Putting It Together

Ah, Sondheim. (The title of this blog post is brought to you by Sunday in the Park with George.) But that really has nothing to do with what I have to say. Just a little extra for you.

Back toward the beginning of the year, I had this idea for a really cool story. As a
child, my dad taught me how to play chess. I have always been fascinated with the game, and when I was a sophomore in high school, I learned that there was a musical! Okay, I love the musical, but I have to admit that it's nothing like what I thought it might be. So perhaps this story has been brewing since that moment. Tie that together with the human chess matches I enjoyed at the Colorado Renaissance Festival, and there we have it.

I started the story in the middle. That's what I do. For some reason, as I am sure I mentioned in a previous post, I cannot write chronologically. That portion is not yet complete, but I could tell that it was going to end up shorter than any other piece I've written. Not the length of a short story, but certainly not the length of an adult novel. The age of the main character was just right for a young adult story, so I decided that was where it would go.

After finishing most of that story, I was curious about the beginning. How did it all start? So I started writing that about a week ago. I'm 15,000 words in, and I love it! I am usually writing in space. It's exciting to write in the realm of kings and queens. I've always loved the
Renaissance era, so I'm drawing from that to complete this. Not that it's set in that specific time - this is a total fantasy.

The story is titled, "Xadrez", which is Portuguese for "chess". I like using Google Translate to come up with names. To me, it gives meaning. For instance - all my good guy characters have names that pertain to the color white, while the bad guys have names that pertain to the color black. Typical chess pieces are black and white, but I wanted to avoid the idea of races. I m not racist in the
least. So I chose to go with "Sacratus" (Latin for "the holy") and Tenebris (Latin for "the dark"). The affiliations have to do with their personalities and not the way they look. Although that comes into play down the road.

All that to say, I am now looking at three parts of the Xadrez story. I'm closing in on finishing Part I. Part III is mostly done. And Part II is mapped out. I am so excited about this story! And I already plan to dedicate it to my dad.

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