S. W. Raine

When I revealed the cover, title, and blurb for The Gatekeeper’s Portal, I dropped an Ask Me Anything in my Instagram Stories asking if you had any questions about book two in the Elementals trilogy for a Gatekeeper’s Portal Q&A—and you delivered. Some of you were curious about the characters, others about my process, and a few of you asked the exact things I hoped you would. (Thanks for reading my mind, by the way!)

So here are the answers in this special Gatekeeper’s Portal Q&A post. Think of it as a behind-the-scenes peek, minus the spoilers (and with just a little author mischief along the way).

Q: You have a lot of characters in this one. Who is the main character?

A: I do have lots of characters, but the main characters are still Ferenc and Olivia—moreso Ferenc.

Q: Who is your villain? You usually talk about them.

A: I do, don’t I? I’ve actually mentioned them before on social media, albeit very briefly. Stay tuned for a full blog post about them.

Q: Who was your favorite character to write in it?

A: It’s a tie between the mercenaries!

I loved writing Moses because he’s morally gray. He’s not good or evil; he just does his job (and he’s really good at it) and protects Kamran. He’s sarcastic and much smarter than he lets on.

And I loved writing Kamran because he’s my Persian prince. He’s not actually a prince, though Moses does say “yes, Highness” when he gives up arguing with him. Kamran’s story has some weight to it—he’s had a tough childhood—but there’s something about his quiet strength and formality that makes him so compelling.

Q: How did you come up with the title?

A: I wanted all three titles in the trilogy to follow the same structure: The Somebody’s Something.

The “somebody” is the person the book revolves around—not necessarily the main character. In this case, the story centers on finding Anya and getting her to open a portal to the Keeper of the Realms. So, The Gatekeeper’s Portal felt like the natural choice.

Q: How is it different from The Elemental’s Guardian?

A: A few ways. For one, this book takes the crew out of Florida and into the rest of the world.

It’s also different because I always try to apply what I’ve learned from reviews and feedback. A lot of readers mentioned The Elemental’s Guardian had slower pacing, so I focused on tightening things up. I actually ended up cutting the first two chapters entirely, among other things.

I also got some valuable feedback on my specific use of the word was and how it tends to lean more toward telling rather than showing. That stuck with me, and now I’m hyper-aware of it in my edits.

Q: List of tropes?

A: Tropes are still a little fuzzy for me, but here’s what I think are tropes that show up:

•  – Elemental magic

•  – Action and adventure

•  – Villain revenge

•  – Strong friendship / found family

•  – Race against time

Q: What are the themes?

A: If you think tropes are tricky, themes are even trickier. But I’d say these are themes in there:

•  – Revenge

•  – Hidden worlds

•  – Good vs. evil

Q: Do you have a song list for the novel?

A: Not really. This book was written with a soundtrack of household noise, Panera Bread overhead music, and—when I needed to really focus—foreign-language music I couldn’t sing along to.

Mostly Danish or Finnish rock, metal, or folk metal. I leaned a lot on Danish bands like Magtens Korridorer. And while I love Volbeat (they’re my favorite band), I absolutely could not listen to “For Evigt” or I’d stop writing and start singing along. And then the procrastination spiral would begin.

Q: What inspired the locations?

A: I needed Anya to live in an excessively remote area. Originally, I placed her on the outskirts of Yakutsk in Siberia (coldest city on earth), but then I watched an episode of Expedition Unknown about the Dyatlov Pass, and the mountain setting won out.

As for Kamran, I needed my Persian prince to be in… well, Persia. So Iran was the obvious choice.

Ferenc and crew meet two characters named Jørn and Jarl (based on a real-life actor I know and his brother!), and since those are Norwegian names, I set that stop in Norway.

Eventually, Moses and Anya take an off-chapter trip to Estonia. I wanted something close to Norway, and Estonia worked perfectly.

As for the final location… you’ll have to read the book to find out. But if you’ve followed me long enough, you might be able to guess what inspired it.

Thanks so much to everyone who sent in questions. If you’ve got more questions after this The Gatekeeper’s Portal Q&A, feel free to leave them in the comments or message me on Instagram or Facebook. I might include them in a future post.

Raine