Behind the Scenes of THE BLOODRUNE SAGA

(WARNING: this contains spoilers for the trilogy)

You may not know that my original pen name is strictly urban fantasy and cozy paranormal mystery. (If you want to check that out, look up Emily Fluke!). But I’d always wanted to write epic fantasy romance with reincarnation, Vikings, gods, etc - I just didn’t have the guts to do it. Especially because the particular story I intended to tell would dive deep into tropes painfully familiar to my own life: forbidden romance (more on that later), and deconstruction of everyone else’s beliefs (more on that later too).

So I buried this want…

For a long time.

Until I binged the show Vikings.

My favorite fantasies are The Last Kingdom, Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, Merlin, The Witcher, the Dungeons and Dragons movies, etc.

And Vikings.

Of course Vikings - which we ALL KNOW IS NOT A ROMANCE.

Not in the slightest. (spoilers!) Ragnar betrays Lagertha, and it broke my sensitive little romantasy-loving heart.

Alongside reading favorites like Phantasma, Dire Bound, Fallen Gods, From Blood and Ash, A Fate Inked in Blood, and King of Battle and Blood, (etc, etc), I decided IT WAS TIME! I needed to write my own romantasy. Cozy mysteries are fun; they’re a good puzzle, I adore them, but they’re not my real passion.

So I finished Vikings and knew what I had to do.

Ragnar’s deconstruction of beliefs spoke to me because, as a chronic people-pleaser, I was allowing everyone else to tell me how to behave, what to believe, and who to be.

Ragnar didn’t listen to what everyone told him to do. He allowed his long-standing beliefs to break down and chose to control his own destiny.

I wanted to read a romantasy with an FMC who did the same. With a resilient woman who stands up and refuses to let tradition, expectations, and what she’s always been told to believe about herself and the world be the end of her story. I wanted Lux to take off the blindfold (and yes; I understand book 1 can be very frustrating for readers who want all the answers right away). Lux lies; she hides secrets to protect herself and her own mental health until she finally feels safe enough and strong enough to be herself.

It takes a long time.

It takes Drak’s help.

But she gets there.

That’s Lux’s arc.

And when she finally breaks free of the chains strapped to her by her parents, the ‘historians’, the society, she becomes the unapologetic FMC. A female version of Ragnar.

And Drak - he reflects the other side of Ragnar’s journey. That obsessive need for power and control and domination. Drak finds that through becoming a vampire and then seeks to become a god, and since this is a romantasy, his end isn’t in a pit of snakes, but with his WIFE.

…now about that forbidden romance. Well, yeah, I lived it. “IN THIS DAY AND AGE?” Yep. My marriage was against the expectations of some of the most important people in my life because of religious beliefs, etc.

But just like Lux and Drak, I got my happily ever after. (Thankfully, I didn’t have to die or kill any gods in order to do it.)

Her'e's us over the years cosplaying as the Ragnar and Lagertha/Drak and Lux that I wanted to - and eventually did - write...