Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Disc Golf

I have picked up a new little hobby recently: Frisbee Golf. It's good fun. There are tons of free courses to play at (I've been playing at Lakewood Hills in White Bear Lake), the only expense is buying the discs (mine cost around $9 and earns me extra geek points by having an Orc on it). I'm not particularly good at it, but I am getting better.

It's both lots of fun and something to keep me active. The Lakewood Hills course is about 8 miles from where I work, and I will sometimes play some over my lunch break. There are 14 holes on the course, and I can usually get through at least half in about 40 minutes. I actually have a spreadsheet of my scores (Gina should be proud), showing how I've been doing.

So if anyone reading this (who lives in the area) :) wants to ever play a round, let me know.

Thursday, May 07, 2009

More With Names

Thanks for the replies to my last post. The jury is still out on the fate of the name of Arien. Now today, I have more thoughts on names. Previously, I had posted how I will quite possibly use The Lords of Sargoff as the name of the book series, and thus will have to come up with a new name for the first book. Here's a list of possible names I've come up with. Let me know if any of them sound like a good title, especially for those who have read it. :) Or, of course, any other ideas or thoughts on book titles would be helpful. I have a few that I like more than others, but I'm curious as to what any of you think.

The Light of Fear
The Light of Magic
The Light of Mystery
The Stone of Fear
The Stone of Magic
The Essence of Fear
The Essence of Magic
The Essence of Light
The Light of War
The Essence of Chaos
The Source of Light
The Curse of the Light
The Illumination
The Glorious War
The Beauty of Chaos
The Glorious Chaos
The Second Shadow
The Power of Magic
The Rise of Fear
The Magic of Fear
The Rise of Chaos
The Essence of War
The Power of War
The Malumar
The Second Shadow of the Malumar
The Successor
The Successor of Chaos

Friday, May 01, 2009

Evidently, My Book is Nazi Propaganda

.......well, not really. But I have recently been made aware of something that I had previously not considered when it comes to my fantasy novel, The Lords of Sargoff.

In the book, there is a dark wizard named Lord Arien (pronounced like "Ariel" from The Little Mermaid). It is also pronounced like "Aryan," which is what the Nazis referred to as the "master race." It has been commented that keeping the character with this name may bring up negative connotations and turn off some of the readers, perhaps especially those that are of races targeted by Aryan racism.

So, I'm hoping to get some input on whether you think this is actually an issue, especially from those who have read the book (which is most of you). It seems there are two possible actions to take.

I can, of course, rename the character. On the other hand, part of me sees the similarities between Lord Arien and the Aryan master race. The character is one bent on dominance and power, with very little regard for the lives of others. I could keep the name, because the connection almost fits.

What do you think? Does it even matter?