Building Earthpillar Online
[Subscribers received this post as a newsletter on July 3, 2022.]
Hope your summer is swell. I tend to write less this time of year, but have a few things going…
Earthpillar Online
I have a ton of material that I’m working to add to the website. It’s a lot of extras and background and whatnot. First up will be an immersive map of Thorendor Castle, where the Order of the Candlestone resides during Lords of Deception.
As you can see in this draft schematic, the maps will be scaled, overhead views of each floor of the castle:
Remember how Master Arasemis made his students read all those books and conduct alchemy experiments? You’ll be able to click through the rooms of Thorendor as if you’re one of his students, kind of like a choose-your-own-adventure.
This will include exploring items in the laboratory or reading excerpts from ancient books in the library, like the tome shown here. I have painted 60 of these books (!), which will be paired with existing text from my unpublished Earthpillar Encyclopedia.
My next step will be to convert the map schematics into finished maps. I have a lot of text and images ready to go, and envision adding more content over time. If you enjoyed Lords of Deception, this should be a fun way to dig deeper into the treasures, mysteries, and histories tucked away in Thorendor.
More Flash Fiction
I’ve continued writing some non-Earthpillar flash fiction. As I noted in the last newsletter, this is just creative practice, but I might use some elements in future Earthpillar stories.
You can find the latest additions on the website here [deleted] New stories include 1) an unsettling discovery on Mars, 2) a miner's experience in a dark, toxic-looking forest of metals populated by automaton birds, and 3) a gloomy tale of a woman consumed by her book collection.
Trivia
I forgot the trivia in the last three newsletters, so here’s a quadruple to make up for it:
- Auch Tenoshun, the capital of Lundewynland Ministry in Donovan, was inspired by the name of the Auchentoshan whisky distillery in Scotland.
- The square-shaped gold coins of Austveeden, bloon(e), were inspired by the old Spanish coinage doubloon and ancient imperial Chinese coins that had a square hole punched out of the middle.
- In The Revolution Machine, the tungfram metal was inspired by combining the actual tungsten metal name with the Swedish word for it, volfram.
- In A Light in the Depths, the drigoman characters are inspired by the dragoman of history that served as interpreters, translators, and guides between Europe and the Middle East during the early Middle Ages and into the Napoleonic era.
That's all for now, thanks for reading!