Hello Subscribers! November is a weird one. My wife and I have decided to do a digital detox, and one of my things is to not be online and also (very radical and experimental) try writing long hand. With like, a notebook and pen. I'll have a lot to say about how that goes in December.

For this newsletter, I'm going to tell you a bit about the world-building in my work-in-progress, which is an epic fantasy novel with magic and lesbians and a crusty hand-drawn map!

Making maps

Drawing a map is one of those activities that my vestigial Protestant brain tells me is too decadent to be enjoyed early, something to be saved for “afters” when the hard work of writing the story is done. But, well, here we are. 60K+ words into what I think will be at least a 130K word epic sapphic romantasy and I couldn’t wait any longer.

For now, I will call this the World of Legend. It’s been in my mind for a long time, for maybe 20 years, since I started thinking I might want to write a fantasy book set in a secondary world. I didn’t know much, but I did know that whatever the story turned out to be, I wanted to the world to be a southern hemisphere one, redolent of the big blue universe of the Pacific, its innards and its margins, with the cold bit at the bottom. No wolves, no horses, no dragons, and no deciduous trees. Instead, in my mind, it is mostly rainforest and reptiles, giant terrestrial molluscs, and birds, birds, birds.

I am not good at parchment-style map drawing so the result is very scruffy and abstract. Hopefully you can still read the writing on it!

Here’s a bit about the story, the characters and how they fit into the world. This is a fantasy romance. I can and should use the term romantasy but I go back and forth on it. I fear that if I use it, it’s false advertising, e.g. will people get mad that there are no dragons of faeries? I don’t know. But it’s equal parts fantasy and romance, maybe veering more towards romance.

The simplest description of the story is a love triangle between three women—a queen, a solider and a shape-shifting princess—where the soldier and the princess (the dual POVs) are competing for the hand of the queen in marriage but end up falling in love with each other.

Here are some notes about the world and the characters. Like my drawing they are very sketchy and lacking detail but I’m afraid this is what my first drafts are like.

Summer

Summer is the centre of the world. It is huge, powerful and diverse, and ruled over by the Sun Queen.

The capital of Summer is Kata-Obari, named after the Obari River. The Obari distributes into a vast delta, and in the south, there’s this little floating village (the Delta is strewn with floating villages) called Hesitation Water, which I named in English after the river near the place where I grew up, Waiāwangawanga (Te Aka Māori Dictionary: āwangawanga).

The Soldier: Nia of Hesitation Water

Nia, the soldier, is from Hesitation Water, and so is the Sun Queen, Rana. They were childhood sweethearts. Nia has always loved Rana and is mother to her children, but they are not together when the story starts. Nia is a Captain in the Summer Army, and is a bit of a folk hero. She is known as the Reed Captain.

Legend

In the north-west sea is a rich volcanic island, known as Legend. About 30 years ago, there was a catastrophic eruption that buried the only city, Rai Sinter, and swept the ruling monarch, the Golden Langur Queen, and all her court (except her son and daughter), into the sea. The people of Legend are mysterious and isolationist. They are thought to be practitioners of sorcery. They are the sole possessors of magic in this world.

The Princess: Lady Beast of Legend

Lady Beast is the High Princess of Legend. Her elder brother is known as the Tapir King. She is in Summer to compete for the hand of the Sun Queen, and is up against twenty-one other suitors, including Nia.

Ratuparichaya

People have come from all over the World of Legend to compete in the Ratuparichaya, which is a once-in-a-generation festival of nations, where luminaries, royals, warriors and rogues compete to marry the Sun Queen. The winner becomes the Consort of Summer and arguably the most powerful person in the world, because they get to decide who will be the next Sun Queen. The word Ratuparichaya is based on several ideas: The Hindi word parichay or pricay, derived from Sanskrit, meaning introduction or acquaintance; the Indonesian world ratu, meaning queen, or sometimes king or ruler, and also Ratu is an honorific for a chief in Fijian. I am checking all of this; my research is imperfect and is something I am working on as I write.

Ratuparichaya is this massive, mobile extravaganza that kicks off in the north of Summer, in Parri-Bā, a city that has evolved from an ancient fortress built around an artesian spring, whose waters empty into the great port city of Surinaya, sea-nest of the Summer Navy.

Kartini of Treasure

To the north of Summer is Treasure, a rich and powerful nation ruled by an Emperor, known as the Nickel Emperor. She has sent her youngest and most expendable daughter, Kartini, to compete in the Ratuparichaya.

The Tapir King has been waging an increasingly desperate war against the Nickel Emperor, who covets access to Legend’s many fabled riches. Lady Beast, rumour has it, is his most deadly weapon, operating for many years as an assassin in the shadows of Treasure’s great capital, Bandalarang. Needless to say, Kartini and the Treasure Delegation are out to get her.

Dayan of Enclave

Dayan is the King of Enclave, known as the Sky King. Enclave is a very small kingdom in the western mountains, where the Sky King rules by divine authority. When the King dies, a new Sky King is appointed from amongst a collection of holy clerics via a secret ritual called Reloncavi. When the story starts, the people of Enclave have revolted, and overthrown King Dayan, who has fled to Summer and seeks to reclaim power by becoming the Consort of Summer, and thus (he thinks) have the backing to reclaim his rights in Enclave.

Hikuroa of Rain

In the south-east of the world is the archipelago of Rain. The ocean of Rain is cold and rough, but it is the richest in the world. The land provides the finest and most valuable greenstone known to humans. The people of Rain are warriors, hunters of whales, but there is strife, because there are three princes, each with a claim to the throne. Hikuroa is the youngest. He is at war with his eldest brother, and has lost his fiefdom on the island of Matui-Pō. Like King Dayan, he’s had to flee. His people have used every piece of wealth they have to buy his entry into Ratuparichaya. He is a bit of a romantic hero in Summer, and is an excellent fighter, so he is one of the favourites to win.

Also, Winter

In the vast south is Winter. The second part of the story will be about Winter, although at the moment I don’t know that much about it. The people are mobile, numerous, decentralised. I think they are anarchists, essentially. Nia has fought against Winter militias. There are unbroken cords of Winter all through Summer, especially in the Obari Delta. Summer is one way to be, and Winter is another. My ideas on this are very ill-formed, at this point. I will perhaps write about this more in another post.

Anyway, no-one from Winter competes openly in the Ratuparichaya, but you should know that their spies are everywhere.

More world-building to come, I hope! Thank you for reading!