Daughter of Damnation Ch. 1 - Reflection

It's time for a new story! Well, a little new. See, while Blood & Chlorophyll was a brand-new story in a new setting with new characters, DoD is a prequel series to Suddenly A Succubus. We've already met our protagonist before, though the version of Evelyn we get here isn't quite the same as the Evelyn we met in Book Four of SaS.

I've been SO excited to start this series, and I'm very happy that I no longer have to keep it a secret.

A casual onlooker might mistakenly believe that this book exists as a direct result of how popular Evelyn seemed to be with my readers (my beta team especially), but hilariously that's not even a little bit accurate. I've been planning this book for ages, long before Evelyn ever graced the page in the first chapter of Book Four.

Long ago, when I was first putting together the premise of the settings, I ended up making some strong choices about Amara's backstory. In the main series, Evelyn hints that some unusual circumstances surrounded Amara's birth, and this has always been the case, but the exact nature of those circumstances presented a bit of a problem. In short, I felt the story was too interesting to just be glossed over in a quick monologue from Evelyn.

While I won't spoil exactly what happens, I think the first chapter alone hints at what I mean. The story is split between two distinct time periods: 1938 and 2000. Events from both times are crucially important to the story, and I simply can't envision a world where I tell the story from 2000 without the context of the events from 1938.

But how to tell that story?

The more straightforward answer would be to split the story in half: the first couple of chapters tell the story of 1938, and then we skip ahead to 2000 for the second half of the story. While I do think that would have worked, and I'm sure that would have been a fun story, it didn't feel right.

See, my hope is that this story will function as a standalone piece of fiction. Ideally someone could read Daughter of Damnation without knowing what Suddenly A Succubus is, and still find it perfectly enjoyable and understandable.

As such, I wanted to structure the story in such a way as to engage new readers with distinct plot hooks unique to this series. If the whole point of this story was to tell the story of how Amara was born, I risk the story relying too much on information and setup that doesn't matter until SaS. And that's no fun! Evelyn has such a rich history, and I would hate to see a world where she feels like a bland background character who's only interesting because she happened to give birth to the main character of a different story.

So, with the prequel problem in mind, I decided to tell both halves of the story simultaneously. What does this accomplish? Well, most importantly, it sets up one big question that will hang over the narrative for the entire book. What happened in 1938 to make Evelyn the person we see in 2000?

Imagine you're a new reader. You pick up this cool new book by some amazingly sexy author you've never heard of, and the first scene gives you very little to work with. The main character is a succubus, she has a small suite of abilities, and she's a lawyer who apparently only wants to take cases for truly awful criminals. She happens to find an Archangel that's just been cast out of Heaven, and that very same Archangel is holding a baby in their arms. Both those angelic creatures are completely at Evelyn's mercy, and now you're asking yourself "What will she do?"

The first scene tells us very little about who Evelyn is as a person. There are some hints, sure, but nothing concrete. It's almost like opening a book by showing someone finding a wallet crammed with money. No matter what they choose to do, their decision is going to speak volumes about who they are as a character.

So, you're a new reader, and you're wondering what Evelyn is going to do about this weird Archangel problem. The very next scene is a flashback, and it shows us VERY clearly that Evelyn is cruel, heartless, demeaning, and vindictive. She clearly thinks she's above the humans around, and she's insulted that she has to let such lowly creatures carry her around.

She's also manipulative. She puts on desperate act as she flags down a nearby gentlemen, and makes sure to mimic his speak patterns in an attempt to win his sympathy.

That's the person the following? This cruel, heartless demon has just found a helpless Archangel in the future? Gosh, I'm sure that's not going to end well!

Anyways, that's my hope, at least. I'm sure plenty of people will read this story in a different mindset, and that's okay. On a slightly less meta level, there's also the interpretation that the 1938 portion of the story is essentially a flashback Evelyn is having in 2000. After all, the two events are shockingly similar, aren't they? It would make sense for Evelyn to see a massively powerful entity being cast out of their domain and immediately remember when it happened to her decades earlier.

The two halves of this chapter are very much in conversation with each other. There are the obvious plot similarities, like the strange chains that bind the abilities of Evelyn and Zadkiel, but I also took great care to have the opening paragraphs mimic each other closely as well. I also think the very similar plot structures help draw attention to the few places where actions differ. Zadkiel immediately threatens Evelyn, where Evelyn leans into her injuries to try and draw sympathy from her kind stranger. Another important difference? They pass out at different times. In 1938, we spend enough time with Evelyn and Vince to see how he treats her, while in 2000, we have no idea what Evelyn is planning on doing. I think this is just another facet of the main question - "What will Evelyn do with Zadkiel? Will she be kind like Vicente, or cruel like herself?" We have no idea if 2000's Evelyn is different or not.

I think I've driven home that particular plot point enough, however. Needless to say, I'm very proud of the structure of this chapter, and I'm excited to be tackling a new kind of storytelling for this book. Let's hope it pays off!

On the other side of the coin, readers who are up to date with SaS will have plenty to love as well. They know what kind of person Evelyn is, and they also know who Vicente Calderón is. I like to think there's enough mystery here to keep both types of readers engaged!

Now, since I've just done a bunch of ranting about the chapter, I don't think I'll be breaking down everything chronologically like I normally do. That being said, I have a few specific passages that I want to talk about, so how about we just jump around a bit and have some fun? That would certainly be on brand for this chapter!

I'm immensely proud of the prose in this chapter. It's been a while since I've had to put in so much work setting the scene, and I think it turned out beautifully. I love the way I describe the storm, the hints that it's slightly more, and the eventual reveal of what is actually happening. This chapter, combined with Chapter 46 of SaS (that y'all are getting soon!), have really pushed me to realize just how much my writing has improved over the last two-ish years.

Back in 1938, I don't have quite as much to say. I'm still proud of the prose here, though I don't think it shines in quite the same way. However, I'm going to go out of my way to point out just how much research I'm doing for this book. I've been digging through old maps, magazines, and newspapers from 1938 in an effort to try and put an authentic portrayal of the time to the page. I know it's not going to be perfect, it's not like I'm a genuine historian, but my hope is that the extra effort will make the section in the past feel a bit more realistic.

I hope you're all just as excited for more time with Evelyn as I am! This is going to be a shorter series, and I'm so excited to see what I can do with it.

Nyx ♥