When a Series Is Like An Old Friend

I’m seeing posts from some fans re-reading the Triempery Revelations series in advance of the release of the final book, The Rill Lord, next month, I’m delighted to note that many are discovering something I already knew:

The Triempery Revelations is a generous re-read.

The writing of this epic fantasy took place over many years. Decades actually. It was imagined as one story, a single book, though it grew too large to be published as such. Still, the story was imagined and written as a whole. One character followed another, each growing their own trials and tribulations and forming their own relationships with their World and each other.

 All six books were fully written before the first book was published. As I wrote and rewrote, a process that took many years, I also reimagined and reinvented different parts of the books—the societies and characters, the lore, the dialogues—again and again. Every reinvention gave the series depth and breadth. And layers. So many layers. Marc Frederick’s relationship with Dorilian affects other relationships for both of those characters. Dorilian’s projective empathy plays out in subtle yet powerful ways. Even Sural, a horse, echoes through the series.

Layers in fiction are beautiful things. Fun, too. While surface reading reveals the story completely, giving the who, what, where, and why of the plot, a story's layers are full of hidden treasures and sometimes clues, lying in wait and adding new insights.

I’ll map a few of the Triempery’s layers for illustration:

The Dorilian / Marc Frederick --> Stefan / Dorilian --> Dorilian /Hans layer

The Emyli --> Aubrey --> Leur --> Mother’s Path layer

The Entities --> Dorilian / Levyathan / Hans --> Nammuor layer

The Cities --> Second Creation --> Gods layer

As I wrote the Triempery series I moved back and forth within these layers, weaving them through earlier events or characters. I would notice when working in a later book of the series that an event or person needed to be introduced, or at least acknowledged, in an earlier book. I would add in that detail. Or something would happen in one of the first two books that I could make point to or foreshadow a later person or event... and so I would gently focus on that moment or bit of dialogue.

Many of the events of the final books, The Walled City and The Rill Lord, have plot twists strongly rooted in Sordaneon and The Kheld King. Quite a few things shown or said in The Second Stone point directly to events that happen much later in The Rill Lord. Why did Dorilian treat Hans the way he did—in any of the books? Was Stefan wrong to believe the Sordaneons dangerous? Marc Frederick believed that too... and later events show why. There will be moments of "So that's why he (or she) did that!" or recognition that another character is in on something. Or even up to something that's part yet maybe not part of the main story.

Like all stories, the Triempery series has a surface layer that’s immediately available to all readers and easy to access. Anyone who reads to the end of the Triempery Revelations will get a full story... indeed several. Not every reader will find the story to their liking, and they may not finish it or may choose not to read the books at all, but the story is there to be had for those who do.

For a certain type of reader, however, the series has something more. It is a series some readers can move into and delve deeper. Read again, the story unfolds in new ways through deeper understanding of just what is going on. It will feel familiar and magical and cozy as an old friend. I had fun writing the Triempery books that way and I hope readers have fun experiencing the journey.