#When I actually turn Aodhan's story into a book

[overlordbravery]

You can find the uncensored Version on my Twitter [ x ] Enjoy Aodhan I guess??

[captainderyn]

On Wulfwryn

Thank you for indulging me and my LOTR feels @lumielles lmao. I really hope you weren’t looking for a nuanced character. 

So three things about Wulf...

1) She was my second big step into fanfiction and OCs (the first being Percy Jackson) back in middle school/freshman year of high school. By the former she was shifting to the Wren we know today--with Wren as she is now shifting in full around last year. (oh god that’s a long time ago it’s been like four years yike). 

2) As such it’s rather cringey. Bear with me. 

3) Just as Wulfwryn is the original Wren--who isn’t similar by any means--the original Baraneth also finds her roots in LOTR. 

Okay, here we go. I’m doing this from memory since a lot of Wulfwryn’s bio is in the notes of an old, broken phone. 

Wulfwryn Gavardis was originally from Rohan, born to a farming family. For really stereotypical reasons she left when she was oh..18 (an incredibly mature age to my middle school self. Well...) because she thought there was something more to life than what their position in Rohan would offer her. So she took her horse (and closest companion) Aodhan and struck out on her own. 

It went as well as you’d imagine. She had no idea what she was doing, she was armed only with a bow, a sword, and a cloak. Following maps she had pilfered off her father’s desk she found her way to Bree. In Bree she met Aragorn and he ended up taking her under his wing after seeing she was a complete and utter dumbass. 

(If you’re imaging Wren but in ranger clothing with a horse then take about 7 steps back to where your left without Wren’s poise and elegance and instead left with her snark and a reckless nature. That’s Wulfwryn). 

((If you’re imagining snark with Wren’s current looks..you aren’t too far off. Take away all elegant fashion, stick a heavier scottish based accent on, sprinkle some more freckles and that’s Wulfwryn.)

Between then and the War of the Ring is really boring and cliche--she and Aragorn became friends, she broke the canon tagging along on some things and learning how to be a ranger. There are two versions of what happens with the Fellowship--one where she’s there for the start and one where she was on some Ranger Business I can’t remember and met up with everyone at Rivendell. The plot plays out essentially the same, Wulf ends up going to Rohan with Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli and not with the hobbits. Yes she’s essentially a 10th Walker as they were called at the time, but you know what, I really loved her. 

**She was mostly based in Movie!verse as the books were (and still are) a LOT of info to write with. I spent many hours pouring over the timeline in the back of RotK making her ages and stuff fit and figuring out years for everything. 

Typical of angsty middle schoolers she didn’t get along with Eowyn and got hurt a few times, I think I killed her off in a AU once before I reached the point I am at today where everyone gets a happy ending or So Help Me. 

However, after the War for the Ring she actually get’s some character! She becomes the Captain of the Royal Guard for Aragorn/King Elessar as the other guy did actually kick the bucket during the big battle and she was a trusted ally. There she found her place and settled into a leadership role and within a few months she and her guardsmen were closer than blood family. I had a whole list of headcanons for them that are on said old phone. At this point the old horse Aodhan was still kicking around, and I never let anyone forget about their Friendship. 

I joke, but I actually really liked her in the role of Captain, it fit her very nicely and was super fun to play with. So eventually in her story she gets married and has a daughter--Baraneth!--who really brings her down to earth and marks the spitfire woman’s mellowing out. Cliche, I know. 

(If your thinking of Baraneth as she is now--throw that out the window. The only similar thing between Baraneth Gavardis and Baraneth Cousland is the blue eyes. Bara then was a curly dark haired, scholarly polar opposite of her mother)

So the years go on and I know for a fact that in Wren’s canon storyline she was killed at 30 in a border skirmish because god dammit middle school me why you so angsty? And that was that. It was very sad. Her guardsmen lit candles for her every anniversary of the day she was felled. Aodhan the trust apparently immortal war steed became Bara’s. And that’s all I remember. 

Wait no, I do remember something else, I shipped Baraneth and Eldarion (ughhhh you know, prince of Gondor, Aragorn and Arwen’s firstborn? I don’t have any issue with shipping canon characters or writing LOTR anything I was just so very, very poor at character nuancing and shipping back then). 

To make up for what I really hope wasn’t high expectations (I should’ve clarified she was OLD yikes) have some really cringe-y, 6+ year old writing):

“Wulfwryn.” at the sound of her name, she turned her head to see that Aragorn had fallen into step beside her, looking grim and determined. He looked as though he were going to say something important, and Wulfwryn took a wild guess at what it would be.

“Don’t do anything stupid?”

“Exactly.”

Wulfwryn snorted, shaking her head. “I could have sworn you knew that I dont do stupid stuff on purpose! It just happens!”

--

“No, it was nothing you said.” Aragorn placated as he read her expression. “You need not be so careful in your speech Wulfwryn. Our friendship has not wavered simply because I wear a crown upon my brow.”

Wulfwryn nodded quietly, redirecting the conversation. “Why did you come? I assume it was not just to talk?”

Aragorn hesitated for a second. “Not exactly, it is to talk, just not in idleness. I do have something to ask of the utmost importance.”

“And that would be?” Wulfwryn pressed, curiosity getting the best of her.

“Since Beregond had to be dismissed from the position of captain for his treason against the city, no matter how well intended, the position is left open. I was hoping that you would stay in Gondor and become the captain of the guard.”

Wulfwryn froze, eyes widened comically as she thought this over.

---

And a more recent throwback, but heh there was a time when Wulfwryn was a rogue/turned Jedi and she and Emeldir were a thing. When I was shifting her to the main Star Wars-verse. That didn’t last long. I’ll let the idea of anyone other than Risha with Emeldir. ICK. 

Taken off guard, Wulfwryn turned back, coming face to face with Emeldir now that she was standing. They were close enough so that Emeldir could see the faint splattering of freckles across her nose. “There’s plenty left to talk about. Such as where we stand if the Death Star isn’t open for discussion.” She tilted her head, eyes narrowing slightly.

“And where exactly do we stand?” she asked.

“Well,” Emeldir drawled. “That depends. Remember our missions in the Clone Wars?”

The corners of Wulfwryn’s lips turned up. “Yeah, back when you had a credit bounty the size of Coruscant on your head.” She drew back a half step when Emeldir tugged mischievously at a curl where her padawan braid used to be.

“And you still had that jedi braid in your hair, silly thing that was.” His eyebrow went up as Wren’s hand came over his, pulling it away from her hair and staying there.

“It wasn’t silly.” she defended before switching topics. “But you were quite the charmer, you nearly won me over.”

Emeldir smirked slyly. “I could still win you over.”

“You might be able to.” Wulfwryn said coyly, her voice low.

[not-poignant]

I know this is out of topic right now but I just wanted to know what your plans are for the Perth Shifters series as far as whose stories you're gonna tell and the order of the books and such? I'm not into A/B/O but I absolutely loved Blackwood and I'm excited for the other stories

Hi anon!

There is no out of topic, and it’s awesome that you asked about Perth Shifters!

I actually put the draft first chapter of Little Star (Aodhan/Thomas) up at Patreon as extra content this month.

BUT, actually, okay, so let me tell you a story. I wrote Blackwood and I knew I would self-publish it. It was partly just as a ‘what the hell let’s see how hard this is.’ (It turns out my fear of success is more crippling than like, learning how to format something for .epub and .mobi but anyway). However, I never expected to sell more than about 50 copies and therefore when I planned my writing for the next few years, I didn’t really include the follow ups because, ah, well I didn’t expect it to do as well as Fae Tales.

To my incredible surprise, Blackwood actually did pretty well for a debut release. And now I’m in this wonderful area of like, being amazed, but also being in a tricky zone of ‘um I don’t have any follow ups written yet and nor do I really have the writing budget for it right now’).

BUT, anyway, the order of the books so far is:

1. Blackwood - Braden/Coll2. Little Star (possibly to be retitled) - Aodhan/Thomas3. Untitled - Hunter/Luuk4. Untitled - Seamus/??? (I know the character but not his name)5. Untitled - Jesse/Mal (we’ll meet Jesse in book 2)6. Untitled - Hardy/Dazza

So far we’ve met Braden, Coll, Aodhan, Hunter, Seamus, Hardy and Dazza. The last three may not be written depending on interest (mine and the readers). But each book kind of explores a different facet of shifter society, Little Star is a beta/omega relationship, Hunter’s book is an alpha/human relationship (with a kink factor), Seamus’ book will go back to alpha/omega, but explore some of the less savoury aspects of how humans have treated shifters directly. And we know that Hardy/Dazza is beta/alpha story, with added pining lol.

But how/when I will find the time to work on them is another matter. In good news, writing the 100k itself is not the issue (or 80k more like), it’s just...Fae Tales is my primary income, and that is where my first order of business lies. Then fanfiction, because it keeps me sane (I tried not doing fanfiction, and I quit writing for about a year as a result). And after that I...don’t have much left over, because Fae Tales is hungry.

So the plan atm is that when Spoils of the Spoiled finishes, I’ll start working on Little Star more diligently, aiming for first draft completion in about 4 months, and then a release about 4 months after that now that I know how that side of things works. But it won’t be a 2019 release, sadly. But in good news, there’s always a ton of other stuff to read that I’m writing at any time. :D

[not-poignant]

Hey Pia! I really enjoy reading all your stories (especially the Fae Tales Verse ugh it's so good) and just how diverse all the characters are and how their personality and characters in general are all so different. I was just wondering how you normally get the ideas for writing your stories. How do you normally create a personality for your characters? Does it just like... progress with the story or what?

Hiya anon!

Glad you’re enjoying all the stories! *bounces happily*

Hmm... normally I create characters before the story (not always, but certainly enough of the time that I can brainstorm characters and then the world comes second).

I’m trying to think of a good example. So I’m going to look at the Perth Shifters series. Specifically, let’s look at the book Little Star, which I haven’t written yet, but will probably come after Blackwood.

For that, I came up with the characters first. In fact one character per book ends up my ‘focal character’ and then I build their partner, and the story, around them.

I knew I wanted a young, driven chocolatier who enjoys sweet things and vintage music. Why? I just had an image of this guy with pastel painted nails sweeping out his cafe/chocolaterie at the end of a day, and quietly singing along to Ella Fitzgerald’s ‘Someone to Watch Over Me.’ I knew he was deeply romantic, but very unlucky in love, so he surrounds himself with other forms of romance, and forgets about it. He has a great friend in Braden, his room-mate, so it’s not like he’s lacking for love.

He’s a wolf shifter, an omega, but he doesn’t have time for his heats, so he takes suppressants. Sometimes he’ll use beta scent maskers too. His cafe is ‘shifter friendly’ - but most of his clients are tourists, since the chocolate he makes his critically acclaimed throughout Australia for its quality.

Over time, I was like okay, but why do we care about him? What’s his love story? What’s his back story? Where’s the plot?

I knew - with me wanting trauma in the background of most of my characters - that he’d have child abuse in his history. But he never talks about it, and he pretends it’s not there. He’s in a complex situation with his family now, and his brother hates him (for reasons that will be revealed). It’s also why Aodhan has issues being an omega, he’s internalised some crap around what he was told about it. Yet another reason he struggles to open up to people, because he’s sensitive about dragging his baggage into relationships.

Then I imagined a second character - the other main character - Leo, a very successful sculptor who travels around for inspiration. He’s a beta, and a pretty well-adjusted shifter, who thinks it’s amazing that he doesn’t have to hide who he is, like his parents did. He’s been coming to Aodhan’s chocolaterie, Little Star, for a long time now, and they’re loose friends. Leo finds Aodhan gorgeous, and would like to date him, but he senses that Aodhan either doesn’t date, or something else is going on there. He’s not someone to push, he doesn’t want to alienate his friend. Aodhan loves looking at pictures of Leo’s sculptures, and thinks he has the most beautiful hands. But soon Leo is off again, to teach another course on sculpting, and Aodhan forgets about him.

Except that lately, Aodhan has been thinking about Leo more and more. He knows he’s demisexual, and it’s occurred to him that being around Leo as a friend, on and off, for a couple of years, has actually allowed him to trust Leo enough to want more from him. But how would that happen? Leo travels, and Aodhan hasn’t been in a successful relationship before. Leo seems carefree and spirited, and Aodhan is tied by invisible ropes to his family, and has a business to run, and doesn’t really get ‘time off.’ Where’s the romance in that? Aodhan wants things to be romantic and beautiful all the time, but Leo understands that in order to make a wonderful sculpture, you have to sometimes make some ugly things first, or go through an ‘ugly phase.’

It’s a good thing Leo knows that, because he’ll be able to help Aodhan through this part, as they find their way together. 

Therefore, the plot will centre around: Aodhan’s issues with his family, and delinking from them when he can, alongside learning how to deal with Leo’s frequent absences, and learning how to have a relationship while still keeping his love for romance alive. I want him to be happy, therefore, it will be a romance with a happy ending.

This is how you might go from character to plot, as opposed to plot to character.

*

So there you go, this is kind of what my process looks like. Or can look like. Aodhan comes first. I have a glimmer of an image first, not even all the bits and pieces of his character. (I still don’t have them, I love learning a character as I write them).

Then other characters often form (I imagined Mosk before I imagined Eran, Braden before Coll, etc.) and from there, I get a sense of the world, and where the major conflict points might be. Conflict points are normally internal, rather than external. They tend to come from the character, as opposed to being random things like a mugging that happen outside of the character. With the exception of Fae Tales, that has a mixture of both.

For really big stories, the process takes a lot longer. For example with Cold Red Light, which is an upcoming Bull/Cullen fic, I have ‘Cullen first’ and ‘then Bull’ and then ‘other ensemble characters’ (Dorian), and then plot. And I’m still formulating some of the major plot points around them. I won’t really feel comfortable starting the story until I have those. Sometimes major plot/conflict points are just big emotional points for the characters.

*

As for the images of the characters, sometimes I really have to search for them, and sometimes they’re spontaneous. They just appear, like I’m seeing a highlights reel from a movie.

Aodhan in the cafe, sunlight streaming through as the sun sets, wearing his apron and smeared in bits of chocolate and smiling to himself, his strawberry blond hair going in every direction? I didn’t ‘build’ a character to fit that, he was just there. I needed to find his name, and I needed to figure out what to call his chocolaterie, but the...essence of his personality and his sweetness, that appeared.

In the demon series I’m thinking about working on, I had an image of a young man holding a locket, turning it over and over in hands that were covered in ink and callouses and little cuts. He has wild red hair and very sharp eyes, and he’s up in an attic, and you can hear yelling and banging beneath him, so he must be a thief who’s just stolen yet another thing. You might even assume the locket has been stolen, but it hasn’t been. It’s a relic of his family history, and he’s determined to make his grandfather turn in his grave. A slow, wicked smile moves across his face, and he crosses the attic to look out of the tiny, dusty window at the Mage-craft school that he’s temporarily escaped yet again. He’s going to show all of them, he’s going to make them regret underestimating him.

His name? No idea. Details? Pfft. Who knows. His partner? Only the vaguest of vagaries.

But that will be enough for me to start thinking about how to build a novel, lol.

I do get visions of an awful lot of characters I never end up writing something for. And I have a backlog of characters and half-formed stories at any one time.

Um, otherwise, I’ll invent characters as I need them (Ondine and Gulvi were ‘suddenly invented characters’ and look at them now, lol), and I can generally trust that plot will figure itself out.

The Ice Plague was very difficult in some respects because I needed to get a lot plotted, and so much of the plot is actually external events happening to the characters. I think that’s why it’s taken so much longer to get started, tbh, and also why I seem so insecure about it. Because it’s so very different to how I normally do things. *thumbs up*

Not sure this rambling has helped anyone, but yall basically have a summary for Little Star now! Lol.