On Writing - Tor/Forge Blog

Peering Skyward: Looking Up from the Bottom of the Research Rabbit Hole by T. R. Hendricks

April 12, 2024June 11, 2024Ariana Carpentieri

T. R. Hendricks’s Derek Harrington returns in The Infiltrator, an adventure of man vs wild—and the domestic terrorists hidden there.

One year after the clash with his former students in upstate New York, retired Marine Warrant Officer and SERE instructor Derek Harrington is the tip of the FBI’s spear in their mission to eradicate the domestic terrorist group known as Autumn’s Tithe. After several successful operations, intelligence points to one final camp in the remote Kentucky wilderness, and Derek prepares to take down Autumn’s Tithe for good.

At the same time ex-FBI Special Agent Hannah Kittle, or Sarah as she is known to the group, devises a plan to meet Derek and her one-time Bureau colleagues head on. Yet her benefactor’s faith in Sarah’s ability to lead Autumn’s Tithe is waning, and other plans are being enacted. Knowing full well what it means for her should those plans succeed where she has failed, Sarah will stop at nothing to see that she is the victor.

As the competing agendas unravel, events place Derek and Sarah on a collision course, setting the stage for a confrontation that will bring Autumn’s Tithe right to Derek’s doorstep.

Read below to see T. R. Hendricks’s take on what it means to do in-depth research for the sake of writing, and how falling down ‘the research rabbit hole’ is paramount in developing precise details that’ll help build an excellent story!

By T. R. Hendricks:

Chances are that if you’re on this website right now, you’re just as familiar with the jokes and memes about writers and their research as I am. The ever classic, “If the FBI ever saw my search history,” elicits no small number of chuckles, but it also rings true with dogged perseverance. Yes, we all go down the rabbit hole at times, but in this context it is done so in the pursuit of those elusive details. The ones we know that once discovered will add an extra layer of authenticity – even credibility for having done the work – in turn elevating our manuscripts to the next level.

In the, “this will surprise no one category” there was no small amount of research into prominent components such as survival skills, military equipment and weaponry, and even the psychology of cults when writing both THE INSTRUCTOR and THE INFILTRATOR. But the devil is in the details, and those details at times required lengthy stretches searching for them. I can recall specifically with THE INSTRUCTOR (we’ll keep it here to avoid sequel spoilers) numerous ventures into the undiscovered country that is the world wide web.

There was one iteration researching the Yankees schedule in early summer of 2018 that resulted in a blowout win. In a podcast I recently did, I explained how I had to spend an hour searching for the USMC regulation articulating the number of folds and measurements of each for the sheet and blanket on recruit racks (beds) just to be certain my Army upbringing didn’t skew that point. “How long to bleed out from a puncture wound of the femoral artery” I’m sure made a great addition to my NSA watch list tally, especially since I made one of those memes I mentioned earlier out of it.

The physics of beaver dams. Velocity of a ball bearing fired from a slingshot. Man traps utilized by the Viet Cong. The physiology of envenomation by bamboo vipers and timber rattlers on the human body. Fun times.

I’m of the opinion that this research, even if delving into hours-long rabbit hole sessions, not only counts as writing, but is indicative of talent that manages to blend them into the story so that they are seamless rather than just window dressing. It may be that the research is limited in its application. For a recent project I’m working on, I spent two weeks getting the details down for a single chapter. Other times the research may result in only a paragraph, even a sentence. Sometimes you’ll never use them at all, because the idea that spawned the search didn’t materialize in the story. Other times you’ll nail it, and then have to kill that precious research bunny darling in the editing phase.

My point being, the rabbit holes are a necessary process (provided you stay on topic and don’t miss deadlines because of it – looking at you, TikTok.) The time put into research early on will manifest into productivity later because you know exactly what you want to say with the details to back it up. Moreover, that single chapter/paragraph/sentence could mean all the difference between readers saying, “this author gets it” and “this author hasn’t the first clue what they’re talking about.” Yikes. I’m sure you’ll agree that we’re all trying our damnedest to avoid the preposterous-induced eye roll.

All that said, I thought it might be a fun take to show you how I arrived at the bottom of a particularly long hare hollow. This journey relates to both preliminary overall plot construction and specific scene orchestration elements for the yet-to-be-title-revealed third installment in the Derek Harrington series. Reader beware: beyond this point is a front row seat to how my mind chains stuff together.

No shit, there I was (obligatory Army vernacular to start the story) sitting down to an afternoon free of obligations, save for the blank page on my screen and the keys beneath my fingers. First I needed a remote location to set the scene, but not too remote. There needed to be an airport nearby and a town large enough to accommodate the presence of a VA hospital or clinic. I settled on a place in Michigan, which then led to the next need, a Mom and Pop coffee shop in said town, complete with their menu and specialty caffeinated concoctions.

To work another angle, I drifted into U.S. Government Accountability Office reports and a congressional mandated assessment on the current state of Veterans Affairs infrastructure (stimulating reading, by the way). For a conversation in the upcoming scene, I needed to search for terminology denoting the study of the way in which certain body movements and gestures serve as a form of nonverbal communication (it’s kinesics). Obligatory hardware searches into the Army’s next generation rifle followed, so as to give my sentries the latest in available weaponry.

Do you know what corner of the U.S. government handles experimental web hosting? Yeah, neither did I. To facilitate the ensuing conversation resulting from the kinesics dialogue, I then went diving for that little nugget. Turns out there’s a whole organization called the Defense Information Systems Agency. Who knew?

The set up for a character introduction turned into looking up the various departments within the FBI, most notably what would be considered Internal Affairs for the Bureau. However, as I wanted this character to be a woman of Israeli-American descent, I then ventured into dual citizenship requirements between the two countries, which chained into female combat positions within the IDF, which prompted a prolonged search for a PDF copy of a Krav Maga combatives manual, and ultimately landed me in a search for the top ten most beautiful Israeli women in the world to model my character’s appearance after (I can assure you that any lingering on this last search parameter was purely for character development).

To make a comparison to turbulence, I wanted to reference a mechanical bull. My next search was, “Average mechanical bull ride times for beginners.” However, to accurately place the bull in Derek’s backstory, I had to spend the next few minutes venturing into the location of the USMC’s School of Infantry. After finding it was Camp Lejeune, I had to then research what the School of Infantry’s weekend liberty policy was, to see if it was even feasible that a young boot Derek would be allowed to venture into a bar in nearby Jacksonville, North Carolina to witness and/or participate in a mechanical bull ride.

Since I had now introduced turbulence during a flight – a flight involving a prisoner transfer – further down the tunnel I went. Stick with me here. I started with the Justice Prisoner and Alien Transportation System utilized by the Federal Bureau of Prisons and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. This turned into research on the aircraft assets available internally to the Department of Justice, which subsequently led back to another GAO report on the misappropriation of DOJ aircraft (again, riveting stuff).

Thus ruling out the government’s air transportation, I turned to researching the types, range, passenger capacity, and cost of chartered private jets. These planes had to then be cross-referenced with the size of the airport in the town I picked in Michigan, plus the nautical miles necessary to travel to New Jersey, to ensure that the jet I chose would both have the fuel to make the trip and capability to land on the runways in both locations.

Having arrived at the end of my three and a half hour writing session, I saw that the research rabbit hole had allowed me to produce a whopping 309 words. However, they were 309 highly detailed and accurate words that lent themselves to not only authenticity, but also critical and convincing components to the story. Do I wish I had put more down that day? Sure. Do I regret spending that much time burrowing? Not at all.

This is how I like to write. It’s the level of exactness I want to get to. Sure, some details could be fictionalized. I could easily extend the runway in my Michigan town if I needed to. Things like that fall in the reasonable suspension of disbelief all the time, and I make allowances for them when necessary. But for the others, the ones that shouldn’t be glossed over, this is the pursuit that in my humble opinion, takes a story from good to great.

So yeah, stop worrying about time spent searching. Go ahead and follow the rabbit to that elusive tidbit. This session might have only been 309 words, but having done the work, future sessions would be in the thousands. If it’s your style, look for those details until it makes your writing pop and your heart content. Just make sure you don’t branch off (at least not too much).

Gal Gadot is quite distracting. I get it.

Click below to pre-order your copy of The Infiltrator, available April 23rd, 2024!

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New Releases / On Writing / What's New

The Thrill of a Science-Based Thriller: By Michael C. Grumley

December 15, 2023March 13, 2024Ariana Carpentieri

From the bestselling author of the Breakthrough series: In his next near-future thriller, Michael C. Grumley explores humanity’s thirst for immortality—at any cost…

The accident came quickly. With no warning. In the dead of night, a precipitous plunge into a freezing river trapped everyone inside the bus. It was then that Army veteran John Reiff’s life came to an end. Extinguished in the sudden rush of frigid water.

There was no expectation of survival. None. Let alone waking up beneath blinding hospital lights. Struggling to move, or see, or even breathe. But the doctors assure him that everything is normal. That things will improve. And yet, he has a strange feeling that there’s something they’re not telling him.

As Reiff’s mind and body gradually recover, he becomes certain that the doctors are lying to him. One-by-one, puzzle pieces are slowly falling into place, and he soon realizes that things are not at all what they seem. Critical information is being kept from him. Secrets. Supposedly for his own good. But who is doing this? Why? And the most important question: can he keep himself alive long enough to uncover the truth?

Deep Freeze is a fast-paced, pulse-pounding story that will keep you on the edge of your seat from start to finish. Read below to see Michael’s take on science-based thrillers and why they’re so exciting to write!

By Michael C. Grumley:

There is something truly exciting about writing science-based thrillers. Of course, many great genres exist, but technothrillers stand apart in a very interesting way.

Science-based technical thrillers are, at their core, idea-driven stories. Naturally, all books have ideas in them. New concepts or approaches to a particular situation or storyline. Or perhaps a fresh perspective or viewpoint on how a story is told. All interesting and completely valid. But what makes technothrillers different is that most are told from the cutting edge of human existence.

It’s been estimated that up until the nineteenth century, the whole of human knowledge doubled nearly every century. It is a staggering thought, perhaps not entirely surprising, when we consider the steady human progress that eventually led to the Industrial Revolution. It changed everything. But then came the Information Revolution. Originally born with the invention of the transistor, the information revolution really took hold in the 1980s, when the computer industry made data not just easier to store but also infinitely easier to access. And from there, the cutting edge of technology absolutely exploded.

By 1982, the great Buckminster Fuller noted that all of human knowledge was no longer doubling every century; it was now doubling every 18 months! That was in 1982! But now, after decades of technological advance after technological advance, the “knowledge-doubling curve” has also rapidly accelerated. Instead of every 18 months, people like David Schilling believe our knowledge now doubles in less than a day! Particularly following the advent of supercomputers and artificial intelligence (AI).

So, back to science-based thrillers. Why are they so exciting to write? Because the actual science and groundbreaking abilities these stories are based on are now being discovered almost daily.

And that’s why it’s so exciting to write them. Writing stories that are both character-driven AND idea-driven. Stories that not only delve into aspects of our humanity and human struggle but do so in a world so fascinating that humanity itself begins to change based on the advancements directly in front of us.

For example, how would humanity change not just with the idea but with the genuine possibility of extremely long lifespans or immortality? How would humanity’s priorities change? Or the way we see the world around us? What happens to everything when death begins to feel a little less… inevitable?

Until now, these were just fun mental exercises. Fantasies to ponder over dinner and a glass of wine or a fireside chat while staring up at the stars. But how does the fantasy change when the idea of immortality is suddenly in the present? You may not know this, but a LOT of fascinating research is being done on life extension and elimination of chronic disease. Fascinating research that feels almost outlandish until you remember that our knowledge is still doubling. Again and again. Not in centuries, not in months, but now in days.

The other day, I was thinking about how human ‘storytelling’ evolved over the millennia. How instrumental and integral it has been throughout all of history. How pervasive it’s been and still is in all cultures and all walks of life. And then it suddenly occurred to me. Storytelling is not something that happens occasionally. It’s not a ‘here or there’ occurrence. Storytelling happens constantly. Not just every day but in every sentence we speak. In every conveyance from one person to another. No matter what the topic. Everything we say to one another is basically a story of some kind.

So, then the question becomes, what are the most interesting stories? What are the most exciting things to talk about? Obviously, it varies depending on where we are at any given moment. But the question reminds me of an old quote from Eleanor Roosevelt. She once said, “Bright minds talk about ideas. Average minds talk about things. And simple minds talk about people.”

And again, we come back to technothrillers. Stories whose foundations are based on real technology, real science, and real ideas. Stories and ideas that focus not on what has already happened but, more interestingly, what is very likely about to happen. Good, bad, and ugly. Which, when combined with human nature, becomes truly interesting.

What would the good, bad, and ugly be if human lifespans were dramatically lengthened? Or what if computers became so powerful that our race could no longer discern what was real? Or if Artificial Intelligence soon accelerated our ‘knowledge-doubling’ to hours or even minutes?

Because these are the things that technothriller authors are currently writing about.

Now you’re ready for DEEP FREEZE.

Click below to pre-order your copy of Deep Freeze, available January 9th, 2024!

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Author Features / New Releases / On Writing / What's New

Big Magic and The Argument I had with my Main Character by Carol Dunbar

July 25, 2023March 7, 2024Ariana Carpentieri

A harrowing and emotional novel set in rural Wisconsin—A Winter’s Rime explores the impact of generational trauma, and one woman’s journey to find peace and healing from the violence of her past.

Mallory Moe is a twenty-five-year-old veteran Army mechanic, living with her girlfriend, Andrea, and working overnights at a gas station store while figuring out what’s next. Andrea’s off-grid cabin provides a perfect sanctuary for Mallory, a synesthete with a hypersensitivity to sound that can trigger flashbacks from her childhood.

The getaway that’s largely abandoned during the off season starts out idyllic, until Andrea’s once-loving behavior turns controlling and abusive, and Mallory once again finds herself not wanting to go home. After a particularly disturbing altercation, Mallory escapes into the subzero night and stumbles into Shay, a teenage girl, injured and asking for help. But it isn’t long before she realizes that Shay isn’t the only one who needs saving.

A story about sisterhood and second chances, A Winter’s Rime looks to nature to find what it can teach us about bearing hardship and expanding our capacity to forgive—not just others, but ourselves.

Carol Dunbar is the author of the critically acclaimed novels, The Net Beneath Us—winner of the Wisconsin Writers: Edna Ferber Fiction Book Award, and A Winter’s Rime. Read below to see the inspiration behind her upcoming book, finding the voice of her main character, and how she discovered the best way to tell her story!

By Carol Dunbar:

The idea for my second novel dropped into my head whole and perfect like an egg; at its center glowed the yolk of my personal experience with trauma and what I was still trying to understand.

Most of that first draft I wrote by hand in journals: the process felt intimate, confessional, and propulsive. My main character Mallory came through very strong for me. She was ready to tell her story; as a writer, I felt ready to receive it. It was a magical partnership.

Then, we got into an argument about the right way to tell her story.

In her book about the creative process, Big Magic, author Elizabeth Gilbert writes about how ideas swirl around us begging for attention until we agree to take them on and make them manifest. I totally truck with that. I was 30,000 words into an entirely different novel when this story took hold. I knew I had to write it, and I knew I had to write it now.

The plot centers around Mallory Moe, an army veteran returning home after serving overseas, who is going through a quarter-life crisis. She can’t sleep, she’s in a bad relationship, and she hasn’t talked to anyone in her family in four years. To avoid being home she goes on long walks after working overnight shifts at a gas station store. One night, she runs into Shay, a teenage girl who is injured and asking for help. Shay is in even worse shape than Mallory, and in trying to help her, Mallory is finally motivated to confront the violence of her past.

For guidance on how to tell this story, I looked to Elizabeth Strout’s My Name is Lucy Barton. I thought her fiction-as-memoir style would work well for Mallory’s story of healing, and I studied the opening chapters of Lucy Barton, breaking them down beat by beat. I typed out the entire first draft of A Winter’s Rime in first person, using Mallory’s voice. I printed out that draft and put it away for six weeks.

When I went back and read, it didn’t work.

First person was the wrong voice for the story because it was Mallory who was undergoing the transformation. She didn’t yet have the self-awareness for those moments of self-discovery. I needed third person for its distance and ability to navigate and weave the past and present narratives.

My next draft I wrote in third person, and everyone in my writing group was like, “Woah, what did you do? This is so much better.” It worked, but I kept getting these strong nudges from Mallory. Sometimes when writing I would slip into first person, and this was very confusing to me. I thought I had the voice wrong, so I hit the pause button and started experimenting again.

I tested out second-person, using the epistolary style that Ocean Vuong so artfully employed in On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. It has this propulsive quality to it—he’s absolutely driven to understand what happened to him and his mother; Mallory is absolutely trying to understand what happened to her. For several weeks I played around with writing the book as a letter from Mallory to Shay, but that also resulted in another failure.

I went to a three-day workshop taught by Diane Wilson, author of The Seed Keeper. I told her about my struggle with how to tell this story, and she suggested I try using a rotating first-person voice. I had used a rotating third-person voice in my first novel, The Net Beneath Us, and I loved being able to view the same event through the eyes of multiple characters. The next morning, I eagerly dove into the exercise that Wilson had taught us.

Using the full name of another main character in my novel, I closed my eyes and said the words, “Noah Quakenbush, tell me your story.” Then I listened, ready to write. And it was really funny because he would not talk to me. I heard nothing but birds chirping from outside. Everybody clammed up, none of my characters would talk, and I got the sense that they were afraid to talk. This was Mallory’s story, and they knew it.

Okay, fine, I thought. I can get on board with that, but as the writer, I needed to find a voice structure that worked for the book.

In No Country for Old Men, Cormac McCarthy used both first and third-person voices. I studied that, then did an entirely new treatment of the novel, using the third-person voice for the main driving action of the story, with italicized first-person passages where the healed Mallory got to talk, sharing her insights. When my agent read it, she didn’t like those italicized passages. None of my readers did—they got in the way of the plot’s momentum, and messy Mallory was way more interesting.

It felt to me like I was in a wrestling match with my main character and I didn’t know how to make both of us happy.

At an author event with Elizabeth Strout, I asked her how she knew that first-person was the right voice for her Lucy Barton novels. She told me, “Voice is the golden thread that I follow when writing. I trust it implicitly.” Those words gave me the balls to press on and trust my crazy process.

What I found was the monologue. Instead of recounting what happened to Mallory as a backstory scene, I used first-person monologues in present-action scenes, where Mallory is finally able to tell her story for the first time. She can only do this once she meets Shay, and that makes their scenes so much more powerful. It was very moving to me, to hear a survivor talk after years of not being able to talk.

Finally, Mallory and I were in agreement.

I’m really glad I trusted my instincts and kept searching for the right way to tell this story. I do believe there is something to Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic, that as writers we are “neither slave to inspiration nor its masters, but something far more interesting—its partner.”

Click below to pre-order A Winter’s Rime, available 9.12.23!

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Author Features / New Releases / On Writing

Inspiration and Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge by Spencer Quinn!

July 11, 2023December 21, 2023Ariana Carpentieri5 Comments

Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge is bestselling author Spencer Quinn’s first novel in a new series since the meteoric launch of Chet and Bernie–introducing the irresistible and unforgettable Mrs. Plansky, in a story perfect for book clubs and commercial fiction readers.

Mrs. Loretta Plansky, a recent widow in her seventies, is settling into retirement in Florida while dealing with her 98-year-old father and fielding requests for money from her beloved children and grandchildren. Thankfully, her new hip hasn’t changed her killer tennis game one bit.

One night Mrs. Plansky is startled awake by a phone call from a voice claiming to be her grandson Will, who desperately needs ten thousand dollars to get out of a jam. Of course, Loretta obliges—after all, what are grandmothers for, even grandmothers who still haven’t gotten a simple “thank you” for a gift sent weeks ago. Not that she’s counting.

By morning, Mrs. Plansky has lost everything. Law enforcement announces that Loretta’s life savings have vanished, and that it’s hopeless to find the scammers behind the heist. First humiliated, then furious, Loretta Plansky refuses to be just another victim.

In a courageous bid for justice, Mrs. Plansky follows her only clue on a whirlwind adventure to a small village in Romania to get her money and her dignity back—and perhaps find a new lease on life, too.

Read below to see where Spencer Quinn drew his inspiration from when writing Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge!

Inspiration and Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge

Uh-oh. Inspiration is the topic. I’m a little afraid to even go there, in case the gods of inspiration are disturbed by my presence and vote to blacklist me. But unlike with any of the other novels I’ve written, the idea for Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge (my 45^th), came directly from a real life event, so maybe the gods will give me a pass.

Five or six years ago, my dad got a phone call. At the time he was in his early nineties. He died two weeks short of his 97^th birthday and was in excellent mental shape and very good physical shape until the end. I want to emphasize that mental part. He was a very smart guy: quick, sharp, clear-headed. Back to the call.

Caller: Hey, Grandpa!

My dad: Jake?

Caller: Yeah, Grandpa, it’s me, Jake.

Cut To: My dad’s wife, noticing he’s putting on his jacket.

Wife: Ed? Where are you going?

My dad: To the bank. Jake’s in trouble and he needs some money.

At that point it was decided to call Jake (living in another city), and he had not called my dad and wasn’t in any trouble. “Jake” never got a penny. But I was amazed that someone like my dad could have been fooled.

And then I got back to writing the Chet and Bernie novel I was working on and thought no more about the two Jakes. Then one day on a bike ride the idea for Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge—indeed the whole set-up, including the Romanian part—came to me in one fell swoop. Shall I summarize that now, or go on and on about bike riding, which I do all year round even though I live on Cape Cod where winter temps can dip into the 20’s or even lower, and how I actually prefer the cold days because no one else is on the bike path, so it’s like I’m in one of those dystopian Last Of Us stories, except it’s a utopia? No, that would be boring, so instead the set-up of Mrs. P.

Mrs. Plansky is a seventy-one year old retiree. She and her husband Norm sold a successful small business they built from nothing and moved to Florida for their sunset years, but Norm soon died. Mrs. P has a 98-year-old father in a fancy assisted living she pays for, plus a grown daughter and son with big dreams but not enough money to realize them. Mrs. P is the kind who helps out. She also has two grandchildren, one of whom is Will, out in Colorado. Late one night Mrs. P gets a call from him—a Jake type call—and, following his precise instructions, she sends $9726.18. She can afford it. Her grandson is in trouble. Case closed.

But it wasn’t Will. And because Mrs. P uses the same password for everything, the scammers have cleaned out not just her checking account but her retirement accounts as well, everything. The FBI tells her the scammers are probably in Romania, but identifying them would be almost impossible and the chances of getting her money back are nil. Mrs. P is humiliated. How stupid she’s been! And even worse: she’s let Norm down. She goes to Romania to recover her self-respect, the trust of a dead husband, her money.

So: that all dropped into my mind on the bike path but at first I didn’t connect it to my dad! Then I started wondering why I’d chosen the name Plansky. Bingo! Tony Plansky was a legendary track coach at Williams College, where the Navy had sent my dad in WW2 as part of their program to get officers (my dad commanded a sub chaser hunting Nazi U-boats in the Atlantic). My dad had run cross country at Williams and he had some funny stories about Tony Plansky. And when I went to Williams in the 1960’s he was still there! Therefore Mrs. Plansky’s name was the bridge to where my story had come from, even if I was too blockheaded to put it together myself. Just one more reason to love what my grandmother always called “the writing game.”

Above: Tony Plansky

Above: Ed Abrahams

Click below to pre-order your copy of Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge, available 7.25.23!

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Author Features / Behind the Scenes / On Writing

On Writing In Constraints by Jacqueline Carey

July 7, 2023July 6, 2023Rachel Taylor1 Comment

Writers love a challenge and today Jacqueline Carey, author of Kushiel’s Dart and the upcoming companion novel, Cassiel’s Servant, joins us on the blog to discuss the constraints around writing. Check it out here!

By Jacqueline Carey

I enjoy writing in constraints.

I’m not talking about the kind that come with straps and buckles and blindfolds… although to be fair, I’ve written about those constraints more than your average fantasy author. When your heroine has been chosen by the angel of punishment to experience pleasure in pain, you’ve got to expect a healthy dose of spice.

No, literary constraints are what I’m talking about. CASSIEL’S SERVANT is a companion novel. It mirrors KUSHIEL’S DART at every step of the way. From the outset, we see our protagonists embark as children on parallel paths, growing into the roles that will define them. And once their paths merge, the entirety of Joscelin’s actions and dialogue in CASSIEL’S SERVANT is constrained by the framework of KUSHIEL’S DART. And since that novel was narrated by Phèdre nó Delaunay, who misses little and forgets less, there wasn’t a whole lot of wiggle room in terms of events.

So why write it?

A number of years ago, I wrote a poem on commission for a benefit. I pledged an Elizabethan sonnet and polled readers. Overwhelmingly, fans wanted a love poem from Joscelin, my stoic warrior-priest, to Phèdre, the daring courtesan who stole his heart. For the first time, Joscelin spoke. Not just lines of dialogue—he opened up his inner narrative. And it turns out that my taciturn hero given to letting his blades talk for him is more thoughtful and self-aware than I knew, with a keen sense of the absurd.

I wasn’t sold on it right away. I took a detour into the desert with a different warrior brotherhood in STARLESS, but it wasn’t enough to silence Joscelin’s inner voice. It was stuck in my head like a refrain. Finally, I allowed myself to imagine what Phèdre and Joscelin’s journey might look like through his eyes.

A lot different.

One thing about constraints, they force you to be creative, patient and diligent. My Sundering duology was constrained by the concept—LORD OF THE RINGS reenvisioned as epic tragedy. It was constrained by copyright issues that meant I had to recreate Tolkien’s plot structure and build a world to support it in forms that were at once original and yet recognizable as mirrors of the source material.

More recently, MIRANDA AND CALIBAN is a retelling of Shakespeare’s The Tempest which was wholly constrained by the original source material. There’s a lot of empty space between the beginning and the ending of that play. Like twelve years’ worth! It allows room for creative improvisation.

Side note: Renaissance magic is wwaaaayy more boring than you might expect. My commitment to historical authenticity forged some surprising constraints. Renaissance magic is mostly astrology and casting horoscopes. Kind of like a slumber party for gouty mathematicians and their wealthy patrons.

In some ways, CASSIEL’S SERVANT might be the tightest literary squeeze yet. I had to adhere to my own original source material. Once we left the Prefectory of the Cassiline Brotherhood, there were very few opportunities for improvisation within the strictures of the plot.

But it doesn’t necessarily take a lot of space to land a knockout.

One thing (among many) for which Bruce Lee was famous was the “one-inch punch,” featured in various Southern Chinese martial arts styles. According to Wikipedia and the countless kung fu movies I watched in college, this is a skill which generates tremendous amounts of impact force at extremely close distances. MythBusters registered the impact of a one-inch punch at 153 lbs with a force gauge. Uma Thurman one-inch punched her way out of a buried coffin in Kill Bill.

For me, writing with constraints requires a similar skill. It forces me to concentrate on extracting the maximum dramatic impact from any pivotal scene. And the one place of freedom, of expansiveness, of infinite possibility, within the story as it unfurls is inside of Joscelin himself.

There’s a lot of intrigue in KUSHIEL’S DART. Picking apart the tangled threads is one of the pleasures Phèdre’s perspective as a courtesan, spy and pawn in this ongoing game of crowns and thrones affords.

Joscelin, on the other hand, would be hard put to care less about political intrigue. It’s not just that he’s uninterested in it—it takes a shocking turn of events for him to fully grasp the fact that this frivolous-seeming assignment is deadly serious. It’s also due to the fact that House Verreuil is basically a D’Angeline version of “old money”. Political maneuvering and speculation are considered gauche. If you have some interesting thoughts on dog breeding or hydraulics, they’re all ears, but money and politics are things one does not discuss in polite society.

Fittingly, Joscelin’s life is circumscribed by constraint. As the middle son of an old aristocratic family, he’s pledged from birth to the Cassiline Brotherhood, bound by tradition and filial duty. He’s bound by his vows and his own sense of honor. Falling in love with Phèdre is the one-inch punch that turns his world upside down and shatters his heart to pieces. Writing in constraints has its rewards!

There are plenty of fight scenes in CASSIEL’S SERVANT and I loved writing them from Joscelin’s view in the thick of the fray—even during the numerous times he went down swinging in captivity. But for me, nothing lands as hard as that one-inch punch of true love.

Jacqueline Carey is the New York Timesbestselling author of the critically acclaimed and award-winning Kushiel’s Legacy series of historical fantasy novels. Recent novels include the Shakespearean adaptation Miranda and Caliban and the epic fantasy standalone Starless. Carey enjoys doing research on a wide variety of arcane topics, and an affinity for travel has taken her from Iceland to China to date. She currently lives in West Michigan.

Pre-order opens in a new windowCassiel’s Servant Here:

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Author Features / New Releases / On Writing / What's New

Author Mixology: Crafting a Military Thriller that Packs a Punch and Goes Down Smooth

April 14, 2023July 11, 2023Ariana Carpentieri1 Comment

Dive into The Instructor, former Army intelligence officer T. R. Hendricks’ fast paced, action-packed debut thriller that’s Jack Reacher meets Survivorman, the first novel in the Derek Harrington series!

Derek Harrington, retired Marine Force Recon and SERE instructor, is barely scraping by teaching the basics of wilderness survival. His fledgling bushcraft school is on the cusp of going out of business and expenses are piling up fast. His only true mission these days? To get his ailing father into a full care facility and to support his ex-wife and their son.

When one of his students presents him with an opportunity too good to be true—$20,000 to instruct a private group for 30 days in upstate New York—Derek reluctantly takes the job, despite his reservations about the group’s insistence on anonymity. But it isn’t long before the training takes an unexpected turn—and a new offer is made.

Reaching out to an FBI contact to sound his concerns, Derek soon finds himself in deep cover, deep in the woods, embroiled with a fringe group led by a charismatic leader who will stop at nothing to get what he wants. When what he wants becomes Derek’s head, the teacher is pitted against his students as Derek races against time to stop what could very well be the first attack by the domestic terrorist cell.

Interested in getting a taste of what inspired T. R. Hendricks to write his pulse-pounding debut thriller, The Instructor? Then read onwards to see all of his ‘ingredients’ and how he mixes them together to create a recipe for the perfect story!

By T. R. Hendricks:

“THE INSTRUCTOR”

5 ounces of active duty service
3 ounces of 80’s action movies
½ cup of heavy metal anthems
1 tablespoon wilderness survival research
1 teaspoon adrenaline
Equal parts experience and emulation
A few dashes of cynical dark humor
Garnish with effort, determination, and belief

A lot of people ask the question, “what was your inspiration” behind my debut novel. While that is a unique story in its own right, in this age of the influencer I thought it might be unique to explore things that shaped my imagination and ultimately led to the story in THE INSTRUCTOR. An inspiration explanation with a twist, if you will…

At least in my case, it helps to have a solid foundation of military service to develop your story from, but this isn’t a necessity. Plenty of phenomenal authors like Nick Petrie and Connor Sullivan have crafted military veteran protagonists that so convincingly leapt from the page that I believed they both were veterans themselves. For me, my time on active duty lent itself to a wealth of experiences, interactions, knowledge, and even consequences that when blended with the rest of the recipe, made up the base of my story.

This can be both a blessing and a curse, if I’m being honest. Yes, technical items like unit structure and equipment; tactics, techniques, and procedures; even the slang servicemembers might use is easier to reproduce having lived that life for five years. On the flip side, many of the recollections of certain memories, ones that I may have worked a long time to banish and forget, can be difficult if not outright painful to work through as I impart them to the page. That’s the rub of experiences like that. They lend authenticity, “the been there, done that” feeling I want my readers to come away with. I benefit from relating my service and subsequent ramifications in that I gain a realism while also expunging some things I don’t wish to hold onto any longer in my own little cathartic methodology.

Foundation in place, we start adding in the ingredients that make up my military thriller. As a blue collar family, we didn’t have cable TV growing up. What we did have was an affinity for movies, action movies in particular, and an older brother who worked at the local library that happened to have a healthy selection of VHS tapes you could borrow. Through our constant consumption and evaluation of movies, I formulated from a very early age what elements work and where the fat can be trimmed when developing a kick-ass plotline.

For THE INSTRUCTOR in particular I have a couple of favorites that were the most relatable to getting this story going. One of my all time go-to’s, the kind of movie that you have to watch anytime it is on, is First Blood. Readers should easily be able to see the parallels between John Rambo and Derek Harrington in their training, internal struggle, and conflict with the antagonists. I was fixated on the scene in the movie where Rambo fashions all manner of booby traps and uses his superior tactical experience to neutralize the Sheriff’s deputies one by one. It’s still one of my favorite sequences in a film loaded with amazing sequences.

Predator tops the list of movie influences as well. A rescue mission deep in the jungle against an enemy camp that turns into a blistering fire fight. Add to that the “Boy Scout” traps that Dutch and team attempt to snare the Predator with and later the primitive weapons and traps that he uses to fight the alien hunter one on one. The movie has all of the action you need to create an edge-of-your-seat ride.

I would be remiss if I didn’t include perennial 80’s action giants like Lethal Weapon and Die Hard. I loved the Special Forces turned cop character of Martin Riggs, especially his expertise during the fire fight at Dry Lake, his fury during the pursuit of Mr. Joshua through the streets, and ultimately the hand-to-hand combat on Murtaugh’s front lawn. Riggs employed a triangle choke well before the popularity of BJJ and MMA, a move that I forever associated with elite training for that time. Riggs, like Rambo, is a flawed character dealing with his internal demons as much as external enemies.

I love the impact the John McClane character had on me. While true that McClane is not entirely untrained, as an NYPD detective he is much closer to that of the everyday Joe like you and I than he is to elite combatants found in the Special Operations community. This “everyday hero” concept stuck with me and, being a native New Yorker, I loved the inherent attitude and snark that John threw at Hans every chance he got.

Need to ratchet up the adrenaline even more when turning the pages? There’s a few choice songs that were my soundtrack to THE INSTRUCTOR. Anthems that got my blood boiling as I churned out the words, and ones that lend themselves to the heightened pace of the action sequences. Add these to the mix of my military thriller cocktail:

“Fuel,” “Blackened,” and “Master of Puppets” by Metallica
“Hail to the King” and “This Means War” by Avenged Sevenfold
“Savior” by Rise Against; “Kickstart My Heart” by Motley Crew
“Faint,” “Numb,” and “Bleed it Out” by Linkin Park
“Ace of Spades” by Motorhead
“Wash it All Away” by Five Finger Death Punch

As an extra track, I’ve always envisioned the movie trailer to THE INSTRUCTOR set to the cover of “Bad Company” by FFDP. Something about the lines, “I was born, a shotgun in my hands. Behind the gun, I’ll make my final stand,” always resonated with me for Derek’s arc in the book. A man seemingly put on this earth to fight, and despite his best efforts to not do so any longer, he finds himself right back in the thick of battle.

Experience is that which adds the human element. What makes Derek a tangible, realistic person with all of his complex flaws and attributes. In this I relate most of my own struggles with reintegration to civilian life after the military, and the at times crushing nature of wrestling with the full spectrum of PTSD symptoms and episodes. For emulation, all of the credit in the world goes to my own father. A man who sacrificed his personal safety, security, and well being in order to ensure his family had exactly that for 20+ years. In doing so, he set the example to my brothers and I of what it means to be a person of honor, integrity, and loving devotion.

He was also a major contributor to those dashes of dark, cynical humor being developed in all of us, but in no way was he the only one. The types of jokes and overwhelmingly raucous nature with which we all communicate is a direct result of being raised in and a part of a family of soldiers, Marines, corrections and police officers, and yes, even mailmen. If you pick up on the edge in Derek’s dialogue and humor, now you know where it came from.

Rounding out this boozy beverage are critical components. For the sake of the recipe I labeled them as garnishes, but make no mistake, effort, determination, and belief are as critically important to this cocktail as any of the other ingredients. Maybe even more so, and you don’t want just dashes. You want teeming fistfulls of them. Belief in yourself, in your abilities, that you will one day succeed in this writing endeavor gives the drink all the flavor you can muster. Yet talent only can only get you so far, so being determined and putting in the effort is what will up the proof and deliver the kick that will have people screaming for a refill as soon as they’re done.

So there you go, thriller fans. The concoction to compliment your dive into my debut. Throw everything in the mixer. Give it a good shake. Pour it over an ice mold, let it mellow a bit, and then enjoy each sweet and savory sip of adrenaline soaked wilderness survival. Down the hatch.

This round’s on me.

Click below to order your copy of The Instructor, available now!

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Author Features / On Writing

Who Needs a Villain? 5 Great Books That Do Just Fine Without

March 15, 2023March 16, 2023Rachel Taylor20 Comments

Does every book or movie HAVE to feature The Ultimate Big Bad ^(TM) to make it a good, entertaining piece of fiction? J. S. Dewes, author of opens in a new windowRubicon, joins us to talk about some of her favorite examples of media with less traditional villains. Check it out here!

By J. S. Dewes

A child of the 90s and early aughts, I grew up in a golden age of the cinematic masterpiece known as the disaster movie. Many a night was spent binge-watching laserdiscs of Twister, Independence Day, Volcano, White Squall, Outbreak, Armageddon, Titanic, Deep Impact, need I go on.

As an introvert terrified of interpersonal conflict, the notion of a dramatic premise that didn’t require traditional antagonists spoke directly to my soul. Why bother fighting each other when you can instead band together to fight MOTHER NATURE?

So it should come as no surprise that when I started brainstorming for my debut novel The Last Watch, my instincts led me directly toward a villainless premise. As castoff miscreants and criminal soldiers, many of my characters would make decent antagonists in their own rights, yet instead my motley crew joins forces to undertake the not so small task of preventing the collapse of the universe.

While writing, I never even considered including any kind of traditional villain—my poor characters really didn’t need a Big Bad thwarting their every move with the universe itself opposing them at every turn. (That was until I realized the story was, in fact, a series, and that a more traditional antagonist may be called for as the story expands, but I digress.)

As a child, I also happened to be an avid reader, and often looked to sate my disaster movie cravings with literature. Though finds are too few and far between, I’ve discovered a few amazing novels over the years that help scratch that disaster movie itch.

opens in a new windowNight of the Twisters by Ivy Ruckman

Night of the Twisters follows twelve-year-old Dan and his best friend, who are caught at home alone with Dan’s baby brother when a tornado watch is issued. They take shelter in the basement just before a tornado strikes, leveling the house. Though they survive, they have a long night ahead—it’s only the first of seven tornados that will strike before dawn.

As the first and only “disaster fiction” I came across in elementary school, I became briefly obsessed with Night of the Twisters (and its admittedly regretful made-for-TV movie of the same name—if you recall it fondly, please don’t look it up now.)

Looming tornadic activity was a staple of my Midwestern childhood summers, so I found it particularly fascinating to read such a realistic account of this kind of disaster. The warning signs and resulting storm are rendered in intense detail, and though certainly a book for young readers, it really doesn’t hold back when it comes to stakes and tension. Kids persevering without or despite adults is a common enough staple in kidlit, though I’ve not seen another set in the framework of such a realistic natural disaster. The twelve-year-old protagonist’s custody of his baby brother is enough to keep you on the edge of your seat, nevermind adding seven tornados into the mix.

opens in a new windowRendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke

It’s the year 2131 when a mysterious, massive interstellar spacecraft arrives in the solar system. The crew of the Endeavor is sent to investigate, and within they uncover a vast alien world filled with unforeseen wonders.

As my default “what’s your favorite book” answer, Rendezvous with Rama holds a special place in my heart. It wasn’t until writing this very article that I realized that may be in large part due to the fact that it fulfills this “no-villains-needed” conflict niche I so desperately crave.

Rama brilliantly showcases two of my all-time favorite science fiction tropes: BDOs (“Big Dumb Objects”) and competent professionals just doing their jobs while making decisions they don’t get paid nearly enough to make. Both tropes naturally perform well in narratives without typical antagonists, inherently possessing plenty of hooks for conflict and tension. Together they work to even greater effect: throw your cast of competent characters at/into a BDO, pit them against any given Impossible Alien Task, and sit back to watch the struggle unfold.

The argument could be made for some late-game bureaucratic Bad Guys (whose *exhausted sigh*-inspiring actions spawn exactly the type of delightful heroic gesture our competent professionals are designed to thwart), but ultimately that all serves as a backdrop for the mainstage on which Rama shines its brightest: exploration of the wonderous unknown, doing right by humanity, and just trusting the scientists, FFS.

opens in a new windowThe Giver by Lois Lowry

Surely you know this one, but just in case: The Giver follows twelve-year-old Jonas, living a peaceable if not bland life in an apparent utopia. When he becomes apprentice to the sole keeper of the community’s memories, he learns some dangerous truths about society and history, and soon realizes he must find a way to escape the confines of their community in order to save his loved ones.

As a kid, this one hit me really hard; I remember thinking, “STORIES CAN END THIS WAY?!” And I know that very ending is what many people don’t like about it, but I was beyond thrilled. It felt like a door of endless possibilities had been kicked wide open. As with life, not everything is always so black and white (unintentional reference, I swear) and sometimes answers aren’t clear-cut or tied up with tidy expository bows.

Though the elders are ostensibly villainous, I’d argue their own ignorance precludes them from attaining true Bad Guy status. Jonas’s journey is more about surmounting his own beliefs and understanding of reality, and as a result his “antagonist” is basically everything—expectation, propriety, society, regulation, trust, resources, fear, “Sameness,” all of human history, even memory itself.

opens in a new windowFail-Safe by Eugene Burdick & Harvey Wheeler

A series of technical glitches and miscommunications bring the United States and Russia to the brink of nuclear war. As both sides struggle to avert disaster, the unthinkable soon proves unavoidable, and omnicide can only be averted via massive mutual sacrifice.

Picked up at a garage sale when I was twelve, Fail-Safe served as my first exposure to the concept of mutually assured destruction. And I was fascinated.

Though the broad strokes of the plot are deceptively simple, it’s rather more detailed and character-driven than you’d think. At twelve I should have found the politicking in this book boring at best, yet I couldn’t put it down. Despite decades of separation and my utter ignorance of the Cuban Missile Crisis or even the Cold War, the authors still managed to convey the tension, hostility, bitterness, and mistrust of the era, capturing an eerie depiction of the dangerous precipice we lingered on for so long—all without any kind of caricature villain to do the heavy lifting. The antagonist in this case is very clearly circumstance—the reality that’s resulted from the decisions and actions of the characters and their predecessors, American and Russian alike.

Though plenty tragic, in retrospect it’s a shockingly optimistic tale given the time it was written in. Though today this would get shelved alongside Tom Clancy and the like, in my brain it occupies the same general slot as other unnervingly realistic radiative stories like How I Live Now, The Day After, and my all-time favorite disaster depiction: HBO’s Chernobyl.

opens in a new windowThe Effort by Claire Holroyde

A massive comet is discovered to be on a collision-course with Earth, heralding an extinction-level event. While scientists from across the globe come together to devise a solution, civilization threatens to devolve around them.

A relatively new addition to the apocalyptic fiction genre, The Effort is the most recent book to have reminded me of my disaster movie lover roots.

The Effort is like if Karen Thompson Walker’s The Dreamers and the aforementioned Fail-Safe had a book baby, but swap the disease/nukes for a comet. It presents complicated sociopolitical issues through a disaster movie lens—featuring a sprawling cast and multiple storylines, each with its own unique set of crises and challenges to face.

The villain here is society itself, and the tentative, fragile instability of modern civilization that we take for granted every day. It’s another that fits nicely in the “hauntingly realistic” category. Contemplative above all else, it’s definitely the type of story with more questions than answers, leaving you with plenty to chew on.

As a kid, stories like these kickstarted my imagination more so than any other kind (and still do). They allow me to imagine a broader purview of conflict—one that doesn’t force a clear dichotomy of protagonist vs. antagonist, enabling a unique approach to storytelling you just can’t arrive at any other way.

Don’t get me wrong, I love me a well-realized villain—whether relatable, morally gray, lawful neutral, unrelentingly evil, you name it—but I’ll always hold a special place in my heart for these kind of high-stakes, all-is-lost narratives that are able to showcase humanity at its most stubborn and determined—and working together to achieve great things.

(Please fill the comments with your favorite novels lacking traditional villains (especially humanity vs nature) because I need more in my life, and you do too.)

J. S. Dewes is the author of opens in a new windowThe Last Watch, on sale 4/20/21. The second book in the series, opens in a new windowThe Exiled Fleet, hits shelves everywhere on 8/17/21.

Pre-order Rubicon here

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Author Features / On Writing

‘The Reluctant World-Maker’ by Scott Drakeford

January 25, 2023February 7, 2023Rachel Taylor1 Comment

opens in a new windowWhat does it take to make your fantasy world come alive on paper? Last year, Scott Drakeford wrote his debut fantasy, opens in a new windowRise of the Mages, and also joined us on the blog to talk about his book and the worldbuilding that came with writing it. Check out his post below, and then check out Rise of the Mages, now available in paperback!

By Scott Drakeford

Fantasy worlds give life to nearly infinite possibilities. For many, including myself, they are places of escape. But fantasy and genre fiction are so much deeper than that: for both authors and readers, these fictional worlds are the perfect medium in which to work through your fears, your hopes, your traumas, your triumphs.

This was certainly the case for me as I built the world in which Rise of the Mages, the first book of the Age of Ire series, takes place.

RiseOfTheMages-world2-REV-sig

I’m not a natural worldbuilder. I can’t close my eyes and conjure worlds. I can’t draw for shit. Geography by itself doesn’t particularly interest me.

Luckily, stories – even fantasy stories – are more than just make-believe settings. The people, cultures, relationships, governments, even the animals that inhabit any given geography are far more interesting to me than the landscape itself. I build my world around my characters and my story, and I build my characters and story around meaningful ideas or events that have left a mark on me. In other words, it’s okay to work backward! This isn’t math class, there is no such thing as cheating. Uh… other than copyright infringement, I guess. Don’t do that.

Behold, the primary catalysts that shaped the world of Rise of the Mages:

Technology, Magic, and Power Sources

Writing Rise of the Mages in 2012 began as something of an attempt to understand an experienced reality that was very different from the strict religious world-view I had been raised with. A fantasy world was the perfect sandbox to play in and safely ask such questions as, “If miraculous power – magic, if you will – such as that claimed in various religious texts was real, what might it look like?”

As I put words on pages, it became clear to me that the entire belief system of my early life did not meet my definition of truth. Such a huge swing in core beliefs does not happen easily or quickly, however, and my fantasy world was the perfect place to mentally come to grips with the facts.

From there, the engineer and science amateur in me took over. I find it curious that most of the processes that comprise life are chemical in nature. Yes, there is a physics component to that chemistry in that our brain and central nervous system use electrical signals to control the chemically-powered meat puppet that is the human body. Even most of the external processes that humanity has used to survive for millennia are chemical in nature, however. Harnessing the power of electromagnetic energy is a relatively recent phenomenon (thanks, Nikola Tesla!).

What if, and here’s where the nerdery begins, humans could harness natural electromagnetic energy, similar to how our bodies utilize chemical processes? Electromagnetism is inherently less contained than chemical processes – even the relatively minuscule activity in the brain can be read by Electroencephalography devices. What if that ability to harness electromechanical energy similarly extended to a person’s immediate surroundings? That might look a hell of a lot like magic.

One step of handwavium further, what if the electromechanical energy were, therefore, humanity’s primary source of energy that powered the majority of their technological advances?

And thus, infusori was born. Nothing has shaped the map of Rise of the Mages more than infusori. Because it is such a powerful energy source, and because the world’s most advanced technology depends on it, the sources of this energy, called infusori Wells, are extremely valuable (quite like oil sources have been for the past century or so in our own world). Though much of the current society in Rise of the Mages is on the cusp of an industrial revolution, infusori has been valuable enough throughout history that most major cities are either built next to Wells, act as hubs for infusori and other trade, or both.

The Plot

It seems silly now, but at the time I started this book, one of my little brothers had just joined the military. Army recruiters had convinced him that he had a good shot at joining the Rangers or other special forces despite having a barely functional achilles tendon. This also happened to be around the time that ISIS was just beginning to emerge in the Middle East. I, like many creatives, have an overactive and severely anxious mind that insisted on conjuring scenarios where I’d have to either let my brother die or rescue him from ISIS myself. To be clear, I’m extremely unfit for anything like that, but that didn’t stop my brain from playing this scenario over and over again.

My brother’s achilles tendon gave out and he was sent home a few months into basic training, but the seed for the story stuck. This first book would be an action-adventure story and a tip of the cap to my love for my own brothers. “They” say you should write what you know. I haven’t stabbed many people, and I, unfortunately, don’t have any magical abilities. But I know what it feels like to be willing to do anything for my family, as I think many of us do.

For this to work, I needed places for my characters to go! My world quickly became densely populated, with plenty of cities and smaller towns within a quick ride of the larger capital and “university town”, Myntar, where the story begins. This meant that the regions immediately surrounding it needed to be relatively fertile to support moderately large populations.

At least in part because I love hunting and fishing, I have a soft spot in my heart for wild places too, however. I also wanted to feature plenty of dense forests, impassable mountains, serene waterscapes, and of course, remnants of long-lost civilizations. This meant that there would have to be viable forms of fast and effective transport: established roads, large navigable rivers, and the like.

Many other real-world interests and events inspired the story, characters, and world of Rise of the Mages. What were they? Read and find out!

SCOTT DRAKEFORD is a longtime lover of the written word, especially fantasy fiction. Rise of the Mages is his debut epic fantasy.

Order opens in a new windowRise of the Mages here:

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Author Features / New Releases / On Writing / What's New

The Return of the Reluctant Hero by Kent Lester

December 13, 2022July 11, 2023Ariana Carpentieri4 Comments

A high-octane thriller that sets Dan Clifford against ancient secret societies vying for power in the modern world; in the vein of Dan Brown’s Robert Langdon series.

In The Third Instinct, author Kent Lester brings his signature blend of cutting-edge science, history, and pulse-pounding action to the next Dan Clifford adventure.

Read below to see Kent’s take on what it means to write about heroes with flaws—ones grounded in reality and who are easy to relate to.

By Kent Lester:

What type of fiction? Over the top, or realistic? That is a question most authors ask themselves before starting a new thriller series. There is a place for both writing styles, but my favorite is “near science fiction,” a fantasy world realistic enough to imagine happening in the near future.

When an author chooses a fictional writing style, nothing anchors the story in reality or sends it into the realm of fantasy more effectively than the choice of hero. Is the hero an ordinary guy or a superhero? The trend lately has been toward superheroes, characters occupying a fantastical setting that barely resembles the “real world.” This trend has probably been influenced by the rise in cinematic special effects and the popularity of the comic book universe. In high concept movies, heroes are often gifted with incredible abilities, over-the-top talents, and often, the power to alter reality itself.

Think Superman or Wonder Woman. The antics of superheroes can often stretch credulity, but their superhuman abilities do make for impressive cinematic special effects, spectacular visual imagery, and lots of action. Sure, all those special effects and superhuman feats can stretch the imagination, but often at the cost of empathy and identification with the hero. And naturally, superheroes beget super villains, and soon the entire story premise becomes an overwrought graphic novel. Movies with an excess of special effects encourage passive viewing and a bored audience. With little emotional involvement in the characters, a flashy story is easily forgotten.

The most enduring movies are ones with a realistic premise and flawed, reluctant heroes. Think John McClain in Die Hard or Lisbeth Salander in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

In literary storytelling, the choice of hero is even more critical. I’ve always considered books to be a far more active endeavor than movies, so much so, that I often remind my fellow writers that their novels are a shared experience. Every fictional story is a partnership between two imaginations: the author’s and the reader’s. Unlike movies with their fully formed scenes, words on a page cry out for interpretation and embellishment. The reader becomes the author’s writing accomplice, filling in the missing details that inevitably hide between the words on the page. This probably explains how two readers can often interpret a single story so differently, because their individual viewpoints influence the perceived events.

To fully embrace the importance of a story’s hero, we should reexamine the purpose of storytelling in the first place. Ever since the first adventures were breathlessly whispered around a campfire, humans have been drawn to stories. One reason is to feel in control of a world filled with random threats and challenges. Our imaginations are always in control, free to craft the outcome however we wish. We can also learn lessons from others’ mistakes. Stories also allow us to empathize with the feelings of others, to walk in their shoes and experience the story through their eyes. Most importantly, stories allow us to work through our own personal problems and fears in the relative safety of a story’s fictional universe.

That’s why I prefer my heroes to be grounded in reality, because it makes it easier to imagine myself walking around in their shoes. In the so-called “real world,” heroes are seldom born; they are made by the necessity and demands of the situation.

In my latest thriller, The Third Instinct, Dan Clifford is the consummate reluctant hero. (as are most real-world heroes) Dan just wants to return to normalcy after the Covid pandemic and share his ordinary life with his adrenaline-junkie girlfriend, Rachel Sullivan. Unfortunately for Dan, and thankfully for the reader, the real world has a different scenario in mind for Dan’s future. Circumstances will demand that Dan overcome a set of challenges two thousand years in the making. As he determines the truth in a pack of lies, he will discover the hero within himself through incredible hardships.

It is my hope that readers will be able to identify with Dan’s vision, and in doing so, imagine an adventure through their own unique viewpoints. To me, the best fiction inspires us to think about issues in the real world, and our own roles within it. If, however, you just want a good beach read or a mindless adventure, don’t worry. The Third Instinct has plenty of literary special effects and superhuman challenges to keep your imagination occupied. Enjoy!

Click below to order your copy of The Third Instinct, available now!

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Extras / Lists / On Writing / What's New

The Atlas Paradox Playlist

August 29, 2022May 17, 2024a cat2 Comments

opens in a new windowLooking for new tunes? How about new tunes AND a new book?

Superstar author Olivie Blake has put together the vibiest playlist of all time to pair with opens in a new windowThe Atlas Paradox, sequel to dark academia sensation / BookTok sensation / general sensation opens in a new windowThe Atlas Six.

Check it out!

By Olivie Blake

People often ask me whether I need music to write, which is a complicated question to answer. While I tend to find lyrics distracting (I’m much more inclined to make homonymic errors if music is playing whilst in the process of creation), I’m a big believer in curating a type of meditative dreamscape that necessarily precedes any productive writing period. Neil Gaiman famously emphasizes the necessity of daydreaming for creation, and I fully agree. For me, music is essential for crafting what can only be properly called a vibe.

While opens in a new windowThe Atlas Six Playlist is a lot of what I consider the soundtrack to one big cinematic fist-fight (in my head, that’s what the book is, although most of the aggression plays out in the form of sexual, ethical, or actual tension) the playlist for its sequel, opens in a new windowThe Atlas Paradox, is a little bit different. The book itself is different—as our view of the world outside the Alexandrian Society expands, so does our understanding of the characters and their respective stakes.

Traditionally I write by mood, meaning that one song can represent a variety of relationships with overlapping themes. As a result, I’ve split the playlist into a four part symphony of desire, betrayal, love, and revenge, based on the common motifs that reveal themselves throughout the Atlas series.

Part I: Ticking Clocks

This is the tension portion of the playlist. Lust, ambition, desire… maybe a little self-sabotage. Some pain for the palate to pair with an old world vintage, a newfound hatred, or a masochistic craving for an old flame.

Till Now – Banks

I am not a woman, I’m a god – Halsey

Kult (feat. Jasiah) – Steve Aoki & grandson

Bitter (with Kito) – FLETCHER

Hate Myself – Bryce Fox

One Way Or Another – Until the Ribbon Breaks

Novocaine – Dream Chief

Part II: Hydra’s Heads

Here is where we keep the irony and the anger, the bitterness of personal and institutional betrayal. The world, not unlike the Society manor house, is a troublesome place, and one without much logic to the pain it inflicts. On some level or another, these songs know it.

Aristocrats – Raleigh Ritchie

Scream! – Judah and the Lion

Monster – STARSET

The Devil is Human – AURORA

ley lines – Flor

take it back – JAWNY & Beck

Where Do We Go From Here? – Misterwives

Hometown – twenty one pilots

Part III: Golden Hour

Every playlist needs a little softness. These are the love songs, which range from toxic to desperate to true. These are meant to reflect the glimpses of intimacy woven inescapably throughout the book, some of which yield more sweetness than others.

Don’t Fade – Vance Joy

Girls Make Me Want to Die – The Aces

Aura – Cuco

Archetype – Omar Apollo

Bittersweet (feat. Dashboard Confessional) – Sam Tinnesz

Cold Heart – The Kooks

Pretty – Astrid S & Dagny

Little Freak – Harry Styles

Wretched – Bartees Strange

Magic – Coldplay

Part IV: Ashes from the Fall / Olympus is Empty

And finally, to close out the listening experience, a sense that rage can always be rekindled and put to good use when it comes to revenge. This is where we put the productive anger, the righteous suffering, and the sense that this is not the end. (And truly, it isn’t… but as for what book 3 holds? That’s one secret I’ll never tell. XOXO, Olivie.)

sadder badder cooler – Tove Lo

Revolution – Bishop Briggs

Set in Stone – Brandyn Burnette

Wake Up – Young the Giant

Red Sun – Big Wild

Same Team – Alice Merton

We Did It!!! – grandson

Burn Me Down – Sophie Simmons

OLIVIE BLAKE is the pseudonym of Alexene Farol Follmuth, a lover and writer of stories. She has penned several indie SFF projects, including the webtoon Clara and the Devil with illustrator Little Chmura and the BookTok-viral Atlas series. As Alexene, she has written a young adult rom-com, My Mechanical Romance. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, new baby, and rescue pit bull.

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“THE INSTRUCTOR”

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Technology, Magic, and Power Sources

The Plot

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Part I: Ticking Clocks

Part II: Hydra’s Heads

Part III: Golden Hour

Part IV: Ashes from the Fall / Olympus is Empty

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