The Introduction
I haven’t done one of these in a while. Each of these posts gives you a little bit of a hint into who L.V. Luca is. Often, it’s stories I’m passionate about, while other times, it’s my understanding of writing and creating stories.
Giving you my biography would be a bit of a drag, to be perfectly honest. You know by now that I’m a Croatian living in Ireland; this is not going on for six years.
My first flight to Ireland was one I didn’t take.
When I was getting ready to leave Croatia, there were so many things I wanted to do before I left. Things like finishing painting a set of doors when I had completed all the shutters, I have always been do-it-yourself (DIY) girl and a lot of the skills I have in my belt came from my own experience.
One of those projects had caused me a temporary back injury due to which it was quickly decided it was best to stay behind a little longer.
When I wanted to do something, I would research it and go into stores to talk to the people working there. I once restored a set of chairs, and another time, I dismantled my father’s library. I’m primarily self-taught in graphics design and video editing, though I have taken courses over the years.
I began writing stories when I was still young and though those feats are riddled with spelling errors, they were my training.
My Writing Journey
I have never taken a full-on writing course.
This is not to say I wasn’t trained. I have taken short online courses, conducted my own research, and achieved a bachelor’s degree in journalism. I have been published in Croatia under my real name as a journalist. I have written a blog in the past during my pastry chef training to document my development.
This is a journey I left behind due to work obligations and realistically, my baking passions could never outdo my writing passions.
Different Writing Fields
I spent years working alongside my mother who was a lawyer before her retirement and effectively developed as a legal secretary during my time with her. I wrote complaints, lawsuit responses, and human rights lawsuits (in Croatian and English). I was a law student for a while before I understood that the educational system was outdated.
After transferring schools, I was accepted but still told I had to retake my final from year one (while being a year two student and taking exams from this level).
My journey to where I am now as a long one, where I constantly followed other interest but ultimately, kept denying the biggest passion of all – writing. In the end, the truth is that I am a storyteller and have always been. I am creative and have always been.
I like the many skills I have acquired over the years, yet many of them are hobbies I enjoy doing to this day, especially DIY at home.
Being a Student
I’m currently enrolled in a course that encompasses all my passions, other than writing—graphics design, video editing, digital marketing, and coding. Although this education is lower than my bachelor’s degree, it has been a brilliant experience here in Ireland.
I have started my second year, but I will give an update once I’m more settled in.
Ultimately, my biggest devotion will always be with my stories.
Just One Series
Just One is a massive endeavour. I wrote the fan fiction when I was a teenager, then left the story (two parts) as I wrote in the roleplaying community.
This was maybe my most significant education of all. Where I honed my character development skills and even more importantly, write with other writers helping me break out of my shell.
People I created stories with could see my writing immediately.
They could help me grow and share their thoughts straight away.
It’s a vulnerable adventure where you allow others to read your work, accepting the possibility that they might not like what you write. Instead of living through this fear, I found friends that enjoyed writing with me and who always came back to help me further develop my characters.
We wrote friends, family, lovers, teachers and students…
The Just One stories that I discuss on my blog and which you will be able to read starting in summer 2025 are tales I re-developed thanks to my time as a roleplayer. The characters I developed came from understanding how it’s done, outlining chapters even when I know that the story can take me somewhere else in the middle of writing.
I know where I’m going with my stories already, even if the details and scenes vary as I learn more about Just One.
It’s an endeavour I’m most proud of.
Just One will not be the only story or book series I write.
The Wolf’s Heir Plans
You already know about The Wolf’s Heir: Katrine’s Awakening. This was an unexpected project as I dared to write a short story for last year’s competition. It didn’t win any prizes in its short contest, yet it was constantly high on the lists of the contest runners before the contest was completed, and I received my review.
The ultimate comment was that with so much action and story packed into it, The Wolf’s Heir should be rewritten into a book. This will definitely happen after Just One is completed.
You can now read The Wolf’s Heir: Katrine’s Awakening here for $1.
Katrine is one of my roleplay characters that is very close to my heart and one I spent a long time developing alongside other writers. She grew from a young girl who knew little about the galaxy on her journey to find her older sister.
This aspect of her story is not unlike the story her own mother went through, where Curupira set out in the galaxy looking for her older sister TiCira, but Katrine’s sister Chloe grew up with her before disappearing.
Curupira found her older sister and reconnected with her before living her life, whereas Katrine never found her sister and discovered a life anyway.
She went from a girl haunted by a deceased ancestor to meeting a lot of people to connecting to the younger version of her parents.
Katrine broke her own curse and realized she was indeed capable of communicating with spirits, which also became a major part of her development as she became a leader of a separate group of Witches (not of Dathomir). She took in a girl she would always think of as her sister, fell in love and got her heart broken while her other half ended up seducing both her and that adopted sister.
She got pregnant with that same man and chose not to let him know after what he did.
The creation of a daughter brought forth a whole other character whose adult presence signifies a different future created…
After being advised to turn the Wolf’s Heir: Katrine’s Awakening into a whole book, I realized that Katrine was not the only member of her maternal family whose story I wanted to tell.
Her mother, Curupira, is definitely someone whose story I would like to introduce to you, as well as their ancestor Satara (Witches of Dathomir live a long life, so Satara is still very much with us even though she is several hundred years old and saw countless descendants grow up).
Katrine’s daughter Larentia, in her adult form, has an entirely different life to tell from what both Katrine and Curupira think their future will be. This will be a great exploration of the alternative timeline concept Back to the Future jumps into during the sequel.
I have mentioned Back to the Future before, I have always loved the trilogy.
What do you like about this story?
Which movie is your favourite?
Can you tell how much I love affected timeline storylines?
To name a few.
Plans for Just One
So, where am I now?
Just One is in the hands of my beta readers, and the book cover was revealed a couple of weeks ago. Just One: Edge of Never is well on its way with multiple drafts and is in a good place story-wise. When I return to this book, I will continue with the edits as the story is fleshed out and completed.
The third book was in its second draft of its extended edition.
Weight of the World, many years ago, when I restarted Just One, I knew that this story had to be multiple books rather than just one, and right now, I’m in the planning stages of this project. It reintroduces us back to the Just One universe in a different, restarted timeline. All the familiar characters will be back, along with some that have been developed further and new ones created.
After Weight of the World, a short story will be developed under the working title Burning down Empire, which will show Eveleen’s mission to Hadin and the repercussions of her decisions in Edge of Never.
The primary focus of the short story is her journey in an alien world and getting things back on track while introducing (or re-introducing) a lot of characters that will only feature here. This will continue with what was originally the second half of Weight of the World, the working title Return to Innocence, which continues with Eveleen’s return to Earth and dealing with what happened to her on Hadin.
The villain of Burning Down Empire will have to be dealt with, as well as a lot of loose ends from Weight of the World, before reaching our happy ending. Return to Innocence will conclude Eveleen and Cameron’s story, which they have been waiting on since their first introduction to Just One.
It will also serve as an opening for other aspects of the series.
One such as the Conspiracy story, which will explain the reasons behind Just One, and potentially a future storyline, which will focus on the next generation…
My Private Life
Beyond my storytelling, I have two Jack Russell terriers, Tilly and Jesse. Tilly is my perfect girl. She’s twelve years old, hardly ever does wrong, and loves sleeping. Jesse is the personification of Milo from The Mask. He’s either the sweetest or the Mask. He’s definitely a rascal. He’s just turned two.
You have seen them both on my feed before but say hello to Jesse and Tilly. 🙂
I work a part-time job, primarily on the weekends, which was a big change from working as a waitress for forty hours last year to juggling being a full-time student. I can work more hours, which I did during the summer, but I want to focus more time on college this year as last year was a bit of a challenge.
Recently, I learned that I was nominated for the Student of the Year in my department.
So, if you’re thinking about whether college is worth going back to you, imagine a world where you don’t take that plunge and how it would make you feel. That was a massive motivation for me. I would love to know your thoughts and plans for this.
Did you take the plunge?
Did you realize something was out there, maybe what you didn’t expect?
The Wrap Up
As always, I hope you enjoyed the read. Tune in again next week for the next rendition of Inspiration Monday. This will be the only written blog section covering all previously existing topics. I would greatly appreciate likes and follows, especially on this blog post.
Next week, we will be jumping into the bloodlines of Just One.
And don’t forget to keep up with my Instagram, Facebook and Twitter!
You can find me on Facebook and Instagram under the username @lvlucaauthor or on Twitter (I’m not very active there) at @LVLuca1.
Until next time…
~ Love, L.V.
L.V. Luca 