In October 2011 I was invited to give some commentary on classic fairy tales for a cable network TV show, "Scary Tales." Each of the four episodes covers two famous fairy tales--Snow White, Hansel & Gretel, etc. and I did the talking head thing, offering historical perspective on some of the aspects of each tale.
Now "Scary Tales" is available on Netflix. I invite you all to check it out. It's rather nasty fun, emphasizing the bloodier aspects of fairy tales--cannibalism, murder, mutilation--so it's not for kids, OK?
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
Saturday, January 5, 2013
Thursday, December 20, 2012
ALLIANCES audiobook
I've only just learned that one of my Dragonlance novels, ALLIANCES, is going to be offered in audio format by audible.com. Here's the link. Now I don't know why the chose this book, out of all my old Dragonlance works, or why they chose to read aloud Book 2 in a three book series, but there you have it. I'll have to get a copy and how it sounds.
Amended January 14, 2013: Of course they have come out with all three books in the Elven Exiles series! And more besides. Samples of the audio books are available for listening on the audible.com site. Best narrator: Alan Robertson, reading CHILDREN OF THE PLAINS. The audible.com site is here.
As far as I know, this is my first audio book. I have had many books translated into other languages, but this is my first one read aloud.
(Some languages my novels have been translated into:
Spanish
Italian
French
Russian
German
Hungarian
Japanese
Polish
Romanian
And maybe others. These I know about for certain. It may surprise you, but publishers don't always let you know when foreign editions come out. I once got two copies of my novel THORN AND NEEDLE in the mail in a language I didn't recognize. It took some study of the copyrights page for me to realize it was in Hungarian.)
Amended January 14, 2013: Of course they have come out with all three books in the Elven Exiles series! And more besides. Samples of the audio books are available for listening on the audible.com site. Best narrator: Alan Robertson, reading CHILDREN OF THE PLAINS. The audible.com site is here.
As far as I know, this is my first audio book. I have had many books translated into other languages, but this is my first one read aloud.
(Some languages my novels have been translated into:
Spanish
Italian
French
Russian
German
Hungarian
Japanese
Polish
Romanian
And maybe others. These I know about for certain. It may surprise you, but publishers don't always let you know when foreign editions come out. I once got two copies of my novel THORN AND NEEDLE in the mail in a language I didn't recognize. It took some study of the copyrights page for me to realize it was in Hungarian.)
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
New Interview at Enslow
I was recently interviewed by the good folks at Enslow. You can read the interview here. I think I'll comment later about my favorite fantasy novel, The Wandering Unicorn, by Manuel Mujica Lainez..
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Life is crazy; use a coupon!
Life has been absolutely crazy busy since Halloween, but I am still here! While I catch up, I thought I would share this coupon my publisher is offering through Amazon. (Scroll down to Your Coupon Book under the cover pic).
You get bucks off a new copy of THE BRIGHTWORKING, simply the best Christmas present ever--well, maybe second best after the Official Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot range rifle.
(I don't have one of those, by the way . . . )
You get bucks off a new copy of THE BRIGHTWORKING, simply the best Christmas present ever--well, maybe second best after the Official Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot range rifle.
(I don't have one of those, by the way . . . )
Monday, October 29, 2012
Born Special, or Made Special?
My family and I went to a Halloween party the other night. One room was set aside for showing movies, and the kids settled in (after a couple hours of gratuitous calories and much whooping and hollering) to watch a famous fantasy movie which shall remain Nameless, though it wouldn't be hard to guess which one.
A basic tenet of this movie is that certain people are born with innate magical ability. Other people, dismissively labeled, do not have this ability. This is not an uncommon trope in fantasy or science fiction. Dressed in pseudo-scientific language, it appears in the (dreadful) trilogy of Star Wars prequels.
I hate this idea.
On one hand, it's lazy story craft. Why take the time to develop why your lead character is special when you can simply assert he was born that way? The implications of this idea are almost never explored. What does it mean that you have a secret caste, or ruling class, or perhaps a persecuted underground of "special" people? The idea is barely noted in the Nameless Movie. If there were a sub-group of humans with innate magical powers, why wouldn't they be interfering in world affairs--maybe even take over the world? For our own good, of course. Claiming the race of wizards is altruistic is naive and simplistic. Altruistic people meddle in other people's affairs all the time. They're the worst offenders when it comes to meddling.
John Van Druten, the author of Bell, Book, and Candle, dealt with the problem of a special race with magical powers by making them a secretive, persecuted minority. They hide out because they have been persecuted in the past. This works, even though his approach is essentially light-hearted. Bell, Book, and Candle is a direct source of the old 60s TV show Bewitched, by the way.
Worst of all, the concept of being born special is the cause of some very ugly events in human history. It's the basis of extreme nationalism, ethnocentrism, and racism. I do not accuse any authors of harboring racist beliefs, but the concept of being Born Special is loaded with real world baggage of the nastiest kind.
In writing the Brightstone Saga, I decided to deal with question of who's magical from the outset. While The Brightworking deals with kids being chosen for magical training on the basis of an obscure gleaning process, it isn't because they were Born Special. The concept of magic in the stories is part of this design as well. Before the Brightstone arrives, there is no magic. Pre-magic, Mikal's world is in a Dark Age of warlords, cults, and priesthoods that stifle progress and prosperity for the common people. The Brightstone comes, and people learn to harness its power to perform magic, and the world transforms. It's a kind of a Non-Industrial Revolution, with magic taking the place of technology to ease the burdens of humanity. Tiny principalities are forged into real nations and hokum religion is driven out by the real results achieved by the Guild of Constant Working. But the dark, selfish old ways are not totally extinct--they never are. A secret society forms called the Anvil, dedicated to ridding the world of magic and bringing back the rule of Might makes Right.
Mikal and his comrades are not Born Special. They're Made Special by circumstance. The only person we learn about is Mikal himself. Growing up by his father's forge (he's a blacksmith), fire and the concussion of metal being hammered supposedly influences Mikal's inner nature. Since the magic in The Brightstone Saga is based on magnetism, it's easy to see how his personal 'magnetism' is altered by his environment.
You may ask, why was Lyra gleaned? I think she cheated.
A basic tenet of this movie is that certain people are born with innate magical ability. Other people, dismissively labeled, do not have this ability. This is not an uncommon trope in fantasy or science fiction. Dressed in pseudo-scientific language, it appears in the (dreadful) trilogy of Star Wars prequels.
I hate this idea.
On one hand, it's lazy story craft. Why take the time to develop why your lead character is special when you can simply assert he was born that way? The implications of this idea are almost never explored. What does it mean that you have a secret caste, or ruling class, or perhaps a persecuted underground of "special" people? The idea is barely noted in the Nameless Movie. If there were a sub-group of humans with innate magical powers, why wouldn't they be interfering in world affairs--maybe even take over the world? For our own good, of course. Claiming the race of wizards is altruistic is naive and simplistic. Altruistic people meddle in other people's affairs all the time. They're the worst offenders when it comes to meddling.
John Van Druten, the author of Bell, Book, and Candle, dealt with the problem of a special race with magical powers by making them a secretive, persecuted minority. They hide out because they have been persecuted in the past. This works, even though his approach is essentially light-hearted. Bell, Book, and Candle is a direct source of the old 60s TV show Bewitched, by the way.
Worst of all, the concept of being born special is the cause of some very ugly events in human history. It's the basis of extreme nationalism, ethnocentrism, and racism. I do not accuse any authors of harboring racist beliefs, but the concept of being Born Special is loaded with real world baggage of the nastiest kind.
In writing the Brightstone Saga, I decided to deal with question of who's magical from the outset. While The Brightworking deals with kids being chosen for magical training on the basis of an obscure gleaning process, it isn't because they were Born Special. The concept of magic in the stories is part of this design as well. Before the Brightstone arrives, there is no magic. Pre-magic, Mikal's world is in a Dark Age of warlords, cults, and priesthoods that stifle progress and prosperity for the common people. The Brightstone comes, and people learn to harness its power to perform magic, and the world transforms. It's a kind of a Non-Industrial Revolution, with magic taking the place of technology to ease the burdens of humanity. Tiny principalities are forged into real nations and hokum religion is driven out by the real results achieved by the Guild of Constant Working. But the dark, selfish old ways are not totally extinct--they never are. A secret society forms called the Anvil, dedicated to ridding the world of magic and bringing back the rule of Might makes Right.
Mikal and his comrades are not Born Special. They're Made Special by circumstance. The only person we learn about is Mikal himself. Growing up by his father's forge (he's a blacksmith), fire and the concussion of metal being hammered supposedly influences Mikal's inner nature. Since the magic in The Brightstone Saga is based on magnetism, it's easy to see how his personal 'magnetism' is altered by his environment.
You may ask, why was Lyra gleaned? I think she cheated.
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
The Fortune-Teller Cover Art & Middle Book Syndrome
Here it is!
Due out January 1, 2013. You can read the publisher's press release here.
I'm really pleased with Book II of the Brightstone Trilogy. It's action-packed, and features much more character development for Mikal and Lyra than was possible in Book I, The Brightworking. Book I is all about setting up the situation and the world, and introducing the reader to Mikal, Lyra, Harlano, et. al. In Book II we'll meet a new character, Killeen, who I think is a powerful addition to the story.
Best of all, I believe The Fortune-Teller avoids the trap that plagues many trilogies, Middle Book Syndrome. I've written several multi-volume works, particularly in the Dragonlance series (The Barbarians Trilogy, the Ergoth Trilogy, the Elven Exiles, etc.), and it sometimes happens that the middle book of a three book series is the weakest or least interesting. This happens, I think, because the author is looking ahead to Book III, and thus makes Book II a simple bridge between the Opening and the Climax.
One unusual way I avoided this early in my career was not my own doing. In 1990 my co-author, Tonya Carter Cook, and I were solicited by TSR for a new novel. We actually pitched a Forgotten Realms story, which was rejected. (I never wrote any Forgotten Realms works). The company came back and asked us to write Book I and III of what became the Elven Nations trilogy. Book II, the dreaded Middle Book, they awarded to Douglas Niles. To this day I'm not sure why they chose to divide up this important trilogy among two sets of authors. Doug is a fine writer, and his book, The Kinslayer Wars, is a vital part of the story. My best guess is that TSR was in a hurry, and they wanted all 3 books done ASAP (they always did). We started Book I and fed chapters to the publisher for Doug to read so he could integrate what we'd written into Book II, and we did the same when we were writing Book III. Not a method I would advocate, but in this case it turned out well. The Elven Nations are by far our most respected Dragonlance novels.
A broader question is, why are so many SF and fantasy series published as trilogies? The truth of the matter is, it's all J. R. R. Tolkien's fault. When he wrote his famed Lord of the Rings novel--and it is basically a single, long story--it was much longer than conventional novels of the time, so the publisher brought it out as three distinct titles. When LOTR became a grassroots phenomenon in the 1960s, writers and publishers consciously sought to imitate Tolkien's success by imitating his format, and the fantasy trilogy became a standard form of publication.
Oh, and Tolkien suffered from Middle Book Syndrome too.
Due out January 1, 2013. You can read the publisher's press release here.
I'm really pleased with Book II of the Brightstone Trilogy. It's action-packed, and features much more character development for Mikal and Lyra than was possible in Book I, The Brightworking. Book I is all about setting up the situation and the world, and introducing the reader to Mikal, Lyra, Harlano, et. al. In Book II we'll meet a new character, Killeen, who I think is a powerful addition to the story.
Best of all, I believe The Fortune-Teller avoids the trap that plagues many trilogies, Middle Book Syndrome. I've written several multi-volume works, particularly in the Dragonlance series (The Barbarians Trilogy, the Ergoth Trilogy, the Elven Exiles, etc.), and it sometimes happens that the middle book of a three book series is the weakest or least interesting. This happens, I think, because the author is looking ahead to Book III, and thus makes Book II a simple bridge between the Opening and the Climax.
One unusual way I avoided this early in my career was not my own doing. In 1990 my co-author, Tonya Carter Cook, and I were solicited by TSR for a new novel. We actually pitched a Forgotten Realms story, which was rejected. (I never wrote any Forgotten Realms works). The company came back and asked us to write Book I and III of what became the Elven Nations trilogy. Book II, the dreaded Middle Book, they awarded to Douglas Niles. To this day I'm not sure why they chose to divide up this important trilogy among two sets of authors. Doug is a fine writer, and his book, The Kinslayer Wars, is a vital part of the story. My best guess is that TSR was in a hurry, and they wanted all 3 books done ASAP (they always did). We started Book I and fed chapters to the publisher for Doug to read so he could integrate what we'd written into Book II, and we did the same when we were writing Book III. Not a method I would advocate, but in this case it turned out well. The Elven Nations are by far our most respected Dragonlance novels.
A broader question is, why are so many SF and fantasy series published as trilogies? The truth of the matter is, it's all J. R. R. Tolkien's fault. When he wrote his famed Lord of the Rings novel--and it is basically a single, long story--it was much longer than conventional novels of the time, so the publisher brought it out as three distinct titles. When LOTR became a grassroots phenomenon in the 1960s, writers and publishers consciously sought to imitate Tolkien's success by imitating his format, and the fantasy trilogy became a standard form of publication.
Oh, and Tolkien suffered from Middle Book Syndrome too.
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