New tattoo - disembodied forearm

To commemorate the release of my second novel 'Spirit Shear' I got a new tattoo!!

 

I actually got it a few weeks ago when I returned from Barcelona. It was an impulse 'post-holiday' tattoo (you'll never see me on Tattoo Fixers!!!) But now it's finally healed and looking great (b-t-dubs, there is no way to take a good picture yourself of a disembodied forearm so the pictures don't quite do it justice). I'm absolutely in love with it!

All of my tattoos have a deep and personal meaning to me. Several people have already picked up some of the meaning behind it; the pen being mightier than the sword. But, on top of that, it's even more meaningful because the glyph at the top of the pen is from my books, the Emersus Project series (read a bit more about the meaning in my celtic tattoos post). I got it to help commemorate the event. I've published my first two novels! That's pretty hardcore.

Yes, yes, I know it looks a bit like the green lantern logo. But it's not. However, in the world of Arbea, it is a symbol of power. I'm thinking that, over time, I might turn it into a band, having all the symbols from my books circling my forearm. Hmm... too many new tattoo ideas, too little time!

The tattoo was done by Nik Costaz (check out Nik's art, it's freakin amazing!) at Tribe Tattoo. It was great working with a new tattoo artist who made some excellent adaptations to my original design. Mostly, adding in the more delicate lines along the body of the pen and doing the pen nib in outline instead of solid black. Nik's contribution has resulted in something much cleaner and light than the original solid black glyph style. It's finer lines lend themselves to the beauty and fineness of creating.

I was apprehensive about having a tattoo that was visible all the time (except when I'm wearing long sleeves). But now that I have it it feels like it's part of me. The only downside is I can't stop staring at it and touching it (especially when it was healing)! Well, that and the Green Lantern comparisons. But I suppose that's the price of showing your art to the world. What matters most is that I love it!

Hope you enjoy!
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If I runed the world

What started out as a jolly has turned into a full on linguistics project! I mention in the book that Sem's sports team wears the rune for power as their emblem. Much like my map I thought "Wouldn't it be fun to include some of the runes of Arbea in the book".

Well, to include them requires them to exist. And what started as a way of illustrating chapter titles has required me to take a hard look at the structure of language, pictographic writing and runes.

Often runes illustrate complex concepts. But, these concepts are quite basic archetypes. I started by looking at Karl Jung's concept of archetypes, creating runes for each. Then I began working backwards breaking down the major archetypes into its component parts.

Then it was thinking of other basic concepts one might night, figuring out how to represent other compound ideas, concepts, reading/writing structure, etc. I won't go into too much detail about how I went about it. It's made even my head hurt. And, I need to get me to a linguist to see what insights they can offer. But, I'm having super fun exploring it.

Here is my first crack at runes (actually more of glyphs) and then the rough translation of each of the chapter names in the book.

Enjoy!
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Page one of glyphs

Title and chapters as glyphs

Map quest

One of the favourite parts of the revision process has been working with friends of mine who have expertise in various fields to identify possible holes and, even better, enhance the story.

Most recently I sat down with my mate Pat, a cartographer, of Stirling Surveys, to formally plot the world of Arbea. Firstly I showed Pat the sketches of the map that I’d done at the outset. We discussed how far apart things were in terms of distance (for example it takes Gemmy approx 20 minutes to walk from his house to endo training).

I learned that I have zero concept of scale! My original map meant that either the people of Arbea are giants or the entire continent was roughly the size of Texas. So we went about rationalising the distances and scale of things which was thrilling.

We also discussed topography and things like where mountains and lakes would naturally form. He pointed out that, given the location of the (inactive) volcano in the middle of Bansho Island City (an island within an island), it would most likely not be a peninsula. And, since it’s called Bansho ISLAND City, why not make the darned thing an actual island connected to the main land by a causeway? This also provides a convenient explanation for why the likes of Gravander (Gemmy’s dad) and Raephite (Sem’s dad) don’t come home regularly. The city itself isn’t really big enough to have an air strip and the distance from the coast on the mainland to Morgengarde is roughly the distance of Edinburgh to London (circa 400 miles).

So, I’ve left Arbea in the careful hands of Pat. It’s great collaborating with him to make Arbea really real. I can’t wait to see what he comes up with.

I’ve done a sketch of what Bansho will look like now it’s had a topographic makeover (with a rudimentary indication of scale from what I remember of our session). I'm designing little icons to put on the finished map once it comes through and I’m excited to see what a pro can do! 

Enjoy!
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The oringinal Bansho - June 2010 

Sketch of the new city (better scale) - Nov 2012

My stab at a colour map

More maps:
See the first draft of Arbea Major.

The world of Arbea

Here are my first map sketches of the world of Arbea.




After five or six drafts of the prologue to the Mighty Orange-Peel, the text finally came together. it took mapping out the world first. O lives in Bansho Island City in the province of Garz on the continent of Arbea Major. Here's a quick glipse of some early sketches of where O lives in this fantastic world.