And then there were three.
At least that's the case for local area author Kevin Lee who has just released 'Ascension' the third book in his ongoing fantasy trilogy TRIO."The books deal with three main characters from our own world that cross paths on one fateful day," explained Lee. "That same day a strange man showed up claiming to be a wizard and asked for their help.
"The three end up on a world where magic and mythical creatures do exist. Hence their adventures begin.
"Book Three continues not long after the conclusion of Book Two and I think brings about a good conclusion to the initial trilogy."Lee said he certainly felt great getting the book into print.
"The final result though is a book that sent a wave of euphoria over me when it arrived in the mail and I had it in my hands," he said.Lee said he wanted to make book three something special building on the writing skills he developed over the first two books.
"The book went through a few different titles before I settled on 'Ascension' which I think describes a lot of what is happening to all of the characters throughout the story," he said.
"Book Three took a little longer to write because I wanted to make sure it measured up to and hopefully surpassed the first two books. I didn't want to just settle for getting it done, I wanted it to be good. So I took a little longer to write it, found an artist to do the cover that I envisioned and that artist Joewie Aderes from Edmonton AB took my concept and created something far beyond anything I could have hoped for."
Lee also had some help from his friends along the way.
"A friend of mine, Ryan Crouse from Yorkton, an artist who has a number of his own comics was my map maker for books two and three and did a great job deciphering my scribbles on a napkin and created a couple great maps of the fantasy world that these characters live in. He did his homework checking out other fantasy novels to get an idea on how he wanted to do them."
Crouse also worked with Lee to create his website at www.kevinleeauthor.ca
Lee said he has held a long interest in writing, and his one-time career as a radio personality allowed him time to hone that interest."I've always been writing in some form ever since high school right up until now," he said. "When I was in radio, I'd have long stretches of music sweeps especially on the evening or overnight shifts and that would allow me to jot down ideas and do a little writing to get them down on paper. I put together a number of stories and I was always coming up with these ideas for other tales so over a few years I had quite the collection but I never really took the idea of writing very seriously, it was more of a way to allow my imagination to escape.
"Then at one point while I was living in Winnipeg doing radio there I thought why not challenge myself to see if I could create a good story that had some length to it. I wound up doing two different stories where I took a different approach and took them that one step further from a basic kind of concept to one that had more in depth characters and a more detailed storyline. After they were finished I decided I wanted to give writing a novel a go."
When Lee decided to take on the challenge of doing a novel he set his sights on the fantasy genre and was inspired by some of his favourite authors.
"I had always enjoyed the fantasy genre and the complex storylines and places that they offered so I wanted to try and create my own fantasy world," he said.
"J.R.R. Tolkien's books, which I've read, by far place him as the 'godfather' of the fantasy realm so he would be the bar in which to measure my material with.
"Terry Brooks is another of my favourite authors and I've always enjoyed his novels so when I went about creating my own work I wanted to see if I could capture the reader's attention like he was able to catch mine.
"I had this basic idea and then went about developing characters, storylines, places and names that I would use."
So the work began, and slowly it evolved into what would be the beginning of the trilogy.
"When I had the basics in place, I wrote a first draft which was about a 100 pages," he said. "I passed it on to a friend of mine who was writing dinner theatre material and wanted to get his input. His 12-year-old daughters got a hold of the story and loved it! They had a few ideas, as did he so I took their suggestions and worked through a second and third draft of what eventually became TRIO Book One: Heroes."
While book one was written it took some years before it saw print.
"Not long after I had that one done I began work on Book two of what I planned on being a trilogy," said Lee. "When book two was completed I essentially put them both aside as work took precedence and eventually moved back to Saskatchewan from Winnipeg.
"Books one and two pretty much sat on my desk gathering dust for about eight years before I looked at them again in the fall of 2006 and decided then it was now or never if I was ever going to do anything with them.
"J.K. Rowling had exploded onto the scene with the Harry Potter books and had brought about a whole new generation of readers! So I figured it was as good a time as any to bring mine to life.
"I found a publisher and had it in print by spring of 2007, and Book two hit print in the spring of 2008."
TRIO: Book Three 'Ascension' is available from any major book chain online, Barnes & Noble, Chapters/Indigo, Amazon.com/ca and for a complete list of online links or where you can purchase 'locally' go to my website www.kevinleeauthor.ca Books two and three are also available in the E-Book format.
