How Hartley Keg Found His Real Home
One of the joys of writing fiction is the characters you meet along the way. I’m not talking about the real-life people you come across, although I’ve met some brilliantly talented and wonderfully helpful bookish folks as a result of writing the Haven Chronicles. No, in this instance, I mean the characters who appear in my novels. Some of them take a little getting to know and develop. Others charge onto the scene fully formed, bombastically introducing themselves, and often taking over the show (book). One of these characters is Hartley Keg.
Hartley Keg is one of the main side characters in the Haven Chronicles. He acts as mentor to young Steve Haven, although his attitudes and methods are sometimes questionable. He’s an enthusiastic, messy, older wizard who has a knack for creating magical doorways and getting himself into trouble. And he often drags his companions into that mess.
But Hartley was never meant to live in a high-tech, futuristic world. Thirty years ago, he was trudging through a very different fantasy landscape.
It All Started with The Crystal Prince
In my early twenties, I wrote a novel called The Crystal Prince. It was a full-on, Tolkien-style fantasy novel with the four main characters finding themselves in very different corners of that world. Hartley Keg turned up to help one of those four characters in a village sited on the edge of a large marshland area that, of course, was populated by monsters. I can only remember one of those monsters, a kind of vine-creature that guarded a portal to other parts of that world.
Hartley was a travelling salesman whose mother came from the marshland village. His father was an unknown traveller who was nowhere to be seen. At this point, Hartley didn’t have any magical powers, but he was knowledgeable about them. He also had a habit of collecting all kind of mystical and mysterious items. He was a useful person to know and not averse to joining in to fight monsters or villains.
I worked on that novel for two or three years, writing it, honing it, sending it off to agents even, but it never found a home. To be honest, I was still learning how to craft a novel at that point. I had all these wonderful ideas, but no real understanding of how to turn that inspiration into a book that readers would buy.
I finally decided to shelve The Crystal Prince, including Hartley Keg, and move onto other book ideas. But it was a story – and a cast – that never really left my imagination.
The Perfect Second Chance
The Haven Chronicles went through quite a few changes and rejigs before it took its final form, but there was one thing that always stayed the same. The main character, Steve Haven, needed a mentor. That mentor had to introduce Steve to the world of magic, become a friend too, and build Steve’s confidence while he travelled through that world.
It was a no-brainer really. Steve’s mentor had to be Hartley Keg. Hartley has the type of enthusiasm and charisma that draws people in, but in a way that helps them overcome their own doubts, learn, and grow. He not only has magical powers but he’s knowledgeable about the hidden underbelly of magic in Steve’s high-tech world. He has plenty of experience of dealing with the powers that be (the Council) and the wider magical community too. And he’s used to being around younger people, having cared for Blessing all her life. So he has at least a little insight into how to talk to twelve (and then thirteen) year old Steve.
But the Hartley who turned up in The Crystal Prince wasn’t going to work in the Haven Chronicles. His charm and personality were ideal for a mentor role, but he needed more. That mean adding magical powers, a whole host of new friends (including Blessing), and a home in the community of Darkacre. He went from travelling salesman, operating from a gaudy tent, to the proprietor of a small shop, Keg’s Emporium – Whatnots and Assortments.
The original Hartley Keg assisted one of the main characters in The Crystal Prince to add a little excitement to his nomadic, salesman life. In the Haven Chronicles, Hartley is fully committed to protecting Blessing as she grows up. So when Steve comes along and Blessing wants to help him, Hartley has to get on board. To be fair, he loves a dollop of unexpected excitement (with a smattering of running around) so he doesn’t take too much persuading.
Want to know a secret?
The Crystal Prince may be languishing in a cupboard somewhere, but I haven’t forgotten about it. There’s too much good stuff in there that explains how Hartley Keg became the person he is. Naughty, irreverent, and completely unique. One of these days, I’ll dust off that manuscript and turn it into something new. Maybe I’ll call it ‘Keg’.
