#fantasy novel

[futboleverything]

Doing some light reading 📖 before bed. I’ve been meaning to start the third book of the Eragon series, Brisingr. Excited to see where this book takes me!

[herebethestories1]

Welcome to Theondra

Theondra is the world that my novel The Mercy of Dragons takes place in. I've decided to start sharing some of the lore, since I did quite a bit of work that didn't show up in the book. The Mercy of Dragons should be fully understandable without this context and is available on my Amazon author page (www.amazon.com/author/rrstockton [idk what's happening I can't actually link it])

This world exists so E'shi, the main character can exist in it. I've done a lot of worldbuilding and will have plenty more to share, but some questions simply didn't come up as I was writing this story, so there are gaps. I fill them in as I need to writing other stories or when my brain wants to.

Here are the super-basics of Theondra:

It's Earth plus. Expect to see pretty much everything you'd expect to see on Earth (given location and time period). We have one sun, one moon, four seasons and gravity and the water cycle and such. I pull most of the dragons and humanoids from various mythologies.

E'shi's story takes place in an admittedly unoriginal feudal Europe-ish place. And I also admittedly stole a lot of words from Welsh. The two primary kingdoms that we deal with are Tir Dewrach, which is a human kingdom, and Tavachegan, the elven kingdom next door. I have a fairly stable map of what this little section of the world looks like. (but is has no labels right now, I'll share it when it's more complete)

In E'shi's book, we deal with humans, elves, and dragons. We interact with more types of dragons than we do humanoid species. It wasn't a purposeful oversight but I honestly don't know how much more I could have crammed into the one book. Humans come in all the varieties available here on Earth. They might not have all made it into the book, but they're out there. There are also magical creatures and monsters but I literally only have one of each at the moment so we'll skip that for now.

Elves are certainly not the only magical humanoids, and my list is expanding but here are the others that I know will show up, or already have: dwarves, fauns, selkies, sirens (bird ones!), and kitsune.

The dragons are also inspired by ones all over the world, again most of the ones we interact with directly in canon so far are from European folklore, but theoretically if it can reasonably be called a dragon it could exist in Theondra. (I really love dragons so I have lists and lists of them from everywhere because researching dragons is fun!) The ones so far that show up in a story are: traditional fantasy dragons (which I call dayum dragons, guess why), wyverns, northern worms, sea serpents, and a personal favorite, tatzlewyrms (which can also be called gargoyles depending on where you are in Theondra).

Dragons here are intelligent beings. They can talk and think and make decisions about their own behavior. Most of them horde stuff (stuff varies), and have a range of personalities. This is also true of humanoids as well. Anyone can be a good or bad person. The good guys here don't just kill a certain group of intelligent beings on sight because they're somehow all evil? It's actually kind of a point I make in The Mercy of Dragons.

So this is the superbasics, but I have to start somewhere.

[jameshmayfield]

FREE Kindle Ebook - THROUGH THE PURPLE FOREST, by Sean Murry

FREE until August 15th, on Amazon Kindle!

What if the monsters children fear are only shadows of the battles they fight in real life?

Eleven-year-old Summer has faced impossible odds before. Armed with courage, an unstoppable imagination, and mysterious powers, she battles terrifying mechanical creatures that appear where no one else expects them. But even as she defeats monsters no child should ever encounter, another challenge is waiting, one that cannot simply be outrun. When John arrives at Kids Castle, he finds himself surrounded by an unforgettable group of children whose lives have been shaped by courage, friendship, and resilience. Together they discover that the greatest adventures are not always found in magical forests or epic battles, but in the quiet moments where hope refuses to give up.

As reality and imagination intertwine, purple forests become places of healing, monstrous cats represent fears too difficult to name, and every victory carries a deeper meaning. Through laughter, suspense, mystery, and heartwarming friendships, each child learns that true strength is not measured by the absence of fear, but by the willingness to keep moving forward despite it.

[franklynspolycule]

what are y'alls thoughts on major age gaps relationships in fantasy romance novels. Like hundreds of years. But its like... 400 yo x 600 yo?

[zeniawrites69]

yay I'm managing to do some drafting!

Been suffering with some writers block for a hot minute, now on my redraft of my first novel. I managed 633 words today despite feeling like death and PMS kicking my ass. I'm 16,500 words into this bitch, including outline notes, so if I'm lucky I might be able to finish one of these things by the end of the year. If my ADHD ass can do it, so can you guys! Get a sentence written. You got it :)

[rbillustration]

It's my birthday!! 🎉

Obligatory cheeky art share if you'd like to check out my work - and a mention that I'm currently working on my fantasy novel Sunder the Sky, a love letter to the JRPGs of my childhood with a focus on platonic relationships 💜✨

[jacecalloway]

IT'S LIVE. Tenebrist: The Cut is up on Royal Road.

His magic charges him for every cast, and only half of it shows up on the sheet.

Corin Hale is a Tenebrist, which isn't a rare gift so much as a filing problem. His darkness reaches, closes, and drinks whatever it finds: warmth, light, and then the rest of it. Other mages watch him work once and afterward stand a little further away. The guild pays him eight silver a day to kill vermin in stairwells and doesn't pretend that's a career.

He'd take it forever if the job were the problem. It isn't. The man who raised him and taught him to cast is on record at floor fifty-one, and fifty-one sits behind a rank he won't legally hold for sixty years of the only work anyone will hire him for.

So he grinds. Contracts by depth, not by pay. Costs down, level up, one number at a time, with three people who should know better walking beside him.

The numbers are going up. Something else is going down, and nobody's counting it.

Floor-based mega dungeon, crunchy LitRPG systems, a found family that actually earns its dynamics, and a slow burn queer romance simmering underneath a story that owes more to Frieren and Dungeon Meshi than to your average tower climb. Not isekai. Just a guy trying to grind his way to the one place that might have answers, in a world that keeps telling him no.

Read it here:

His magic charges him for every cast, and only half of it shows up on the sheet. Corin Hale is a Tenebrist, which isn't a rare gift so much