In preparation for the release of ‘Meniscus: Reckoning,’ the next book in the Meniscus Science Fiction Series, I have finished the painting for the cover.
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The painting is based on the pencil drawing ‘Travelling the Lip.’ It shows six travellers as they cross the treacherous El’ban Elevations, on their way to rescue James, imprisoned in El’ban. The group, in order, are Kotildi (the wild alien ‘wolf’), Belnar (one of the Slain), Odymn (heroine of many of the stories), Daniel (also a Slain), carrying Danny (Odymn and Daniel’s baby), and Don’est (the Dock-winder child, with her long neck).
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To be consistent with other covers, I need a distant view of the Meniscus moons (Cardoth roe and Cardoth grill’en), a mid-range view of the travellers, and a nearer scene from the book. Campfires are a common theme in the story and who better to sleep by the fire than wolf-like Kotildi?
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I was pleased with the painting. For a couple of days, I showed the travellers as black silhouettes against the Elevations. In the end, I gave them some colour, to suggest clothing and hair. I love the browns, blues and yellows in the painting.
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To make the painting fit the space on the book cover, I made some alterations in GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program). I brought the moons closer to the mountain silhouette and moved the fire and sleeping Kotildi closer to the travellers. In the end, the image fit well with the cover design. Here is a sneak peek at the final cover.
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I am now re-reading Meniscus: Reckoning for the last time, making a few revisions as I go. I have also sent the proof to my beta-reader for her reactions.
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I plan to release Meniscus: Reckoning in early May. I am looking forward to my reader response!
Next in the Meniscus Science Fiction Series? A Trilogy. Three books telling the story of how the Humans discover a way to overthrow the Dock-winder overlords.
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The books will be:
Meniscus: Rosetta Stone
Meniscus: The Struggle
Meniscus: Return to Sintha
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The books will feature two new characters: Abra, a translator and historian, who is working to understand the secret Dock-winder language; and Trath, her husband, a Slain, who deals in beelwort, the drug-of-choice on Meniscus.
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Their adventures take them to an amblion mine, a brothel in Bleth-nan, the hide-out of The Resistance movement, and every city in the North and South Districts of Prell. You will meet The Resistance movement in various cities: The Whirlwind in Enbricktow, the creepy triplets (the Shadow Builders) in Bleth, and the ragged members of Curfew Dark in Prell.
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Abra
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Trath, a Slain
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In the world of Meniscus, in the halls of the Museum of Dock-winder Legacy in Prell, is a statue of The Five Planners, leaning over a strategy table, necks entwined. I am certain they did not foretell the clever way Abra will bring the Dock-winder hegemony to its end.
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The first book in the trilogy, Meniscus: Rosetta Stone, will be available at Amazon on October 15, 2021.
The next book in the Meniscus Science Fiction Series will be released in October. Meniscus: The Knife is ready to go, except for my two scheduled beta-reads and format of the final cover.
The theme for the cover comes from a drawing I did for Meniscus: Oral Traditions. The drawing shows a trio of Dock-winders and a lone Hooplore travelling towards the mountains known as The Flames and The Knife. A lot of my new book takes place on the road to Nebul-nan.
The temporary cover for Meniscus: The Knife shows this drawing.
Today, I finished the painting based on the drawing. It still needs the touch of a professional photographer but this is a poor photo of the finished painting.
And here is what it will look like on the final cover.
Meniscus: The Knife tells the story of Tagret’s quest to find Rist and rescue him from the Brotherhood. Lots of action, twists and turns. The book also includes the story of Don’est (a Dock-winder child) and her quest to fit in with the Humans of Themble Hill.
Soon I’ll post the release date for Meniscus: The Knife.
Meniscus — a planet far from Earth. When humans are taken there, they face a life of hardship and servitude. But humans are resilient. Follow the story of the humans who struggle to escape from the oppressive Dock-winders and build a home in an alien world.
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In the sixth book of the Meniscus series, Meniscus: Oral Traditions, meet Tagret. The Dock-winders have taken her from Earth and deposited her on the streets of the alien city of Sintha. Tagret feels helpless, but she soon meets other humans who will help her get along in this strange and dangerous place.
One of these is Rist, a Slain, a genetically modified human who has forged a life for himself. He does not want or need a tag-along to burden his days. But when Tagret is sold at a Dock-winder auction, Rist uses all his tickets to save her from a terrible fate. Tagret feels safe with Rist and makes plans for the future.
But Rist has a secret …
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Meniscus: Oral Traditions is a great entry point for readers who think they’d like to find out more about the humans on Meniscus. Each Meniscus book is written as a readable long poem and is illustrated by the author. The books are a quick read, and include both adventure and romance.
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For five days next week (August 5 to 9, 2019), I will be running a Kindle Free Book Deal and the e-version of Meniscus: Oral Traditions will be free at Amazon. here
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I will be sending reminders during the Kindle Free Book Deal, so stay tuned!!!!!
I am pleased to announce, the next book in the Meniscus Science Fiction Series, Meniscus: Oral Traditions is now available for order in paperback here. It will be available in e-book format within a few days.
Meniscus: Oral Traditions is a stand alone book, fitting within the story of the Humans on planet Meniscus but introducing new characters as they learn to live in the shadow of the Dock-winders.
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Meniscus: Oral Traditions
Margaret, with her Masters Degree in Chemistry, works at a call centre. Her days are uneventful, answering the questions of pet owners and walking along the river with her dog Winston each evening.
Then everything changes.
One minute she is explaining to a call centre customer how to convince her labradoodle to swallow its medication.
And the next, her hair has grown four inches and she is in the streets of an alien city, surrounded by unfamiliar spaces, water that climbs and aliens with skin like green gelatin.
In the next weeks, Tagret (no one will use her proper name) learns about her new home on Meniscus and meets one of the Slain, Human males who have been genetically modified by the Dock-winder aliens. Rist is like no other Slain. He is strong and has a Slain’s special weaponry and abilities, but he also sings and jokes and makes Tagret feel safe on this alien planet.
Together they set off on an adventure that will put Tagret’s chemistry knowledge to use.
But Rist has a secret. He has taken a vow . . .
For those of you who live nearby, I will have copies of Oral Traditions by May 30 or earlier. After that, they will be available from me directly or from Westminster Books in Fredericton.
So happy to be able to share this story with you! As author, my favorite to date!
I have completed the painting for the cover art of the fifth book in the Meniscus Series … Meniscus: Karst Topography!
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Here is a sequence showing my process in doing the painting:
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The painting ‘walking among the stars’ shows my character Kathryn as she navigates a holograph of the galaxy and finds the planet Meniscus.
When the Slain return from an excursion, they discover the women of the Village have been taken by a Dock-winder transport. They set out on a dangerous journey to Prell-nan to find the women, risking their lives in the dirty streets, sordid brothels and creepy buildings of Dock-winder-run Prell. They find Vicki, Madoline, Kathryn and Meghan, but where is Odymn?
The use of symbols is a key element in creative writing.
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Symbols are settings, objects, characters or events containing layers of meaning. Beneath any literal meanings are figurative meanings that imbue the symbol with depth and significance. A common symbol encountered in literature is the ‘owl’. On one level, the owl is a feathered creature with big eyes and amazing head-turning capability; on another, figurative level, the owl is symbolic of wisdom.
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my only photo of an owl … snowy owl on the Grand Lake Meadows, December 2013
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Mention an object once and it’s a prop, sometimes with associations. Mention it twice and the reader remembers the first mention, loaded with its connotations and denotations. Mention it three times and the associations can scream, suggest elements of plot. The object has become a symbol.
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The use of symbols deepens meanings and helps the plot reverberate throughout the writing.
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In the book I am currently revising (Meniscus: Encounter with the Emenpod, publication date July, 2019) my male character Rist wears gloves when he is with other people. Mentioned once, they are part of his wardrobe. Mentioned twice, the gloves are associated with his inability to touch the woman he loves. Mentioned more often, those gloves are a symbol of his separation from anyone he cares about. Even when other characters wear gloves, the reader is reminded of this separation, and all the associated history.
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Rist, alone, wears no gloves
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When I wrote the first draft of this book, gloves had no role in the story. As often happens, the symbol, the wearing of gloves, solved a plot problem. Once I had added the gloves, their mention had strategic importance. I also realized that gloves had already been included in the plot, in an entirely unrelated way. Once the gloves became a symbol of one character’s separation from others, their further mention built on the idea of separation and lack of understanding between cultures.
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Symbols operate like mini sub-plots throughout story. These mini-plots echo the main plot, and, during the story, the objects change in a way that illuminates it. The mini-plots also tend to occur in three ‘beats’, providing a beginning, middle and end. For example, gloves are at first worn in every circumstance; when they are occasionally removed, risks are taken; later, when the gloves are removed forever, intimacy can grow between characters.
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To strengthen the use of symbols in my work, I use tables. Once I have decided which symbols will be important to my story, I build a table of symbols and note where the symbols are mentioned (the three beats) and what mini-plot is suggested. Gaps in the table suggest possible revisions.
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Object
Symbol
Key Occurrences
(Chapter Number)
Mini-plot
gloves
separation
7
42
65
Rist must wear gloves to avoid transfer of elements of body chemistry to other people; removing the gloves represents a step in committing to Tagret.
bell
home
4
29
63
the dinner bell is introduced in Meniscus: Karst Topography (September, 2018) as a symbol of missing loved ones. In Meniscus: Encounter with the Emenpod, bell ringing is the first warning the Village is in peril; later, the ring of the bell is a sign community members will return.
kettle
family
5
33
58
the cooking kettle was introduced in Meniscus: South from Sintha and has accompanied my characters on their various adventures. When tragedy occurs, a search for the kettle is representative of a search for a missing child; when the kettle is found, there is hope for the restoration of family.
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Symbols seem to take on exaggerated importance in science fiction. Perhaps this is because of the association with fantasy where objects often have magical significance. Fantasy and science fiction plots often involve the ‘quest’ for a significant object. Although I am sure other story-telling includes powerful symbols (for example, the ‘car’ in The Great Gatsby, symbolic of wealth), science fiction and fantasy genres are particularly proud of theirs (for example, the ‘One Ring’ in Lord of the Rings). All the more reason to embed symbols with maximum significance and meaning.
Food is one of the most basic Human needs, necessary for survival. But what do Humans eat on an alien planet? What do they eat when they escape from the tyranny of the Dock-winders and have no access to the high-tech resources of the planet?
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Odymn, the heroine of the Meniscus stories, is skilled at finding edible wild plants. This is in part because her father taught her the basics of natural history at home on Earth. She also uses her curiosity to discover the edible among the plants she finds.
Odymn picks
a leaf
from an unfamiliar plant.
Takes a nibble.
Shoos Madoline’s hand away.
“I test new plants I find,”
says Odymn.
“Just one per sun-reel,
so I know
which leaves or roots or berries
make me sick.”
(Do not try this at home on Earth!)
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When they combine Odymn’s knowledge and the wood lore of the furry Argenops, the Humans of Themble Hill have a range of foods to choose from:
roots – arbel corms and ransindyne
fruit – spenel berries, yarnel, thief-bush berries and sloe
seeds and legumes – gettle gourds and grammid beans
greens – slag-fern, glasswort, ishlin, and zill
and the sweet sap of the pilinoth tree
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The Slain hunt for wild kotildi meat and have access to the Dock-winder markets, so they add to the variety of the diet. Items include oranges (brought from Earth since they will not grow on Meniscus), MRE (meals ready-to-eat, also from Earth) and chocolate (no diet is complete without chocolate).
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Kathryn, who escaped a transport crash to join the Humans of Themble Hill, is an artist and she has drawn many of the plants in the Themble Woods.
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arbel
The nodding arbel is the first edible wild planet introduced in the Meniscus Series. The plant produces an edible corm and its leaves can be used to make an analgesic tea.
Gnaw of an empty stomach.
A cluster of arbel flowers,
green and nodding.
She digs with her good hand.
Finds the corm, rubs it white,
slides it into her mouth.
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yarnel
In Meniscus: Crossing The Churn Odymn uses her parkour skills to reach the branches of yarnel and its juicy fruit. The bark of yarnel is bulbous, depicted on the cover of Meniscus: The Village at Themble Hill.
A glimpse of crimson,
high in the canopy.
Rolls to running. Two steps on a trunk.
Grabs a branch. Swing and push
to standing.
Yarnel kernels gleam.
A pomegranate turned inside-out.
Tart and juicy.
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gettle
The gettle gourd is first introduced in Meniscus: Winter by the Water-climb as a staple in the gardens of the furry, friendly Argenops. The seeds are a major food-source. The gourds can be used as an odd-shaped ball in a game or as a substitute for a jack-o-lantern.
Nine hollow
gettle-shells
arranged at intervals.
Belnar picks one up.
Reaches in.
Pulls out
a half-burned candle.
“Don’est,”
says Vicki.
“Signalling
to her people.”
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I hope you have enjoyed this brief look at the vegetation on planet Meniscus. If the plants resemble some of Earth’s plants quite closely, just know I am a strong believer in convergent evolution.
I have published four books in my science fiction series Meniscus. The fifth book (Meniscus: The Village at Themble Hill) will be released on April 14, 2018. I have four other books in DRAFT. Keeping them straight has become a bit of a nightmare!
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in ‘The Town at Themble Hill’, Odymn breaks her leg … not a happy time for a girl who loves to run in the Themble Woods …
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The planet Meniscus, with its interesting landscape and biology, suggests many possible adventures. A while ago, I began to think about a ‘spin-off’ featuring the stories of different main characters. I also wanted to include characters from the first books, to give them more background and a better chance to ‘speak’.
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To weave the stories together, I realised I would need to create a time-line for my books. This would help me to situate the new characters in time and avoid character collisions. I did not want characters who were supposed to be in Prell to show up in Sintha. I did not want dead characters to live after their demise.
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The time-line shows the books in the series, the number of days covered in each book, the seasons and the years. The first eight books are consecutive, flowing from one to the other.
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In my next book, I want to introduce some of the Human recruits to the Village at Themble Hill and tell about them when they were still captives of the Gel-heads. So I knew the next book would start before the end of book Four and continue until the beginning of Book Six when Don’est’s continuous, banshee scream splits the air of the Themble.
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Why is Don’est screaming? You’ll have to wait until Book Six, ‘Meniscus: Encounter with the Emenpod’, to find out!
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Plotting the time-lines helped me know what characters I could include, the seasonal components of the setting and how to merge the stories. It also suggested to me that I should re-number Meniscus Six, Seven and Eight to better reflect the time-line.
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If you are writing a series, I suggest you add time-lines to your process. Think of your story in terms of time. Determine how many days pass during the story. Plot the sequence of your stories with respect to one-another. This will help you to avoid inconsistencies and incongruencies. It will also help you be accurate if your setting has a seasonal component.
If you are dealing with time-travel, causality and paradoxes, considering time-lines is essential!
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Hope this helps you with the writing of your series!
Meniscus: South from Sinthais FREE on Amazon (worldwide) for the next five days (June 1 to June 5).
Odymn wants the Slain to return his ‘aquisitions’ (a wolf-like Kotildi, a Grell-swallow chick, a beautiful human woman, a Dock-winder child and another genetically-enhanced Slain) to their homes. The Slain wants to try, to make Odymn happy, but the task might not be so easy!
off planet 