Wounds & Rescue The climb left its mark. Not all at once. Not dramatically. Just enough to realise that pushing the story forward, really pushing it had taken more than I’d noticed at the time. Not just tiredness, but the kind that settles deeper. The sort that makes even good progress feel heavy, and turns momentum into something that needs carrying. The direction was still right. The story still mattered. But continuing without pause would have been careless. Suziedog clock

Weathertop With Strider walking beside me, the journey felt steadier. There was direction now and fewer guesses. A sense that the story had a spine, even if the details were still changing. So I did what felt like the obvious next thing. I pushed the story forward. And almost immediately, it pushed back. A scene didn’t land the way I expected. A character choice felt thin under scrutiny. The shape of the story revealed a weak point, not loudly, but enough that it couldn’t be

Strider   Strider didn’t arrive with instructions. No grand plan. No dramatic entrance. Just a steady presence and a sense of knowing the road a little better than I did.   At this stage, the journey is still about shaping the story, the choices, the structure, the direction it might take, not writing anything yet, just learning how to move forward with intent.   This wasn’t about handing anything over. The story was still mine. The choices were still mine. But suddenly I was

Bree   After the ferry, the pressure lifted. Not completely, but enough to breathe again. Enough to enjoy the process instead of bracing against it. The story stopped chasing me, and for a moment, I let myself relax.   As the ideas got a little messier, the laughter crept back in. I stopped gripping the outline so tightly and remembered why this was fun in the first place.   Gandalf was still there, the spark, the belief, the reason I started, but he wasn’t standing next to m

The Ferry Once we were back on the road, it was obvious we weren’t alone anymore. The Dark Riders don’t arrive with drama. They arrive quietly, as questions that won’t let you rest. Is this storyline good enough? What if the story doesn’t work? What if you’re not the right person to write this? They followed close. Not visible but felt. Every step forward brought another whisper, another reason to slow down, to turn back, to make the whole thing smaller and safer. The pace pi

The First Step Outside the Shire A clay-style animated scene featuring two fantasy characters and a small dog in front of a hobbit-style house. A short video introducing Chapter 5 of The Baldr Experiment: taking the first step outside the Shire. Every great story begins with an unexpected visitor. Not always at the door, sometimes during a dog walk. Yesterday, my Gandalf arrived. I’d done my Mission Possible planning, stages mapped, colour-coded, feeling organised, composed,