Liz Cultivates | L.M. Fern

Where we’ve been, feat. where we’re going

I’m going to do something a little different this year for prep. There are official documents for this on the National Novel Writing Month website, and I’ll probably use some of those as inspiration throughout the month leading up to November. We’re going to start, however, with a quick retrospective of the current project and the progress I’ve made with it so far.

First, the baggage: I started this project in 2018 as a revitalization of the book I tried to write in high school. The characters are entirely different, the story is entirely different. The setting is pretty static, for the most part. I will share some maps I illustrated when I was younger at some point this month — be on the lookout for those.

Now, the current state of affairs.

Word count

As of October 12, I am at 76,194 words.

Chapter count

16, with three more filled vaguely with content.

Main characters

• Dranna: Half ice-elf sorceress investigating why magic feels “wrong” lately.
• Feldina Crithan: An old fire-aspected sorceress who knows a lot but says… not enough, according to Dranna.
• Exis: Head guardsman of the High Prince of Boltick. He has an extreme sense of duty, but can be a little short-sighted.
• Uehum: A young girl looking for explanations for her village’s sudden sickness.
• Merickh: Mercenary from the mountains in the far south.
• Felthar: Dranna’s beau and windling.
• Esal: High Prince of Boltick.
• Thideren: Twin Princess of Galithnia, next in line for the throne.
• Yentruoc: Twin Princess of Galithnia, next in line for the throne.
• Kiroth: An apparently tortured individual who keeps sending letters to Feldina.
• Ceder: A young windling who pals around with Kiroth.
• Renn Siranhan: ???

I’m sure there are others we will meet along the way. (I don’t want to give away who Renn is quite yet.)

There and back again…

Anyway, this is where I’m starting. Hoping to go a little more in-depth later in the month (i.e., tell you a little more about the storyline) before the novel shenanigans start in earnest!