Recently best-selling author Dave Farland wrote this article about the cost of magic. It’s an argument I’ve encountered before, and the short version is, everything must have a cost. If you cast a spell, the power has to come from somewhere. It’s the basic Law of the Conservation of Energy, one of the rules that keeps the universe ticking along. In other … Read More
Guest post: Logan Masterson on the Facets of Death
Logan Masterson (that’s not him above) is, like me, a Tennessee writer of speculative fiction. Below he talks about death in fiction, how it affects us, and why it’s important. Facets of Death No, not faces, facets. In fiction. Fictional facets of the very real human experience. Let’s get into that. The Tufa, they have an eye on death, and means … Read More
Thoughts on Black Widow and Joss Whedon, two months late
(I’m always behind the curve on whatever’s cool, which is why I’m posting about The Avengers: Age of Ultron while everyone else is discussing Jurassic World.) It’s no secret that many fans, particularly feminists, had issues with Age of Ultron when it debuted a few weeks back. Their ire centers around writer-director Joss Whedon’s treatment of Black Widow, a.k.a. “the … Read More
The Music of Release Day
So today, the third Tufa novel, Long Black Curl, hits stores and devices. The pre-release reviews have been good ones, and that’s always a comfort. But the finally judgment really comes from the people who buy it. Hopefully, you. Like Wisp of a Thing, the prior novel in the series, this book also features song lyrics by contemporary indie artists. Here’s … Read More
Some Thoughts on the Chosen One
There is a concept, a hidden implication, in the original Star Trek series that James T. Kirk might not be unique. He might be merely one of many Starfleet captains out there boldly going, having amazing adventures across the galaxy. After all, the Enterprise is one of a dozen identical starships, and the rest are certainly not sitting in space … Read More
Guest blog: Sonya Clark on Getting the Music Right
I meet a lot of writers through social media, and one day I was chatting with Sonya Clark, author of the Magic Born trilogy and two novels in the Bradbury Institute series. It turns out she’s working on a novel about music, and her thoughts on that intrigued me so much that I asked her to share them with my blog readers. … Read More
Seeing It a New Way
In my teen writing class at the Mount Horeb Public Library last week, we segued into discussing Catcher in the Rye, and one of my students made the following observation (which I’m paraphrasing): Some of my friends have said that, since the characters in the book were rich, Holden’s problems weren’t that significant. But in so many other books I’ve read, … Read More
Talk like a pirate, win a book
So this Friday, September 19th, is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. Now that’s something I can really get behind. I love pirates. From The Black Swan to The Sea Hawk, from Raphael Sabatini to William Goldman, from Errol Flynn to Johnny Depp, I dig them all. And not just the fictional ones: I’ve seen Blackbeard’s cannon and Black Sam … Read More
Out today: Wickedly Dangerous by Deborah Blake
One of the perks of my job is that I get asked to give blurbs to upcoming books, which means I also get to read them long before they come out. Usually such requests come from editors, or agents, or writers I’ve met at conferences, but occasionally they come from good friends who also happen to be good writers. That’s … Read More
Cruel to be Kind: Killing Off a Major Character
Occasionally, because I’m not really that smart, I’ll put out a call for blog ideas. And sometimes I get one that’s so original there’s just no way to ignore it. So thanks to Claudia Tucker for asking: “Have you ever been tempted to ‘kill’ your main characters off and start with a new Hero who might be a an offspring … Read More