Saturday, January 19, 2013

Wassup, King Arthur?

Over at io9, Lauren Davis shares some interesting writing advice in her article, "How to make sure the language in your historical fantasy novel is period-accurate." She references The Jane Austen Word List created by fantasy author Mary Robinette Kowal to help her weed out period-inaccurate words for her novel, Glamour in Glass, set in the same time period as Jane Austen's books. To build the list MRK assembled "all the words that are in the collected works of Jane Austen to use for my spellcheck dictionary."

While I have to admit I didn't go too crazy about this in Dragonfriend, preferring to come down on the side of middle-grade "readability" rather than being overly concerned about historically accurate Old English vocabulary, I did ask my editor, Darren Robinson, to flag any eye-poking anachronisms.

A few of the words Kowal ended up pulling out of her book "because they either didn’t exist in 1815 or that didn’t mean what they mean now" are: "cliquish," "mannequin," "laundry," "titanium white," and "wastepaper basket" (for which she writes, "Weird note. Trashcans, wastepaper baskets, garbage cans… none of these exist even as a concept. Everything got reused, fed to the pigs, or burned in the fire.")

For me, it was more a case of catching myself wanting to put in modern (American) slang words like "okay" and having Darren flag things like "biz," "Father Christmas," and "halfpenny" which he correctly points out, "only dates back some 700 years, long after Arthurian times." 

How about you? Any vocabulary challenges in your own work of historical fiction (fantasy or otherwise)? Or a case of being derailed by anachronistic word choice in a book you were reading? Let us know in the comments.

Thursday, January 10, 2013

Book Review: Brood of Bones



An exceptionally cruel dark magic is plaguing the city of Morimound and Enchantress Hiresha must solve the mystery of who has infected the wombs of almost all the women of her beloved town with bony abominations. Simultaneously nearing the end of their nine month pregnancies, Hiresha races to find the culprit - an evil sorcerer, she suspects – and undo his brutal spell before the women of Morimound die horrifyingly painful deaths giving birth to these unchildren, this brood of bones. 

As much an exciting detective story as it is a great fantasy read, Brood of Bones succeeds in both genres. Author A.E. Marling has crafted a complex yet accessible tale rich with plot feints and red herrings that had me guessing until the very end. The real joy, however, is how he’s created a world so unique and detailed that I found myself marveling at his ability to describe and generate the rules of magic for a setting that is both comfortably familiar and completely original. The “dream physics” of Hiresha’s laboratory alone establish Marling’s credentials as an exceptionally skilled creator of never before imagined worlds. 

In short, Brood of Bones is a fantasy masterwork. Highly recommended.

Saturday, January 5, 2013

Bye Bye Blog: The Re-post

I posted this a couple of days ago on my other blog, Roger Eschbacher Books, and wanted to see if anyone here had any thoughts or comments. Feedback (especially if it's not related to baseball) appreciated. ;c)

And now, the re-post:

I launched this Roger Eschbacher Books blog a few years back with the intention of having a landing spot specifically for the readers of my books (as opposed to The Novel Project, my blog primarily aimed at other authors).

BUT...

Anyone who's been following Roger Eschbacher Books knows I haven't been very good about updating this blog at all. In fact, I've been terrible! So, unless there are any strenuous objections of the "you moron, here's what you should really do" variety, I'm thinking it might be time to consolidate the platform and put this old and neglected horse out to pasture.

A couple of options I'm considering...

  • Renaming "The Novel Project" and calling it "Roger Eschbacher Books." The Novel Project was the name I came up with to chronicle the march toward completion and publication of my first NaNoWriMo project that was to eventually become Dragonfriend. Since that book is completed and published, well...
  • Getting a new URL for the "new" blog (to replace http://thenovelproject.blogspot.com/)
  • Focusing all of my blogging energies on the revamped site -- retaining The Novel Project's author-centric bent but tossing in some reader focused material, too.
  • Retaining the sillyroger url but have it "silently" point to the new and improved blog (or should I just chuck this domain name altogether? For some reason, I'm loathe to dump it but I think that might just be sentimentality at play as I'm not sure its all that good for my current "brand." I've had it for over ten years but came up with sillyroger when my focus was primarily on picture books for the 4-8 year old crowd, not middle-grade fantasy novels).
I know this is all inside baseball stuff of interest (maybe) only to other authors, but I'd love to hear everyone's feedback/suggestions on what I should do as I'm not one hundred percent sure about which path I should take. Thanks!

Friday, December 14, 2012

Fantabulous Indie Book Sale 12/15-12/18

Hey folks! Some iAi author pals of mine are running a special holiday promotion where you can get six great books for one great price ($.99 each!). Click on this link to find out more about each title including where you can go to purchase them as gifts for all of those special someones in your life.

Thursday, December 13, 2012

Guest Post: Author Vanna Smythe Talks Revision

Please welcome fantasy author Vanna Smythe as she shares her thoughts on the revision process.

The Revision Part of My Writing Process
By Vanna Smythe

Roger has been kind enough to offer me a guest post spot on his blog today. He asked me to write on the topic of my writing process. Since I just finished the final revision of my second novel Decision Maker (Anniversary of the Veil, Book 2), I thought I’d share with you my revision methods.

First, let me say that I am a seat-of-the-pants writer, meaning I don’t have a great love for outlines and planning before I start writing.  In fact, what I would do with stories and novels before I started writing this one is just jot down a few notes on who my main characters are, what the world is, and what the conflict is, then I’d start writing. And rarely look at the outline again. In other words, I’m very good at sticking to a plotline, not veering off my intended storyline, or characterization.  I’m also very good at writing a complete first draft in a month or less.

I am, however, really bad at revision.

I had my first novel, Protector (Anniversary of the Veil, Book 1) written for over a year, before I finally started revising. It took me another year and a half to get it ready for publication.  But I’m happy to say that Decision Maker only took me 6 months to complete, and here is the revision process I worked through to get there:

1) First I read through the first draft and analyze my worldbuilding, characterization, plotline development, and so on. I note down all the places where more information, or better development is needed, but I don’t fix anything on the manuscript yet.

2) After this, I outline each chapter I want to keep, and also write down all the ones that are still missing.  I try to make this outline as brief and concise as possible, and have it contain fixes for all the problems I uncovered in Step 1.  Character motivation, shocking developments in the story, worldbuilding expansions all go into this outline.

3) Then, based on the outline, I start to rewrite the book chapter by chapter.

4) After the second draft is done, I send it off to my beta readers for feedback.  At the same time, I also read through it again, just noting down all the things I still have to change.  Once I get the reader comments back, I start the final revision. After I finish each chapter, I have my computer voice Alex (I’m on a Mac) read the text back to me.  Having someone, even a computer voice read your book to you is an awesome editing tool. It helps you spot typos, but also shows you, which sentences need to be rewritten for better readability.

5) The final step is another read-through using my computer’s text-to-speech program. During this step, I’m only concentrating on the flow of language, punctuation, word choices,...

So that’s how I revise nowadays.  I hope my process has given you some ideas.

Vanna Smythe
Vanna Smythe - Fantasy Author
Twitter: @Vanna_Smythe
Facebook: www.facebook.com/VannaSmytheAuthor
Protector (Anniversary of the Veil, Book 1): http://amzn.to/xLusPP

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Thanks, Vanna! I'm more of an outliner than a "pantser" (allowing myself to deviate from the outline when I make discoveries along the way) but I know a lot of folks do it your way and I appreciate you taking the time to share your revision process with us. 

Have a sure-fire revision tip or technique? I, for one, am always open to learning better ways to do things. Feel free to enlighten us in the comments.

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

The Next Big Thing: Giantkiller


Author pal Scott Bury, tagged me for The Next Big Thing blog hop and while I must admit I’m not normally a fan of this sort of thing, it sounded like fun (and he can be very persuasive). As Scott puts it:

"The idea behind the Next Big Thing is to answer a set list of questions about your work in progress, then tag five more authors to do the same thing."

I haven't figured out who I'm going to tag yet (hint hint -- if you'd like to do this for your upcoming novel, let me know), but here are some answers about my Next Big Thing:

What is the working title of your book?

Giantkiller: Leonard the Great, Book Two

Where did the idea come from for the book?

Giantkiller is the sequel to Dragonfriend, the first book in what I hope will be a three book series. After I’d finished Dragonfriend, I knew I wanted Leonard’s story to continue so I started thinking about what the next installment would be like. I’d been mulling over possible storylines for several months when it came to me from an unexpected source. In my garden I have a small “sculpture” of a stone cast in the shape of a man’s head. The idea popped into my mind that it “looked like a giant’s head.”  Next, the name “Boulderhead” showed up along with a tidal wave of story ideas.

What genre does your book fall under?

Middle-grade fantasy adventure with an Arthurian twist.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Hmm, not sure. If pushed, I’d say the young leads would probably be unknowns while the adult roles would probably be played by a lot of the same folks who showed up in the Harry Potter/LOTR/Hobbit films.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

When his beloved is snatched by raiding Giants, Leonard sets off to rescue Maid Glennys before a gruesome fate befalls her.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Self-published.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

I wrote the first fifty thousand words of Giantkiller as my 2010 NaNoWriMo project. Life events such as the demands of my day job (I’m an animation writer) and no small amount of laziness conspired to keep me from completing the first draft until September of this year. It now weighs in at a hefty eighty-eight thousand words.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

There’s a lot of action in this book and a story that (I hope) moves along nicely without being overly complicated – everyday people behaving heroically, some authentic peril, great monsters, and a bit of humor. That being said, I hope my readers would think Giantkiller compares favorably with Riordan’s Percy Jackson series and Nancy Farmer’s Sea of Trolls books.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I’ve always been a voracious reader and I think even from a very young age, I knew I was going to be a writer and, hopefully an author, too. Until you actually give it a try, the thought of writing a novel can be very intimidating. I’d think, “I should write a novel,” then get all flummoxed about where and how to start and quickly run away from the idea. Then in 2007 I heard about the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and everything clicked into place. I was still nervous, but found that a deadline (50k words in the month of November) was just the motivation I needed to finally get off my butt and get started. The result of that first effort was Dragonfriend. So, to answer the question, I guess it was the “what” of NaNoWriMo that inspired me.

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

It will be reasonably priced.

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Scott Bury’s Bones of the Earth is a gritty and exciting fantasy read. To learn more about it, check out his blog, Written Words.

Monday, November 5, 2012

Dragonfriend: B.R.A.G. Medallion Honoree

This past week I was contacted by the fine folks at the "Book Readers Appreciation Group" and told that Dragonfriend had been selected as an honoree for their B.R.A.G. Medallion. I'd submitted the book for consideration back in July and then promptly forgotten about it (a mental health trick I try to employ as often as possible -- if I forget about these things, then I don't obsess about these things). Imagine my delight when they contacted me to let me know my book had been chosen for their list.

One of the nice things about this group is that it's made up of "a large group of readers, both individuals and members of book clubs, located throughout the United States, Canada, and the European Union" -- in other words, they're an organization of "real" readers. From their website:
"The single most important criterion that we ask our readers to use in judging a book is whether or not they would recommend it to their best friend."
 I very much like the idea that Dragonfriend is considered worthy of such a recommendation. Thanks, B.R.A.G.!

Eater of the Dead: A Dragon Friend Excerpt

Just in time for Halloween! Check out a featured Dragon Friend excerpt on the BestSelling Reads blog: "The spooky season is upon us! H...