The Sceptre and the Orb

Where do I begin? This is my first novel, my baby, and I genuinely believe it’s very good. It is epic High Fantasy, all 200k words of it. It is also reasonably uniquely structured and has the right story lines to introduce the world where Evyntyde exists.

As I stated in another blog, the world I write about was not altogether my construction – there were a bunch of roleplay game designers who collaborated on convention modules, and with a great deal of enthusiasm, we did a lot of world building. I was one of the most active, but certainly not the only one. The group eventually went their separate ways in terms of this project, and I continued it pretty much solo for a while, and eventually realised that the world had a lot to offer from a writing point of view. The other designers either formally handed over rights to the world to a smaller subset of designers, and those that remained consented to allowing me to dip into the stuff we collectively built. I should point out that my creative writing effort is mine, and mine alone, and by far the bulk of the world building used to construct the novels (and short stories) are also mine.

For fear of jeapardising my chances of selling the book through a publisher, I will refrain from quoting from my work, at this stage, and for that matter, divulging too much about the story. The following is what I am willing to offer.

The Sceptre and the Orb (‘scepter’ in US English) are two ancient artefacts, one created by a god-emperor, while the other by one of the greatest alchemists of all time, who used god-originating materials to construct it. They were designed to work together. They symbolised the right to rule the Kingdom of Waymoor, as well as the Kingdom of Evyntyde, that came out of a Great Migration from the earlier land. They also are powerful items of magic in the hands of people who know how to wield them (spell casting alchemists), and who have the Gift.

The novel is set in two places and timeframes, and appear to be two different stories, although each have spell casting alchemists of the Cimiaric Order, and the two artefacts play an important part in the conduct of events. The earlier thread takes place in the Kingdom of Waymoor, about 550 years prior to the events in the Kingdom of Evyntyde. The lives of three alchemists are followed, each having challenges in their lives, but also being entangled in the fate of the Waymoorian Sceptre and Orb.

Civil War, treason, jealousy – great events take place and near the conclusion of the novel all threads join together and add meaning to each other.

The story is truly epic, and I am proud to have written it.