?
That’s where culture comes in. Perhaps you’re interested in worldbuilding for a story you’re writing, a tabletop campaign you’re planning, or simply want to have an outlet for your creativity. Whatever the case, an essential part of worldbuilding is designing and fleshing out cultures within your world. There are a million and one blogs, websites, and tools helping you figure out the logistics of a realistic (or perhaps unrealistic, but original, universe and magic system). This series is going to focus most on the cultural aspect of worldbuilding—helping give some good starting points, considerations, and resources for constructing a culture (or many cultures) for your world!
credit to Alex Mit
Thousands of years ago, I studied Anthropology (and also Global Studies) in college. It wasn’t the most useful for getting a job, BUT, it has been very useful for guiding my own culture and language constructing. And now, I will share what I learned through my own experience in this process and implementing it in my book series, The Warriors of Bhrea.
The Why
Like in Conlanging 101, it is important to determine why you want to design a culture. What purpose will it serve? Will you need to start building from scratch, or will you already have a real world example to draw from? How involved will the cultural aspects of the setting be with the story/gameplay/etc? These questions will help determine the scope of how much detail you will need and how in depth you will need to focus on certain aspects of culture. For example, if you are writing an alternate historical fantasy set in medieval China, you won’t necessarily need to build a culture from scratch, but you will need to adapt the culture of that time and place to whatever fantastical elements you will introduce in the story (like if dragons were real). As another example, you might be creating a tabletop RPG set in an entirely different universe where the very physical laws of nature are different, so you’ll need to go DEEP into the foundations of worldbuilding and how that will affect the cultures of that universe. And finally, sometimes you won’t need to plan out an ENTIRE culture, only focus in depth on certain aspects that are important for your project. Perhaps much of your fantasy world reflects our own, but you want to pour your creativity into the religions of your world. You will still want to consider how other aspects of culture influence religion, but you won’t need to plan out detailed systems unless they deal directly with religion.
credit to Amith
The Culture Building Process
Once you have determined your “why” and the scope of your project, on to actual building! Sort of like conlanging, culture is made up of foundational pieces that build upon each other. However, instead of just putting basic sounds together into more and more complex sentences, I view culture more like a pyramid. At the base is the fundamental aspect of reality, the physics and metaphysics of the universe, and at the top is more “surface level” stuff like the aesthetics of buildings and clothing—the things that would be more directly apparent in a setting.
And what all is in between? While it may not cover all aspects of culture, my process generally goes like this:
Metaphysics/Physics
Environment/Biology
Geography & How Geographies Interact
Physical Needs
Beliefs & Values
Family Structure
Societal Systems
Technology
Aesthetics
Individual Differences
The first three blocks pertain more to the physical aspect of a world. While not dealing with culture directly yet, they still represent very important considerations for the culture. After all, it is difficult to have a culture if there is nowhere for a culture to live!
The next seven blocks have more to do with the actual culture you want to design. Several of those categories, like societal systems and family structure, are more complex and might require some “sub posts” in order to fully explain my process.
For now, however, I will wrap up this introduction. I hope you find the upcoming information useful, and if you’d like to see my culture-building in action, be sure to check out my book series, The Warriors of Bhrea!
You’ve probably heard of Klingon, or perhaps Quenya (from J.R.R. Tolkien’s books), but have you heard of Anglish?
It might sound a little familiar, but only because of its play on the word “English”—you know, one of the most commonly spoken languages in the world?
This doesn’t even include the number of people who have learned English as a second language.
Before I get into Anglish, first let’s talk about English. Pretty much any English speaker, native or learned, knows that English is…weird. So many strange exceptions to rules, odd spelling, and pronunciations that don’t match how a word looks. WHY is that?
There are several reasons, from vowel shifts to dropping consonants in a word (but keeping the letters, of course). The one I will focus on right now is foreign influence.
A little bit of history…
The history of the British Isles can be oversimplified as one long string of invaders taking over. Celts, Romans, Anglo-Saxons, Vikings, Normans, the French… Who hasn’t taken over Britain at some point? We’ll start with the Anglo-Saxons. A Germanic tribe, their language was the root of what we speak today. When they took over, they mingled with the Celtic tribes, and presumably, some exchange of vocabulary occurred, but we don’t know the exact extent.
A few centuries later, Vikings start invading and bringing their own language (Old Norse), and that contact further influenced English. Another couple centuries later, and the Normans invade, successfully conquering England and establishing a new ruling class. This is where French starts to heavily influence the development of English.
I have written before about how class differences affected which French words got adapted into English. Words that deal with the raw, unprocessed product, such as a pig or cow, remained English. Words that dealt with the end product (and thus made it to the tables of the ruling class), became more influenced by French. For example, pork and beef.
What’s the point of all this? Why I am rambling about the French and cows?
Oui, oui, moooo-sieur, moooo-moiselle.
Now, we get to Anglish!
Anglish is variation—a sort of conlang in the context of a real language—that attempts to only use words firmly rooted in English’s origins, not words borrowed from other languages. Psh, you say. That’s easy!
Is it?
Take the following sentence:
I am a person because I use my brain—that is a fact!
Silly sentences aside, can you spot how many of those words are from foreign (mostly French) influence?
If you guessed person, because, use, and fact, you are correct! I was surprised to learn brain is derived from Old English brægen. Not a foreign word!
Anyway, it’s not so easy to omit foreign words, is it? Here is the same sentence but using only words derived from Old English:
I am a man owing to wielding my brain—that is a truth!
You can see how it’s still intelligible, though quite different than what might come naturally.
Many people have attempted to whittle away foreign influence on the English language, notably Paul Jennings, who coined the term “Anglish” in 1966 (900 years after the Battle of Hastings, where the Normans defeated the English and began their reign of Frenchy terror).
And now, the Anglish project garners fascination from all kinds of folks. Some want to exercise their linguistic chops and come up with new words as an alternate for modern terms that Old English never envisioned. For example, instead of “computer,” saying “reckoner,” which sounds a little ominous…but also rather cool.
Why might it be useful to look into Anglish?
If you’re the conlanging type like I am, you are probably interested in languages in general, as well as their history and relationships. That is one reason to consider looking a bit into Anglish, simply to compare how English could have been to what English is today. Then, you could apply some of those concepts to your own language. How has outside influence changed the languages of your world? What is the reaction to that influence? Are there factions in your world that oppose that influence and wish to “restore” the language?
It’s questions like these that might make exploring Anglish worth it. Well, where can you do such a thing? Turns out, there is a community for that, including groups on Discord, Reddit, and others. There’s even an Anglish translator.
If you’re interested in Anglish and how it could be a fun and informative way to explore your own conlang, be sure to check it out at www.anglish.org. You can find links to the various communities concerned with Anglish there, as well as some videos and history that expand upon what I wrote here. It’s got some great info!
Want some more resources? Here are a couple more sites that provide useful info on the origin of English words and some ways to “translate” modern English to Anglish.
Hello, and happy new year! I have one more interview for you, and this time we’re going to mix it up. It’s on YouTube, and you can just sit back and watch us talk about Midwinter Magic & Mayhem (still available for 99 cents!), fairytales, and fantasy.
I have another fellow author and contributor to the short story anthology,Midwinter Magic & Mayhem! Anna Tizard is a truly unique author that you will love getting to know. Be sure to check out Midwinter Magic & Mayhem for only 99¢ and enjoy some comfy reading for a chilly night. Be sure to also check out Anna’s books and podcast, which are linked throughout the interview.
I write weird, highly imaginative speculative fiction and dreampunk. For me, the whole point of stories is to take readers on a journey they’ve never been on before. Writing a story is magical – you’re literally creating and imparting to someone an experience they wouldn’t otherwise have. But to make these experiences resonate, they must explore situations which, even if they’re completely impossible, are in some way psychologically true.
A lot of my writing is inspired by the theories of the twentieth-century psychologist, Carl Jung, although I never set out intending to draw on these ideas; they tend to emerge of their own accord, taking on new, fantastical forms.
Stories are a way to tap into our unconscious minds, both when writing and reading. I think this is how we find and create experiences that really affect us and stay with us: they reach something deeper inside us.
You have a very unique method for writing new stories. Tell us about it!
Yes – “unique” is the word! I use the surrealist word game of Exquisite Corpse to come up with story ideas. The game randomizes word entries from different people to generate bizarre sentences that follow this structure: “The described noun did something with/to/ for the described noun”.
In fact, I play the game “live” on my podcast, Brainstoryum, brainstorming story ideas by scrambling words my listeners have sent to me through www.annatizard.com/play! It’s hilarious – I laugh quite a lot on the show – but once you start digging beyond your initial impression of these weird word combinations, you find how suggestive they are of situations and characters. Often they can be quite haunting.
Where did you come up with that idea, and how did it lead to your books?
I discovered the game when I was working in a call centre, bored but glad to be working with a great mix of people. At first we played Consequences (where you co-create a short story, with each player writing a different segment on a piece of paper and folding it so the next person can’t see what’s come before). Through a French-Spanish colleague (and an internet search) I learned that the French surrealists in the 1920s transformed Consequences into an even weirder game where you co-create a single sentence.
It was actually years after that initial discovery that I started experimenting with stories from the game results in earnest, and I got hooked!
“The empty danger” was a weird word combination that felt like a puzzle: what could be both dangerous and empty, or intangible? Along came the pandemic and I had my answer: fear itself. The novella explores the question of what happens when (pretty much) the whole world is feeling the same thing at once – but based on entirely fantastical interpretation of what fear might look like (evil goblin-like creatures beyond the clouds. Oh, and they also stink!).
My next book was inspired by an entire Exquisite Corpse result: “The lofty portrait of my grandmother rapidly salivated at the estranged stairwell” (and yes, you will probably have to read that sentence twice!). This sparked a story about an artist whose dying grandmother’s portrait comes alive after her death – so is she really dead? The plot has some really weird twists, again based on the idea that our minds are all connected. “I For Immortality” won the Imadjinn Award for Best Literary Fiction Novel in 2022.
So far I’ve written at least twenty short stories based on different Exquisite Corpses (Overcast in Midwinter Magic & Mayhem being one example). While many of these are yet to be published, one story, The Midnight Ship, became such a collaborative project since I invited my podcast listeners to give me feedback on the first draft, that I decided to publish this as a stand-alone, perma-free e-book. (Download here: https://BookHip.com/BLRGGCX.)
What is the silliest or funniest word combination you’ve had to work with?
Oh my goodness, there are so many… Two that spring to mind are: “The humungous vampire angrily washed the engorged cheese” and “The crispy pumpkin vaingloriously ached for the attentions of the narcotic slipper”. Another, more recent example is: “The loving horizon passed through the TSA Checkpoint with the galloping pickle.” I mean, come on! Talk about a writing challenge.
But it’s so fascinating to get feedback from my listeners because they can come up with whole new ways of looking at these things. For example, one author (Frasier Armitage) suggested that “The Loving Horizon” might be a valuable painting which someone is trying to smuggle through customs by hiding it under the less well-regarded piece, “The Galloping Pickle”! Incredible. Hats off to my listeners!
It’s funny you should ask about my followers’ submissions: When I first received the invitation to write for this anthology, I hunted around for an Exquisite Corpse that would fit the wintry theme. When I couldn’t find anything, I asked my listeners and readers to send me wintry words for the game, hoping that these would combine into the perfect Exquisite Corpse to inspire a story! But inspiration doesn’t work like that. As the original surrealists knew, the spark of an idea comes from the unconscious mind and one way to “get at” this is through randomness, and by not trying to control things.
So after going round in circles on this (and experimentally trying to break my own “rules” for finding inspiration!) I settled on a sentence that had some resonance for me, though not with an obvious winter theme:
“The long-tailed mystic learned the secrets of the overcast gargoyle.”
The word “overcast” was my way in to a weather-based kind of magic, and gradually the rest of the story took shape. The concept of winter actually being inside the protagonist came to me quite late in the drafting process. (I’m a discovery writer, and often I don’t know how everything’s going to fit together until quite far in to the first draft.)
The word play that occurs with the title (I don’t want to give this away to anyone who hasn’t read the story yet!) literally sprang into my mind at random while I was quite far into the second draft – there’s no way I could have worked that out consciously or in advance. This is what I love about being a discovery writer. Not only do my stories tap into the deeper parts of the mind, but the process itself is a way of delving into these unknown spaces inside me – and I get to turn them into entertainment!
Many readers come to my site to read my series on conlanging. Though you aren’t making up a new language, you are playing with words we know and use everyday. How has this opened up your creativity, if it has done so?
Trying to create stories from Exquisite Corpse game results is really challenging, but it’s become a vital regular exercise for my imagination (as well as extremely fun!). Since I began the podcast, I’m finding it quicker and easier to come up with new ideas. The imagination is like a muscle: you never know what you can achieve until you push yourself that bit further.
Brainstorming story ideas on the spot for the podcast also enables me to share this process with so many other authors (or aspiring authors) who, like me, have no clue where this is going to take their creativity.
Some people might find it a weird and scary prospect: allowing complete randomness to guide what I write next. It is scary, every time I sit down to play the game! But it’s given me confidence in what my imagination can do. It’s also given me the most unique, unexpected ideas I would never have otherwise dreamed of.
Do you have any upcoming releases or works-in-progress you’d like to tell us about?
I have several works in progress at the moment, either in early drafts or busy percolating. I like to switch between projects so some stories can “rest” while I work on others, and come back to them afresh. It’s a messy process but it works for me!
I’m looking forward to the spring or summer 2023 release of a new dreampunk anthology I’ve contributed to, entitled Somniscope (Fractured Mirror Publishing, edited by Cliff Jones Jr,). Broadly speaking, dreampunk is a fantasy and scifi subgenre which explores the mind and different states of consciousness – right up my street! My story is called The Secret Undoing and it’s about an auditor for the government who comes across some dodgy figures in the accounts. Having notified his manager, he is then forced to “forget” this incriminating piece of information. A dream clinician guides him through a meditation into the deeper layers of his unconscious mind so he can literally “bury” the unwanted memory. It’s as weird as it sounds!
Any parting thoughts you’d like to share?
I’ve always felt that stories are full of unlikely yet resonant connections. This is what the original surrealists were exploring by randomizing words and juxtaposing ill-fitting images: they wanted to go beyond the conscious order and the automatic assumptions we make, and to reach for something deeper than the obvious or surface reality. By placing situations and characters together that don’t fit perfectly, or are deliberately misaligned, we find the basis for a striking, original idea.
Everyone knows that stories are about conflict. But not everyone realises how much you can discover by digging into mismatched, conflicting ideas or themes, and using them to uproot new ways of exploring universal themes. This is really at the heart of what I do.
This is also why I’m always encouraging Brainstoryum listeners to join in, and to write in if they’ve been inspired to write a story. The possibilities are literally limitless.
Like Einstein said, “Creativity is intelligence having fun”.
Thank you so much, Anna! It was a pleasure to interview you. You can find out more about Anna at her website, www.annatizard.com. You can also subscribe to her email list and get TWO free stories!
At last, the big day has arrived! Four books down, and one more to go. I hope you enjoy this exciting, action-packed penultimate installment of The Warriors of Bhrea.
The hardcover is unfortunately not quite ready, but it should be in the next couple weeks. Keep an eye for it if that’s the format you prefer! Otherwise, the ebook and paperback are available now, including on Kindle Unlimited. And if you haven’t read the first three books, they are on sale for 99¢ each! Check out the whole series HERE.
The enemy has played their hand, and now chaos reigns.
Though separated by worlds and kingdoms, Lauren Strauss and her companions have a united goal: take down Astrin and her villainous cohort. New allies are found, secrets are revealed, and most of all, deep bonds are formed even amidst the shadow of destruction looming over an entire world. But will it be enough to stop an ancient goddess bent on doing whatever it takes to raise an empire from the ashes?
It is easy to give in to despair…but hope remains, however small. Lauren and her friends must either place all their meager hope in chasing rumors of a hidden goddess—or they must rely solely on themselves to defeat a great and powerful evil.
