Ray Lilly survives yet again
So, the first round of the Suvudu cage match has ended, and Ray Lilly survived. He’ll face Tyrion Lannister, a character so popular his name is in WordPress’s spell check (j/k). To be frank, I’m a huge Song of Ice and Fire fan, and of Tyrion in particular. I’m looking forward to this, and I have an idea or two that I think will be fun. We’ll see.
As for round one, things got contentious early and stayed that way, but that’s not a big deal. What is a big deal is that I think people might have gotten the wrong idea about R. Scott Bakker’s books.
If you skimmed through the comments looking at his fans’ description of the Kellhus character, you might think Bakker has written a munchkin’s wet dream, but the books are more interesting than that.
Check out this review of The Darkness That Comes Before by Victoria Strauss. Here’s her review of book 2, The Warrior-Prophet. At this point, the trilogy is complete and the second trilogy is nearly finished.
Anyway, these Suvudu cage matches are supposed to be an opportunity for readers to try out new books. Here’s the Prince of Nothing series:
The Darkness That Comes Before: The Prince of Nothing, Book One
The Warrior Prophet: The Prince of Nothing, Book Two
The Thousandfold Thought: The Prince of Nothing, Book Three
Check them out.
In which I am insulted
Commenters on Ray Lilly’s cage match have gotten pretty hot, calling Ray a “mary sue”, saying my writeup was weak, and a couple of other insults.
I don’t link to it because I want people to rush over to my defense (please don’t). I pretty much expected this and at least one of Bakker’s readers has already backed off and expressed regret at letting things get too serious. Besides, much worse has been said in Amazon.com ratings. No big.
Still: interesting human behavior and it’s cool to see that Bakker has such passionate readers.
Added later: I’ve tried twice to post a comment on that thread to say “No blood no foul” but my comments aren’t showing up. What’s more, the page won’t reload with newer comments, even after I clear my cache. I wonder what’s going on?
reading The outside world: internet publishing wasting time
by Harry Connolly
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Read a short Ray Lilly scene at the Suvudu Cage Match
The poll is up. Head over there to read the fight scene featuring Ray Lilly, and see him take damage like never before (and of course he has no idea he’s in a cage match).
If he wins I get to write another one, so why not drop a vote for him?
added later: Hey, be aware that this one gets a little… intense. Don’t click through if you don’t want to read a scene that’s very physical and a little over-the-top.
Van Eekhout for the Andre Norton Award
Longtime readers of this blog may have noticed that I’m not much interested in awards. I don’t pimp my own stuff and I don’t talk about yours. When the Hugos or Nebulas get handed out, I skim blogs for drama but otherwise ignore it. A few days ago I got a notice from SFWA announcing the Nebula Award nominees for this year and I deleted it unopened (not that I didn’t see all the names plastered all over my window into the web by lunchtime.
I don’t have anything against awards, but I just don’t care.
Well, as I was scrolling past one of the many, many copies of this years Nebula Award nominees, I noticed one particular book up for the “Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy”
“Hey, son. Remember that book The Boy at the End of the World by Greg van Eekhout? You liked that, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, it was awesome! He should get paid a million dollars to write a million sequels.”
“Well, it’s up for a big award.”
He read over the list, but The Boy… was the only one he’d read. “Cool!”
“Do you want it to win?”
“Yeah, Dad. Tell everyone I said they should vote for it.”
making books reading: interesting things links publishing words
by Harry Connolly
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“Andre Norton and Me”
I raved about Sherwood Smith’s INDA series recently, and now I want to link to her Tor.com post Andre Norton and Me. Good stuff. You should read it.
The Fox by Sherwood Smith
In 2007, I had just started reading The Fox by Sherwood Smith (the mmpb will be rereleased in April) when I signed with my agent. I’d enjoyed the hell out of Inda, the first in the series despite the long section set in military school. I’m not a big fan of school stories, but Inda won me over.
The Fox is even better. I don’t want to go too deep into it, but it’s a fantasy set mostly on sailing ships with lots of politics and action. The best thing is that the characters are so very real.
You hear a lot about gritty/realistic fantasy, and it’s always so cynical, as though realism is people behaving really badly. The characters in these books cover a wide range in a way gritty fantasy usually doesn’t–using omniscient POV, which isn’t used often enough.
And the world-building is terrific, yes, and there are so many characters it sometimes is hard to keep track. The hero is one of those super-capable types that make fantasy fun, but he has enough quirks that he rises above the generic hero stereotype. The whole thing is terrific.
There are two more books (which I’ve already bought) and the series is complete. You should totally read it.
Worldbuilders
The auction for The Wooden Man and the ghost knife prop has ended but the Worldbuilders fundraiser will continue until February 7th. It’s a lottery system; for every $10 you donate, you get a chance to win any one of hundreds of prizes.
Most are books, signed by the author. Some are ARCs of unreleased novels. Some are graphic novels. Look at this!
An ARC of Neil Gaiman’s Stardust
A “Best of” collection by Caitlin R. Kiernan
A full set of Tad William’s SHADOWMARCH
An ARC of Seanan McGuire’s newest novel
And much, much more stuff.
What’s more 50% of your donations will be matched.
Don’t miss your chance for some terrific books.
reading The outside world: everyone loves blue dog harvest of fire internet man bites world
by Harry Connolly
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The “Implied” Author
Posited: When a critic says “George R.R. Martin is a conservative authoritarian who believes monarchy is a great system of government,” they’re not referring to the real George R.R. Martin. They’re talking about an imaginary George R.R. Martin they dreamed up while reading one of his books. If you confuse the real GRRM with that imaginary one solely because the critic is referring to the imaginary one with by the real author’s name, that’s only because you’re insufficiently knowledgeable about criticism.
I’m agnostic about whether this is true or not, but if it is, that rule would be just as stupid as if it’s a made up thing.
By the way, if you’re not reading James Nicoll’s LJ and comment section, you’re missing out.
I’ve read some bad comics in my time, but…
The Dusk Society set a… well, is it a new low? Because I’ve read some genuine shit in my time, and this book, while it was definitely bad, was mostly just dull and anti-dramatic. The villain continually thought up reasons not to kill his enemies, the photo-based art was ugly, and if there was an interesting way to get a plot point across, this book dodged it.
Sure, it’s supposed to be fore kids, so they didn’t want a lot of bloody murder, but you can’t call a villain worse than Satan if all he ever does is collect magic trinkets and tell his henches not to kill people.
The plot covers the recruitment of four modern teens into a monster-fighting society (they each have Speshul Powers Or Skills). I got bored with it less than halfway through, but my son read the whole thing, laughing all the way through.
Then you get to the end of the book, when the sexy teacher in the bad clothes who inducted the students into the Dusk Society offers a contract to the reader. Would YOU like to be a secret monster fighter???
The large size is easier to read. But here’s what the contract says:
Contract
I solemnly promise to serve The Dusk Society, with my life* if needed.
I understand that my life will at risk–everyday.
————
Signature of member
Notice that asterisk? What it refers to is handled in a caption, not even on the contract itself. It reads:
*UPON DEATH, ALL YOUR LIFE SAVINGS AND PROPERTY WILL BE SEIZED BY THE DUSK SOCIETY. WITHOUT NOTICE, THE DUSK SOCIETY MAY ALSO EXERCISE THE RIGHT TO ACQUIRE THE SAVINGS AND PROPERTY OF ANY SURVIVING RELATIVES.
That is one helluva clause, isn’t it? I’m tempted to make a joke about asking kids under 18 to sign contracts, or about the ways cults enrich themselves from their members, but in truth this sort of dopey story choice just makes me depressed.
By the way, that thing beside the couch is a cat.
Guest Post: Joshua Palmatier and Benjamin Tate
Some years ago, when Miss Snark was active online, she recommended that aspiring authors read debut novels to study up on what’s selling. I did that for several months straight, and one of the books I read was Joshua Palmatier’s The Skewed Throne. It was pretty intense stuff.
Since then he’s released a new series under the name Benjamin Tate, and since I will probably be adopting a pen name for my post-Twenty Palaces writing, I asked if he wouldn’t mind talking about it a bit. Here he is:
First, thanks, Harry, for having me guest blog today. I hope your readers enjoy!
One of the most common questions I get as soon as I introduce myself at signings or on panels at conventions is, “Why are you published under two names?” If you weren’t aware, I have a split personality. My “Throne of Amenkor” series and most of my short stories are published under my real name, Joshua Palmatier. I also edit anthologies under that name. My newest series (check out LEAVES OF FLAME, just released) is published under the pseudonym Benjamin Tate.
The short answer to that question is easy: marketing. All of the more detailed reasons I’ll get to shortly boil down to that: marketing. The publisher is attempting to make as much money off of the books produced by the author as possible. Marketing is what drives the publishing machine, and most decisions—from the cover art, cover copy, even what appears inside the book—comes down to what the publisher thinks will sell the most copies.
Let’s talk about some of the marketing reasons that a pseudonym might seem like a good idea. I’ll only hit a few, some of the more obvious ones, because I don’t think you want the entire novel. And the reasons are numerous enough that you could probably get a book out of this. Let’s stick to two:
First, SALES: I’d hazard that this is the most common reason a pseudonym is used. Basically, the number of copies ordered by the bookstores like Barnes & Noble depends on the number of copies of previous books sold by that author. If the author is new, B&N has no previous numbers to base their ordered on, so it comes down to how well the publisher can excite them about the book. But once the author has a second or third book on the shelf, the publisher can talk all they want, but B&N is going to look up the previous sales before they order the new book. And in general, if the previous book sold, say 20 copies in one store, they will order FEWER copies of the new book. I see you shaking your head; I shake my head as well. I don’t understand it, but that’s how it happens. Sometimes the publisher can convince the bookstore to order more, if the title has some particular buzz or other selling point, but most of the time not. What happens is what writers and publisher refer to as the “death spiral.” Book 1 sells 20 copies in a particular store; the store orders in 15 copies of book 2 (and typically won’t reorder if these sell out); the store looks at the 12 copies of book 2 sold when book 3 comes out and orders 10 copies for the store; etc, etc, etc. You can see where this is heading.
So, if a particular series from an author is caught in the death spiral, when that author introduces a NEW series, the publisher can risk the bookstore looking back at the old sales and saying it didn’t sell well, we aren’t going to order much of this new series, even though its new . . . OR the publisher can introduce the new series under a pseudonym. The bookstore has no previous sales records to look at, so they order 20 copies, as if it were a debut author. And then the publisher and author hope that the book and pseudonym takes off and avoids the death spiral.
A second reason for using a pseudonym is GENRE. Often an author is interested in writing in more than one genre of fiction, say fantasy and mystery, or science fiction and romance. In this case, the author may want to keep the marketing of the two genres separate. You don’t want the exuberant fan of your cozy mystery novels seeing your name on the cover of a new book, pick it up expecting a cozy mystery, and then discovering that the new book is erotica. That could alienate your fan. (Or it could make them an even bigger fan, who knows? It’s a risk.) To avoid this possibility, you write one genre under one name, and the other under a different name, thus keeping the two genres separate. No one accidentally picks up your western novel when they’re a fan of your science fiction. This can also be done for subgenres as well—say using one name for your historical romances and a second for your paranormal romances, just to keep them separate.
As I said, there are other reasons for using pseudonyms, but I think those are the two main reasons. Both of them come down to marketing in the end—whether it’s marketing a new name to escape the sales records, or marketing a new name for a particular genre. Which reason was it for me? I have to admit it was the death spiral. While the sales of my “Throne of Amenkor” series weren’t horrible (they were modest), my publisher felt that I might be able to expand my audience by using what’s called an “open” pseudonym—basically a pseudonym whose real identity wasn’t kept secret after the release of the new book. It was hoped that the “Joshua Palmatier” fans would learn that I was now writing under the “Benjamin Tate” name and buy the new books, while I’d pick up new readers for the “Ben Tate” books by catching people browsing the shelves and running across this debut author.
Joshua Palmatier (aka Benjamin Tate) is a fantasy writer with DAW Books, with two series on the shelf, a few short stories, and is co-editor with Patricia Bray of two anthologies. Check out the “Throne of Amenkor” trilogy—The Skewed Throne, The Cracked Throne, and The Vacant Throne—under the Joshua Palmatier name. And look for the “Well” series—Well of Sorrows and the just released Leaves of Flame—by Benjamin Tate. Short stories are included in the anthologies Close Encounters of the Urban Kind (edited by Jennifer Brozek), Beauty Has Her Way (Jennifer Brozek), and River (Alma Alexander). And the two anthologies he’s co-edited are After Hours: Tales from the Ur-bar and the upcoming The Modern Fae’s Guide to Surviving Humanity (March 2012). Find out more about both names at www.joshuapalmatier.com and www.benjamintate.com, as well as on Facebook, LiveJournal (jpsorrow), and Twitter (bentateauthor).
Just to throw my own two cents in, when I first started coming online in the middle 90′s, I discovered that some editors hated pen names and actually refused to honor them in their magazines. Apparently, writers used to use them to hide the shameful truth about their second, science fictional careers and this editor (who is dead now and shall remain nameless) just assumed that anyone using a pen name was being insulting. Oh, genre, you’re so wacky.
Hey, check out the cover to “Tate’s” new book:
.
It looks fantastic.
How DARE you write such a negative review!!!
This review is too mean!! Obviously this is all just envy! This review is less professional than the book! Grammar doesn’t matter if the book is entertaining! You mean women should deal with your mental health issues! This review is a personal attack on the author!
(I’d suspect linkbait if there were ads on that page)
Look what showed up at my door this weekend:
Stephen Blackmoore’s new novel is out from Penguin (in trade, no less) and over at the B&N review blog, Paul Goat Allen gives it a terrific review, saying: “… the story is relentlessly paced and literally filled with nonstop action from the first page to the last” and “If City of the Lost is any indication, Stephen Blackmoore could be the illegitimate lovechild of James Ellroy and George Romero – zombie noir at its bloody best!”
And I’m all: Damn. It’s a zombie novel? I knew the guy came back from the dead, but I didn’t know it was zombies. Still, it just got a great review from a guy who wouldn’t look at a twenty dollar bill if it had my name on it.
I plan to crack the spine after I read a few of the things I Absolutely Must Read First, but if you like fast-paced UF shoot ‘em ups (and zombies) check this one out. (Amazon B&N)
Let’s assume you like books
I assume you do. Let’s also assume you have loved ones who like them, and with the holiday season coming up, you’d like to give books as gifts this year.
No, I’m not going to push my own stuff.
But remember Q.R. Markham’s Assassin of Secrets (Jesus, even I wouldn’t have gone for that title) the almost entirely plagiarized debut novel that was recently yanked off the shelves? Did you know that copies are going for fifty bucks on eBay? I sorta wish I’d bought one now.
Anyway, you can’t read his book–and why would you want to?–but you can read all the books he ripped off. So here is a holiday shopping list of books and authors that were wronged, and who better to throw your money at:
- Body of Secrets: Anatomy of the Ultra-Secret National Security Agency by James Bamford
- The Tears of Autumn by Charles McCarry
- James Bond: The Union Trilogy: Three 007 Novels: High Time to Kill, Doubleshot, Never Dream of Dying (James Bond 007) by Raymond Benson (In this case, it’s High Time to Kill that was ripped off, but this is the only current edition)
- Dream Time by Geoffrey O’Brien
- The Last Supper by Charles McCarry
- Second Sight: A Paul Christopher Novel by Charles McCarry
- For Special Services by John Gardner (Although as I write this they have the wrong cover art uploaded to this page)
- James Bond: License Renewed: A Novel (James Bond 007) by John Gardner
All citations found here.
Know someone who likes spy novels? Or, even better, if you’re looking to read something a little out of your usual, these books are certified good enough to steal from.
First person shooters and novels: same name, opposite everything else
To show you how far behind I can get on things, I’ve been wanting to comment on John Scalzi’s post about first-person video games since it went online on the thirteenth. Here’s the relevant quote:
So, John compares first-person shooters to first-person narratives, saying they’re both equally immersive and allow the player/reader to experience the story as if it were happening to them. But to me, a first-person shooter video game and a novel written in the first person have two things in common: the word “person” and the word “first” (although they don’t necessarily appear in that order).
I Play Games
A first-person shooter feels very first-person-y. The camera shows what the character sees, including whatever weapon the character is holding. When enemies attack, they point their weapons directly into the camera. When the character who is attacked from behind, it happens “off camera”.
John is correct; it’s an incredibly immersive way to play, and it feels like the player is the character. (Like John, I really enjoy this sort of game, but I don’t get to play it much because I dislike zombies and won’t shoot good/innocent/neutral “people.” Nazis? Monsters? Yes. Cops, guards, people defending their homes? No.
I Relate A Narrative
I always compare a first-person novel to sitting at a table in a coffee shop with an interesting storyteller. “I went to the supermarket and there were police officers everywhere. I recognized one of them from a barbecue my brother-in-law threw last summer and asked him what was going on. He told me that a guy dressed as a ninja had taken a bunch of customers hostage. Before he’d even finished, a throwing star came zipping through the broken front window right by me–I could feel the wind of it passing–and broke my windshield.”
Now, maybe it’s me, but when I read a narrative like that, I don’t put myself in the place of the speaker. I’m not shopping that day. I’m not the one who met the cop at the BBQ. I’m not the one that nearly got cut. I’m not the one with the broken windshield.
I may feel a strong sympathy for that person. I may feel empathy, even, but I don’t put myself into the story in the same way. But maybe that’s just how I read.
To me, first-person has a distancing effect. In being addressed directly by the character, the narrative I’m getting is colored by their experiences, prejudices, and history. What’s more, that history is important. It’s one thing to fight a junkie mugger in an alley over the contents of your wallet. That’s current. It’s happening in the moment. It’s another for a character to have a detailed history, like kids from a failed marriage or (just to pick a random example no reason really) a criminal record complete with jail time.
That history distances me as a reader because it’s not mine. I can get caught up in the character’s story, and maybe I imagine what I would do instead, but I never confuse it with my own. As games become more “story-like” and introduce backstory, the first-person aspects will become less persuasive. My crystal ball says so.
“The Hero’s Invisible Buddy”
That’s the term Clive Barker used in the intro to the trade edition of Marshall Law to describe the feeling a reader gets as they float along, unnoticed by anyone, in a third-person narrative. It’s almost like being a ghost or an angel.
By the way, this is how I feel whenever I read A Song Of Ice And Fire:
In neither case am I confusing myself with the narrator, although I can become powerfully invested in them.
But that’s just the way I read. Maybe it’s different for you.
making books reading: everyone loves blue dog links moi? people publishing words
by Harry Connolly
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The Urge To Please
Quentin Rowan, the plagiarist author of Assassin of Secrets, apologizes and explains himself via email (posted online with permission) to one of the writers who blurbed his book. Rowan’s words continue through successive comments, so keep scrolling down.
Here are some excerpts:
But the minute I got an agent and started showing it to people who suggested changes, I began to distrust the quality of whatever real work I’d done on it. So I started ripping off passages from spy novels in my collection that fit. Somehow public scrutiny has always been the pressure point for me. Once I feel I’m doing the work for someone else’s eyes, I begin stealing, because I want to impress.
I just didn’t feel capable of writing the kinds of scenes and situations that were asked of me in the time allotted and rather than saying I couldn’t do it, or wasn’t capable, I started stealing again. I didn’t want to be seen as anything other than a writing machine, I guess. Some call it “people pleasing.” Anyway, the more I did it, the deeper into denial I went, until it felt as if I had two brains at war with each other.
I would say it was fear. Plain and simple. Fear that my own spy novel wouldn’t be good enough. That I just didn’t know enough about neat gadgets and missiles and satellites or government agencies to do it right.
There have been a lot of people talking about Rowan’s arrogance and contempt, about how sure he must have been that everyone but him was too stupid to realize what he was doing. If we can believe what he’s saying now (and I’ll tell you straight up front: I do believe him) it’s clear that he plagiarized out of insecurity, not arrogance.
And why do I believe him? Because I’ve felt all those same feelings. All of them. Just because I never turned to his self-sabotaging “solution” of stealing text from writers I admire doesn’t mean I haven’t endured all of these doubts.
The trick, though, is to keep in mind the one most important thing: You must fail on your own terms. You can’t cheat the process because of a deadline, or because a certain genre/tone is in style now. You can’t keep doing the same things all the time because that’s been successful in the past.
And even more importantly for someone like Rowan, you have to shrug off your early praise and criticism. Rowan had all this self-imposed pressure on him to amaze everyone who read his work, and where did it come from? He won a poetry award at 19, when he wasn’t mature enough to deal with it. The “Best of the Year” notice changed his self-image (he doesn’t put it in those terms, exactly, but it’s right there in his email) into a writer who had to impress people, and he didn’t believe he could live up to that self-image.
Now, I’m not going to go into Imposter Syndrome with regard to writing. Everyone covers that and if you follow writers at all you’re probably sick of hearing about it. I suffer from it, too, like everyone. So I’m going to skip the analysis and jump right to my own personal solutions to it, which comes in two parts.
First: write for a specific set of three people. When you’re writing a book imagine three people as your audience. Don’t tell them, don’t talk about it with them, nothing. You don’t even have to know them. Maybe one is your oldest pal. Maybe another is a writer you admire but never interact with. Maybe the third is an interesting genre critic, or your book-crazy hairdresser, or your snobby aunt.
The point is, you don’t want to write for an amorphous, undefined audience consisting of everyone in the world. You can’t amaze or astonish everyone and you shouldn’t try.
Second: You should dare to fail on your own terms.
Let’s talk about Game of Cages here. My editor hated the ending. That scene in the food bank? Written as one long sentence? She thought it was too dark, too down, and she wanted something more heroic in its place.
And I’m sure she was right. I refused to cut that bit and I’m utterly certain that it hurt sales. Thing is: that scene was right for those books. It was cruel as hell, anti-heroic, and deliberately tragic. I’ve been thinking of those Twenty Palaces books as action tragedies–full of the sort of thrilling violence that leaves you feeling sad at the end. To me, cutting that scene would have been cheating the whole concept of the series; the end of Child of Fire is pretty much a promise that this scene will be there.
So everyone, including my agent (no-god bless her for everything she’s had to put up with from me) explained that the scene would hurt sales. In response, I explained my own deepest fear: what if I change the scene to make it more heroic, and the book fails anyway? I wouldn’t even be failing with my own book.
I’ve seen a few responses to my end of the Twenty Palaces series that suggests I’ve “learned a lesson” about what makes a book good or bad, and that’s really not the case. I’ve certainly learned what makes a book popular, but good?
No. I believe the Twenty Palaces books were successful. I said so in that post. Commercially, no. Artistically? Well, of course I would like to go back and fix things, but not the things that would sell more copies. Artistically, I think the books work. I love them. And I don’t care if somebody on Goodreads gives them all one-star reviews. That doesn’t matter to me.
I am ready to fail in the market place. I am ready to never win any award, ever, within the genre community (frankly, I don’t expect to win any awards for the work I do and I don’t care–someone else would appreciate it more). I am ready to be laughed at and shrugged off and called boring. It’s true that I’m working on something that I hope will be successful in a commercial way–I have bills, after all–but I’m never going to write the farmboy-who’s-secretly-a-prince story just because that’s what people like.
A soldier goes into battle knowing he might die, but he goes anyway. Yes, he takes every precaution, but that is the risk he takes. If he can do that, I can take the meager chance of a bunch of one-star reviews on Goodreads, or even a complete lack of interest from publishers.
And now my son is up and wanting to get on the computer, so I’m closing out. See you all on the far side.
“That’s the end?”
That was my wife and son’s reaction when I read the final line of The Hobbit to them last night. (It was this edition, so we had to stop often to admire the artwork–although I can’t say I was fond of the way the elves were portrayed.)
As family reading time goes, this was a long one, or maybe it just seemed long because I was the only one reading it. Usually we trade chapters between the three of us, but there was no way I was going to ask my dyslexic wife to read all those dwarf names over and over. That would have been hell for her. And since my son is not enthusiastic about reading aloud at the best of times, I gladly took on the task myself.
The only problem: we were watching DVD previews of… something last week (not a good sign, eh?) and the LOTR blue ray was one of them my son was startled to hear Elijah Wood say the name “Gandalf.”
“Didn’t you know?” I said. “The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings are set in the same world. They’re connected.”
“Oh. Let’s read those next.”
And my heart sank. I’m happy that he’s (finally) warming up to fantasy, but there’s no way I can ask my wife to read LOTR aloud, so all the books would be on me and me alone.
Not only that, but much of Fellowship… is freaking dire. I’m sorry; I know there are people out there who lurve the books so much they read them every year or whatever, but too much of the early travel stuff is just tedious. And Bilbo’s birthday party takes forever to get to.
I’m tempted to break the family rule and skip the books in favor of the movies.
Interview with me
Here’s an interview with me at The Quillery, for those who like to read this sort of thing. There’s also a chance to win all three books in a giveaway.
Circle of Enemies, Chapter One
Here’s the first chapter of Circle of Enemies.
It was August in Seattle, when the city enjoyed actual sunshine and temperatures in the eighties. I’d spent the day working, which made for a nice change. I’d just finished a forty-hour temp landscaping job; dirt and dried sweat made my face and arms itch. I hated the feeling, but even worse was that I didn’t have anything lined up for next week.
As I walked up the alley toward home, I passed a pair of older women standing beside a scraggly vegetable garden. One kept saying she was sweltering, sweltering, but her friend didn’t seem sympathetic. Neither was I. I was used to summers in the desert.
When they noticed me, they fell silent. The unsympathetic one took her friend’s hand and led her toward the back door, keeping a wary eye on me. That didn’t bother me, either.
I stumped up the stairs to my apartment above my aunt’s garage. It was too late to call the temp agency tonight. I’d have to try them early Monday morning. Not that I had much hope. It was hard for an ex- con to find work, especially an ex-con with my name.
I’m Raymond Lilly, and I’ve lost track of the number of people I’ve killed. more »
Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s influence on urban fantasy
Urban fantasy tropes go way back to the pulps and comics of the early 20th century. Weird Tales was publishing hard-boiled PIs vs. supernatural horror very early, and Dr. Occult (among others) appeared in the comics in the 30′s. But pretty much all of it was marketed as horror.
When the horror boom collapsed in the 80′s, people started calling their horror “dark fantasy” to separate it from the serial killer and splatter punk stuff. At the same time, Charles de Lint was doing his thing, and War for the Oaks made its big splash.
I have no idea why it got the name “urban” though, except maybe from urbanites’ bias that city=modern and rural=the past.
But I don’t think the genre hit its stride until Buffy came along. I mean, there were people writing it before, but Buffy seemed to have a powerful effect on the readership. Readers who loved the shows began snapping up the books.
What’s more, BtVS showed how powerful and effective paranormal romance plots could be, and it enshrined the new story structure of the UF, which was a break from the de Lint style. That was:
Horror fiction + protagonist with agency = urban fantasy.
It seems to me that the genre has sort of backed into the crime thriller format (I’ve said “mysteries” before, but that was stupid of me. Mystery novels are usually extended series of interesting conversations. Thrillers have more violence, and it’s the thriller that UF has emulated.)
Once the protagonist gets juiced up the vampires and werewolves become more like thriller-ish super-criminals, and the protag no longer flees in terror. That just pushes the story toward this:
Awful event -> What caused this? -> investigation <--> violent clashes <--> plot twists | (until finally) extended climactic battle.
Which is a classic thriller style.
I’m not an expert in any of this, but this is how it seems to me.
