I like the series the way it is! I like not having to clean up Coby’s messes! I like no consequences!

STOP YELLING!!

That was me...yelling at my subconscious. My inner voice however, was not yelling back. It was calmly repeating the same thing... “Stop taking the easy way out”.

I hate my inner voice...especially when I know it’s right.

So, off I went to...back to the drawing board with Elephitten. And a nagging question... “Can I write straight fantasy?” Not imagination fantasy, but straight fantasy, where the things I’m writing actually happen inside the framework of the book. It was an interesting concept. I decided that I just had to start writing.

The first question I had to ask myself was, where did Elephitten come from? For that, I have to give some credit to my writing workshop partners from Big Sur. They had suggested a few options but there was one in particular that stuck out in my mind. And, being a closet tech guy, I like the idea of some cutting edge technology. It’s not exactly Frankenstein’s monster...but it’s as close to magic as I’ve ever seen in real life. The 3D printer!

With this concept in mind, I started writing a chapter in the book where Coby uses the 3D printer to create a model of Elephitten. Once I got that far...it tied nicely into the main story of the book.

Once I got to the end... then I had to deal with the other burning issue...consequences. I decided to leave some of this up to the reader, but Coby still has to solve the problem of what to do with this creature he’s created. I felt like I had a clever solution for that, and as I finished the book, I really liked the way the whole thing came together. As writers tend to do... I went back and read the book a few times through just to make sure I connected all the dots.

Amazingly, I had just wrote my first full fantasy book. And, I’ve used a formula that I can play with moving forward with the series.

Now that the road is clear - let’s get Elephitten out there for everyone to enjoy and I can move on to the next one!