The Pantheon Triptych: First Steps

Seeing as I'm likely to commit the first words to the page for my next novel, The Pantheon Triptych, in the next few days, I thought it would be worth gathering my thoughts into a single blog post. A lot has changed since the overview I gave back in July.

For a start, it has a much better title. The word triptych came after realising that so many aspects of the world of Pantheon came in threes. Three starships colonised it. The population is spread across three continents. There are three mysterious underground energy channels called fluxes. The expedition to investigate the latest flux to be discovered has three members. The line of succession on the continent of Anatol always spans three generations. The story features three main characters. It was inevitable.

Let's start with an updated blurb to set the context:

The world of Pantheon was colonised well over a century earlier by generation starships from Earth. The first colonists were surprised to develop mild psionic powers thanks to exotic flux channels running through the planet. Healing abilities were prevalent thanks to the nearby health flux. In other regions, the kinetic flux bestowed psychokinetic abilities. They soon became part of life.

On the island continent of Anatol, fealty to his leader is everything to Steffan. Despite being the heir apparent, he would give his life for Rurik, Anatol's authoritarian ruler. He's always felt that way. It leaves him feeling the need to justify his life as the transfer of power approaches.

Elsewhere, eccentric expert Katsu Keating is part of an expedition sent to study the first signs of telepathic powers emerging in the wastes of the northern continent of Kitara. His viewpoint on the discovery of the mind flux adds critical texture to Steffan's tale.

Cynical investigator Tomlin Gaudy is sent to track an unusual subversive element emerging along the borders of the kinetic flux on the southern continent of Temani – quite why wealthy celebrities would start supporting such an unexpected cause is beyond him. The knowledge he eventually uncovers proves critical in Steffan's narrative of his life.

The convergence of their three perspectives reveals a threat to Pantheon's future that only Steffan can counter – if he can work out what to do. First, he has to decide who he is.

The story will primarily be told from the first-person perspective of Steffan, the heir apparent to the ruler of the island continent of Anatol. In the days before the succession, he feels the need to justify his life and his place in the world to himself. In amongst his reminiscences, he can't explain everything without relating the experiences of two acquaintances from the continents of Kitara and Temani. Meeting them changed his view of the future.

The stories of how the academic Katsu Keating from Kitara and the investigator Tomlin Gaudy from Temani come to meet Steffan from the traditionally isolationist island of Anatol will be told in a close third-person perspective, introduced by Steffan himself. That's a change from the previous plans when everything would be written in the first person. I think this makes more sense.

I've fleshed out all the characters in more detail, especially the primary and secondary characters. Below is a quick overview of everyone I need for the story at present. There will be more, but anyone new will unlikely be around for more than a chapter. Indeed, that's true of several of those here – Katsu and Tomlin are both on the move, rarely staying in one place between chapters.

A critical part of my planning was creating a rough world map. Unusually for me, it shaped and inspired the story beyond what I originally planned. It won't be in the book itself, but I thought I'd include it here for completeness, given how it changed the story. It's a bit rough, but it does the job.

Unlike my usual novels, the story hasn't been split into multiple parts. In the current plan, it will comprise 28 chapters. These alternate between Katsu's and Tomlin's perspectives, with shorter(?) chapters in between each from Steffan's viewpoint to link everything together. The number of chapters will change, but I know roughly what needs to happen where.

At the top, you can see my current draft cover for the book. I'm unusually happy with the design at this stage, which typically comes much later. I'm likely to tweak the colour balance and layout slightly, but it fits the story remarkably well and is pretty genre-effective. We'll see. I expect I'll change my mind.

The next stage is to write the first few chapters and then review how it's going. I may even get my son's thoughts on how well it's working at that stage. The way I'm telling it is a little new for me, so I need to be sure I'm on the right track before I get too far. Four chapters should be enough: an introduction from Steffan, Katsu setting out, a linking chapter from Steffan, and the start of Tomlin's investigation.

This could be fun. I'll start slowly around a few other commitments (including publishing the Fractal Space trilogy at last!) but will go full steam ahead once I'm confident in my approach. I'll report back after those opening chapters are complete.