A - Z Blogging Challenge: J is for Jinn

The A to Z Blogging Challenge is underway!

If you haven't heard of it, check out the A to Z blog and join in the fun.

Here at Untethered Realms, we're taking on the Challenge as a group. Each day, one of us will be sharing with you a fantastical creature that may be from one of our books, a favorite movie, or something we just came up with as entertainment.

 

 

J is for Jinn.

  

I came across the idea of Jinn while writing the first book in my Afterlife novella series called Second Death. While the word Jinn is related to the better known Genie, they're actually miles apart in meaning. We all know if you find and rub the magic lamp, a genie will emerge and grant you three wishes. But Jinn are at once more complicated and more sinister than that. While made of smokeless fire, they can take different forms (dogs, cats, snakes, birds, dragons), including human and can also inhabit an existing human, much like a demon. They can be good, bad or indifferent.

But here's what I find even more interesting than the Jinn themselves; the atmosphere in which they live.  According to Wikipedia, they "inhabit an unseen world in dimensions beyond the visible universe of humans." A world just like the human world, with a hierarchical lineage, communities, schools, etc. This information set the synapses in my imagination every which way...

What was the result?

The cemetery in Second Death, or more specifically the abandoned old dilapidated building on the cemetery property. What's different about it? It transforms into Gertrude's Garden, a gathering place for paranormals, including ghosts, jinn, kitsoon and shadow people. A place where all dimensions can gather in a neutral atmosphere, with a nightclub-like setting. Time doesn't exist there, as my characters found out when they emerged several hours later to discover only fifteen minutes had passed.

And fair warning: never, ever, drink the punch!