Once upon a time, there was this little girl who loved to go fossil hunting everywhere, and read too much fantasy, science-fiction, and classic literature, instead of going to bed at a reasonable hour.

One night, she had an oddly-vivid dream, about a mysterious group trekking across a wide countryside, to stop some shadowy-figure from kidnapping people and terrorizing towns and villages. The first person who’d decided to set out on this quest, within this group, was a boy who’s father had tried to defeat this shadowy-figure—and between a determination to finish what his father had started, and the fact the boy could secretly shape-shift into a dragon, he had taken it upon himself to finish the task. But when the hour finally came to face this villain lurking in a fortress, the boy fell from a great height while scaling the roof, and his companions failed to find him when they searched the ground below. Their gathering assumed the worst, and mourned his supposed demise—when the girl awoke from her dream, seeing at the last second all was not lost.

Dissatisfied by this dream’s uncertain ending, the girl who liked to read too much found there was nothing for it, but to write down what had happened, and rearrange the pieces until they made sense. Which, as it turned out, proved a much, much more difficult and chaotic process than she had first imagined.

For the next several years, she wrote hundreds of pages, cast them aside, turned to other projects, (and continued to read too much), then became enchanted by the old idea again and would start over…until the idea took a completely different direction. A more detailed world emerged, with new wild creatures running rampant, among a people fraught with some disaster that, this time, lurked out of sight—all of it growing up around that one hapless, shape-shifting boy, and bringing new purpose to his journey.

And so…alright, alright, I’ll quit goofing around now. That girl was me, and that peculiar character that stubbornly refused to die was Storm, the protagonist in this series I’m calling “The Legend of Iveswood.” My fascination for meaningful, well-crafted stories is not limited to one art-form, and has stuck with me since childhood. I do plan to write (and someday illustrate) other projects as well, but this one has grabbed my attention so often time and again, I now feel obligated to see it through to The End.

I hope to put Storm and his friends’ adventures in print, and find out if anyone else becomes as taken with them as I have. But in the meantime, feel free to look around the site, and try some short-stories, explore the land of Skylia, or read about behind-the-scenes tips and satire, and delvings into the wonderful world of random research topics. I’d love to know if you enjoy it!
– Zoë Ring

P.S. I have a long list of things planned to post more frequently in the future. Stay tuned, and join the monthly newsletter for updates!