Epic fantasy formulas are usually thus: An ordinary young person, (usually a boy, but also sometimes a girl), discovers something unique about him or herself: a hidden talent or a prophesy, or maybe they can swallow swords while juggling cats, I don’t know. And it turns out that this secret is what saves the world. …
Read more “The Character-Driven Epic: The Hero’s Journey and the Drive to Succeed”
A while back, I posted a link to fanfiction I wrote when I was 14. I’m not going to do it again; I’d like to spare you from further eye-gouging opportunities, especially in the likely scenario that you’ve never read any of my stuff before. I’ve improved, I swear. I think people have this image …
Read more “When Everything You Write Is Shit: Why Young Writers Should Not Give Up”
Last weekend, we went up to the Purcell Mountains in BC to do an overnight hike and some sightseeing. I’ve been wanting to go up to this area for years, but have not been able to build up the stamina to do so until now. By stamina, I don’t mean about the actual hike itself. …
I‘m not exactly sure who made character-driven epic fantasy a thing. Certainly, the popularity of GRR Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series might have done a lot to turn the tide from the old-fashioned epic fantasy (good vs. evil, chosen hero, ridiculously deranged villain) to the shades-of-grey, good-guys-are-bad-guys-too epics of today. I follow the …
My upcoming novel, Birthplace, is the first book in a series about werebeasts from Filipino folklore: the aswang. It is also, incidentally, the first book I’ve written that isn’t in the epic fantasy genre…it is paranormal YA. A sort of long, kind of bloody, definitely M-rated paranormal YA. The working title of this book was “My Anti-Twilight.” I’ll leave …
