We once lived in Malaysia where it was tropical. The heat and vegetation became the backdrop for Transport Island in Book 2.
In Malaysia, there was a special place inland with a waterhole, which I called a Lagoon when reinvented in Book 2. Vines hung from tall trees in the middle of dense vegetation and enabled high school students to launch into the water by swinging on the vines. Encountering snakes was always in the back of our minds on the island, in water as well as land.
I came to know about these nuts from encountering Orang Asli, the indigenous people of Malaysia, who had consumed them. Teeth were often stained red. The nuts were known to have drug-like properties…possibly lethargy after sudden stimulation.
the Frygt’s, are birds, in the story, that manifest when someone lets fear overwhelm them. They create more fear in that person. While searching for a bird that could typify this kind of dark, wide wing span bird, I had no idea that there is an actual bird, a Frygt, that nests on the western coastline of Mexico. While writing Book 2, I encountered some while resting on a balcony. About 50 of them soared right above me and I, then, discovered them to be the very Frygt’s in my book - already written about!
I initially encountered earth villages while in France. Homes built into a hill with natural skylights…tunnels up through the earth to reach the sky. The earth villages in Book 2 and Book 3 are an adaptation of the ones that I saw.
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