Loyalty Fallen Book 1: The Sapphire Prince now has a gorgeous cover! Shoutout to Ileon on Fiverr, who I commissioned for this beautiful piece.

And since I haven’t been able to do my regular blog posts, I figured I’d share a bit more about Loyalty Fallen ahead of the eBook release. Let’s get started!

1. What is Loyalty Fallen about?

Loyalty Fallen is a novel series about Kathryn Prada, a princess who is falsely accused of her husband’s murder on their wedding night and now seeks to regain her position in society.

2. What genre is Loyalty Fallen?

Loyalty Fallen is fantasy. More specifically, I’d call it a political fantasy with romantasy elements. Originally I thought it would fall under the romantasy title, but I think the politics are complex enough, and the romance doesn’t necessarily feature front and center.

3. If Loyalty Fallen has romantasy elements, what’s the spice level?

Very low to none. I’m not big on reading spice, and I wanted to write something for people like me.

4. How long is Loyalty Fallen?

Loyalty Fallen is intended to be a four-book series. The first book is only about 65k words. The second is over 70k, and the third will likely be closer to 75 or 80k. I’m not sure how long the fourth will be yet.

5. Is Loyalty Fallen finished?

No. Loyalty Fallen Book 1: The Sapphire Prince is finished, though I’m currently editing it for an eBook release, so it may undergo some changes. Book 2: The Desert Crossing is also finished, but again, it will undergo some significant changes as I prepare it for an eBook release, since it was originally a serialized novel. Book 3: The King’s Champions is at the drafting stage, and I’m currently on chapter eight. I already have the full plot outline for Book 4.

6. Where did you get the idea for Loyalty Fallen?

Originally, it came because I was a big fan of Yona of the Dawn, which is an anime about a girl who has to flee with her bodyguard after her father is murdered by her childhood crush. It’s actually a much more complicated and incredible story than that, but you get the gist.

Yona of the Dawn focuses a lot more on the handsome men in her life, though, at least initially, and Hak, the main love interest, is the “sophisticated dark and broody type.” Yona starts out as a naive child and maintains that through much of the manga series and anime. I disliked this, as Hak can be a bit aggressive with his affections in my oversensitive opinion, and Yona is completely oblivious and so childish and physically small compared to him that it feels a bit icky.

I wanted to eliminate those tropes when writing Loyalty Fallen, so in LF, Kathryn starts out as a politically savvy and highly sophisticated individual, albeit a one who is very bad at magic and has big trust issues. She is more physically “adult” as well, often being described as tall and elegant. Ren, on the other hand, is still an incredible warrior, but a major plot point of the book is the fact that although he loves Kathryn, she worries that he’s the one being put at a disadvantage because he’s only a bodyguard and was forced to become one at a young age. He’s also been parentified and cares about others at the expense of himself, a trait that sometimes does more harm than good.

7. Where does the title come from?

Loyalty Fallen speaks to the main themes of the book; in other words, that loyalty can be corrupted or harmful in some cases. There are lots of examples of this, such as when General Valen, who is overall a good man, does very shady things in service to Illian because of his loyalty, or when Trista, out of loyalty to Illian, puts herself in serious danger for a goal she can’t attain. Ren is also intensely loyal at the expense of his own safety and volition, often putting himself second in a way that is harmful to him and sometimes even to others, like Dena, who pays the price for the fact Ren solely cares about Kathryn’s safety.

8. Is Loyalty Fallen YA or child-appropriate?

Loyalty Fallen wouldn’t really fall under the YA genre. The language and style doesn’t really fit, and many of the characters that get a lot of focus are older. As far as being child-appropriate, mild language is kept to a minimum, and there’s no strong language. There’s no sex. Violence is generally pretty mild.

That said, there are other aspects that may be problematic, such as:

Spoilers! Click the arrow to open for full trigger warnings.

1. Torture, though rare, does feature into the second and third books.
2. Other “thematic elements,” like forced marriage, slavery, child abuse, alcoholism, mental health, and suicidal ideation are prominent in all four books.
3. Mild language may occasionally make an appearance.
4. Some violence from the second book on does get a bit more graphic or disturbing, resulting in severe injuries or dismemberment.
5. Themes of betrayal, harassment, and parental neglect may be disturbing to some.

9. What POV is used throughout Loyalty Fallen?

Third person limited. If you’re not familiar, third person limited POV follows the point of view of one person, until such a time as it switches to another person. It’s different than omniscient POV, in which an all-knowing narrator can tell you things the characters don’t know. Also, 3rd person means it will use “he” and “her” and “them” rather than “I.” POV blog post coming soon!

10. How many POV characters does Loyalty Fallen have?

A bunch! I like showing the villain’s point of view every now and then, plus there are a number of characters that are very important in the first book. This may be a turn-off for some people. The number does go down in later installments.

11. Will Loyalty Fallen continue to be free here on the site after the eBook release?

Yes, at least for a while. It might hurt sales, but I figure people might want to see a longer sample before buying.

12. How much will Loyalty Fallen cost?

I’m planning to sell the first book as an eBook for a dollar. The future ones will probably cost more, but no more than $5 apiece for the digital version. And readers can always just opt for the free version here on the site if they don’t want to pay.

13. What’s the main thing you want people to know about your book?

I want people to know that my book is ultimately hopeful. There are some pretty depressing aspects, and there are some cliffhangers, to be sure. But The goal of my writing is never to make things darker than they are already in our world. It’s to make things a little brighter.

14. Do you use AI in your writing process for Loyalty Fallen?

AI has become a deep problem for a lot of creatives. Some people are just “writing” entire books through a bot and publishing them. Other people block anyone who says they use AI in any capacity.

I’ve written a blog post on using AI once before, and I think it’s important to say that my views have changed since then. I now don’t think it’s wise to use AI anywhere in the brainstorming process or writing process, including to offer advice or suggestions. My next blog post will hopefully be covering why that is, but in the meantime, I’ll just say that I have not used AI to generate a single line of Loyalty Fallen and I never will.

15. When will book three start?

Book two of LF unfortunately ends on a terrible cliffhanger, so I want to get book three out as soon as possible. That said, even though Loyalty Fallen is a serialized novel, I like to finish the entire first draft and then read through at least twice and get some preliminary feedback before I start uploading chapters. I’m about a third of the way through book three, so you can expect it within the next year and probably sooner.

16. Did you have any beta readers for books one and two?

A friend acted as an alpha reader for both, and I have one beta reader taking a look at book one now. It’s something I definitely want to focus more on in the future. I think more feedback would help me significantly improve my writing. That said, I don’t plan to make any major changes to Loyalty Fallen’s story, beta readers or no. I’m happy with the direction it has taken, and the privilege of self-publishing is being able to maintain that direction regardless of the feedback.

Final thoughts

Thank’s for joining me for this Q&A, and I hope you’ll read Loyalty Fallen here on the site or subscribe to the blog to get notified when the eBook goes live! I’ll be resuming my informative blog posts soon as well.