The Setting

The model for Mythikas was the Greek island Rhodes. I picked September when storms often rage in the

Mediterranean. I took liberties with descriptions of the terrain since the events occur over 5,000 years ago.

I read about Santorini and wondered what happened when an entire island was destroyed. Where did the survivors go?

That is where I came up with the problems between the Titans and Heliots. The Titans are a fair-haired race who survived the destruction of their own island. Because their seers warned them of its demise, they set off in boats and made it to Helios. Having superior technology, i.e. weapons, husbandry, farming, they easily took over the Heliots’ hunter-gatherer way of life and put the natives to work re-creating their palaces.

It is amid this turmoil that the girls are forced to become leaders. The two preceding generations have made a mess and they will have to deal with the fall-out. It is not so different from the world our

children live in today. The natural world is unstable with storms and natural disasters. Governments are in flux. The world feels scary and unpredictable.

I spent over a year researching the area and the time frame. What was their body of knowledge? What kind of technology did they have? I looked at food, clothing, shelter, metallurgy, astrology, weather patterns. I looked at the weather patterns in September in that area of the world and the stars they would have seen in the sky. I researched plants and animals. How would they have hunted? What would they eat in the wild.

I studied survival manuals and watched endless episodes of Bear Grylls the survivalist to get tips for the girls as they navigated the terrain. I studied medicinal plants and practices in ancient times.

I read articles about volcanic eruptions and tsunamis and earthquakes.

I injected ancient concepts such as belief in runes, auras and natural healing to add dimension to the characters. It is possible they knew more about natural medicine than we know now and they would have had superstitions of some kind.

I pulled plot points and character references from Greek myths. The concept of the Greek gods was not yet a reality, so they were in the beginning stages of developing a belief system. Which lead to my premise:

Next: The Characters