Magic

Serializing Delphinium

Posted by

0

I’ve been a bad author. It has taken me far far too much time to get Delphinium done, and frankly, I’m still not finished.

I am sorry.

I get ahead of myself and make plans, and then I realize I can’t do what I want to. With a blog and facebook and twitter I’ve found myself also spouting all my plans to people who actually count on me. Then I can’t deliver.

I’m learning, I’m trying to catch up with my mouth and ideas. I’m getting there. To make up for this astoundingly long wait I’ve decided to serialize Delphinium’s first edition on my blog. It’ll have pages up there under “Clandestina > Larkspur Series > Delphinium” and I’ll mention it in posts here. There are 15 parts of ~2000 words each, and most still need polish, so I’m going to release one at a time (in order :P) until the book’s finished. I’ve giving myself a day, maybe two, for each section. That said some sections are almost perfect now, so as soon as they are done they will be put up. I won’t be holding anything back, it’s less ‘a part a day’ and more ‘a part as fast as I can finish it.’

Then I’ll send it over to my editor to catch any last moment issues I may have missed, and release it on Amazon/B&N/Kobo. Sadly at that point the ‘first edition’ will be taken down.

The first part of Delphinium will be up *tonight.* It’s late-ish (East Coast) but I’ll have it up before I crash for the night. I promise.

Terms, technicalities, and magic

Posted by

0

Also, as long as I’m being pedantic– Pierre is not a necromancer. Yes, Larkspur is subtitled ‘A Necromancer’s Romance’ but that’s mostly because if I said necrocræft user no one would understand. (Maybe I could change it to Suitor of Death’s Romance though..).

The suffix -mancy implies divination. Necromancy is telling the future from the dead. In modern terms it usually just means whatever dark wizardry involves corpses and maybe spirits. While Pierre does have some mastery over spirits of death, and the souls of the dead, he does not tell the future with this power. Whether he can.. well I’ll have to think about that.

Being a user of cræft/craft, is closer to what I want to express. In Noctuina a cræft is a magic that you are practicing. What is special about humans is that with their balance of humours, most people can learn a cræft if they so choose. General magic works well with humanity. Other creatures may have their types of magic, but they could not so easily learn another kind.

Also, a cræft is something you must practice and hone. When a magic becomes so ingrained in you that no matter what it cannot be lost the suffix of the cræft changes to -magia. So pyrocræft would be learning and practicing magic related to fire. To have pyromagia would be to always have this magic within you permanently.(Necromagia, from Mora’s kind of necrocræft, is not possible).