Posts Tagged ‘fantasy’

How I Wrote Rebellion

Rebellion
The war is lost. The stone mage wakes. One slave will defy him . . .

The second book in a trilogy is always tricky to write. Unless the author is very careful it can be the weakest of the three books, because it’s neither the beginning of the beginning nor the end of the end.

The way I solve this critical problem is to give each book its own driving storyline, with a powerful beginning and an even stronger ending, both of which dovetail neatly into the overarching story of the trilogy. It’s easy to say that, of course, but not so easy to do, and it takes a lot of planning and rewriting to get right.

What’s Rebellion about?

REBELLION (US | UK | AUS), book 2 of my epic fantasy trilogy The Tainted Realm, is set in an isolated island nation, once Cython but now called Hightspall, which is forever tainted by the brutal way it was colonised two thousand years ago. But now the conquered land is fighting back with one natural disaster after another, the Cythonians’ long-dead alchymist-king Lyf is rising again, and they know it’s time to take back their country.

Only one person can prevent Hightspall from running with blood – Tali, a slave in Cython who, as an eight-year-old girl, saw her mother murdered for the magical ebony pearl secretly cultured inside her head. Tali, now 18, is determined to bring the killers to justice, but discovers that she too bears an ebony pearl – the master pearl, in fact. And every villain in the land wants to hack it out of her head, including the killers.

In Book 1, VENGEANCE, Tali pursued the killers, and was hunted by them, through a land at war. To avenge her murdered mother she, a timid slave, had to take on the wizard-king, Lyf, who first died two thousand years ago.

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My First Time: The Magic of Terry Brooks

SwordEveryone remembers their first time.

Mine was back in the mid-1990s. A close friend excitedly showed me a book called THE SWORD OF SHANNARA (UK | ANZ) that his jetsetting pilot father had picked up for him from a bookstore in America. I remember being impressed at its sheer size and being immediately drawn to both the cover (a glowing magic sword, what more could a thirteen-year-old boy want?) and the gorgeous interior illustrations by the brothers Hildebrandt. I forget what gushing eulogy my friend gave about the book, yet it was positive enough for the novel to stick in my mind. Faced with the horrors of a two-week family holiday a short time later, I purchased a copy of THE SWORD OF SHANNARA, thinking it might prove a decent distraction for a fortnight.

It didn’t – because I burned through the novel in two days. I was already a fan of fantasy, having devoured Fighting Fantasy gamebooks and the late Brian Jacques’s much-loved Redwall series, but this was the first time I’d read an adult book – and I was hopelessly smitten. I loved every page, every word. For hours at a time I lost myself in this mythical world, enthralled by the plucky heroes’ dangerous adventure to save the land from darkness. I may not have realised it at the time, but that reading experience was a watershed moment in not just my reading tastes, but my entire life. (more…)

Terry Brooks UK signing!

BrooksTerryOrbit is so excited to announce that Terry Brooks will be visiting the UK for the first time in over 5 years!  He will be in London on holiday but has spared an evening to schedule an event at Forbidden Planet – on Wednesday 3rd April at 6pm.  He will be signing copies of the first in his new series, Wards of Faerie (now available in paperback) and his new hardback Bloodfire Quest (out 12th March).  Like our Orbit UK Facebook page for full details and updates.

terry badge

And for all Terry’s UK fans who can’t make it to London, never fear… whether you can attend the signing or not, every person who emails a question for Terry to orbit@littlebrown.co.uk will receive a Bloodfire Quest badge!  We will film his answers so everyone gets to ‘meet’ him.  Plus the top three questions will win a signed and dedicated book.  (UK entrants only).

Join us to celebrate a great year for a legend of the fantasy genre!  2013 is an especially exciting year for Terry as his full Dark Legacy of Shannara series will available, with the last novel in the trilogy, Witch Wraith, publishing this July.

Wards of Faerie: The Dark Legacy of Shannara, Book One
Wards of Faerie: The Dark Legacy of Shannara, Book One
Bloodfire Quest: The Dark Legacy of Shannara, Book Two
Bloodfire Quest: The Dark Legacy of Shannara, Book Two
Witch Wraith: The Dark Legacy of Shannara, Book Three
Witch Wraith: The Dark Legacy of Shannara, Book Three

The Ultimate Epic Fantasy Author for the Ultimate Epic Fantasy Fan

The fantasy novel The Dark Legacy of Shannara Book One: Wards of Faerie by Terry Brooks, endorsed by Christopher PaoliniAdored by readers and revered by authors, Terry Brooks is a trailblazing epic fantasy author like no other. His action-packed stories and unique characters have captured the imagination of fantasy fans all over the world.

If you’ve been looking for an excuse to start on an epic Brooks adventure, now is your chance. WARDS OF FAERIE (UK | AUS) is out now in paperback, followed up with book two of the Dark Legacy series, BLOODFIRE QUEST (UK | AUS ) on 12th March. With dark powers, an epic adventure, and a fight for survival, Terry Brooks will draw you into the Shannara adventure and not let go.

 

What readers have been saying about WARDS OF FAERIE:

“Brings back the magic that was in the first Shannara series” – Goodreads 5 star review

“Terry Brooks has provided me with a lifelong love of Fantasy” – Orbit reader

“He writes with such detail to create a world that is wholly believable and which you can sink into for hours at a time” – Orbit reader

“Transports you to a world of fantasy that you can get lost in” – Orbit reader

“Everything a good fantasy story should be – full of adventure, romance, magic and danger” – Goodreads 5 star review

“Threads are so marvellously woven together, and the tapestry they form is one of action, mystery and sorrow” – Bookreporter.com

The Ultimate Epic Fantasy Hero Infographic
Since we think Terry Brooks is an ultimate fantasy writer, to celebrate the release of WARDS OF FAERIE, we asked readers to tell us what their ultimate fantasy hero might look like. Here are the results…
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War and Power: Sources of Conflict in THE GATHERING OF THE LOST

Last week I mentioned the diversity of heavily armed societies a reader might expect to find in a High Epic tale like THE GATHERING OF THE LOST (UK|ANZ) – which got me thinking about the importance of conflict to epic fantasy generally, and about the specific conflicts in the Wall of Night series’ world of Haarth.

The Importance of Large-Scale Conflict In Epic Fantasy

Something I’ve discussed before in relation to epic fantasy – particularly in my Big Idea post for THE HEIR OF NIGHT (UK|ANZ) – is the way in which classic epic stories speak to our human condition through juxtaposing the internal conflicts of the protagonists with the external conflicts in which they are engaged. Nations and worlds are often at stake; at the very least major paradigm shifts and world-altering events provide a way of exploring more personal struggles and human cost.

The conflicts that characterize the Wall of Night series honour that epic tradition. (more…)

In Alternate Soviet Russia, Magic Rules You

In exactly one month from today, Peter Higgins’s brilliant debut WOLFHOUND CENTURY will be published here in the US.  “Sentient water, censored artists, mechanical constructs, old-fashioned detective work, and the secret police are all woven together in this rich and fascinating tapestry,” wrote Publishers Weekly, and that’s only the beginning of the wonderful praise we’ve received for this novel.

Watch the trailer on our website and pre-order your copy  of WOLFHOUND CENTURY today! You can also read the first five chapters on io9 right away.

WOLFHOUND CENTURY by Peter Higgins

 

 

How to make a fantasy book cover: FADE TO BLACK

It’s finally here! Today is the release date for FADE TO BLACK (UK | US | ANZ) by Francis Knight, one of the most hotly anticipated fantasy releases of the year.

The illustrator for the covers of this series, Tim Byrne, did an awesome job representing the vertigo-inducing city of Mahala, the setting for FADE TO BLACK and all the Rojan Dizon novels. We asked Tim to go step-by-step through the process of creating such a cool image:

I started off by doing a very quick sketch of the cover to get an idea of how the perspective might work. I wanted to convey the extreme height of the city of Mahala and how it might be if you were at the bottom looking up. I nearly always start a cover by positioning the type – as once I know where and how that is sitting, I know how much space I have left for the rest of the image.

Sketch by Tim Byrne for FADE TO BLACK by Francis Knight, the first Rojan Dizon novel and a highly anticipated fantasy debut

Next I started blocking in the faces of the buildings/vertical streets using an image of a mud face that I had – which I repeated, scaled and distorted in order to get the perspective to work. This gave me a base on which to start adding bits of buildings and windows.

Stage 1 of a cover by Tim Byrne for FADE TO BLACK by Francis Knight, the first Rojan Dizon novel and a highly anticipated fantasy debut

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Use of Weapons: The Armoury of Epic Fantasy

When embarking on a High Epic tale like THE GATHERING OF THE LOST (UK|ANZ), with its diversity of heavily armed societies, making an inventory of the epic armoury becomes a priority. Any good armoury, after all, should comprise an array of weapons – some magical, some mythic, some even real – that may, depending on circumstances, save the day for one’s protagonists.

The Gathering of the Lost paperback is released today!

The Soul-Sucking Sword

A favoured contender for any self-respecting High Epic tale has to be The Soul-Sucking Sword. After all, they do abound within the annals of the epic literature we love: from Elric of Melniboné and Stormbringer, to CJ Cherryh’s Morgaine with Changeling, and Steven Erikson’s Anomander Rake and Dragnipur. Even Robin McKinley’s (far) more benign Blue Sword has an ambivalent sense of humour. When the chips are down, a soul-sucking sword – or one that can drop whole mountain ranges, like the Blue Sword – has to be handy to any protagonist with worlds to save and a destiny to fulfil.

There may not precisely be soul-sucking swords in THE GATHERING OF THE LOST, but there is reference to black blades:

“Fool!” the old woman spoke with asperity despite her cut and bruised mouth. “She’s carrying black blades—that’s how she defeated the siren worm five years ago. That’s where all your power is going now, too, unless I much mistake the matter.”

 “Black blades—fables for children!” Boras said, but Garan noticed they had all taken a step back.”

There is also a frost-fire sword with a liking for geasas—but to say any more than that might be a spoiler.

The Spear of Power

Spears of power are almost as popular in the epic armoury as soul-sucking swords. Tolkien’s Gil-galad carried Aiglos, which “none could withstand”, into battle against Sauron at the end of the Second Age, while the Irish hero, Cuchulain, possessed the Gáe Bolg, the spear of mortal pain. Whether the spear of power is quite as effective as a soul-sucking sword remains moot however. Tamora Pierce’s heroine, Keladry, may wield the glaive to good effect in the “Protector of the Small” series, but proficiency with a spear does not preserve Oberyn Martell in George RR Martin’s “A Son of Ice and Fire.” Nor does it appear to have done Kaladin a great deal of good, so far, in Brandon Sanderson’s The Way of Kings. (more…)

Interview: Francis Knight on FADE TO BLACK

Fade to BlackRojan Dizon doesn’t mind staying in the shadows, because he’s got things to hide. Things like being a pain-mage, with the forbidden power to draw magic from pain. But he can’t hide for ever.

Because when Rojan stumbles upon the secrets lurking in the depths of the Pit, the fate of Mahala will depend on him using his magic. And unlucky for Rojan – this is going to hurt.

Only two more weeks until FADE TO BLACK (US | UK | AUS) releases online and in stores. Here’s an interview with Francis Knight. Find out how the city of Mahla came to be and more about the magic system employed by Knight’s pain mages.

Have you always known that you wanted to be a writer?

No, I can’t say that I have, probably because it never occurred to me to write down all the stories in my head. I’ve always read, and always made up little stories but it was only when I was struck down with ME that I started to write—I was housebound, and it was almost a defence against day- time TV. So I wrote one of my little stories and found I was addicted to writing.

Did the idea for the Rojan Dizon books come to you fully realised or did you have one particular starting point from which it grew?

As with most of my ideas, it came a piece at a time, each piece from a different direction. The idea really takes hold when they gang up on me. The theme came from one direction, Jake from another, whereas Rojan came as I was writing. He was kind of an experiment—I’d never writ- ten in first before, and he is polar opposite to me in many areas (though we do share a trait or two), so he was almost a challenge I set myself, to see if I could do it. I splurged out fifty thousand words in a month—at this stage it was a future dystopia world, but then my writers’ group pointed out, quite fairly, that I am horrible at making up future tech. One member suggested, “Why not make it a dark fantasy?” which kind of fed into a separate idea I’d had for a world where magic lived with technology. I dabbled a bit then left it on my hard drive for a few years, tinkering with it every now and again in between other projects. It was only when I decided to actually knuckle down and do something with it, when I started with the idea of pain magic in fact, that it really came to life. It was waiting for me to have the right idea to make it work, I think.

Read the full interview here.

Ian Tregillis in conversation with Charlie Stross on The Laundry Files

The Coldest War - the second novel in the Milweed Triptych following BITTER SEEDS, a fantasy series featuring superhumand and dark magic, and earning comparisons with Charles Stross's Laundry Files novelsThis week sees the release of THE COLDEST WAR (UK | ANZ) , the second novel in Ian Tregillis’s landmark series, the Milkweed Triptych. The trilogy began with BITTER SEEDS (UK | ANZ) and concludes with the forthcoming NECESSARY EVIL (UK | ANZ).

These novels feature a secret history of Twentieth Century conflicts in which scientifically-enhanced superhumans and dark magic collide. The result is described by Fantasy Faction as ‘oh-so compelling, fascinating and frighteningly convincing’ and by Cory Doctorow  as, ‘some of the best – and most exciting – alternate history I’ve read. Bravo.’

The Apocalypse Codex, a Landry Files novel by Charles StrossIt’s possible to draw a few parallels between the themes in the Milkweed novels and Charles Stross’s highly popular Laundry Files (including the recent THE APOCALYPSE CODEX – UK | ANZ) – a series of science fiction spy thrillers featuring Bob Howard, once an IT geek, now a field agent working for a British government agency dealing with occult threats. They’re what SFX calls ‘beautifully handled, believable and well envisioned – a highly enjoyable bit of spy-fi.’

For that reason we were really interested to hear these two exceptionally clever Orbit authors in conversation about their series. The results are below!

Ian: In an afterword to THE ATROCITY ARCHIVES (“Inside the Fear Factory”) you mention that while writing the first Laundry novel you were advised to avoid Tim Powers’s novel DECLARE.  And that later you were made aware of the Delta Green supplement to The Call of Cthulhu RPG, which again resides in a similar neighborhood.

Bitter Seeds - the first novel in the Milweed Triptych, a fantasy series featuring superhumand and dark magic, and earning comparisons with Charles Stross's Laundry Files novels(After BITTER SEEDS debuted, people assumed I had been influenced by DECLARE, Delta Green, *and* the Laundry novels!  But, like you with DECLARE, I wanted to avoid cross-contamination. So I didn’t dive into THE ATROCITY ARCHIVES until after I turned in THE COLDEST WAR, at which point I was 2/3 through the Milkweed trilogy and the story was on a ballistic trajectory.)

But of course even Powers wasn’t the first to marry espionage and the occult – Dennis Wheatley’s novel THEY USED DARK FORCES first appeared in 1964, and Katherine Kurtz‘s LAMMAS NIGHT was published in 1983, as just two examples.

In the above-mentioned afterword, you make a strong case for why it’s natural to blend horror, the occult, and espionage.  So is this an idea that’s continually bubbling into the aether to be rediscovered by other writers?  Or have we reached the point where we’re having a conversation within an actual subgenre?

Charlie: It is indeed an actual subgenre! Or maybe a sub-subgenre: a corner of that section of urban fantasy that is preoccupied with the interaction between agents of the state and the occult. (more…)