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Saying Goodbye

Some time in the late 1990s – and inspired, I know with certainty – from a particular passage in Guy Gavriel Kay’s Tigana – I began to envision a fishing village, spreading up from the sea, moorland above it, cliffs on either side. I borrowed the landscape of Anglesey, and perhaps a bit of Dorset, for the sense of place. Lena, the young woman who lived there, and whose story I began to write, came from wherever it is a writer’s characters come from, deep inside our subconscious, shaped by influences we don’t fully understand.

That was at least twenty-five years ago, and probably more. For the first ten years, I worked on Lena’s story sporadically, as my responsibilities and self-doubt allowed. But slowly, gathering momentum, the narrative grew, and the country and its politics and societies took shape. The characters became three-dimensional, people in their own right inside my head and on paper. They became, in a way, friends.

Fast-forward to 2024, and the end of the series: eight titles, three generations of characters, a world that grew wider and more complex; characters who grew older and wiser, who experienced love and death, war and peace, friendship, betrayal, laughter and tears. Characters who were frustrated, happy, devastated; who bared their souls and who never spoke of their demons. Who lived lives that influenced the politics of their times, sometimes willingly, sometimes reluctantly. Who inhabited my head almost every waking moment, and occasionally showed up in my dreams. Who made me laugh, and cry, and think, and infuriated me, sometimes, as friends do.

And now it’s done. The last book is called Empire’s Passing, and it deals with loss and grief and change, and surviving it, and finding a way forward, politically and personally. Which is now what I must do too – but there is, undeniably, a period of mourning needed. None of my characters are me, but all carry parts of me within them. Lena’s persistence and restlessness, and her need for silence and solitude. Cillian’s stoicism, and his love of books and of teaching. Sorley’s deep connection to the land he loves. Druise’s economy of speech and his pragmatism. (Those are the ones I recognize.)  So I’m also saying goodbye to the exploration of self I did, not just my characters.

I’m not finding it particularly easy. I have a sense of the next book(s), set in the same world five hundred years later. There’s a lot of research to do, and I like research. The story will arise from things that really happened, and from things in the research that make me say ‘what if?’ Characters are appearing, still two dimensional, but taking shape. But it’s coming very slowly. Partly I’m tired, from eight books published in nine years, and partly from a difficult 2023, and partly because I’m nearly 66 and I don’t have the energy I used to. But largely, I think, because I need this time to slowly let Lena and Cillian and Sorley and Druise – and Colm and Gwenna and others – go. But also to take the step back and say: look at what you did, Marian. A dream since childhood, fulfilled. That other people love them too is a bonus.

Even if I never write another book, it’s enough.

— Marian L Thorpe

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About the author:

13526863My books are historical fiction of an imagined world, one that is close to Britain, Northern Europe, and Rome, but isn’t any of them. A world where a society evolved differently after the Eastern Empire left, where one young fisherwoman answers her leader’s call to defend her country, beginning a journey into uncharted territory, in an Empire on the edge of history.

After two careers as a research scientist and an educator, I decided it was time to do what I’d always really wanted, and be a writer. As well as my novels, I’ve published short stories and poetry. My life-long interest in Roman and post-Roman European history provided the inspiration for my books, while my other interests in landscape archaeology and birding provide background.

Linktree

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Liis reviews the Empire Legacy series books:

Empire’s Daughter I Empire’s Hostage I Empire’s Exile I Empress & Soldier I Oraiáphon I Empire’s Reckoning I Empire’s Heir I Empire’s Passing

Many thanks, Marian, for the wonderful guest post that captures every emotion that the past 9 years have been like with the Empire’s Legacy book series. Many thanks, Marian, for your dedication to your characters, your stories… Many thanks for sharing the historical world, the political intrigue, the societies, the joys and hardships. The love, love, love… the down to Earth, intelligent nature of people and the way things are. Thank you for this incredible reading experience. Thank you for writing! Every next book I was waiting with anticipation, every new book I read with a slight anxious vibration for the things to come, every book that I read left me feeling sated after. A reader’s dream come true.

Look at what you did, Marian! ❤