The Vitmar Chronicles
“The Vitmar Chronicles” is a low fantasy series set in the world of Ilynika, which follows brothers Gabriel & Kaldor Vitmar as they navigate life together.
Nobody saves the world in “The Vitmar Chronicles.” Rather than write yet another heroic tale of people banding together to fight evil, I thought it would be more interesting to write about heroic tales of people banding together to survive life and all of its intricacies.
The Origin of “The Vitmar Chronicles”
I very much considered “The Vitmar Chronicles” to be a fresh start as a writer. I had grown quite bored of the group-of-young-people-saving-the-world dichotomy that I saw in most fantasy media, be it Final Fantasy video games or, frankly, most of the well-known fantasy series of the day, which were “DragonLance” and “Forgotten Realms.” So instead, I wanted to focus on the things that my ex’s brother and I had discussed: the lives of these characters as they live them, trying to exist in a fantasy world.
It occurred to me later on in 2024 that “The Vitmar Chronicles” is strangely similar to “Anne of Green Gables” in that there isn’t any strict “point” or “purpose” to the story in the usual sense, it just follows the lives of the protagonists. The only overarching lesson that the series is trying to make is that life itself is an adventure, regardless of setting, and my goal is to prove it by showing how interesting these characters’ lives are. The series starts following them from their late-teens/early-20s and following them over the span of around 20 turns [years]. They experience and deal with trauma, grief, love, children, and a multitude of other things that should be depictive of life in general, be it set in a fantasy world or the real world, but perhaps with a more open-minded take on what’s harmful versus helpful than many modern/western people might still be ready for. A lot of my hippy soul bleeds into this world and story.
A great many years ago, I had done some rough sketches of some of the characters, which you can see scattered around here (I now have a scanner, so I plan to get better copies of these drawings sooner rather than later).
Back in 2007, I was dating a nice fellow in Calgary whose brother also happened to be a metalhead and fantasy writer. At some point, he and I began a discussion about what our lives would be like if we were characters in a fantasy novel. This conversation sat in my brain and lingered for weeks, maybe even months, until January 2008, when I finally decided that I simply had to write this story and that it was going to be so much better than anything else I’d written up until then.
The World of Ilynika
The stories are set in the world of Ilynika, whose name I’m quite sure I adapted from Ilyria from Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night.” The world is largely divided into islands like Isidor, Eayl, Nordvahl, and Andranei. The central and northern parts of the world are my version of a utopia: a place to where a great number of people from Andranei migrated after the War of Doors at the end of the 2nd Era, when they became sick of the problems society refused to solve (relatable?). Andranei is, then, the more familiar fantasy setting with all of the common issues of inequality, tyranny, and the like. While most of the stories are set in the central-north, it goes without saying that a few of the problems faced throughout the series are nevertheless caused by Andraneian culture.
When TVC begins, the people in the 3rd Era had reformed their society on the concept of harmony and an effort to genuinely take care of one another. Since they were accustomed to a monarchy, they decided to re-imagine what it meant to be a king in their new settlements and changed the term to “Patron of the Realm.” The Patron’s first priority is always to take care of the people. The Patron’s children’s job is to spend as much time in different walks of life as possible in order always be up-to-date on what life and progress are like for the people, so they are in the best possible place to understand problems and be able to solve them in a way that’s fair for everyone. However, these children are also not forced to become future Patrons if they feel unsuited for the role.
The general societal rules are decided in democratic tribunals, with the first question always relating to a combined scientific and societal exploration of how the subject may both benefit and harm individuals and society as a whole. Therefore, most forms of discrimination don’t exist outside of Andranei and everyone has, for example, a basic income. Children participate in standard educational gatherings for a few years, followed by apprenticeship in whatever interests them and/or best suits their skills. Art is celebrated and stories and life experience are considered more valuable than material wealth.
TVC Over the Years
For a long time, I planned to try to pitch this series as a trilogy, with the first two books being collections of year-chapters and the last book being a full adventure novel starring the new generation of Vitmar children. However, when I decided to abandon my pursuit of traditional publishing and do things my own way, it occurred to me that it actually makes more sense to release the chapters one-by-one as shorter stories, since they are technically standalone tales. That way, all of the year-chapters will build up to the final book, which is a more traditional novel that takes place over a much shorter timespan.
Many changes have happened throughout the 16 years of rewriting that “Volume I: An Ending & A Beginning” underwent. The opening ten pages, in particular, have be rewritten so many times that I’ve lost count. Over all those years, I learned how to “show don’t tell” in my writing, how to slowly reveal information rather than spamming backstory and exposition, and how to really get in depth with my characters. My descriptive writing has improved considerably as well.
Before I could boast as much life experience as I have these days, Ilynika had a lot more common tropes. There was a king, not a Patron, and everyone hung out in taverns. Kaldor was definitely more of a mindless brute barbarian than the dedicated and loyal warrior he is in the current iteration. Characters got married, rather than undergoing joinings. Brianna “Rian” O’Garthy went by the name “Kalani” (turns out that literally translates to “my fish” in Finnish [insert face-palm here], hence the change) and is now named after Dimension 20’s Garthy O’Brien and nicknamed after a guy named Ryan Roch who runs a dispensary in Cochrane, AB. I also replaced general alcoholism with an addiction to eyedrops colloquially called the Bottomless Mirror, but you’ll have to wait a few volumes before that comes into play.
TVC Today
After my personal revelations at the end of 2023, I decided that, if I didn’t enjoy the process of hunting for agents and trying to convince them that my stories are worthwhile, when ultimately, I might get rejected because of their laziness or outright bad luck, I decided to stop pursuing publication altogether. I would far rather keep more of the pie for myself and self-publish than jump through a hundred hoops for the sake of a publisher, even if this route has its own inherent difficulties.
My low-key goal was to start releasing these books in 2024, but I didn’t want to make any promises I couldn’t keep with regard to when they would start coming out, especially since I suddenly found myself in need of fifteen (or so) book covers instead of the originally-planned three, but I had a rather manic moment in 2024 and decided that I could probably get the first part ready for release by my birthday, so release it I did!
In the end, in order to free this series from my soul, encourage me to keep working on it, and be the writer I always wanted to be, I opted to make simple faux leather-bound covers with the assistance of my extremely cool and talented friend, Kathy Criswell (you should check out her novel, “Aphrodite Rising,” which will be available in spring 2025—I was the editor!), with a longer-term plan to eventually crowdfund a print collection, which could result in cool album art and a proper world map. Until then, self-published digital books will have to suffice.
More info here!
As an effort to promote this book, I made a video where I talk about the series, where it came from, what’s important to me in my writing, and where it’s going from here! You’ll learn a few of my quirks when it comes to writing and my belief systems, which play out in my stories.