Amidst the withered fields I roam and realize, of empires, I know nothing

[wayfaringwordhack]

Because I tend to avoid all things political, it rather surprised me that one of my MCs, Baxente (pronounced Ba-shent- é for those who like to know that sort of thing), was to be an emperor, soon to take over from his aunt who had been ruling until he reached majority.  I know not the least little thing about running a country, let alone several, and most of the conflict I could foresee for him was a slew of boring policy meetings and asserting his authority, after he succeeded in wresting the crown from his aunt, who was feeling very fine on the throne, thank you very much, and did not like having to relinquish it. 

However, in further developing just how the empire became an empire, I realized that Baxente is not going to assume his rightful place on the throne. Suddenly, I'm much more interested in his plight. To me, a man who should have been emperor is more interesting than one who is. He's going to be quite the tortured character, and that promises to be fun to write.

Not only that, the power-grubbing aunt suddenly came to life for me, too, and now I know exactly why she opposes Baxente. She is no longer a cardboard villain, schemed up to provide conflict for my MC. She has motives, a raison-d'être! Hallelujah!

Little by little, the elements I need to attack the prose with assurance are coming together for me. Now I must turn my attention to the island nation that will be at odds with my empire, designing their language and figuring out key features of their culture, and then I shall be ready to write again.

In other news: No, the pc is not fixed; yes, I'm using it anyway. I'm sick again. No surprise there. I'm not whining about it. Just noting it for future reference. I really hope it is seasonal and/or something to do with the house (in which case, I should miraculously recover after the move--only 7 weeks to go). In any case, I really should ferry to GT and see a different doctor. Procrastinating is just too easy though, and I did a fair bit of that over the past few days, working on a new look for my LJ and that of my dear love. I was tired of following links and stumbling on other journals using the same theme, so I finally buckled down and dug around enough to figure out how to change the background and header image. Changing the text will have to wait until I can build up the courage to wade back into CSS again and actually figure out enough to make it obey me.

Comments

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

Thank you!