Arts & Literature
Local Author Spotlight: Ellie Raine’s Successful Story in Self-Publishing
Ellie Raine is a Peachtree Corners resident with nine book titles to her name, most notably the NecroSeam Chronicles, which consist of a series of five epic fantasy novels and two prequels. Her writing has earned her recognition as a two-time winner of the Readers’ Favorite in the International Book Awards and first place in the fantasy division for Writer’s Digest’s Self-Published Book Awards in 2019, as well as a couple other awards.
Author Ellie Raine. Raine’s books and merchandise.
The NecroSeam Chronicles even have their own website, necroseam.com, which is themed around their fantastical namesake. There, Raine regularly engages with her active fanbase on her blog, posts her own artwork (and fanart, coming soon), sells merchandise, promotes her upcoming events and provides notes and a glossary on the world she’s built. There’s even a personality quiz you can take to find out what knight you are! (I’m a BladeSworn.)
But who is Ellie Raine? How did her writing expand beyond her series to build a fantastic universe?
A visionary from the beginning
Raine explained that her love of magic goes back to her childhood.
“I was a huge fantasy nerd, like the rest of my family,” she said. “I grew up on Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, books with dragons, Harry Potter, King Author, Final Fantasy, Zelda, tons of anime, the Hobbit, Lord of the Rings — you name it. If it didn’t have knights in shining armor, magic sorcerers and fire-breathing dragons, I wasn’t interested.”
Book covers 1-4 of Raine’s books.
The joy she found from video games, storytelling and fantasy led her down the path of video game art and design, so she enrolled at the Art Institute of Atlanta to gain an education in that field. While she was enrolled, she took a creative writing course and started telling the story of the game she was developing. She found that she liked the writing format better than video game development, so she switched fields.
“It was so much more fulfilling. It was like something just clicked, and I’ve been writing ever since,” Raine said.
Today, that video game turned creative writing assignment has turned into the NecroSeam Chronicles.
The NecroSeam Chronicles
It took Raine over 10 years to write the epic, gothic, high fantasy series for which she is best known. In addition to Terry Pratchett, Raine said she draws inspiration from Rachel Aaron and Brandon Sanderson (notable for his creation of the Cosmere fictional universe) as well as from her own life.
Three more Ellie Raine titles.
“Being present in the moment is probably the most effective tool for sparking creativity, especially for fantasy. I have a lot of fun asking, ‘what if things worked this way instead?’, and those are the questions that usually prompt a new story,” Raine said.
The Necroseam Chronicles have been described as “[i]f Tim Burton had written Lord of the Rings” by Vincent E.M. Thorn, author of the Dreamscape Voyager Trilogy.
A sampling of Raine’s merchandise.
“They are an epic fantasy series about twin necromancer brothers who were born with split abilities to control the dead,” is how Raine described the NecroSeam Chronicles in a TikTok video.
“One resurrects corpses, the other puts souls inside them, so together, they kind of make one necromancer. But one of the brothers gets his soul ripped out of his body and trapped inside his brother, so they go on a journey to figure out what happened to the other brother’s body, and on the way, as they’re crossing over all these other kingdoms, they run into demons, they run into dragons. So, it’s a lot of fun. It’s magic-adventure.”
The series contains so much lore and worldbuilding that it spills out of its own pages. Raine has created an oracle deck based on the series (similar to a tarot deck, it’s a loose collection of cards that assist in self-reflection) that she often performs readings with during interviews and at conventions. There are maps (because all the best fantasy novels have maps), songs sung in the audio versions of the books using the language that Raine created and explanations of how her fantasy world operates — its laws, symbols and belief systems.
The process of creating this series was a “passion project” in itself for Raine. Though the first two books were traditionally published, the author decided to self-publish her third book onwards.
“It was a wildly different experience, but to be honest, there’s something freeing about learning what exactly goes into publishing. The logistics can be dizzying, but eye-opening for why traditional publishers make the decisions they do,” she said.
With self-publishing, Raine said she’s become educated on market trends, book advertising and marketing. She’s also built close relationships with her cover artists and audiobook narrators, and the latter have their own profiles on the NecroSeam Chronicles’s website
More Ellie Raine
Though the NecroSeam Chronicles are complete, Raine said she does have plans in the works for projects that exist in the same universe: one is a standalone NecroSeam novel with different characters in a different part of the same universe, another is an epic fantasy novel that plays with shadow-magic. An audiobook of “Pearl of Emerald,” the third NecroSeam book, is scheduled to be released this fall or winter.
For younger readers or those who don’t have a taste for violence, Raine has also created a children’s illustration book that she originally wrote and illustrated for her then-two-year-old daughter. It’s called “Ballad of the Ice Fairy,” and it’s “[a]n enchanting children’s illustration book with beautiful colors and a lovely story of courage, magic and healing,” according to its description.
“Honestly, writing the series and the noir novella was insanely easier than the children’s illustration book, mostly because I’m much slower at creating visual art than I am at writing. It was a huge part of why I switched over in college,” Raine explained. “It took years to finish the children’s book, instead of my (previously) usual six-month turnaround for novels. But I’m still insanely proud to have finished it, and I definitely plan to do another one when I have another concept to obsess over.”
In addition to finding new genres and new subjects to try her hand at, Raine’s had to adjust to a new routine as a mother in her 30s and post COVID-19. While she used to pull all-nighters writing, fueled by caffeine and hyper-fixations, she said that nowadays her daughter keeps her awake all day, especially with the reduced childcare availability caused by the pandemic.
“The progress is drastically slower than the old days, but one of the most important mantras to keep in mind for any writer is ‘Any pace is better than no pace,’” Raine said.
For aspiring writers, she also loves to share this piece of advice: “You can’t edit what doesn’t exist, and you can’t take care of your story if you don’t take care of yourself first.”
Keep up with the author
Raine is currently hosting a NecroSeam fanart competition through July 30. All entries will be featured in the website’s upcoming fanart gallery as well as across Raine’s social media channels; winners will be awarded special additional prizes. Find more information on her blog on the NecroSeam website.
You can also catch her live in the upcoming months, including the Savannah Mega Comic Con on July 30-31, the Key City Steampunk Festival on Aug. 12-14, the Multiverse Fandom Convention on Oct. 14-16, Anime Weekend Atlanta on Oct. 27-16 and CONjuration on Nov. 4-6.
In the meantime, follow Ellie Raine on TikTok and Instagram, like her Facebook page, subscribe to her YouTube and bookmark both her personal website, ellieraine.com, and the NecroSeam website, necroseam.com. You can purchase her books directly from her online store or listen to them on Audible.
