Frickin' hell! It's epic!
Aw man, I am so far behind! First, let me thank you for this flurry of posting on these Low Roads threads! I truly do love reading opinions and speculation about this series, particularly when they're so in-depth as this! Second, my profound apology for taking so much time to reply… it was not for want of gratitude, believe me! Hope that my enthusiasm will make up for tardiness!
"Stop your muttering, I've come to brawl not drawl!" superbly crafted and unique dialogue throughout.
Very kind of you to say so! I tend to fret over the language my characters use; tinkering on the script never seems to end (I just recently wrapped up work on Chapter 26, after about a month), but the effort is so worthwhile when I receive compliments like this! Distilling the rather free-from elements of story musing into concrete practicality can be a trial, but it's still that part of the creative process I enjoy most. Having it so appreciated makes it that much more intense a pleasure!
I love the exotic worlds you've created, and even the more familiar towns have a fairytale 'Brothers Grimm' quality - the timbered and stone houses of Tabor county are almost like the picturesque towns of central Europe, and then Stondene- reminds me of the places visited in the Asterix books for some reason. A perfectly realised but distinctly fantastical world, with the nexus of the dream realm.
Thank you! I'm rather nuts about tudor style architecture and have tried to infuse as much of it as I can into Fairview. That does indeed lend the town a fairy tale familiarity which, as far as tone is concerned, really works to the story's benefit. Such grounding makes for a solid "normalcy" against which the more exotic intrusions and locales can be accounted… it serves as a relatively secure home base for the readers' perspective. The town's rather moldering loneliness also puts me mind of H.P.Lovecraft's arcane settings, which is a reaction I personally warm to.
So very pleased you liked the settlement of Stonedene Eastside! I was really eager to explore a tribal miliu, both because it would be so radically different from the societies thus far encountered and to set up the tone of raw-boned hardiness that would follow the Feares throughout their mountain trek. I'm only mildly familiar with the Asterix comic, but I can see why it would suggest itself. The dynamics are rather similar… tribal stolidness contrasting against a softer, more civilized invading outlook... even if the edge of aggression is absent.
For the story, sweet Angie is too polite to resist the sudden offer of the fertility ceremony, and what a stroke of genius to give wriggling snakes a pleasantly ticklish downy coat with which to stroke Angie's curves.
Angie is kind of a pushover! And Fiona is just enough of an imp to take advantage (in a loving, sisterly way, of course!) I'm really delighted that you enjoyed the serpent ceremony! That's something I'd wanted to try for quite some time… blunting reptilian cold-bloodedness into something warming and cheery. I'm personally a bit conflicted about snakes: close contact make me uneasy and I avoid being around them; at the same time, at at safe distance (like onscreen in a documentary, for example) I find them fascinating and admirable animals. The Stonedene ritual may have served as devise to make me more comfortable about the slithery critters; many of my imagined scenarios have a similar conciliatory dynamic involving creatures I'd sooner shun.
I'm catching up with this incredible series, now that I have my own efforts re-established. I'll enjoy seeing what happens in the multitude of narrative threads you've spun.
I'm most delighted you now have the time! Let me say how extraordinarily excited I was to see the continuation of your outstanding Fox Sisters adventure "Waterbabes"! That trio of sweeties (one blonde honey in particular!) can't appear on our forum pages often enough! Especially not when their superlative forms are being polished to a fine shimmer by all the slippery, wriggly sea life the briny can produce! Their subterranean, submerged sojourn has come to a most intriguing pass in your present pages… can they tear themselves from an outlandish massage they're only just coming to enjoy in order to encounter deep-sea horrors that promise to be more intrusive still! Neptune alone (… well.. and you, of course…) knows the answer!
I think the art has improved in the sense that the angles seem more cinematic than I remember, but there is a timeless quality to the story and the presentation, a classical picturebook style married to the wonderful language. I had a book as a child about a girl who goes on a journey filled with incredible monsters, all rendered in a very particular style, but I have no idea what it was called. This just reminds me of it in so many ways.
Your kind words about my artistic improvements are deeply appreciated! I certainly pray I grow more proficient as I go (a fine fix if it was working the other way!) I sympathize and am quite flattered by this comparison to the storybook you remember from your youth! I recall much in the way of child's picture literature (one wondrous, whimsical, beautifully illustrated volume about time-traveling back to see dinosaurs) that came from our local library in my formative years and had the most profound influence on my imagination! Alas, so many of those titles are beyond reach today, try as I might to find them… how I'd love another look!
Really, really enjoyable. Thank you.
A genuine privilege to hear from you, sir! Thank you so much for your generosity!
