Five years ago, I created my first post about the world I call Adaran.

I introduced Meegan Redoak, my half-elven misfit, who falls in with a group of adventurers after tragedy upends her world. The original plot events petered out to nothing. I had a solid beginning of an adventure, but nowhere to go. Her goal was to locate her father. I just didn’t know how or where that would happen.

Enter NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) in November 2022. I’d attempted NaNo a few times before. This time, I went all in and wrote a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. In the year-and-a-half since, I’ve been fleshing out the bones of the story. I’m almost ready to start my third major revision.

Of course, I reworked the original plot into something that just flowed through my brain and onto the page. I followed as Meegan told me her story. The characters from the original plot were just as involved as before. This time around, Meegan had a simple goal and was hyper-focused on reaching that goal. I had the time and energy to sit in front of the screen every day and observe what the characters were experiencing.

By this time, I’d lost all of my (mostly empty) notebooks to wildfire, so all of my world-building now lives in my head. Through a tremendous stroke of luck, my Eldest Kid has some of my source material in his basement. We had also put a chunk of our living room and my office in storage when we did a remodel one summer. A lot of those boxes never made it back to the old house. Yay us?

While writing this post, I’ve been looking back on some of the first blog posts in the Tavern Tales. I found a lot of diamonds in the rough that will help me re-create the continent of Adaran. I’ve already found several stories to rewrite and re-imagine. Now, to make it all happen.

Two days ago, I reached a milestone that had slipped by. I have happily added 1600+ blog posts to the Tavern Tales. It all started with my first post of substance, titled Hail and Well Met. For those of you who have been a part of this ride from the beginning, I thank you. You are the folks who kept me going when I struggled to find a direction.

A lot of you joined after we lost our home to that wildfire. For those of you who have found this page by chance or recommendation, thank you for your support as we rebuilt our lives. We’re far from finishing Rebuilding the Dream. I’ll keep you posted on how the rest of our construction goes.

Until then, I hope you enjoy my stories.