Author Archives: wesleyallison

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About wesleyallison

Author of twenty science-fiction and fantasy books, including the popular "His Robot Girlfriend."

The Voyage of the Minotaur: Radley Staff

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Radley Staff is a fictional character in the Senta and the Steel Dragon books.

Spoiler Alert

Lieutenant Radley Staff makes his first appearance in The Voyage of the Minotaur and plays a very important part in the series.  He is absent in Book 0 and Book 2.  I think he comes across as perhaps less important overall than I had originally intended him.  His return in Book 3 was meant to be a real pivotal point in the story, and while I think it is still dramatic, perhaps not as much as I intended.  In some ways, he kind of takes the place of Terrence Dechantagne for the remainder of the series.

Radley Staff is just a name that I made up on the spot.  He is one of the few characters that I refer to constantly by their last names, even as narrator of the story.  It just seems more appropriate for him.  In Book 1, we find him one of the junior officers aboard the battleship HMS Minotaur, and he acts nominally in charge of the colonists.  He therefore has quite a bit of contact with Iolanthe.  This of course develops into a love affair.

If I was going to write their love scenes again, I would do it from Iolanthe’s point of view.  As it was, I was trying to view it a little distantly, and so we only see it from Senta’s point of view.

Update: Astrid Maxxim and her Undersea Dome

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I just finished chapter 8 of Astrid Maxxim and her Undersea Dome, and that means I’m almost halfway done.  I’m only working on it intermittently, as I also write The Young Sorceress.  It’s amazing how much easier Astrid is to write for me right now.  As I’ve said before, I have ideas for about 20 Astrid Maxxim books and plan to write at least two or three a year for a while.

On a related note, I’m almost keeping up with my New Years Resolution to write 3 pages a day.  I’m only about 26 pages behind.  Oh well, maybe I can catch up this summer.

The Voyage of the Minotaur: Senta’s Family

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Spoiler Alert

We see the same members of Senta’s family in this book that we saw in Brechalon, but their situation changes when Granny dies and Bertice gets married, taking some of the other children with her– but not Senta, who gets left with a neighbor lady.

The idea for this came from stories from my own family.  My great grandfather was the youngest of a very large family, and was still quite young when his parents died.  There were several older siblings, who took in the younger ones, except for my great grandfather, who ended up being raised by neighbors.  This had to have had quite an effect on a person’s psyche.  In the book, Senta shrugs it off fairly easily– probably not realistic, I guess.

As I mentioned before, several of the kids show up later in the series, but not until they and Senta are pretty grown up.

The Voyage of the Minotaur: Pantagria

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Spoiler Alert

One of the characters I find most interesting in The Voyage of the Minotaur doesn’t even exist.  Pantagria is a figment of Terrence’s imagination– an angelic woman living in a magical world which he visits when under the influence of the drug white opthalium.  She is stunningly beautiful– perfect– with long golden hair, white feathered wings, and she usually flies around naked.

The idea for this character and the setting came from some short stories I wrote when I was in high school, about real people going to an imaginary place covered with purple flowers with human eyes.  That this was the result of a drug was a new element for this story. 

The imaginary setting is more than it appears though, because not only does Terrence visit Pantagria while he is there, but others who use the drug apparently see her too.  I think this works because this is not just a drug, but a magical drug. 

There are two problems with Pantagria.  One is that she begins to change and Terrence’s dream becomes a nightmare.  The other is inherant in any drug– using it takes away all those things that make a human want to achieve.

The Voyage of the Minotaur: Zurfina the Magnificent

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Zurfina the Magnificent is a character in The Voyage of the Minotaur and the other books of Senta and the Steel Dragon.

Spoiler Alert

When we last saw Zurfina in Book 0: Brechalon, she was prisoner 89 in the Kingdom of Brechalon’s magical prison of Schwarztogrube.  Now we find her living in the city of Brech, although it is pretty clear early on that she is in hiding, at least to a degree.  Needing a high power magic wielder, the Dechantagne’s hire her to go with them to Birmisia.  About this same time, she comes into contact with Senta and takes her in as an apprentice.

Zurfina is really not a major character.  She is a very important minor character.  She acts as a deus ex machina in several situations.  She is however in the front of the action in this book more than any of the others, primarily because she and Senta spend so much time together aboard the HMS Minotaur. 

Zurfina is fun to write because she is completely self-absorbed.  While Iolanthe thinks of nothing but the good of her family, Zurfina thinks of nothing but herself.  Even when Terrence chastises her for allowing Senta to almost get eaten by velociraptors, she simply replies.  “Children are going to be eaten.”  Still, her relationship with Senta grows as the story progresses and we see a few hints of affection.

The Voyage of the Minotaur: Zeah Korlann

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Zeah Korlann is a character in the Senta and the Steel Dragon Series.

Spoiler Alert

Zeah is another character who makes quite a transition in the course of The Voyage of the Minotaur.  He starts off as the Dechantagne’s head butler, just as he is in Brechalon, but in journeying to a new colony and being one of the main figures leading and organizing that venture, he becomes quite important in the new community.

Zeah also finds himself being courted by a much younger woman, one who is not of the same faith.  This causes a great deal of consternation for him, though others don’t seem to have nearly the problem with it that he does.  One of the things I enjoyed was slowly changing Zeah from a stuttering self-consious servant to a much more confidant man.  He still finds his stutter whenever cornered by either Iolanthe or Egeria Lusk.  More about her in a few days.

The Voyage of the Minotaur is Book 1 in Senta and the Steel Dragon.  It is available wherever fine ebooks are sold.

Voyage of the Minotaur: Yuah

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Yuah Korlann is a fictional character in the Senta and the Steel Dragon series.

Spoiler Alert

Yuah has a much bigger part to play in The Voyage of the Minotaur than she did in Brechalon.  In making the journey to the colony, she steps up from the servant class into something closer to middle class.  She is a sister to Augie and wants to be so much more than that to Terrence.  To Iolanthe, she goes from being a dressing maid to being something close to a friend, or if not friend, at least confidant.

It’s easy to like Yuah.  She is sweet and kind and beautiful, if suffering (understandably) from a bit of
an inferiority complex.  She is also one of only a few characters whose story arc takes the entire series.  

The Voyage of the Minotaur is available wherever fine ebooks are sold.

Nostalgia: Commodore Vic-20

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The summer of 1982 I was trying to decide which video game system to buy– Atari or Intellivision.  Then I saw Captain Kirk himself on a TV ad for the Commodore Vic-20.  That was it.  I had to have one.  I bought a Vic-20, a joystick, and a Jupiter Lander game cartridge.  Total $330.00.  I used and enjoyed my Vic for years.  I still have it, stored in the garage.

Voyage of the Minotaur: Terrence

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Spoiler Alert

Terrence Dechantagne is really the star of this volume of Senta and the Steel Dragon.  He has a lot going on.  Yuah is chasing after him, as are a few other women.  Iolanthe is riding him constantly in an effort to make him stand up and become the man she thinks he is.  And his drug addiction is in high gear.

“Terrence’s Jungle Adventure” is one my favorite chapters in the entire series.  Here, Terrence gets to play Indiana Jones and chase the bad guys, fight his way though a temple filled with baddies and traps, and rescue the damsel in distress.  The fact that he does this right after scoring his fix just adds another dimension to him.

Terrence has some great moments in the other chapters as well, becomming a hero, hunting down and bringing a bad guy to justice, and saving children from several types of predators.  On the other hand he suffers some truly horrible injuries– physical and mental.  I remember reading the chapter of the great battle with the lizzies to a group of friends for the first time and feeling great satisfaction when they all stared at me in open-mouthed shock.

It may sound weird, but my favorite parts of this book are those scenes when Terrence falls apart.  He’s really like a Greek tragedy.  He’s fated to a sad end and it doesn’t matter how high he flies in the meantime, he’s going to fall in the end.

Voyage of the Minotaur: Augie

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Spoiler Alert

Augustus P. Dechantagne is the same happy-go-lucky devil-may-care fellow that we’ve come to love in Brechalon, but in The Voyage of the Minotaur this is complicated by his expansive womanizing (even when he meets the frightening sorceress Zurfina, he’s not afraid to “hit that”), and the posibility that he might be a serial killer.

Augie is seldom the focal point of the action, but he is almost always there– chasing cultists on the tropical island of Enclep or fighting a lizzie army in Birmisia.  Ultimately though, it is Augie’s failings, especially with the natives, that are his achilles heel and almost spell the end to the colony.

I love all my characters, Augie included.  He would be a guy that I would enjoy knowing– casually.  I would never want to rely on him though.