Review: The Emerald Lady

The Emerald Lady by James L Hill
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Mermaids, pirates and dragons; characters often used in fantasy literature. So how does one take a clichéd idea and turn it into something fresh?
If you are James L Hill, you create a new mythology replete with events so compelling that you will believe this is exactly how it was ‘before’.
First in the Gemstone Series, The Emerald Lady goes back to the swashbuckling era of heroes, heroines, and anti-heroes you love to see squirm when they get what they deserve.

The tale begins on a normal-enough laden ship about to cross the Atlantic; its cargo, timber. Having left too late in the season, it runs into a ferocious storm the likes of which the crew has never encountered and before the night is over there are only two survivors – Jeremy, the first mate, and Jack, a ship’s boy.
Being an honourable young man, who promised Jack’s mother to look after him while at sea, Jeremy makes sure the boy is safe on a raft before he himself loses all hope. But all is not as it seems in his dying moments.
His compassionate efforts have been witnessed from afar by a creature he does not believe in and as he finally lets go, Shera rushes in. All Jeremy sees in his drowning shadows is a shark about to end his life and heroically refuses to go down without a fight.

Shera has chosen to live a free and solitary life away from Usea Maya, where Rehema, reigns supreme, expecting complete loyalty. When Shera visits home to request aid to return Jeremy to the surface, the answer is ‘no’ and Rehema makes it clear to the assembled mermaids that they must steer clear of human contact and let the sea claim whomever it wishes.
Shera disregards the command and does all she can to save Jeremy’s life, but in so doing brings about consequences that sends three groups into world-changing events. For not only does she ignore the queen, she also inadvertently causes another sea creature’s death, and falls in love with Jeremy, a mere human.

Enraged, Rehema curses the lovers and upends all hope of there being a normal world. She begins to manipulate all things as she pleases and considers her right to do so and finally instigates the split a select few have been expecting for centuries.
James’ tone is rich and imaginative, fulfilling the need for excitement. His characters shine in their mesmerizing descriptions, creating an opulent world packed with both beauty and treachery. A world that is both real and fantastic. But let me not give too much away, read it yourself, and discover a new remarkable world that says, when is number two coming out?

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Armchair Travellers

I am often asked how I write about places I've never seen. How do I know in which direction the river flows, if the cobblestones are russet red, and is the baobab 30 feet tall?

The answer is; I don't know all those things for sure.

Some of the places I write about are real, and those who live in the areas will recognize them instantly, but often, scenes come out of research I do as preparation, visual help to set the scene, and the rest straight out of my imagination.

People call this the armchair traveller.

Many of us are bound by various circumstances; a nine to five job, a full-time mom with no time to discover a Miami neighbourhood, or a night nurse who needs to sleep during the day. So although you hear it constantly that you should write what you know, another answer is this, don't be scared, make things up, but equally, don't take such liberties that people think your modern-day romance is set in another Miami on a different planet.

To write first-hand is clever enough, but to write out of what your mind processed and made believable, is just as smart. For the woman on location may be momentarily concerned with her skin and how it fares in the blazing sun, if the taxi driver will over-charge yet again, or if the calamari is about to revolt against her delicate stomach.

The armchair traveller on the other hand, has become an adequate student of information, sifting through paragraphs, descriptions, and essays on decor and architecture, navigating thousands of pictures and sometimes even maps and jungles.

In addition, if armchair travellers were not accurate substitutes, we would reject all historical novels off-hand.

So, for those who are concerned about the gnashing teeth of a critical public, do what I do, rename villages, towns, and cities. No one will be any the wiser whether Bellamar, Bellastown, or Bellasdorp are real.

Patterns

Before I begin on themes and topics, I have decided to look at patterns.

According to wikipedia, a pattern is a discernible regularity in the world, or in a man-made design. And as such, the elements of pattern repeat in a predictable manner.

In other words, it exists everywhere in nature and in everything people do.

Other descriptions for pattern include; design, arrangement, method, sequence, system, formula, shape, guideline, example... you can see where this is going.

Although patterns are especially noticeable in math and natural sciences, I'm referring to writing, which is a science all its own.

Call it what you will, and tell me you don't follow a pattern, that you simply write what takes your fancy, but whoever reads, sees it.

Of course it's the story readers like, but that hidden sequence that is part of you will manifest and grab them.Which is why they end up preferring an author over another.

Every romance, mystery, fantasy, horror, and all other classifications have resolutions. They don't all have to be good, but something must change by the last page.

Tell me that is not a pattern right there.

Again, why did I choose this subject?

I have noticed lately that many writers seem concerned about not coming across as unique, of simply being lumped together with others in a particular category and therefore becoming invisible.

Uniqueness reveals itself in the telling of a story, not how it's structured, because every tale revolves around "meet", "lose", and "get", and it makes no difference what genre it is.

Take the top writers in the world. None is worried about proving his or her distinctness. They simply sit down, know the rules to writing well, and then carry on.

Introduction

I am new at blogging.

I do not mean that I have never read any, which I do regularly, from able and professional writers, I simply mean that I have never written one myself.

Therefore, I have yet to develop a style, so this is my attempt at interacting with readers, new and seasoned, and bloggers of all types, and wait with bated breath for comments.

As I am a writer everyone suggested that I should blog about my work. I agree and disagree.

I will explain why I disagree first.

Don't you feel that some movie previews give too much information away? True, it's just a few minutes, but don't you often feel you no longer need to watch the film because you've already seen the best scenes? Therefore, why bother?

Given, movie people try to shroud their work in some secrecy, but sometimes they fail, and it's all out in public before the first theatre has been filled. Where is the anticipation, and excitement?

Why I agree and how I agree.

To create that very mystery I mentioned above, I should keep something of the content to myself, yet be forthcoming.

So I have decided to go about this in a different way. I will delve into the themes I write about and have discussions about those, instead of the story itself. This way, you'll know what I've written, but not how I've written it, and so possibly whet your appetite.

I will include excerpts at a later stage, perhaps after we have exhausted a topic, and you are free to make observations as you wish. All I ask for, is courtesy, even when we're losing our tempers. I know we can't all agree all the time.

Let me know what you think.