The world of Elderealm started as a spark when I was a freshman in college. I wrote a short script called “Doug the Obese Dragon.” It was a horrible script, but it was where Doug was born.
When I took my first screenwriting class, I finally sat down and wrote “Dragon Lotus,” a screenplay staring Doug. I did a lot of world building and created the first map for the continent of Majerä. (The map drawn in color pencil was done in 2003)
In grad school I wanted to do more with “Dragon Lotus” and toyed with the idea of turning it into a novel or comic script. I rewrote the screenplay and revised the world building. This lead to a new map of Majerä. (The fully black and white map was drawn in 2008)
In 2016 I decided it was finally time to make “Dragon Lotus” a real novel. This of course meant revising the map. (The current map was last updated in January and was published in WRATH OF DRAGONS in March of 2018)
What’s interesting is that the basic shape of the continent staid about the same through all iterations. That’s crazy to consider when the first map was done fifteen years ago! The major borders of nations are about the same, but a lot of the cities and kingdoms changed.
A few of the names that did stay consistent were:
- HAL – I had just taken a Stanley Kubrick Class in 2003
- KALE – In 2003 my BFF was a vegetarian and always into different foods (she is still my bff)
- ARWYN – In December of 2003 RoTK was going to come out in theaters and Arwyn was a misspelling of Arwen
It’s crazy to look back at that 2003 drawing and to see what Elderealm used to be. That was SO LONG AGO. I hadn’t lived in DC. My Dad was alive. I still thought I’d do grad school in LA. Soooo much has changed and yet Elderealm is still very close to what it was originally.
I don’t expect this to be the final map of the continent of Majerä. After book three in the Elderealm series there will be a slight shift in the world. When that happens I’ll need a new map. I suspect instead of making one myself, I’ll hire an artist to create the new map and to redo the current map.