My writing as taken me to many places and on many journeys, not only through the act of piecing together my stories and works, but through the research I undertake to give a touch of authenticity to my work. Amongst the projects I am working on, I have just had pirates murder a mermaid and am pondering how the not-so-powerful leader of my nation is going to interfere and what he will do next, and have just had a pair of magical shoes made for a sceptic who has just been attacked by Red Caps and still refuses to believe in the existence of magic and magical creatures. I’m hoping the unicorn will change his mind.

What inspired these? With the unicorn, I love Scotland and unicorns, and felt a desire and pull to write something using them, leading to many orders of books on Scotland and the Victorian era, to get as many details as possible right. It is always the details, I find, that make the story full-bodied along with the plot and characters. The sceptic and pirates are proving quite fun to write. In exploring these characters and stories, I am able to give commentary and explore how these different people might see the world, even though it is in a somewhat humorous light to fit in with the themes of my story – an aim to perhaps prove to the sceptic that he shouldn’t just dismiss something because he has never seen it in the way human beings can do that occasionally with many things in our world. We do not always need proof. Just belief. For some, belief is enough, and for others, they need proof. I have a character straddling these two worlds in that she has belief in the unicorn but doesn’t need to see it to know it is there, and also, having proof of history and social causes is more important to ensuring something can be done rather than just a philosophical belief. I perhaps have been a little nasty to my pirates and made them ugly, rude and stupid enough to believe that mermaids don’t age, or because he gets attacked by Red Caps and still refuses to believe in the existence of magical creatures in the case of the sceptic but all in good time, all in good time. I have many more shocks to give to these characters.

Crafting magical shoes and deciding on a price is hard work, but it’s done and he is wearing them. Whether they will speak or not, I haven’t decided but they could present some interesting scenes. Of course, I am taking part in Camp NaNoWriMo, so anything goes and can be changed – this will be left to the very end when all is written, the curse is lifted and the unicorn has brought up a great revolution that shall be felt the world over.