Building Lore from the Shadows: LN Bokete

L N Bokete
May 15
2 min read

Updated: May 18

When I write, lore doesn’t arrive fully formed. It creeps. It waits. It whispers before it roars. The worlds in Tokoloshe and Pisces Family weren’t drawn on a map. They emerged from the shadows: myth, memory, and emotion fragments. I don’t invent lore to explain the world. I build it to ask better questions.

Darkness as Foundation

Light reveals. But shadows? Shadows suggest. And suggestion is where imagination lives.

In Tokoloshe, the mythology didn’t start with a creature. It started with fear. What lurks beneath the surface of inheritance? What do we pass down; stories or hauntings?

African folklore, often reduced to footnotes or curiosities, became sacred architecture. I didn’t want to borrow myths. I tried to listen to them. The Tokoloshe became more than a monster. He became a symbol of what we don’t talk about. That’s where the lore took root, not in exposition but silence.

Layered Truths

Lore, for me, isn’t just about origin stories. It’s about contradiction. It’s about who tells the story—and who doesn’t.

In Pisces Family, the zodiac signs aren’t cosmic archetypes. They’re people. Siblings. Each has their version of the past. Their side of the myth. And not all of them are telling the truth.

I didn’t write one lore. I wrote twelve competing truths. Because real mythology isn’t flat, it’s layered. Messy. Evolving. Just like family.

Letting the World Speak

I don’t write lore to show off the world. I write it to serve the emotion.

A hidden ritual. A forbidden name. A nursery rhyme with blood beneath it. These aren’t just worldbuilding details; they’re emotional fingerprints.

In Tokoloshe, a forgotten language carries power. In Pisces Family, a recurring dream reveals history none of them remember. The world reveals itself only when the characters are ready to face it. Not before.

Beauty in the Obscure

There’s beauty in the things we don’t fully understand. In the unexplained. The uncertain. The half-remembered tale.

I write lore like a mosaic. Fragments that, from a distance, become a pattern. Some pieces are missing. Some never existed. And that’s okay. Because mystery is part of the magic.

Conclusion

I don’t build lore to decorate a story. I build it from the shadows, to reflect the characters, to echo their questions, to haunt them gently. The deeper you go, the more you find. Not answers. But resonance.

👉 Step into the myth. Discover Tokoloshe, Pisces Family, and Totem Series on Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/stores/L.-N.-Bokete/author/B0BST533VN