Stories from the Bits Backlog
After joining Fantasybits, I promised myself I'd make a point to go back and write from the extensive backlist of topics that have been posted from the beginning of the group. I've only been somewhat successful in doing so, but I'm working on it. . . .
The titles of the pieces below are listed as they appeared, as writing topics, on the group.
minotaur After I wrote this, I decided it was part of the backstory of Jenny Haniver, the urban magician whose journal entries appear in the Ian Barrett epistolary story. Her voice changed when I actually got around to writing her, but I kept the ideas in mind I developed in this vignette, including her master Dario and the Labyrinth as a magical "device."
rainbow drops I've wondered for a while what it would be like if I wrote a children's story, or at least one that used children for characters. I don't know if I'll ever expand on this, but I love the idea of these kids having an encounter with this obviously (to my mind, at least) strange and otherworldly person.
your character is falling from a great height One of my very few self-contained sketches, which I should take, if nothing else, as proof than I actually am capable of working in the short-short form. Nonetheless, I may check up again on Andalee one of these days and see how she's getting along.
flitting fruit flies I intended this excerpt to eventually be included in a longer work concerning the world of Orwn Dvarra and the people from our world who find themselves whisked there. I'm terribly fond of Orwn Dvarra and the way it sidesteps many (but not all) of the clichéd tropes of high fantasy - I see it a little like a combination of Narnia and Imajica, with a liberal dose of Thomas Covenant thrown in. This piece was one of the first actual posts I made to the Fantasybits list.
a little cabin in the woods I hope to see this vignette make its way someday into the Ian Barrett storyline, though I confess I'm not sure yet where; astute readers will recognize the character of Tom Rowan from that story. It does contain some minor spoilers pertaining to that plot, so readers who care about avoiding that kind of thing might wish to bypass this one until later.
fulfilling a vow Another monstrous fragment concerning the rich and strange Orwn Dvarra setting. It has considerably more "high fantasy" feel than most of my other work. Be warned, though: it's a bit of an infodump, containing a lot of invented words and names that are largely left unexplained. I intended it for an audience already familar with tales of Orwn Dvarra - almost none of which have actually been written yet. Nonetheless, it has some imagery I'm very proud of, and I include it here for the sake of that if nothing else.