Write What You (Sort Of) Know)

I’m back! It’s been a while, y’all–partially due to some technical difficulties with the website, but mostly because teaching takes up 90% of my mental energy and I like to spend the dregs I have left over on stuff like cleaning my house and making sure I have food to eat. I’m on Thanksgiving break now. On the one hand, I’d like to write as many blog posts as possible. On the other hand, we have some family friends visiting (they’re in the process of moving here from the Netherlands) and I’m hoping to spend some time with them and my family this week.

Anyway….

The last time I talked about the fantasy book I’m working on, I basically turned my blog into a brainstorming session. And it worked! I took my own advice and I’m currently in the process of inserting a new character into the book. Gregor, the main character’s big brother, is turning out to be a fun addition to the story. However, this means I’m fighting a war on two fronts: I’m both editing the previous nine chapters to include Gregor and continuing the story in the tenth chapter. And, unfortunately, Chapter Ten starts off with a concept I’ve been avoiding for a while.

See, part of our protagonist Maywin’s character arc involves him getting attacked by a fae early on in the book. He slowly succumbs to what is essentially a magical infection after this. It is at this point that I must confess that I have zero experience with magic. It’s not even that this is the first story I’ve written that has a magic system or supernatural entities in it. My mother has a religious conviction against magic in books, movies, and TV shows. She made me fast forward through the bits of Dora the Explorer that had the Grumpy Old Troll in them. I wasn’t allowed to watch the Sesame Street segments that featured Count Dracula. Growing up, I never read books that had ghosts in them. I was ten before I watched my first Disney princess movie, and I was twenty before I was allowed to read Harry Potter.

Suffice to say, I have no idea what I’m doing.

That isn’t to say that I haven’t worked with similar concepts before. My Clouds Aflame trilogy is technically a Christian fiction series. God talks to my characters (I actually prayed and asked God what He’d say to my characters, and He answered!). There are miracles. There are rituals and belief systems. And I know that some of these, at least theoretically, can translate into a magic system. But I’m just not sure how.

I’m running into the exact same problem with Gregor. I’m the oldest child. I don’t have a brother. The closest thing I have is a younger sister who is admittedly a bit of a fireball. The most commonly tossed-around piece of advice for writers is to write what you know, but no one mentions what you’re supposed to do when you’re trying to write something that you almost know.

I’ll get it figured out eventually. My writing might be like pulling teeth for a while, but I’m stubborn. I’ll get through this if it takes me a decade. In the meantime, do you have any stories about brothers? Or tips for writing a magic system? Let me know in the comments below! God bless you, dear readers, and don’t forget to like us on Facebook!