Scribes & Archers

Guess what’s back! The Language of Worlds link-up! :D What is this link-up?

• The Language of Worlds (TLoW) is a character linkup tailored to speculative Christian fiction (but other genres are more than welcome!).
• It’s bimonthly — every two months, a new set of questions releases. This edition lasts from January ’til February, and the next begins in March and ends in April.
• There are ten questions per linkup, and new ones every time!
• Anyone can join! All Liv asks is that you use the graphic (below) and link back to her blog.

This time around I’m going to be answering for Nathan Samuels, the main character in a post-apocalyptic(ish) novel I started last month.

The Questions:

1. In five words or fewer, how would you describe your character?

Brave, good brother, scared, protective.

2. When do they see an opportunity for self-improvement?

When he sees something wrong with himself.

3. How do they view themselves (good, evil, neutral, etc.)?

He views himself as good, but not perfect. He knows he does his best and that’s the best he can do.

4. Is there a story that inspires them? What is it?

I think Lauren (his best friend) probably has a story about her military grandfather that Nathan finds inspiring, but I don’t know what it is yet.

5. What proverb or quote do they identify with?

“Courage is not the absence of fear. It is acting in spite of it.”

6. What does their standard day look like?

Rolling across the country in a van, surrounded by rowdy kids between the ages of 5 and 18, most of the people in the car singing along to travel songs and Christian music like Steven Curtis Chapman, stopping for lunch at rest stops or convenience stores, chatting with Lauren and Owen, and then sleeping in the van or cheap hotel rooms.

7. When they picture their ideal day, how does it go?

He and Levi (his little brother) are safe in a country house somewhere with both their parents, he’s helping take care of their handful of horses, and after chores are done he and Levi play hide and seek around the farm or climb trees or build a treehouse or something else that normal brothers do. His mom grew up on a farm and he knows she’d love to go back to that life, and he’d like for him and Levi to be normal brothers again instead of dodging bombs and missiles.

8. Do they have a favorite memory? If so, what happened?

When Levi was born and Nathan first got to hold him. He still remembers it like it was yesterday, the love and joy and his promise to “take good care of” his little brother.

9. Where do they see themselves in five years?

Ideally he sees himself buying his mom a farmhouse, buying himself a house next door, being married to Lauren and both their families being safe. He thinks the more realistic option is that the U.S. will be rebuilding from the attacks they managed to stave off and he’ll be helping rebuild wherever he and the Averys end up landing.

10. What is their life dream?

At this point, just for his family and the Averys to be safe.

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Totally unrelated note: I’ve changed up my newsletter(s) for the new year. Instead of just one list, I now have a list for writers and a list for readers.

If you were on the list already and set your preferences, you’re all set.

If you didn’t see the newsletters at the end of last year and didn’t reset your preferences, you’ve been removed and you’ll have to re-subscribe to whichever list you’d like to be on.

If you weren’t on my list to begin with, now’s your chance! You can sign up to my reader list here and get access to the first chapters of The Dark War Trilogy, and/or sign up to the writer list here and get access to my resource library.