11 December 2025, Writing - part xxxx259 The Novel, Idea, Shadow of Darkness
Announcement: I
still need a new publisher. However, I’ve taken the step to republish my
previously published novels. I’m starting with Centurion, and
we’ll see from there. Since previously published novels have little
chance of publication in the market (unless they are huge best sellers), I
might as well get those older novels back out. I’m going through Amazon
Publishing, and I’ll pass the information on to you.
Introduction: I wrote the
novel Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon. This was my 21st novel
and through this blog, I gave you the entire novel in installments that
included commentary on the writing. In the commentary, in addition to other
general information on writing, I explained, how the novel was constructed, the
metaphors and symbols in it, the writing techniques and tricks I used, and the
way I built the scenes. You can look back through this blog and read the entire
novel beginning with http://www.pilotlion.blogspot.com/2010/10/new-novel-part-3-girl-and-demon.html.
I’m using this novel as
an example of how I produce, market, and eventually (we hope) get a novel
published. I’ll keep you informed along the way.
Today’s Blog: To see the steps in
the publication process, visit my writing websites http://www.sisteroflight.com/.
The four plus two basic
rules I employ when writing:
1. Don’t confuse your readers.
2. Entertain your readers.
3. Ground your readers in the writing.
4. Don’t show (or tell) everything.
4a. Show what can be
seen, heard, felt, smelled, and tasted on the stage of the novel.
5. Immerse yourself in the world of your writing.
6. The initial scene is the most important scene.
These are the steps I use to write a novel
including the five discrete parts of a novel:
1. Design the initial scene
2. Develop a theme statement
(initial setting, protagonist, protagonist’s helper or antagonist, action
statement)
a. Research as required
b. Develop the initial
setting
c. Develop the characters
d. Identify the telic flaw
(internal and external)
3. Write the initial scene
(identify the output: implied setting, implied characters, implied action
movement)
4. Write the next scene(s)
to the climax (rising action)
5. Write the climax scene
6. Write the falling action
scene(s)
7. Write the dénouement
scene
I finished writing my 31st novel,
working title, Cassandra, potential title Cassandra:
Enchantment and the Warriors. The theme statement is: Deirdre and
Sorcha are redirected to French finishing school where they discover difficult
mysteries, people, and events.
I finished writing my 34th novel
(actually my 32nd completed novel), Seoirse,
potential title Seoirse: Enchantment and the Assignment. The
theme statement is: Seoirse is assigned to be Rose’s protector and helper at
Monmouth while Rose deals with five goddesses and schoolwork; unfortunately,
Seoirse has fallen in love with Rose.
Here is the cover
proposal for the third edition of Centurion:
|
Cover Proposal |
The most important scene
in any novel is the initial scene, but eventually, you have to move to the
rising action. I am continuing to write on my 30th novel,
working title Red Sonja. I finished my 29th novel,
working title Detective. I finished writing number 31,
working title Cassandra: Enchantment and the Warrior. I just
finished my 32nd novel and 33rd novel: Rose:
Enchantment and the Flower, and Seoirse: Enchantment and the
Assignment.
How to begin a novel. Number one thought,
we need an entertaining idea. I usually encapsulate such an idea with a
theme statement. Since I’m writing a new novel, we need a new theme
statement. Here is an initial cut.
For novel 30: Red Sonja, a Soviet spy,
infiltrates the X-plane programs at Edwards AFB as a test pilot’s
administrative clerk, learns about freedom, and is redeemed.
For Novel 32: Shiggy Tash finds a lost girl
in the isolated Scottish safe house her organization gives her for her latest
assignment: Rose Craigie has nothing, is alone, and needs someone or something
to rescue and acknowledge her as a human being.
For novel 33, Book girl:
Siobhàn Shaw is Morven McLean’s savior—they are both attending Kilgraston
School in Scotland when Morven loses everything, her wealth, position, and
friends, and Siobhàn Shaw is the only one left to befriend and help her
discover the one thing that might save Morven’s family and existence.
For novel 34: Seoirse is assigned to
be Rose’s protector and helper at Monmouth while Rose deals with five goddesses
and schoolwork; unfortunately, Seoirse has fallen in love with Rose.
For novel 35: Eoghan, a Scottish National
Park Authority Ranger, while handing a supernatural problem in Loch Lomond and
The Trossachs National Park discovers the crypt of Aine and accidentally
releases her into the world; Eoghan wants more from the world and Aine desires
a new life and perhaps love.
Here
is the scene development outline:
1.
Scene input (comes from the previous scene output or is an initial scene)
2.
Write the scene setting (place, time, stuff, and characters)
3.
Imagine the output, creative elements, plot, telic flaw resolution (climax) and
develop the tension and release.
4.
Write the scene using the output and creative elements to build the tension.
5.
Write the release
6.
Write the kicker
Today: Let me tell you a little about writing. Writing
isn’t so much a hobby, a career, or a pastime. Writing is a habit and an
obsession. We who love to write love to write.
Let’s look at the outline for a novel again:
1. The initial scene
2. The rising action scenes
3. The climax scene
4. The falling action
scene(s)
5. The dénouement scene(s)
There are some other ways of writing a
novel, but I don’t recommend them. The
main reason is that the other methods have not in the past been bestsellers. You do get a few for example in the Roman Fleuve
style or the stream of consciousness style, but those are considered outliers. If you have even encountered a novel in a
different style than the common outline, you are either a book freak like me or
a literati. I’d rather you be a book
freak, the literati think both these experimental styles make a great
novel. I’ll have to say John dos Passos’
USA is a great trilogy about the USA, but it’s not really that well read of a
classic and not a modern bestseller.
James Joyce is a bestseller because the literati keep making his
terrible stream of unconsciousness novels required reading. If anyone other than a book freak reads them,
I’m not sure who it is. I’m certain none
of the literati read James Joyce. In
fact, more people have read Tolkien the most unread read writer in history than
any literati who read Joyce. I’ve read
them all. Tolkien is the best of the
bunch, but Tolkien has his issues. I’ve
written about that, and I’ll likely get into it again. For now, take my advice. If you want to write a novel that people and
you will want to read, follow the outline above. Let’s go over it a little, or a lot.
First let me tell you why I write. I love to read. I’m constantly reading two or more novels and
a stack of nonfiction. The reason is
that I love to read. I’ve been rereading
some novels lately just to recalibrate.
I think I’ll move to Jack Vance for fun and remembering. I’m also reading Guttenberg project
books. I advertise that I read all the
old bestsellers that no one reads anymore.
This is true.
I write to make novels that I want to read
and reread. That’s my only purpose. I’m self-entertaining, although I write for
others to read, my purpose and goal is to write novels that I love to
read. Why is that? I figure that if I love to read the novels,
others will love to read the novels. In
fact, I know I’m succeeding because although I still love my earlier novels and
I reread them, I’ve become a better author over time. My first novel isn’t as well written as my 32nd
novel, and my 33rd novel will be better than that. I must say, some of my middle novels might be
better than some of my later novels, but it may be by degree rather than much
or little. In other words, the
qualification of better is really hard to categorize when the plots, ideas, and
worldviews are different. We become
better writers as we write more and more novels. Everything becomes better because we are
improving our skillset and our skills.
So, this leads directly to the question
why write novels? The reason is always
(or should always be) to entertain. I
can assure you, unless you do entertain and intend to entertain your readers,
you will not sell any of the novels you write.
Novel writing is all about entertainment no matter what the literati
have told you. Writing is just like song
writing, art, or music. Ultimately, if
the viewer or hearer isn’t entertained, they will not buy or look at your art
or music. Yes, I know there are the rare
or not so rare cases of the very terrible art and music that is foisted on the
masses as great, but look at what happens to the art and music sales. I mean specifically, The Painted Word by
Tom Wolf where Wolf describes that abstract pieces did not sell well even when
they were accepted wholesale by the art literati as the modern genre. It was only when pop art made its break into
the art market that sales began to grow again.
He wasn’t criticizing abstract art as a media as much as he was noting
that people want art they can understand and that is entertaining to them. Much of the abstract art doesn’t do
either. If you try to write an abstract
novel, as James Joyce did, your chance of entertaining your audience is very
poor.
I want to start with these definitions as
a premise for writing.
1. Write to entertain
2. Write using the
common outline for a novel
With both of these as a premise, I can
easily help you to begin to write a novel.
Let’s move to the basis for the novel, an idea.
This is my approach. It isn’t everyone’s approach, but it has
worked for me about 25 of the 33 or so novels I’ve written. In my earlier novels, I started with an
idea. A specific telic flaw that I could
develop into a full length novel. I’ve
written in the past about these ideas and where these novels started. These are my earlier novels and mostly my
published novels. I’ll repeat again, my
publisher went out of business and I’m looking for a new publisher. That said, I should define a few terms and describe
how I developed ideas for my earlier novels.
The first thing to define is the telic
flaw. The telic flaw is a Greek and
classical term for the problem that causes and must be resolved in the novel
(writing). For the Greeks, the writing
was mainly plays, but they also had epic poetry. The telic flaw is the problem that causes the
novel (play) to happen. In a comedy, the
telic flaw is resolved by the protagonist.
In a tragedy, the protagonist is overcome by the telic flaw.
Usually, the telic flaw is relatively
simple in ancient writing (plays and epic poetry) this doesn’t mean the stories
or the plots are simple. In the Odyssey,
Odysseus is trying to get home from the Trojan War. In the Illiad, the Greeks are trying
to return Helen to Greece. In the Greek
worldview, the basic plot is fate.
Pathos is the fate of man, and chronos is the fate of the gods. All Greek writing orbits around this plot and
theme, however the telic flaw for the writing is usually simple and unique.
Most writing after the Greeks took on the
Greek form even to a large degree with the ideas of fate. This turned into the plot and theme of blood
will out in Victorian literature. This
is important for the understanding of writing and novels in the past, but not
so important to the idea of writing a modern novel.
For the modern novel just realize
this. First, you need a telic flaw. Second, you need a protagonist. Third, you need an antagonist. Fourth, you need to have the protagonist
resolve the telic flaw (comedy) or you need to have the telic flaw overcome the
protagonist (tragedy). We can write this
as an idea like this:
3. Develop a telic flaw,
a protagonist, an antagonist, and plan to resolve the telic flaw.
I write generally to plan to resolve the
telic flaw because whether you are writing a comedy or a tragedy, the telic
flaw gets resolved (so to speak), and I like comedies. I don’t usually write tragedies. Tragedies are not as entertaining to me as
comedies. I might write one, but I
haven’t planned to.
In the past, although I didn’t fully
realize this, I started with a telic flaw, a problem in the world of my
potential novel. I accomplished this
with a what if question, or just a general question. For example, with my published novel Centurion,
the question was: what led the Centurion before the cross of Christ to state,
“Surely this man was a son of God.” That
was the basis for the novel Centurion, and Centurion is all about
that person who is the protagonist. The
telic flaw was encapsulated in the concept of the statement. In other words, the Centurion at the cross had
to recognize Christ as a son of God. The
resolution was that statement and the background for it. It took about 400 pages or over 100,000 words
to get to that point—that’s a reasonable novel.
I should explain about how I got to the
ideas for my other novels as a part of this novel and novel idea development
leading up to writing a novel. I guess
I’ll do that, and then I’ll move on to how I develop an idea for a novel today
and compare it to how I did it in the past.
I’ll also explain why I like my current method best. I’ll put up the basic “rules” for novel
writing in compilation:
I want to start with these definitions as
a premise for writing.
1. Write to entertain
2. Write using the
common outline for a novel
3. Develop a telic flaw,
a protagonist, an antagonist, and plan to resolve the telic flaw.
I cleaned up the blog a little because I’m
finished at the moment with the concept of developing a plot or a question as
the basis for the idea of a novel. This
method will work but it has issues. I’ll
leave up the point of the transition of my ideas in Sister of Darkness
and below I’ll explain why I’m not as enamored of using a plot or question as
the basis of a novel.
With Sister of Darkness I just gave
up on the idea of the question. I really
didn’t fully comprehend how I was writing my novels, but I had a protagonist,
Leora Bolang and I moved forward with the novel. I should have realized earlier that Lumiere
Bolang was pretty much the actual protagonist.
Protagonist, protagonist, who is the real protagonist. Here’s how things shook out.
This novel Sister of Darkness may
have been one of my best novels, but here’s how writing works. We get better and better as we write
more. That’s not to say we can’t have
some better novels and some not as good novels, but generally, an author gets
better and better until he or she doesn’t anymore. Experience and skills as well as life
knowledge drive the novels to get better and better. I’ll still hold up my earlier novels as great
novels, they are, but as I wrote, my writing and the subtlety in my writing has
improved. I think this is
marvelous. It may or may not make a
novel a reader can really determine as better.
What do I mean by that?
This is what I’ve determined in about 45
years of novel writing. The plot, as
long as it is an okay plot, doesn’t matter.
What matters is the protagonist.
A novel is the revelation of the protagonist. What matters is the protagonist. I’ve read a lot of novels with weak plots,
but few with weak protagonists. The
stronger and more interesting the protagonist, the better the novel. This doesn’t mean the plot isn’t important,
but what is really important in a novel is the tension and release in the scenes.
I’ve written that there is never a single
plot or theme in a novel. A novels is a
series or sequence of plots tied together by the telic flaw and the
protagonist. The telic flaw is the
problem the protagonist must resolve.
Every novel must have one—that is a problem the protagonist must
resolve. A whole bunch of plots usually
define and lead up to the resolution of the telic flaw.
This is what Sister of Darkness
helped me understand. It wasn’t about
the plot as much as it was about the protagonist and the telic flaw. Here’s the synopsis of this novel. I should mention, the novel was just about to
be published as a trilogy and individually when my publisher went out of
business. It was a great novel.
A pall spreads over the world with the
beginning of World War II. The darkness is both a physical and spiritual
miasma. Colonel Paul Bolang, a special officer in the French Alpine Corps, is
assigned, with his men, to support the Allied operations against the Germans in
Norway. He leaves his wife, Leora Bolang and their children Lumiére, Robert,
Jacques, and Marie in sunny Hyères, France.
Paul and Leora share a secret they have
never divulged to their children or to their closest friends. Leora is the
incarnation of the Goddess of Light, herself reintroduced into the world from a
4000 year old tomb. Paul, her warrior, has a power beyond that of normal
humans. Unfortunately, when Paul released Leora, Leora’s sister, the Goddess of
Darkness, Leila was also released into the world. Leila delights in darkness
and the deaths of men. 4000 years ago, Leora and Leila were displaced with the
entire pantheon of the Egyptian gods when Moses led the children of Israel out
of Egypt. Now Leila wants revenge—revenge against the people who displaced her
and revenge against the world—“that is her purpose.”
Paul is still on assignment when Germany
invades France. Leora and her children barely escape the clutches of German
troops through the help of Major Lyons leading a British Special Forces Team.
They are shipped to Britain with only the clothes on their back. In Britain,
Matilda Hastings, Tilly, rescues them, and Leora discovers she was, weeks
before, invited to a royal function. How did Lyons know the Germans were coming
for them? How did Tilly know to help them? Why the predestined invitation? Who
knows about Leora and Paul’s secrets, and who is helping them?
Worse, the Osiris Offering Formula, a
small black tablet Leila desires, lay protected and safe at the house in
Hyères—now it is missing. If Leila gets her hands on the offering formula, she
will be able to influence the world a hundred fold greater with her evil. Leila
controls men through their own dark desires. With the offering formula, her
power will increase.
As war spreads, Leora must deal with
Paul’s loss, her sister’s interference in the world, the violent world around
her, and finally, her daughter, Lumiére’s strange dreams and desires. The
novel, Sister of Darkness leads through the dark days of World War II from its
beginning to a spiritual confrontation at its conclusion. Leora and Paul face
enemies and threats throughout, yet they persevere to the bitter end—an end
where they must directly confront Leila and their own daughter.
My writing really didn’t change much with
my own revelation, but the way I approached the idea for a novel and the easy
with which I wrote did change. I could
put out a novel in a month or months instead of years. Plus, I should mention, research of certain
points became much easier with the advent of the internet. I’ll explain more, next, and I’ll write about
Shadow of Darkness.
Why not to use a question or a plot as an
idea for a novel. This might get a
little dicey, but stick with me and I think I can explain. I discovered through writing about 10 novels
that ideas for plots were few and far between.
That doesn’t mean I didn’t get them, but rather that the discovery, inspiration,
and creativity was uneven and dependent on something other than work and study—perhaps
luck? I’m a scientist and an engineer—I don’t
like luck. Not to say luck isn’t good to
have, but I wanted a more disciplined and easier method for inspiration than
just luck. I wanted to be able to design
an idea that would produce a good to great novel, and I wanted it to be easy to
use and predictable in its outcome.
Waiting for a plot or a novel length idea
was worthwhile, but I wanted something I could use and develop all the time to
build a novel. That’s where it all came
from. Let me give some negatives about using
a plot or a question to write.
As I mentioned, you have to wait for and
develop the question or plot not by work and study necessarily, but by luck and
happenstance. That’s the first problem I
have with this method. You can’t just
start writing and hope the overall result is contiguous, reasonable, and connected. You have to start with something. That means you have to have an idea of how
the work will end when you begin.
That works great with Centurion,
the end is the crucifixion of Jesus—that’s easy. It’s historically based and the end is set in
stone, so to speak. Historical fiction
works that way, so most of my historical fiction had this as a basis. I knew the end before I began and wrote to
the end. The Second Mission had
the death of Socrates and the return of the time traveler—easy peasy. Aegypt was not exactly purely
historically based, but the end was the opening of the tomb of the Goddess of Darkness. There were pretty obvious end points. Sister of Light was different, but the
end was the advance of Hitler’s Germany.
Sister of Darkness was about World War II—the end was the end of
Hitler and the war. Then came Shadow
of Darkness. I guess I’ll get into that
next. I was still basing my novels in
known history and the history of the times.
Let me continue why this method of plot development is so difficult to
write to.
My writing method began to change but the
real start for this was Hestia: Enchantment of the Hearth. I need to explain that too. I’m moving back in time a little.
The problem, as I noted for writing to a
plot or with a question is the inspiration, and I didn’t want to wait around
for the inspiration. Hestia cam
about due to inspiration, but that’s not what drove the novel. I had little idea where I was going when I
started the novel. It began with a
protagonist and an initial scene. The initial
scene was the real tool for the creation of the novel. How did I get there? It was Sister of Darkness that caused
the greatest revelation I had about writing.
As I noted, in the past, I waited for inspiration
and then wrote from the inspiration of the plot. I couldn’t tell how long a novel might
be. Athelstan Cying was supposed
to be a single novel. How could I guess
the idea would end up as five and I would have to break it up into two
originally and then design a new protagonist for the Protania family?
These are the problems with the method I
used to write when I started. I have a
much better method of approaching ideas and novels now. It took many years and years of writing, but
I think I can pass this to you. What I’ll
do next is relate the next movement in my writing experience. I’ll add it to the list:
I want to start with these definitions as
a premise for writing.
1. Write to entertain
2. Write using the
common outline for a novel
3. Develop a telic flaw,
a protagonist, an antagonist, and plan to resolve the telic flaw.
4. Start with an initial
scene.
I knew this little piece of information
for a while, but it really never connected until I wrote Sister of Darkness. The initial scene is poignant, powerful, sets
the novel, and really sold it to the publisher.
Unfortunately, as I wrote, the publisher went out of business before the
novel was published—it came pretty close with an Amazon page and
everything. Oh well.
The point is this. I realized at that time that an initial scene
is really the thing that sells your novel both to the public and to a
publisher. It isn’t really the
protagonist—the readers doesn’t really have time or patience to understand your
protagonist until they buy and really get into your book. It isn’t the plot—again, you have to buy and
read the book to get into any of the plots.
The only thing that sells the reader is the title (if that), the blurb
(if they read it), and definitely the initial scene. That’s exactly where every reader heads when
they find an interesting book in a bookstore or online. That’s how I find a novel to read, that is
other than name recognition for the author.
If we go with this, we can see the initial
scene is the single main selling point of the novel. Now, that can’t be all. The rest of the novel including the
protagonist and the plots have to support the initial scene, but if you want to
write a great novel—look for the initial scene.
The main question then becomes: what do I need for a great initial
scene?
Are we back to a question—not really. We simply need to define the initial scene
and then write to it. Here are the most
basic rules about the novel I keep giving you:
I want to start with these definitions as
a premise for writing.
1. Write to entertain
2. Write using the
common outline for a novel
3. Develop a telic flaw,
a protagonist, an antagonist, and plan to resolve the telic flaw.
4. Start with an initial
scene.
Look at number three. I actually gave this too early to you. I should have written the part about the initial
scene first, but three defines it perfectly.
If you develop a telic flaw, a protagonist, an antagonist, and a plan to
resolve the telic flaw, you are ready to write an initial scene. This is exactly how I get an idea for a novel
today. This method has been extremely
successful for me. In fact, I can even
simplify the development for you. I’ll
start now and then provide some examples from my novels.
You don’t need to start with a telic flaw
or an antagonist. All you need to begin
is a protagonist. I have given you the
steps to make a modern or Romantic protagonist before. This is always step one for me. I have a current novel in mind and
germination that I will write when I’m finished with Bookgirl. It’s Aine and I developed Aine and the protagonist
Eogan for you before. Why not start
anywhere else?
I’ve written over and over—the novel is
the revelation of the protagonist. If I
have a great protagonist, I have something to reveal. In addition, I’ve written—every protagonist comes
with a telic flaw. In fact, a
protagonist without a telic flaw can’t be a good protagonist. I also advise developing a protagonist’s
helper. I suggest this even more than an
antagonist. You need an antagonist, but
the antagonist has really changed over time from a face to a faceless adversary. I’ll probably try to explain this better for
you too.
So here is the list again:
I want to start with these definitions as
a premise for writing.
1. Write to entertain
2. Write using the
common outline for a novel
3. Develop a telic flaw,
a protagonist, an antagonist, and plan to resolve the telic flaw.
4. Start with an initial
scene.
5. Develop and define a modern
protagonist: you get a telic flaw, a potential protagonist’s helper, and a
potential initial scene from the development.
6. Write to reveal the
protagonist.
I’ll give you an example of a great
initial scene or the concept of the initial scene and the protagonist. I’ll get it from Shadow of Darkness.
If you remember, when I wrote Shadow of
Darkness I was still trying to figure out the best way to get an idea for a
novel and to develop it. With Sister
of Darkness, I had a great protagonist I had developed, Lumiere, the
daughter of Paul and Leora Bolang who was the current Goddess of Darkness. What I discovered was I needed a great initial
scene. The initial scene flowed and
followed from the end of Sister of Darkness. Here is the synopsis of Shadow of Darkness:
Whoosh… flash… boom, an explosion nearly
steals the life of Lumière Bolang. It robs her of her memory, voice, and
mobility. She becomes a victim, like so many other children of the violence of
the Second World War.
Lumière Bolang is the daughter of the
goddess of light and her warrior. Her soul was tainted through the actions and
teaching of her aunt, the goddess of darkness—or so Lumière believes. She
believes this so strongly, that after she, her mother and father conquered the
goddess of darkness, Lumière ran away from them—forever. Her mother and father
thought she was dead. Lumière took with her, the goddess of darkness’ “changed”
tablet and her servant, Oba.
When Lumière and Oba attempt to escape
Berlin at the end of World War II, she is caught in a firefight and almost
killed. Lumière is rescued by a Jewish Soviet reporter and nursed back to life.
She learns to speak and read Russian, and he takes her to Moscow.
Lumière injuries are extensive—they affect
her legs, her speech, and her mind. Lumière can’t remember anything before the
explosion, but when she meets Oba again, horrible dreams haunt her. The dreams
are so terrible, the local commissar wants to send Lumière to a people’s
asylum—a mental institution. Instead, her Jewish friend takes her to the newly
opened Moscow convent. There, he believes, Lumière can get the help and
protection she needs.
At the convent, Lumière’s incredible
language ability becomes evident. The Patriarch of the Orthodox Church begins
to use her as a translator to tempt the Soviet intelligence system. The
Patriarch wants a spy in the NKVD, the precursor of the KGB, for the Orthodox
Church—Lumière could be that spy.
Beria and Abakumov the chiefs of the NKVD
and the MGB take the bait, and Beria installs Lumière as the head of Embassy
Relations. Her skills are also too tempting for Stalin who accepts her as his
translator, Stalin’s Little Bird. Stalin makes Lumière the head of the
Department for International Understanding and puts her in charge of all
advanced language study in the Soviet Union.
Meanwhile, Lumière is learning more about
her own past. She determines that she needs to study Chinese to help her flush
out the goddess of darkness who is now influencing the communists in China.
That is when Lumière meets Aleksandr, an associate professor of Oriental
languages in Moscow University. Aleksandr falls in love with Lumière—a love she
is certain she cannot return.
In 1953 Stalin dies, Beria and Abakumov
are imprisoned. Lumière’s life hangs in the balance. All thoughts of her
mission to China disappear. She must escape to the West before the Soviet state
led now by Khrushchev, purges her directorate and her life.
The initial scene for this novel was when
Lumiere is trying to move toward the east and Russia from Berlin. In Sister of Darkness Lumiere is held
in captivity in the Neues Museum in Berlin.
At the end of Sister of Darkness, Lumiere escapes from her
captivity. At the beginning of Shadow
of Darkness, Lumiere and her servant Oba are escaping from Berlin. She gets caught between the Germans and the
Russians and is injured while using her powers to save them all. This is a very tense and exciting initial
scene. That’s the point. The initial scene is what drives the entire novel. Perhaps I should give it to you. We shall see.
Here is the initial scene from Shadow of
Darkness:
1945,
Lumière and
Oba crept soundlessly through the night hewn streets. All around them, the clatter of machinegun
fire and the whistling roar of artillery shells became muffled by darkness and
distance. They chose the blackest
shadows and the most isolated paths. Oba
guided them. His nose and eyes seemed to
unerringly sense the presence of soldiers.
Oba was
tall and large. He wore civilian
clothing now, but in the near past, a German Gestapo uniform had covered his
strong frame. He appeared much like a
living man. He was well shaped and his
face looked starkly handsome. On closer
inspection, his lips were black and somewhat torn, his skin leathery and
ancient. He carried himself like a
soldier, a leader of soldiers. Yet in
his wake followed only one, a young woman—Lumière.
Lumière was
not tall. Her appearance was almost
waiflike. Her hair was black, as black
as the night, and her skin the color of rich cappuccino. Her face was radiant with large deep emerald
eyes that would have seemed more appropriate looking out of an Egyptian tomb
painting than on the thin face of a teenage girl. She was swallowed by a cotton shirt that was
much too large, and woolen pants meant for a man. A bit of braided towel held the pants on her
thin frame and kept her long shirt tightly under wraps.
Lumière let
Oba lead her. She watched carefully for
his signals as though a mistake might mean her life, and indeed it might.
The streets
of
A few days
earlier, Lumière and Oba had escaped from the
During the
day, she and Oba hunkered down in basements and cellars, and hoped they would
not be spotted by civilians or the military of either side. Oba carried enough food in his sack that
Lumière didn’t go hungry. Sometimes the
food was sparse, but usually Oba was able to find something. He ate little. Lumière wasn’t sure he ate at all.
During the
day, they heard the movement and voices of many troops and people. The language usually indicated Russian troops
although, once or twice, German soldier’s voices cut through the afternoon
while they hid. Lumière and Oba had made
little progress east from the Neues Museum.
Each night when they attempted to move through the lines of troops, they
found themselves forced back.
Unwillingly, the fighting drove them back, closer and closer, toward the
river Spree, and eventually compelled them to parallel the river. Russian and German troops vied for both sides
of the river. The night before, for the
first time, Lumière and Oba moved to the west of the Neues Museum. They tried to spend the day in a depression
near Unter den Linden and Ebertstraße, but near noon, the sound of advancing
tanks forced them into the woods and gardens just south of the Reichstag
building. Through their cover, Lumière
could glimpse the Reichstag. It was a
bombed-out shell. Russian tanks and
soldiers moved toward them from the south, and German soldiers waited inside
the Reichstag. Lumière discerned the
glint of the Germans’ weapons as they took aim at the Russian soldiers. All at once, the crack of rifle fire and the
pinging of bullets cut through the warming day.
Lumière and Oba burrowed deeper into the sparse brush.
In the
early afternoon, the Russians decided to rush the German positions. Lumière noticed with dismay that she and Oba
hid right in the center, almost directly between the two forces. “Oba, what will we do?”
“I don’t
know, mistress. My skills are those of
sneaking and ambush. Our travels have
brought us directly into this conflict, and now I don’t know what to do. We can’t fight either of them, and both will
kill us.” He stared at her then spat at
the ground, “They’ll both seek to defile you.”
“If they
can. I’m not a weakling. I can defend myself.” She looked up, “Whatever we do, we must go
now. The Russians are on the move, and
I, like you, fear their tanks and their guns will make no exception for
us. To the west Oba. Go!”
The motors
of the tanks, not a hundred meters away, revved and machinegun fire and high
explosive shells flew over their heads.
“Keep your
head down, Oba.”
“Yes
mistress.”
The huge
Russian tank guns blasted yellow red spurts of deadly fire at the
building. Stone dust burst into the air
at each shot. Lumière heard the screams
of dying men. German machinegun fire
blazed everywhere, and she was astounded neither of them had been hit. Then Oba went down. He didn’t make a sound, just jerked backwards
and fell to his knees.
“Oba!”
“It’s
nothing, mistress.”
“There is
nowhere for us to go. Can you run?”
He stood,
“They will shoot you down, mistress. You
run, I’ll draw their attention.”
“Oba, there
are too many of them. We have nowhere to
run. Nowhere to go.”
Oba didn’t
say another word. He stood and began to
run toward the line of Russian soldiers, then he yelled, “Mistress, run the
other way, through the line of tanks.”
At each word, Lumière saw a blast of blood and muscle burst from Oba’s
body. She knew he would move until his
body was cut to pieces—they could not kill him.
“No! Oba!”
she screamed. Lumière removed a small
tablet from her pocket. It looked like
pure gold, striped oddly with black lines.
The tablet measured about fifteen by ten centimeters and one centimeter
thick. One side was marked with ancient
Egyptian hieroglyphics and the portrait of a seated woman. The lips of the woman’s picture once made a
frown—now it formed neither a frown nor a smile. Her mouth remained straight as though at any
moment the lips might turn either way.
Lumière
jumped up. She held the tablet in her
hand and said a word. The word itself
was encased in power. It rose up from
her lips and seemed to swirl with sunshine.
It rose like a dust devil but formed of light and darkness instead of earth. The golden swirl rose up and expanded. It encased Oba and swept him along. It caught up the tanks and buffeted them
mercilessly. Their guns stopped
firing. The Russians who walked behind
the tanks fell, bowled over. Their
bodies buffeted and their weapons lost, but they remained unharmed. When the golden light hit the Reichstag
building, it washed over the stone and rushed through the windows. Each man it touched fell to the ground blinded
and unmoving. The world became nearly
silent in the wake of the thing the girl had created.
A German
soldier took careful aim with an antitank weapon at the slim girl who stood
between the Russian tanks and the Reichstag.
He had many antitank Panzerfausts to fire at the Russian vehicles, and
he expected to die today. What would the
death of one girl mean to anyone? He
knew he made the right choice of target when the swirling light exploded from
her hands toward him. He aimed at
her. The moment the light hit him, his
finger squeezed the trigger. He was
unable to hear the heavy thump as the round cleared the tube. His eyes stared unseeing as the projectile
rushed toward the now running teen. He
could not know it struck a tree not ten feet away from her.
Lumière
wasn’t far from Oba. The way for their
escape now lay clear. They could make
their way through the line of stunned men and tanks and head east—their
original destination. But then a roaring
filled her ears. Lumière felt herself
lifted into the air. She felt the touch
of a super-heated blast against her back and the penetration of burning metal
into her legs and arm. Her last thought
was excruciating pain. The tablet was
pushed from her fingers, and she didn’t know where it went.
Vasily
Grossman stood beside Efim Gekhman. They
were sheltered near the rear of the Russian troops at a place where they could
observe everything that went on between them and the Reichstag building. The fall of the Reichstag might be the last
shots fired in
Vasily and
Efim both wore Russian officer’s uniforms with green tabs that marked them as
quartermasters of the second rank. They
were, in fact, special correspondents with the Russian army reporting for the
Russian newspapers. Vasily’s uniform
looked wrinkled and worn. He had a large
nose, weak eyes aided with round spectacles, sensuous lips, and a strong chin. Efim was thin and wiry with a mischievous
look and outlook. They both were
laughing at the futility of the German’s defense, and their writing had taken a
sarcastic turn—even though they were just taking notes.
The Russian
tanks were moving forward. Vasily had
just written: “huge guns were blasting yellow, dagger-like fire at the
building, and everything was swamped in stone dust and black smoke,” when
something between the tanks and the Reichstag caught his eye. He immediately stopped writing and pointed
with his pencil, “Look Efim, do you see that?”
“Where?”
“There. Look there.
Do you see that boy?”
“It looks
like a boy?” Efim put his binoculars back to his eyes, “It’s a beautiful
boy. Maybe a girl. What’s she doing?”
Vasily put
his binoculars to his eyes, “He…she has something in her hand. She’s yelling something. “Adoni, dear Father Abraham, do you see
what’s happening?”
“I can see
it, but I don’t believe it.”
“It looks
like the sunlight and shadows are swirling around her,” Vasily strained his
eyes through the binoculars.
“Do you
think she made it happen?”
“It’s
centered right where she is. What do you
think?”
“I’ve seem
a lot during this war, Vasily, but I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“Look! Our troops are dropping. Do you think she’s German?”
“The
Germans are dropping too. They haven’t
fired a single round. Vasily, the tanks
are being moved around—pushed backwards.”
“You’re
joking.”
“Just take
a look.”
“No. I’ve got my eyes on her. How can she do this?”
“She’s
definitely not German.” Efim leaned
forward, “They fired on her.”
“Fired on
her?”
“Panzerfaust
by the looks of it.”
“Why would
they waste a weapon like that on a girl?”
“A girl who
makes miracles.”
“Dear
Adoni! Efim, I see her thrown into the
air like a rag doll. She’s got to be
dead.”
“Dead or
dying like millions of children in this horrible war.”
“Look. The instant she was hit, the moving light
stopped.”
“It was
her, Vasily,” Efim spat between his fingers.
“The end of her and good riddance, my grandmother would say. What a dangerous thing—if you believe it.”
“I don’t
believe it, but I want to see this person.”
“You’ll see
nothing but a broken, dead body, just like all the others you’ve already seen.”
“Come on
Efim—let’s go. Quickly now”
Efim walked
slowly, unwillingly, to the jeep, but they both stepped in. Vasily pressed the starter and put the jeep
in gear. They flew past their own troops
who lay still stunned on the ground and past the tanks unmoving and jumbled as
though they were toys. Efim half stood
up in his seat, “Have you seen anything move a T-34 tank like that? Watch out, Vasily. You’ll run her over. She was just here.”
“I didn’t
think you were interested.”
“Professional
interest only. There she is. Blown half apart by the looks of her.”
Vasily
stopped the jeep and leapt out. He ran
over beside the girl. She lay on her
face. The back of her shirt and pants
legs had been nearly blown off. They
still smoldered. The thick clothing had
somewhat protected her slight body. Her
body, small and thin, showed through the large holes in her clothing. Blood covered her white shirt and dripped
onto her pants. Vasily put his hands
around her shoulders and turned her over.
She was beautiful. The most
beautiful woman he had ever seen. Behind
him, he heard Efim gasp, an entirely involuntary intake of breath. Efim came up beside him, “How could you ever
think she was a boy? She is so
beautiful.”
“She’s also
dying.”
While they
watched, the girl choked on a mouthful of blood. Her eyes fluttered and flew open.
Efim
covered his face, “She’s dead.”
“She’s not
dead. Here, you dress the wound on her
arm. I’ll get her legs.”
“She’s
bleeding from her lungs. How long do you
think she will last?”
“Long
enough for an interview, I hope.”
“Vasily,
Vasily, Vasily,” Efim pulled out their first aid kit and began wrapping her
bleeding arm.
The girl
gave a pathetic gasp. Vasily tilted back
her head and turned it to the side to clear her throat.
Efim shook
his head.
“Take her
arms Efim. I’ll get her legs.”
Efim
grabbed the girl’s arms. He shook his
head, “You think the field hospital will help her? Are you a fool?”
Vasily
lifted her by her feet, “She weighs almost nothing.” He rasped under his breath at Efim,
“Efim. Did not you see? A girl who can do this. She stopped the tanks. She stopped the guns and the troops. All the troops. What kind of girl is this?”
“You are
living in a world of fantasy, Vasily.
Whatever girl she was, she will soon be dead.”
“You drive,
Efim. I’ll hold her.”
Efim shook
his head again. While he drove, Vasily
held the gasping girl in his arms, “Dear God she is trying so hard to
live. Efim are those tears on your
cheeks?”
“You’re
torturing me, Vasily. I can’t stand to
hear her dying there in your arms. She
reminds me of my own child. You’re
getting blood on your uniform.”
They
listened the whole way to the girl’s horrid gurgling breath, while Efim drove
them to the field hospital a couple of miles away. At the hospital, Vasily picked the girl up in
his arms and carried her inside. He
stopped the first orderly he met, “Here is a wounded girl. She needs your help.”
The orderly
halted, and his lip curled, “Sir, we don’t have any time or space for civilians
even if she is your love interest.” He
looked at the girl then lifted her eyelids, “She doesn’t have much longer
anyway. She’ll be dead in just a little
while.”
“Can’t you
give her a cot, something? Can’t a
doctor just look at her?”
The
orderly’s strained face became a little gentler, “We don’t have any room in
here for the dying. You can leave her
outside with the rest of the expiring soldiers—no one will molest her there. Here we only have the time and resources to
treat our own soldiers who might have some hope of living. You can tell she’s bleeding on the inside. Not even a surgeon could fix that.”
Vasily
stammered, “You can’t do anything?”
The orderly
pointed, “I told you. Put her with the
soldiers outside who are dying like her.
No one will molest her—at least while she’s alive.”
Vasily
stepped to the opening in the tent where the orderly pointed. He carried the girl out into a fly infested
area where lay the dead and dying. They
were all Russian soldiers, aligned in twin rows. He saw a soldier who gasped much like the
girl. A piece of shrapnel obviously
skewered his lungs. Another soldier lay
and begged for water. The top of his
scull was gone and exposed his brains to the world, yet he cried out for water. All down the row, they quietly or loudly
waited for death. Many made noises, the
noises of those who did not know they were left to die, yet for whom death was
certain.
Vasily
glanced at the girl. Her lips lay
slack. In and out of them wheezed her
labored breath. She grappled the air in
gasps that now and then that sent a trickle of blood down the side of her
face. She looked pale. Her hair, partially unbound by the blast
tumbled thick and long. It cascaded from
her head like a shining black fall. He
pulled her closer and put his face in her hair and smelled blood and the scent
of his mother and his wife, his daughter.
Angrily,
Vasily whirled on his heel and exited the hospital.
I wasn’t certain where to end this scene
for you, but I hope you get the idea.
The initial scene sets the novel.
This is the most important part of the novel. In the past, I developed the plot with a
theme idea or a question. What I
accidentally discovered was that the initial scene was much more important than
the plot or the theme. The protagonist
and the revelation of the protagonist was the more critical to the novel and the
ideas of the novel than anything else. I
also found that the novel would come together much better and with much greater
complexity than when I conceived of a plot or a theme. I’ll get more into this, next.
There’s more.
I want to write another book based on Rose
and Seoirse, and the topic will be the raising of Ceridwen—at least that’s my
plan. Before I get to that, I want to write another novel about
dependency as a theme. We shall see.
More
tomorrow.
For
more information, you can visit my author site http://www.ldalford.com/, and my individual novel
websites:
http://www.ancientlight.com/
http://www.aegyptnovel.com/
http://www.centurionnovel.com
http://www.thesecondmission.com/
http://www.theendofhonor.com/
http://www.thefoxshonor.com
http://www.aseasonofhonor.com
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