The final short story: The King and Queen of Loire is out! I hope you like it! It was fun to FINALLY be able to show Lucien’s father and mother. But enough news stuff, on to the post!
There are some serious SPOILERS in this post, so if you haven’t read Frog Prince yet, you’ll want to high-tail it outta here.
Alright, I’ve been hinting at the Summit ever since Cinderella and the Colonel came out, and as you can tell based on Lucien’s little talk, I’ve had the big reveal in place since I wrote Beauty and the Beast, and I’ve been actively presenting it in every book–though it’s most obvious in The Snow Queen books. How on earth did I do? The answer is a looooot of planning.
Seriously, I’ve had this reveal in mind for a long time. It’s changed a bit since I first started the series–originally Lucien was going to be turned into a frog later–during Angelique’s story to be precise–but I decided it was much better to have it happen during the Summit. However, I have had the Chosen reveal plotted out since the very beginning.
And as you can probably tell, everything still hasn’t been shown. There are quite a few more twists that will happen in the next few books, but Frog Prince sets the stage and gives you an accurate idea of what’s really been going on. It also marks the final book in the series’ shared time space. From here on out, things get much more linear. The events of the 12 dancing princesses take place in fall and early winter–pretty recently after Briar beats Carabosso in Sleeping Beauty–and events of Snow White will happen the following spring/summer.
As for the Summit itself, it will give you a little taste of what the final book in the series will be like. Because I’m absolutely insane, the final book in the series will bring back the hero and heroine from nearly every book in the series. Everyone will get their own little segment in the final story, and they’ll be interacting with each other–much as they did during the Summit, but on a far larger scale.
The Summit also introduces you to characters/concepts that will play out in future stories. Princess Astra–the summit representative for Baris–will get her own story in the future, though it will take place AFTER this current story arc. (Meaning you won’t be getting her story for a number of years.) Rider Neera comes from Farset–where the Twelve Dancing Princesses reside–but her role as a Rider also acts as a precursor for another book that will take place after the current story arc as well.
I had a few readers as about the politics of the Summit, more specifically how I came up with the political undertones and all the government references. It was actually really fun for me because I used to be a newspaper reporter, and my beat (the articles I was responsible for) was to cover all the governmental and school board meetings that took place in a small city I lived near. I sat through a lot of meetings, and while my fairy tale world is fantasy, it still needs a government that actually works, so I really drew on my newspaper experience when I was putting everything together.
We still have a few Frog Prince blog posts yet–I want to talk about the morals, and also talk about the warfare/tactical side of the Chosen attack, so we still have some fun topics coming up. Thanks for reading, Champions! I hope you enjoy the story, and I hope to see you at one of the live events!