The Inspiration For Awakened

 This article was originally posted during my blog tour last spring and appeared on Bookish Comforts book blog.

 I am often asked where my inspiration comes from. My answer is usually... everywhere. People, music, movies, something I see in nature or some times an idea organically pops into my little brain and I just run with it.

But I do have a story on how I came up with the idea for my first story in the Legends of Elyndia series and I am here today to share it with you.

The Inspiration for Awakened

Inspiration comes from many places. It can be found in nature, movies, people we meet and from the books we read. It can also come quite literally from an actual event. It was one summer day when I witnessed a gesture as innocent as a father passing a precious family heirloom to his only son that brings us to what we are talking about today, my debut novel, Awakened, book one in the Legends of Elyndia series.

A few years back my father-in-law decided that it was time to share an important gift with my husband. It was something that was passed down to him from his father and was very dear to him. He pulled out an oblong box with contents unknown to us at the time. From the box he pulled out an object wrapped delicately in a baby blue cloth and tied closed with a thick white string. After untying the string and carefully unwrapping the object, he placed it in my husband’s eagerly waiting hands. It was an antique knife with a curved blade and tattered copper sheath. When the knife was handed to my husband he held it with great respect, as it was obvious that it was very old. Not long after he held it, my husband carefully pulled the sheath from the blade and held the knife out in front of him for everyone in the room to see. As he was holding the knife I pictured a wave of powerful magic wash across the room as if the beholder just awakened an ability they never knew they had.

From that moment, I began writing a middle grade story in honor of my son. It was about a young boy that finds a magical knife and gets transported to ancient Egypt. I worked on that story and outlined it from start to finish over a three-month period. Then one day I just could not stand it any longer, and shared the story with my son. I knew for sure he would love it. After I explained the story he looked me in the eye and said…nothing. He then shrugged his shoulders and went back to his Gameboy. I asked him what he thought and he said it sounded boring and didn’t think kids would like it. So I scrapped it.

Before I started working on the middle grade book, I was working on an epic fantasy, but that story was just was not coming together for me either. So what did I do? I took a few of my favorite elements from the epic fantasy, combined them with the magical qualities I gave my knife in the middle grade story, and Awakened was born.