No, really...

Ever read Clark Ashton Smith's Malgrys stories? For example, The Flower Women? It's about a magician who rules his own solar system. Or there's that Jack Vance tale, "Morreion", where the magicians of Dying Earth venture into the galaxy.

What would a military story be like if it took place in such a setting?

That's what I foolishly set out to discover. I quickly got bogged down in world building. Just for starters, how do the battles work when you can mix artificer-punk tech with sorcery? So, I wrote a bible, and that helped. But then I couldn't quite get the feel right, and then I had my operation and... well, I more or less lost momentum.

But now, fuelled by Hans Zimmer on Spotify, I'm blundering onwards. Style of speach, names, even military ranks - I'll fix them all on the second pass. It's the end result that matters...

Best of all, I'm having fun.

( Snippet of very imperfect first draft material... )

Tags: sins of the father, writing
Current Music: Hans Zimmer

If Xmas Dinner were organised with the precision of D-Day, then half the American guests would arrive to find they didn't have the correct utensils, and spend most of the day struggling with the starter. The other half would turn up at the wrong house and discover an unguarded meal laid out on the table, read to eat. Meanwhile, the British and Canadians would be forced to eat a very tough turkey indeed, and then put up with the American complaining that they were always last to finish...

Tags: xmas

Watched a documentary about the artist Kit Williams on BBC iPlayer last night. He's most famous for the Masquerade book, but... well he's got this eccentric genius. You have to see it (here). Something about the way he approaches his art, or the art itself struck a chord. Some introspection now required...

So, I followed a link from a blog on Leigh Brackett links and ended up at the online gallery of Chris Achilleos. There's this fantastic picture from the front of Reivers of Skaith. The original is for sale, but I had to be content with lifting it for my PC desktop.

Later, Kurtzhau sits down to play Blitzkrieg, notices the image...

"What's that picture Daddy?"

"It's from the front of a book I like. Do you like it?"

Kurtzhau frowns. "He couldn't have killed all those men... How did he get through the gate? Where's the Battering Ram?... If all those men got hit by arrows, how come he's still alive?"

"Um. Maybe I'll find a different one."

Kurtzhau nods sagely. "Yes, showing the Battering Ram. And perhaps there could be some guys with crossbows providing covering fire? And maybe he could have better armour that covered his legs and some other guys with shields to back him up?"

Tags: fantasy art, fatherhood, kurtzhau

Settled down for a child free afternoon of writing. Fell asleep over my laptop. :)

Tags: fatherhood, writing
Current Mood: refreshed
Current Music: Hans Zimmer

I'm in a reading limbo, having bounced off half a dozen fantasy books. It's left me so log jammed with undropped "other shoes", that I can't settle to anything in the genre. This is a problem.

First up, I like Fantasy. I am the most happy reader when wrapping myself in its tropes. More importantly, this is my chosen genre! I need to read inside the modern field so I don't turn out as the "heir to Lin Carter". And there are tricks of the trade for conveying a fantasy world, for working the tropes. Where better to learn them than by reading the actual books?

So, what on earth is the matter?

It's not that I'm magically sensitised to bad prose. Hell! I cheerfully zip through old pulp without flinching. And I'll rollick through a patchily written technothriller.

And, though I'm plot obsessed as a writer wannabe, I'm not quite as demanding as a reader. I'm happy to read through pages and pages of plotless but interesting action, e.g. Patrick Robinson serving up a slice of life on a US aircraft carrier. If the travelogue is quirky enough, then I'll curl up with lazy exploration of an improbable milieu - Clark Ashton Smith is still a comfort read.

It's not a question of quality either. Highlights from the rubberised books collection include some well-reviewed, enthusiastically recommended, and very successful volumes.

The one thing they all have in common is that stuff goes wrong slowly. The disaster doesn't just arrive in one dollop, setting off the epic quest. It happens blow by painful blow, forcing us to share the suffering of the characters. Eventually there'll be catharsis - revenge, or at least validation for the characters; but I never read long enough to earn that.

For me, this breaks the escapist contract. I live in the real world, I know about pain and suffering - it's the heroic response to misfortune that I yearn to explore. So let adventure begin in the ruins of a kingdom, let the hero mourn his dead, but let's get it over with in chapter one, please? Or can we just meet him as he contemplates a freshly dug grave?

Other people like... love... this stuff. They crave that agonising build up of tension. So, ultimately it's a flavour of fiction. I walk away from such books the way I avoid prison movies, but I can't judge them wanting.

This is all very well, but what do I do about all the unfinished books? The stand-alones and book ones - they can take their chances in the charity shop pile. But what do I do when a series in which I've invested time and suspended disbelief shifts mode and starts drip-feeding me doom? Do I trudge through the volume, praying that it is a mere aberration and that the next will bring twisty tales of daring do? Or do I write off the whole lot?

Hence my log jam.

Tags: fantasy, reading