THE NOVEL

ALLASTRIA

ALLASTRIA the novel is an approximately 150,000-word manuscript set in an epic fantasy setting. It was first completed on 28 February 2019 with 51 Chapters, in addition to a Prologue and Epilogue. Several query letters have been sent out to agents and publishers, so it's really just waiting and working on my next project (and updating the site) while waiting some more. Whatever the outcome, my lifelong goal is to see that the novel (and its subsequent sequel stories) eventually get published. Some have suggested going the self-publishing route, but let's see how the queries turn up first and we'll see what's the next step. Fingers crossed!

Anyway, here's the elevator pitch for ALLASTRIA:

When Taliesar was two, she saw her mother leap from the King’s Tower to her death. Twenty years later, when her father dies at the hands of Allastria’s mysterious enemy, she learns that not all is right within the kingdom itself. As war rages between her all-seeing king and an adaptive enemy, she is forced to follow in her parents’ footsteps to fight for Allastria’s future, even if it means making the ultimate sacrifice in the King’s Tower, just like her mother did.

In retracing the steps on why I'd wanted to write Allastria, I guess it came from a burning desire to see the story told to as many people as possible. When you truly believe in the heart and soul of the story, you want as many people to experience it; the joys, the sorrows, the exhilaration, the anguish, the romance, the betrayals, the spectacles and the plot twists that make you curse and fall off your chair. While I will not share any snippets or extracts of the novel in the public domain (as it's still undergoing its querying stage), I will however chart the inspirations and history of how Allastria the novel came about, which I think is interesting.

GENESIS

Allastria was originally known as Magian Son, where Magian is a term used to mean magus or one of the magi. It was a novel I had started writing in 1997 but it didn't go far (only 3 Chapters I think and I had kept the only surviving printed copy of it on file - pictured above).

The story had an entirely different protagonist (a young boy hero who would soon become a wizard) as he encounters the animal-men creatures (known as the Primoerials) and a female general named Taliesar. Some of the landmarks and characters from Magian Son made it into Allastria but their roles and backgrounds may have changed.

It's kind of interesting how stories I had previously written remained percolating in my head long after I'd forgotten about them. Reading those three chapters again brought back many memories for me, especially when they're something I'd written more than 22 years ago.

SCREENPLAY

In 2005 or 2006, I attended a scriptwriting workshop with consultant Madeline DiMaggio. The attendees were each tasked to progressively submit a screenplay project we wanted to work on - I decided to submit something related to Magian Son. However, I renamed it as Allastria, as I wanted the plot to focus on the kingdom herself, to make her a character of sorrow and suffering, and the many heroes and villains within her struggles her morals and pain.

I completed Allastria the 150-page screenplay towards the end of 2006 and submitted it to several studio agents. Most of the comments were roughly along the lines of 'the premise is interesting, some of the characters really stood out and were unique, but for a story of this size and scale, you'd need to build a fan-base the likes of The Lord of the Rings or The Chronicles of Narnia if you'd even want a whiff of it ever being made.' So I shelved the screenplay and moved on.

NOVEL

Fast forward 13 years later and I've written Allastria as a full-length novel. Can't really say what drove me to complete it - maybe I was in-between jobs and had the time to finally write a novel, or maybe the story continued to stick with me since those 3 chapters in 1997 and I knew I had to do something about telling its story.

Or maybe, it came to me when I was cleaning out my old documents and I came across a sketch I'd done in April 2007 (pictured above). It showed the image of Taliesar standing next to Skarne the wolf-wizard. I remembered sketching it because I had felt disheartened by the comments about the screenplay. There were so many character dynamics between Taliesar and Skarne in the story that really moved me and I guessed I couldn't understand why others weren't able to see them. The sketch was a way for me to bury the past I guess, and somehow, it reappeared 13 years later, moving me enough to want to adapt the story as a novel instead. So let's see how that pans out.

Beyond the story of Allastria itself, there is also the fantasy world which Allastria resides in - Mortalissar. The world and the regions within which Allastria resides in also had their metamorphoses. Before I jump towards the final map of Allastria and her surrounding regions (which are relevant to the story of the novel), I thought showing you the genesis of the world and her regions throughout the years would be just as interesting.

ROLE-PLAYING GAME

The map above is but a small part of a larger fantasy world I used to call Mortallis. It was drawn and colored in 1989 or 1990, forming the basis for the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game I was Dungeon-Mastering for when I was first introduced to it by a school-mate.

If you look at the map closely, you'd see Allastria and Dreuden, being part of the Oeren region, surrounded by a mountain range called the High Borden and several other kingdoms.

The world of Mortallis itself (pictured below) was separated into different continents - one of which was Thalladorn (to the north-west). The rest remains mostly intact to the current world of Mortalissar with a few additional continents or regions. The ice-continent of Kaeosium and the Spawnion (supposedly a huge chasm in the middle) were eventually removed from the final version as well. It's kinda unthinkable that I drew this map nearly 29 or 30 years ago (good thing I still have the only hand-drawn colored copy with me).

MORE RPGs

Fast forward to the period between 1995 to 2005. I had begun to dungeon-master more role-playing games, including AD&D, Mage the Ascension, Ars Magica and so on. Naturally, I've changed and expanded the fantasy world I'd created to give it more detail, adding cities and towns, points of interest, rivers and so on.

The map above was drawn using Microsoft Windows Paint and features a close-up of Allastria's Tasselgott Region, including cities, towns, forests and rivers. They served to aid my role-playing gamers in identifying how far and where they were during the RPG sessions, giving them a pretty good idea on where they should go in their hunt for clues or fulfilling their quests.

The world of Allastria in these RPG sessions had a name change as well - Earthandica. Noticed Mortallisar was named a continent in the game, several territories were moved about, Rulmark was actually a city and Allastria became part of a continent known as Oerensia. Allastria's boundaries looked like the side of a dog or wolf's head then (which was intentional). It's now changed to resemble more like a human face.

Oh and Mirlandir's family name, Ochanar, originated from the north eastern ocean of Earthandica, while Kirath's tribal name, Hemoth, came from the south-eastern ocean.

FINAL VERSION

For the novel, I've recreated the map of Allastria and her surrounding neighbors to include just Thalladorn, Primoeria and Dreuden. These kingdoms serve the story in the novel; each with an identity and character of their own. The Sea of Aramyss from my earlier Mortaliss map remains to the east, but most of the defining landmarks have changed (especially from the RPG versions).

The maps were drawn using WonderDraft, an amazing paying tool for world-builders, role-players and writers. Another great tool (with a free version) would be Inkarnate. Anyway, some of the landmarks in this version feature prominently in the story of the novel. They give the characters a sense of where they are and where they should go, providing the intensity of pace, desperation, emotions and conflict - all crucial elements for story-telling and plot.

I didn't add a scale this time, as I'm hesitant to portray distance and the passage of time (for travelling scenes) when it comes to night and day. But the final version should probably include a scale, that I'm sure.

The final version of the world map, named Mortalissar, is pictured below. Allastria is indeed the smallest kingdom among all - it sits on the north-eastern edge, beside the Sea of Aramyss, being part of the Oeren Lowlands continent. If you click on the map, it'll take you to a more detailed post on the different regions within Mortalissar (and you can zoom into the map to see details).

So here, in all her glory, is the colored version of the map of Allastria and her neighboring kingdoms - Thalladorn, Dreuden and Primoeria - which serve the story of ALLASTRIA the novel. See if you can spot the shape of two faces - one larger and one smaller (which was intentional).

For Mortalissar, you can reference The WORLD section of this site, as it delves deeper into the mythology, belief systems, calendaring and a myriad of different areas and cultures beyond just Allastria the novel. The world map should also give you a better perspective on just how small and vulnerable Allastria really is as a kingdom compared to her larger neighbors - Thalladorn, Dreuden and Primoeria - and the massive landmass of many other countries, islands and oceans that give Mortalissar her shape and form.

Have fun.