A. K. Hauser
—or just Andy
I will preface what you’re about to read by acknowledging that this sort of thing is usually written in the 3rd person and in a very professional tone. I find that a bit strange, however, since I am the one currently writing it and I'm not the least bit professional.
:P
Prologue
My writing journey began when my desire to work for others ended.
I had worked various jobs in the startup worlds, and always something semi-creative, be it community management, marketing, management, business development, and game design.
The vision was someone else’s, and even though my employers were often open and willing to listen, I realized I could never scratch that creative itch while working for someone.
It’s not that I don’t like people, I’ve just found that I much more enjoy working with someone, on my own terms, than for them, on theirs.
The Beginning
Game design was my latest corporate responsibility, and it was also my last.
It was the best job I’ve ever had, but also the most demanding, and so I eventually broke down from the stress.
I quit in the first month of 2021 with no plan; just a depression, my cat, and my single-room flat in a coastal village of Denmark.
It was here, after hiding from life during all of Spring, that the idea came: I was gonna create a world. I was gonna built an IP of my own.
I was gonna… was gonna… write a novel?
Initially I just wanted to build a world, but I soon realized that such a world needs a lens through which to experience it, and I wasn’t quite ready to collaborate with others in order to build a game around it (nor did I have the technical skills to do so alone), so I started writing what eventually became
The Cradle of Oshae.
The Middle
Diving head-first into creative writing came with a multitude of hard lessons: I knew the basics of writing, but I didn’t know how to write fiction—not to mention an entire novel. I had no clue about head-hopping, about character arcs, story acts, points of no return, tension, inner and outer conflict, pacing, showing vs telling, passive vs active writing, voice, style, and the plethora of other techniques that I as a reader had never noticed or even thought about.
But coming from a game design job, I knew the value of feedback, and so I wrote a chapter. I posted it to a few online critique groups. I got bashed (or rather, my writing did). I tried soaking up whatever knowledge came my way, like a sponge in a lake. Aaand it became clear that I wasn’t nearly as good as I thought I was. It hurt, but I moved on, rewrote, reposted, and repeated the process until I eventually realized that implementing too much feedback can be just as harmful to your art as implementing too little.
Paths have to be followed; choices have to be made; originality has to be preserved—but knowing when to listen and when to stop is, for me, an ongoing adventure.
The… End?
I was 25 years old when I wrote that initial chapter, and I loved it so much that I vowed to spend the next 25 years building the universe in which it all takes place: The Entangled Worlds.
I’m still in love with it, but after having spent three years on a single book, I see that it will probably take me the rest of this life to do it how I want it done: On my terms, at my own pace, without any use of AI, and without summoning the spirit of the mythological speed engine also known as Brandon Sanderson.
The Cradle of Oshae is the first glance into the Entangled Worlds, but it is far from the last. Nine Ages of stories are coming. Primordials Rise.