I have tried to put the history and background of myworld into words before and it never seems to come out right. Originally I was going to do it as an epic poem but I am not a very good poet, and all such attempts failed. 

Whats posted here isn’t exactly a spoiler since only a few in the story know the history and it doesn’t really matter to most of them. The nature  and purpose of the highway system is irrelevant to you when all you have is a bicycle. (Does that seem like a forced analogy? Well bullying analogies is a hobby of mine.)

It plays a part in how things last. Why does a millennium old sword still have an edge? Because it wasn’t made yet and thus it can’t go dull yet.

I don’t know. Read it and if you have further questions I can try to explain batter. But to really get it you should BUY MY BOOK and then we can better discuss what is what and why.

The secret to the world in the Dead Wizard is :

SPOILER

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Time. You see the Well of the Gods is a planet-locked black hole. The Creator and the dragons, with the help of dwarves and giants, built the dimensional portals into the planet and they are tied into the black hole and it’s extra-dimensional properties.

It took since the beginning of time to get it all set up, but when completed the creations from across the universe could safely visit the planet, commune with their guardians/gods, and return to their own space and time without permanent harm. The achieved this by pulling the pilgrim spirit back in time. You see you can’t harm what doesn’t exist yet.

The Well World is influenced like a dream. What the pilgrims perceive and wish can and will happen, as long as another pilgrim doesn’t prevent it. The world is a communal delusion that protects the pilgrim as they journey to find "god". They then return through their portal to the real world waking enlightened. Should they perish along the journey, their being does the same thing, only without the enlightenment and with an existential memory that they may interpret as they will.

As time went by many pilgrims chose to stay in the dream realm of the Well World, settling down roots with each other and with manifestations of their minds. These first generations were nigh immune and immortal in the Well World, that is so long as time in the real world never caught up to them killing their reality body and their manifestation with it.

Inevitably the pilgrims began having children with each other and the manifestations of their and the gods dreams. Slowly they populated the world and the Dragon States that guard the Well. A great civilization grew up. With each following generation the immunity lapsed more and more until those with "magic" powers were less and less common among the population.

The number of pilgrims fluctuated as the Avatars’ wards went on without the Avatars watching and guiding their civilizations. Gradually the wards’ reliance on the Avatars faded, making the Creator happy that they were learning to get by with each other on their own. But all was not peaceful.

Some of the gods were not content to wait for their wards to come and seek guidance from them. These gods, some abandoned by their wards and some determined to guide their wards, fought to escape often. The abandonment and loneliness maddening them even more as they saw other wards seeking guidance. For them the paradise in the Creator’s court became unbearable and they became obsessed with escape and revenge. Avatars split into factions as some plotted to escape. They probed the far reaches of the infinite palace that was their prison. Up, down, in infinite directions, they struggled to find a way out.

The frustration and anger was too much for even gods, and thus the determined Avatars became demons determined to reenter the physical world and the joys they had had there. Pushing their influence in various directions they tried to incite rebellion among even the pilgrims and their children.

Their repeated actions had consequences though, and each escape attempt cost them access to their wards. separating them further.

I am starting to rethink my promise of spoilers. I doubt it would stimulate more purchases and it would ruin the surprise of future novels. I’ll give you some hints though. Here’s a SPOILER from the long, long ago of the planet’s past.
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The world was once a peaceful planet with gates to planets across the universe. A place out of time, it served as a sanctuary for followers of the gods to come and confer with them. The planet protected visitors from dangers as they gained guidance from the gods and then returned to the realms of reality. It was a peaceful scholarly place. The Dragon Cities took care of the gods and the faithful alike, bringing peace to the restless universe of creation.
But some of gods still wanted to return to reality and help their peoples directly. For the Creator had had to trick half the gods, the Creator’s avatars, into coming here in the first place. Many had fought and resisted the initial confinement, but aided by the dragons and the more agreeable gods, the avatars were forced to accept their fate. Their influence over their wards diminished.
Only with the support of other avatars could any one communicate directly with their wards, thus preventing the avatars from using their wards to compete against each other and to settle petty scores with the slaughter of each others wards. Those who refused to cooperate were cut off from their wards and push deeper into the well and away from the world and reality. Things were peaceful and balanced again.
No one considered that one day a ward might come searching for its god.

So I tried a second set of twitter messages, and evidently I’m either already labeled a spammer or it set of some kind of posting sensor on the twitter. All it said was "Support diverse point of views in Fantasy Lit. Pre-order today @inkshares.com --- Goblin lives matter!"
Which do you  think?
I’m betting spam alert.

Half way through the drive.
I hope the sales reflect my lack of marketing skills and not the quality of the writing. I suppose I’ll have to start giving away spoilers to draw interest. But don’t worry if you want to be surprised I’ll label those bits. Though I suppose that they aren’t really spoilers so much as details that the characters aren’t aware of. Hence their confusion about what some objects.
One thing they aren’t aware of but, that the reader will notice is that their swear words include a lot of human swears. Partly because they live around humans, Khoma being a human run kingdom, and partly because goblins have encountered and absorbed the knowledge of some "modern" humans.
Even the humans aren’t aware of that anymore. Pretty much only the dragons know the true history of things. Though those that lived through it are loathe to talk about it. Even with other dragons. They have their scars to remind them daily of when  the humans arrived again.

Buy my book! Please. :-)

We are now one third the way into the pre-order sale drive. With less than sixty days to go!

The pre-orders are off to a slow start, but an end rush is probly more typical. I have sent out appeals to the couple of syndicates the Dead Wizard falls under theme wise, and I optimistically await their decisions. I am planning to spend some of the weekend finding fantasy fan groups on facebook and and posting there. Like most of the Goodreads clubs though, postings are often limited to members only, but I’ll see what I do to persuade the owners.

I thank those of you that have been mentioning the Dead Wizard to your friends. The more people we can get interested in the story the better the chance of taking off. If there is anything I can do that might entice your friends let me know too.

And if you know and artist that  might be interested in doing some cover art or other promotional illustrations, send me their names and site addresses.

Thanks for reading. There will be more to come.

PS- I know probly isn’t a word yet... Yet!

Well I think I have emailed and tweeted at everyone I know. Plus I did the facebook announcement. That got some people here.

Tonight I go after the Book Syndicates and their members. Goodreads I’m coming for you too! If I can figure out where to post stuff there.  That might take all night.  But the selling must go on!

I’m about to start working full-time at a graveyard shift job, and I figured I better get this started while I have time to try to get people to pre-order.  Then I postponed it because my cat, Esmeralda, started dying. After mourning her for a few days, I decide to launch. Well, that happens to be the day "anna1 from France" decides to spam the message boards, thus ensuring that anyone I try to encourage to pre-order is going to be more than a little apprehensive about who is contacting them. So now I have launched but I will have contacted hardly anybody for the first few days while I wait for their trust of Inkshares emails to return.
Le sigh. I feel like the luckiest goblin ever.

"Sure I lost a foot, but they died and I didn’t. Can’t you  see I’m winning?"
- not a quote from my book, but it would be a good one.

Added a temporary cover image. It’s some silhouettes of the main and supporting characters that I had done for an ad when I first tried to self-publish it. It’s very rough but works alright in the small size.

Hopefully it will only be a substitute until I get a pro image.

I was thinking of trying to sell soon. Even without a pro cover image. Anxiety and uncertainty are eating me alive right now. I wish they’d get sick of my flavor and bugger off.

The silhouettes are from left right starting in the top- Nitte, Inpoko, Steep, Yurgii, Schoona, and Sewol. Bottom row- Kobold with rat, Random kobold, Nermel (pictured taller than he is), Voem, Random kobold coal shoveller and Teleedel with Boxer the ferret (that’s the lump on her shoulder).

Who are they? Well, if you read the posted sample chapters, you have met Voem, Nitte, Inpoko, Nermel, Yurgii, Teleedel and Boxer. More details to come...

Voem wears a broken visored sallet helmet. His is missing the neck guard which was broken off during the death of the previous owner. Voem however is unaware of that since he merely  picked it out of the outfitting pile in the Watchhouse.