Dear Unsuspecting Reader,

This is the very first draft of a story called The Journey. It takes place in a fantasy world called Legea, and chronicles the travels of a family of three siblings across vast and varied terrain in their search for safety and security.

Or, the present version does.

If you're reading this at all, you probably have read The Journey or at least a part of it. You are curious as to what the polished tale looked like in its beginnings.

Well, that was four years ago that I started it, a skinny little thirteen-year-old with big ideas in her head. It was different. Legea was different! It wasn't even called Legea back then. That world was, and I quote from my random book, " Legea was where we dumped all our fandoms into an AU Middle Earth with modern technology and wreaked havoc with that."

It didn't stay that way, obviously. By the time I got to writing The Journey it was its own place, although it still didn't have a name besides "that Middle-Earth". But it was all things weird and wacky, bizarre and unrealistic -- it was one of those places where nothing had to have an explanation. They just happened. People blowing up places with dynamite everywhere you looked, everyone randomly going on quests/journeys, people regularly surviving rides over massive waterfalls...

What you are about to read begins with a casual, semi-satirical tone and over-the-top characters. It morphs into an overdescriptive style with deeply conflicted main character. Eventually, it evens out into a simple, potent writing with characters toned down and deepened.

I wish I had an entire "first draft" of The Journey. But my writing tends to progress so slowly that by the time I got to chapter 12, I had been working on it for three years and my style was completely altered for the better. For that reason I am not going to post anything past 12, since it is virtually the same as what now resides in my word document, with minor revisions.

Forewarning: I will insert the occasional sarcastic commentary into the story, just to further tear down your opinion of my writing. XD These will be in bold type.

Explanation for photos:

Last year my siblings and I filmed a half-hour movie with dolls, based on this draft. Scrupulous care was taken to include all the worst lines possible. All pictures that you see in header media or inserted into text, unless specified otherwise, are screenshots from the video.