"This is the world of Vara Elma! Home to the Orbs of Destiny!"
Vara Elma is the setting of, and where Toshie appears after death, in Toshie the Hero and the Orbs of Destiny.
The name came from playing around with some Latin words until I found something I liked, and then altered the words enough not to be the originals but not something that already exists. The problem? I didn’t write down where I got it from, and I can’t remember. I also have to go through each thing I write and make sure I’m not writing Vera Elma, because I can’t even spell words I make up.
Unterstone came first. The idea of Toshie waking up in a field came to me, and then seeing a medieval-style town, forest, and cloud-topped mountain appeared in my head. When she arrived in town, for some reason, in my head it was occupied by Dwarves. But where was the castle? Well, these Dwarves mine (Original, I know.) and so the castle is underground. Of course, Toshie couldn’t stay in one place, so moving to the trading town of Waterlink came up, and then the world expanded as I continued writing the books.
Unlike lots of fantasy books, though, there’s no map here. I’m not much of a planner. I’m writing this series by the seat of my pants, and while I have to go back at the end of writing a book and fix up some stuff, it ends up being fairly satisfying for me, and I think I’m being consistent. Hopefully it won’t bite me in the ass. (Well, I know where it’s going, it’s just the path there might take some twists and turns.)
So this is not necessarily the final map of the world. And that’s okay.
See that unnamed place? Those vast open fields? The empty sea?
Those are for me to explore, and then bring to you.
Toshie the Hero and the Orbs of Destiny is available now!
Books 2 and 3 will be released in 2025.
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