My novella is all done and has been uploaded to this blog in full. Cue the celebration noises. It isn't too late to give me feedback (bad or good), via comments or messages. Please let me know if there's any particular scene you liked, or hated, any character you liked, or hated, or any thoughts about the plotting.

Now it's over, I wanted to share some behind the scenes stuff about my process in planning and writing Imperial Gold. How did I develop the story from nothing into something? If that's something that interests you, then you're in the right place. I thought a little deep dive could be interesting as a way to bookend this novella.

Spoilers ahead, obviously. Click here to start Imperial Gold if you haven't had a chance yet!

A far-off beginning.

The spark of the idea that eventually became Imperial Gold has its beginnings in Budapest. I mean that very literally. I was in Budapest on holiday in 2018 and, aside from my discovering it was my favourite city, I discovered something else that summer. The desire to write again.

I won't bore you with the details, but this rekindled interest in writing coincided with my reading of Sharp Ends by Joe Abercrombie, a collection of short stories all set in his First Law world. It made me think, 'Hey, I could write short stories, too.' So, in our more relaxing moments in Budapest, I started writing a short story. I had wanted it to be à la Abercrombie at the time, with blood and gore aplenty and I wanted to basically write it in a few thousand words.

Imperial Gold is now about six times longer than my 2018 idea and not nearly as bloody.

However, the basic idea I started with hasn't actually changed much. Three friends try their hand at ripping off a few local gangsters. Two decide to do it after getting drunk while the other thinks it's suicide. The key difference is when the story begins.

When I came back to the few pages I'd written three years ago, I felt it would work better if we had more time to know the characters, meet the antagonists and so on. It needed this, I thought, to build tension and audience connection to the characters as things go wrong, which I feel could have been missing in a shorter tale.

I'm also a better writer, now. Here's a snippet of how my 2018 text begins to try and prove it.

'Fucking hell Kalo. You've really fucked it this time.' Bridge kicked a bucket over, sending its contents on a path down the street. A dog whined as it flowed into it causing Bridge to soften his frown in something like regret.
Bridge never did regret, so he often said, so Kalo knew it couldn't have been actual regret. He smiled to himself at the thought, thinking of how he might dispense the anecdote to Bagi later.
'Nice to see that you're pleased with yourself!' Bridge's frown had returned to its prior intensity.
'It went exactly how I planned it,' Kalo tried. That caused Bridge to scoff, spluttering to a volume far above one desired by a man wishing to keep a low profile.
The nearby dog looked around causing a softening of Bridge's expression and another smile on Kalo's face.

I incorporate this scene into Imperial Gold, when Bridge finds out about Syn and Doda's crazy plan. Now, I don't know about you, but this comes across as clunky. I think - I hope - I've improved.

The Trio.

When re-planning this book, I wanted the three protagonists to be of completely different backgrounds, but still able to relate to each other. In 2018, I hadn't done any character development other than names (two of which I changed) and their level of aversion to the high-risk plan.

This gave me a starting point. I had to give them reasons for why they had different risk aversions. Doda is the least risk averse, primarily as her life has been mostly plain sailing, at least until the recent events which led her to Berusia. Syn is definitely more cautious than Doda, but that's because he's lived much of his life scrounging to get by. Finally, Bridge is a straight-edge military man who is used to rules and orders. He feels safe in that environment, but not out in the open.

This is also complemented by their ages. I'm not sure how well age comes across on the pages, but Bridge is about 30, Syn is in his mid 20s and Doda is a new adult. Their respective maturities colours their view on things.

The characters can relate to each other as they all currently have nothing. Syn's always had nothing, but for the others the concept is new. I may use this as a conflict for a future book.

Now follows some character models I made on the fantastic Hero Forge site:

Torxis, aka. "Bridge".
Nthu-Doda
Synestes of Nowhere

How do these match up with your mental depictions of the characters? Let me know in the comments.

The Buyers

When it came to creating the three "antagonists" of the story, I first envisaged them all to be warlords like Fury and Gelmud. The idea of making Catonica a bit different came later as I struggled to introduce three warlords in a way that wouldn't be repetitive.

Fury and Gelmud are somewhat based on the barbarian enemies that Roman generals fought against. (Beruisa itself is loosely based on the Mediterranean after the fall of the Western empire). Although Fury and Gelmud are certainly more in it for the money than idealists like Arminius or Vercingetorix, characters like these great enemies of Rome could make appearances in the future.

I made Catonica elusive so I could skip explanations about who she was near the beginning, but this also gave me the room to make her the mastermind of it all. I wanted there to be an "Ahhhh" moment at the end; a plot-twist. Catonica served that function well.

I knew pretty early on that I wanted Fury to be the big bad of the story, and for Doda's naivety to play into his hands at the expense of the cautious Bridge and the dying-to-be-liked Syn.

Gozane, a nothing town.

For the setting, aside from being in the Land of a Thousand Empires, I needed the stakes to be pretty low. I'd developed the Berusian caste system for Shards of Lisgrimir, book 2 of my main fantasy trilogy, in which the country features prominently, and I really wanted to explore it. It takes a backseat in SoL because the plot is wider reaching, and I'm currently struggling to introduce the concept of tonics that work on some castes but not on others.

Making the setting basically irrelevant meant it didn't impinge on the world-changing events of SoL, (and created a few background characters I could plug in later should I require them) and enabled me to focus more heavily on the caste and tonic stuff. Most of this was retconned into the plot after I got near the end.

I needed Doda to be captured and in my first plan I intended Syn to save her. I didn't really like how this turned her into a damsel-in-distress, and gave Syn a victory when his plan had gone so horribly wrong. And so, I layered the tonic and caste stuff in so Doda could be the one to save Syn. And, most importantly, Bridge could save both of them so he had some catharsis (as he didn't like the idea in the first place).

Imperial Gold 2: Electric Boogaloo?

I hope you enjoyed reading my off-the-cuff explanations for things included in Imperial Gold. If you liked the novella, please share it around, it'll be up here for free forever. If you didn't like it, please say why!

With all probability this won't be the last you'll see of Bridge, Doda and Syn. I believe they were going to the Green Meadow to maybe make some wine, though I can't imagine that will play for a particularly interesting story.

However, it will very possibly be the last you see of them in 2021. My focus has been on planning my wedding and SoL for the past couple of months and SoL will likely take up my attention for a while yet.

I might take a break from it if it starts to annoy me, which it sometimes really does (why oh why did I plan a 150,000 word book? Why couldn't I have planned a 80,000 word one?) and I may write some shorter stuff. However, I can't imagine I'll be writing another 30,000 word novella before I finish SoL.

I'll post any shorter stuff on here if I write it, which would likely be in the 1,000 to 5,000 word range. I've never finished anything of that length before so it could be an interesting writing exercise.

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