I’ve updated the on-line glossary to include the principal characters and locations mentioned in the soon-to-be published Book 3 – The Gathering Fails and made some minor corrections where they were needed.

I’ve also made one critically important change. The last-born elf of Goneska has changed his name. Previously known as Maccabee Damario Rockshard, this mountain elf is now Dexter Rockshard.

Why and how? Well, for several reasons.

As many of you know, my characters are based upon people I have known and met through my life – family, friends, personal and professional acquaintances. As some of you suspect, the members of the Blue Leafs are a special sub-set of those people. They all come from a specific time and place, an especially difficult time when their friendship and an MMORPG saved my sanity and saw me through some very emotional crises. In effect, the real Blue Leafs became a second family.

One of these friends was named ‘Mighty Dex’ which he derived from traits he assigned to his online character. For a time, we called him ‘MD’ as it was quicker to type. Inevitably, it devolved to ‘Doc’.

I wanted to pull that nickname into my story but ran into several issues; the chief of which is the term ‘medical doctor’. That term made no sense in my fantasy world. Also, in game and in real life, Mighty Dex was not a dedicated practitioner of the healing arts.

My editor and I discussed what I should do. I nixed his idea of using ‘Dexter’ because I was caught up in the TV series and the name carried baggage. (We even discussed the phonetic spelling ‘Emdee’ as the character’s name). In the end, he grudgingly allowed me to make up a difficult and lengthy name which I could then abbreviate to MD.

I wasn’t completely satisfied, but I learned to live with it … for a while.

Now, you need to know three more things. First, the original, real MD would wake up an hour early every single day and log onto that MMORPG to play for exactly one hour. Second, he was with me online when the game was brought to a very emotional end. And third, my younger daughter works with children on the ASD spectrum.

The collision was inevitable.

As I fleshed out the literary character under my daughter’s (and her co-workers’) tutelage, his behavior took on characteristics identified as on the ASD spectrum.

Suddenly, the name ‘Dexter’ dropped its old baggage and brought a smile to my face and to my heart.

(Spoiler alert) – It also modified the ending of The Last Elf series.