At Shore Leave this weekend I talked with a few people about a novel I’m working on–an historical fantasy mystery. (For something along those lines, look at Keith DeCandido’s Dragon Precinct, though that’s a little more fantasy than what I’m thinking of.)
The plot is still a little rough, and I’m hoping, by the end of the month, to have a better outline in place. The hitch? In my mind I’d been going back and forth between two possible permutations of the setting. Did I want to make it something a little more historically grounded, or did I want to make it something a little more fantastical? It took a few conversations, just to bounce ideas, for the setting to really crystalize.
The main character? I’m thinking… a medieval Frank Black. Yes, Lance Henricksen’s character from Millennium.
Well, not exactly.
But someone prone to visions, even precognitive visions. Visions that he can’t quite understand, but visions that give him great insight.
And, in some ways, it’s a curse. In these dark and superstitious times, how are the visions interpreted? Are they from god? The devil? From something else entirely? Does he have to keep them secret, lest the religious heirarchy believe him to be possessed by evil spirits?
The implications of this one little character trait amaze me. 🙂