So in a lot of the new reviews regarding TDW series, readers have mentioned the world-building and how alive the world feels, or at least, interesting–its own character, in a sense, and on that, I have to say I’m proud.
Proud that my attention to detail is being recognized by readers, and proud that people care enough to share how much they liked (or disliked) my creation.
But I didn’t start off thinking about the world itself, contrary to the series’ title, I focused, instead, on the characters, and as the dialogue and story progressed, asked myself the following:
What would this character do?
Why would this character do that?
Who does this character answer to and why?
What limitations and freedom do these characters possess and why?
The answers to those questions created the Dark World you call can read about at your leisure, but I wanted to get this out there for those that continually ask me how I’m ‘able’ to craft such a world. The answer is simple: It just comes to me.
With everything I do, I follow a simple line of thought process that helps herald advancement toward my end goal. I like my characters to experience things as they happen and as such, their emotions, attitudes, and physical gestures and expressions all add up for whatever’s happening in that moment.
For example, in The Two Swords, there’s a scene that goes:
Christian Delacroix stared at her within the red carriage, feeling her eyes burrowing into him, feeling their judgmental, pressing gaze. “Paint a portrait,” he said after a time, “it will last longer.”
As we can see, everyone’s favorite Vampire isn’t happy (when is he, really?), and though we don’t know why, unless we’ve read the books, we can just infer from these two sentences, alone, that he is upset, feeling judged for something this woman he’s looking at has seen him do, perhaps in a previous scene, and his snide comment afterward further accentuates this defensiveness.
We needn’t paint obtuse colors of expression on our character’s faces all the time (I was a fan of this when I first started writing), their dialogue and small mannerisms can help paint a picture that can, with every little nuance, create a greater, more believable world.
You can see more reviews on The Dark World series here and buy the books here.
The Goblet: Book 5 is available for pre-order now, and is releasing November 28th, 2017.
With blood and love,
S.C. Parris
