Time for a story! Specifically, it’s time to talk about my initial idea for Albion and where it came from.
Albion: The original inspiration
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Albion’s Council
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Albion’s Council is a rather unusual institution. What else do you call a group where everyone on it is arguably a twenty-first part of a king, at least in a ritual sense? Time for a blog post with a bit more about the Council. (And psst, it’s going to be relevant in Grown Wise, coming out on May 2nd, 2025.)
Levels of magical power
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Today’s topic about levels of magical power comes from a question on one of the current running series of extras for patrons on Patreon. (More about the context below.) The question is about levels of power, and how Garin (and more generally Lords of the land) fit into that.
This post makes a quick tour through ‘how do we define magically powerful’. Then we’ll look at some specific character examples. I’ve avoided plot spoilers in those!
Making the Pact
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More about the background of the Pact in the previous post. Here we’re looking at who makes the Pact, when, and some edge cases.
The Pact
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The Pact has been a foundational magic of Albion since 1484. After my post about apprenticeship, I had several great questions from people who wanted to know more about specific aspects. This post covers the basics of the Pact. The following post (up on the same day) gets into making the Pact in more detail.
Healers and apprenticeship
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Continuing on from last week’s post about apprenticeships in general, it’s time to dive into a specific set of training: Healers and related professions.
Apprenticing in Albion
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I had a question from a reader recently about how professional training works in Albion. Today’s post is about apprenticing in general, and next week’s will talk about Healers and related professions in more detail.
Victorian Albion
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I’ve written a few things set in the Victorian era (Forged in Combat takes place mostly in 1882 and Four Walls and a Heart in 1884). But with the Mysterious Fields trilogy, I got to spend quite a lot more time in the period. These three books are set between March of 1889 and June of 1890 (with the last chapter in October of that year).
Happy Pride! LGBTQIA+ Books
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It’s June again, and that means it’s Pride Month. As you likely know if you’re reading this, most of my books are M/F romances. But more than a few of them have queer or LGBTQIA+ content and characters!
Several include demisexuality (most of my books are also slow burn). A couple have main characters who are asexual and/or aromantic. There’s an F/F romance, a M/M one, and a couple with a MMF polyamorous relationship. And of course the “Enemies to it’s complicated” Best Foot Forward.
I’ve avoided big plot spoilers below. But of course there are some in talking both about people’s identities and orientations, and about which books that’s relevant in. Some additional characters can easily be read as fitting in the following categories. If they do for you, please read them that way!
I’ve a few more ideas coming! This post covers all of that. Plus it ends with a couple of recs of where to find other great queer romances.
Want a handy list of my books that are particularly LGBTQIA+?
Showing books 1-9 of 9
Period: Edwardian
Romance: F/F, Late in life romance, Closed door, Lesbian
Content notes: Click here to reveal
Period: 1920s
Romance: M/F, First relationship, Demisexual, Bisexual
Content notes: Click here to reveal
Period: 1920s
Romance: M/F, First relationship, Late in life romance, Closed door, Demisexual
Content notes: Click here to reveal
Period: 1920s
Romance: M/F, First relationship, Late in life romance, Demisexual
Content notes: Click here to reveal
Period: 1930s
Romance: M/M, Late in life romance, Asexual, Bisexual, Polyamorous
Content notes: Click here to reveal
Showing books 1-9 of 9
Or here’s Geoffrey, commenting on the state of his relationships and the people he loves, not always in easy to label ways.
(more…)“As I keep saying, if I am lucky, he will to the end of our days. See, I am already experienced in complicated relationships that no one understands. We’ve muddled along, far better than fine, for going on twenty years now.”
Geoffrey Carillon, Best Foot Forward, chapter 41
Architecture and magic
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One of the things I’ve thought about a lot is the interaction between architecture and magic in Albion.
Now, first, I am by no means a specialist in this sort of thing! But besides having lived in a range of places, I’ve done a little bit of college coursework that covered buildings. I’ve been generally been interested in how spaces adapt and change over time.
