Fantasy Magic: Internally Consistent or Author Fiat?

When it comes to fantasy, the magic system is often very central.  If not to the plot itself the options available to characters often rely on rules and restrictions of their magic systems.  There are two main types of ways (and many points between those two) authors handle those limitations to their characters.  One is by having a rigorous magic system with it’s own internally consistent rules.  It in essence becomes another type of technology that gives predictable outcomes if one takes specific steps to achieve them.  The other is magic more as mystery or a story device.  If you treat it this way it seems like a capricious force that achieves things without the reader or character being able to know why, or the character being able to replicate the same effect again.

A lot of older fantasy fiction and myths occur like the later description.  Magic in stories was a way to have the mysterious or even frightening happen. Those that could use it would be rare, and follow more the paths of a mythological hero than anything else. Early fantasy fiction followed this.  For example Gandalf as a wizard does very little that the modern day would consider “magical” in the Lord of the Rings.  He fights with his sword more than anything else, and most of his wizard abilities were small, illusory, or using obscure lore.  He could however suddenly do things completely unexpected and not foreshadowed, like essentially coming back from the dead.  Even greek and norse gods seemed to only have the abilities that fit the needs of the specific tales they were in.  The one exception to this was at times magic items would do the same things every time, whether it be a ring of invisibility or a spear that causes thrones to sprout out of it’s target.

Modern fantasy seems to be more informed by the fact that many of its readers have been role playing gamers, or played video games or other media which are influenced by specific rules. There is still some leeway for surprise effects, like letting a character have fire magic without codifying each and every use of this before it happens.  Then the mage who normally throws fireballs at its enemy can summon a firestorm and go unconscious from the fire during he final battle (or even burn themselves up) without it seeming “deus ex machine” or to occur by fiat.  Some authors (such as Brandon Sanderson) might add appendixes so you know exactly the limitations and abilities of each “branch” of fantastical powers available.

Whichever you choose, it’s best to stick to one of them, or whatever place you decided in between, the whole series.  If people can use their abilitiesonly  in certain logical ways most of the times, but at key story climax times unexpected capricious things happen it can leave a reader feeling frustrated.

The mysterious version is best if you want the characters themselves and most of the denizens of their world afraid or awed by magic.  If almost no one knows how it works then it gives a feeling of amazement when it does show, or if it works differently every time even those using it cannot rely on it for they do not know what effects will happen when they use it.  Many dark fantasies like Game of Thrones and Chronicles of Covenant make magic either rare or capricious, so that no one relies on it for they never know what outcomes will happen.  If a main character uses it even they should be afraid to use those abilities for dark consequences may happen.

Those that want to build a world different but similar enough to our own will often choose to have their magic systems following laws our minds can understand.  As stated before this is common to those who come to fantasy from genres outside of older literature (comics, video and role playing games, similarities to some sciences, etc) often expect it. In these worlds magic is less a taboo dark force than it is a consistent tool that just could not exist in our own universe.  This is a great system to use when also crating world with culture or flavors like our own (something that feels Victorian, renaissance Italian, ancient Celtic), etc sicne our minds accept it in the same way we would accept a weapon or other tool a culture uses that we do not.

Poll:

What is your preference for magic systems in your fantasy literature?

1)Open and unreliable

2)Defined and methodical

3)Whatever works for the book it is in since as long as it is consistent.

4)Don’t care at all.

Book Update:

I am probably about 60% through the first draft of Rise From the Sun Below, the second Allmother’s Fire book.  In the conceptual stage I am deciding what series to do next, between two different series, and a standalone book idea.

World Info:

Bodies of water are an interesting thing in this universe.  There are no oceans, so most water is confined to well spots or occasionally canals and streams.  Streams do go off the island, but instead of falling down into the Sun Below they careen back to the under portions of the island and then go back into the steams and different points.  If one wanted to they could try to pilot a small boat of the side of an island, but no knows if they would make it back up the island again, or careen down into the sun below.

A few islands actually have large lakes, and this is the closest anyone in the universe has to Oceans.  There are tales of islands that have lakes large enough to be similar to our Oceans, yet no one has ever been able to map how to go there, so it may just be a tale. It is certainly spoken of in the past of lakes large enough to be Oceans, and if this is not true then it is curious why airships looks almost exactly like ships that in our world would cross the Oceans.  Some whisper that this is just one more mystery suppressed by the Allmother’s church.

Reviews: Life Blood of Independent/Self Published Books

As per the title, without reviews independent and even more so, self-published books, wither away and disappear.  Without a giant media machine letting you know you should buy something, or buying reviews in Locus or other major review organizations the only way most readers know if they are truly interested in your work is in reviews.  The two most important for this are Amazon Product review and Goodreads.  Without these things, your book is lost amongst the glut of self-published fiction, with nothing but maybe your cover and product description to distinguish yourself.

In some ways the Amazon Product Reviews are the most important.  A prospective reader can tell if someone actually bought the product, and Amazon does a good job filtering out sock puppet accounts and false reviews.  There is also an immediacy to it, especially if you book is a Kindle only one, for they can scroll down and see the whole review right away.  If something happens to make it so that they are already reading your description (such as your cover catching their eye, a free promo day kicking you up in the rankings, hearing about your work on twitter) this is probably the best type of review to have.  However this does not normally help someone learn about your book and something had to already draw them to that product description page for it to do any good.

Therefore Goodreads reviews can be excellent to have also.  Many people like to use Goodreads, especially if their friends with someone, or someone has similar reading tastes to them.  The way a reader tags your book is good too, for it can show up in searches more frequently.  From my own personal experience my Goodreads reviews seem to be by people giving more in depth reactions to my book than my amazon reviewers, but that is only anecdotal evidence.

Other ways available for your book to be review include personal and professional blogs.  The more widely read the blog is the better it is for you.  However this sets up an issue that the very wide read blogs are often booked up and so it can either take forever for someone to review your book this way, or they may not even try if there are not enough reviews on your book already.  This is where it helps to have reviews on Amazon or Goodreads, to show that other people found the novel worth their time.

If you really want to thank an independent/self-published author for writing a book you enjoyed then write a review on one of the above places.  Even if it’s not perfect, any word of mouth and honest opinion does help, and it’s more genuine that way.  You do not have to give a glowing 5 star review to make an author very pleased that someone took their time enough not only to read what they wrote, but to give an opinion about it later.  All of this is of course because my newest book Mandatory Paradise is very new, and looking very lonely with no reviews anywhere.

Poll

If you read Reviews, where do you get them from? (you can choose more than one)

1)Amazon

2)Goodreads

3)Small Personal Blogs

4)Large Review Blogs

5)Libraryanything

6)Shelfari

7)Other, put in the comments below

 

World Tidbit – Allmother’s Fire

The Grand Laws of the Universe are often said just like that in one large unwieldy phrase.  The Grand Laws are not put in just one specific book, but are all the combined observations of scholars and philosophers throughout the Centuries of how the world normally runs.  Families with Domain over a certain aspect can Loophole them, but they still follow some sort of internal logic with a cost for what they do.

Many philosophers have thought of codifying what the Laws are so that they can be read in all of one book.  The Allmother’s church however has a distaste for the written word, and discourages such movements whenever they occur.  It is whispered that this may be because the Church is afraid that people will look to the Grand Laws instead of the Allmother to solve their answers if this was ever to occur.

In the darkest of locations it is rumored such a book does exists, and the Church has either destroyed it or acquired it long ago, never to be seen again.

Letting a Book Go (post publication)

So your book is done, it’s published and the world now has access to it.  What do you do next?  In my opinion, boot up the computer and start typing your next book.  That doesn’t mean you do not pay any attention to what you just released. You obviously need to talk about it, publicize it, and let others know it exists.  At the same time, right before a book is released you are living and breathing that book constantly.  You go over final edits, approve covers and formatting, and start setting up a support network for it.  All you can think of is that book day in, and day out.

If you are an e-author however your bread and butter is new books.  You don’t have the same publication machine as the large publishers, so you cannot be content to rest a bit before kicking out another book by the next year.  Not to mention in most cases your efforts have been more procedural based and you probably were not writing much while the book was about to be published.  Now is the time to hit they keyboard and move on!

The biggest advice I believe though is to not get caught up in the sales aspect of the new book.  It seems it takes 12-36 hours for payments to process, and it can make a person go insane if they just keep hitting refresh waiting for the latest sales reports.  Instead channel that fidgety energy into launching into the next narrative.

Another issues I have noticed is no matter how long you have a book in the editing process you can always think of little things you want to change or alter once it is out.  Unless it is important (like typos, grammar, major errors) then it is best just to let it go.  I have known several people who have written some great things but never tried to  publish it, for they could never find the “final” form they want it to be in.  Instead they clamp both hands on their manuscript down firmly and never release as they keep trying to perfect it into eternity.  I personally don’t think there is such thing as perfection, and if a majority of the people editing/beta reading like the product, it is time to let the world have it.

Not to mention one of the joys of e-publishing is if you really do need to make changes, you can do so after publication.  I would not recommend this with large story points, and of course you should thoroughly remove all spelling/grammar issues before hand.  If you really want to tweak that one piece of dialogue though, or add one sentence to a description to clarify intent, you can do that.  Don’t do it right away though.  Come back a month after your book is released, and then re-read it.  If you still have those issues it won’t be because you just could not let go, and then it won’t be a bad thing to make those alterations.

Poll

This poll is not completely related to this post.  It’s also different for me, because for once I am not starting a new book (still working on the second Allmother’s Fire book) or in the final process of getting another book out.  I am curious of something though, and it definitely ties into publishing:

Where do you hear about new books?:

1)Old Fashioned word of mouth.  My friends tell me about a great book, and I then try it.

2)Internet Retailers: I go to Amazon, Barnes and Noble, etc and look at their recommendations for me

3)Reviews: From magazines, Goodreads, newspapers, I read something proactively to hear about new good books

4)Social media: I see what options are out there on Facebook, Google +, Pinterest

5)Actively see out new books.  I don’t randomly read reviews, but I will google for books similar to ones I already like.

World Info will return with the next blog.  I need some catch up time, and will be writing a blog for Genre Underground soon that I will link to.

Mandatory Paradise Cover Art (Fitting the tone of the Book)

Not the most creative title ever, but pretty accurate.  Here is the cover art to my new book below:

Cover art is very important, as often even before a synopsis is read a prospective reader will see the cover.  If you are in a list the title and the cover is all they have, and it must catch the eye and interests of a prospective reader.  It helps if it fit’s the book tonally too, so it is not jarring to a reader if they see an epic fantasy like cover then read a story mainly focused on economics.

The cover you see is not the first draft, and it is significantly different than the first.  The first had an authentic Minoan background, but it clashed a lot with the rest of the cover, and some people thought it would repel readers.  We chose the current background you see of a Labyrinth due too it’s importance to the story, and that it gave a neutral tone so the rest of the cover would “pop” better.

Also, the stark lack of details about book plot from the cover was done like many thrillers. The intent was to give more of a feel and less of a preview of what actually occurs in the book.  The only tone aspect that is not shown in the artwork is the “flippant” (think more Terry Pratchett) tone some chapters are told in due to who the characters are.  Each chapter is written featuring specific characters, and when that is happening the “voice” of the chapter synchs with who is starring in it.  So a chapter about a priestess or a bureaucrat will be more serious than one told from a rather frivolous artist or gruff outsider.

With all of those differences there was not a way to convey this on the cover without clashing in a very “busy” manner.  I do like the details in this cover and it holds up very well when increased in size, and I may eventually make this book available for print (there was resolution issues with my last one, and I will not be able to have that book ready for print until I can resolve them).

As for other final touches, the book will come out this week, most likely Wednesday or Thursday.  There will be a blog post when it comes up.  I’m just doing one last once over and all of the involved formatting before it is released.  The Sample Chapter available at the top of this website has been altered to match the edited text of the book.

The final Synopsis has been made by the way :

Alnanla has not always enjoyed her life as a Priestess and a teacher, but she, like every citizen of the Island of Nimoa, has always had her needs met. At night she gazes up at the energy shield that keeps everyone safe from the flying monstrosities of legend, and she wants more than just to exist in her pre-ordained role. When hundreds of innocents are massacred, Alnanla finds herself to be the prime suspect. To clear her name, she teams up with a grieving Bureaucrat, an eternally optimistic Artist, a gruff Outsider and a sarcastic Spirit. As they begin to discover the details of what really happened, they find more than they bargained for. Should they expose the dark secrets they find and risk their society’s destruction? Or should  they sacrifice their lives and let the lies continue in order to preserve the way of life that has given them all peace and safety for thousands of years?

Poll Question:

Which cover do you prefer?:

A) The Fall of House Nemeni

B) Mandatory Paradise

There were aspects I liked about both covers, but due to the resolution issues I might contemplate using a different artist for the second Allmother’s Fire book than I used for the first one.  I personally like this new one more, but I am curious what my readers think.

Next Blog: THE RELEASE OF MANDATORY PARADISE!  Woo  hoo!

Sample Chapter for Mandatory Paradise and It’s Easier to Walk the Path a Second Time

I now have up the first chapter of Mandatory Paradise, my soon to be released Epic Fantasy Thriller.  It is not part of the Allmother’s Fire trilogy or even set in the same world.  It is a self-contained novel, and I only plan to write in this world again with short stories and the like.  You can click here or go the link at the top that says “Sample Chapter for Mandatory Paradise.”

It feels a little bit easier this time to do the final things needed to get a completed manuscript done.  The “Race” to finish everything seems familiar now. Formatting is not so bad once you learn a few tricks.  This novel was already done before I started the Allmother’s Fire Trilogy, but it has been easier to adapt properly as I do rewrites and accept edits.

I am in talks with an artist (A different one than what I am using for the Allmother’s Fire Trilogy) and I feel more confident describing what I would like this time around.  I hope to have that cover in the next week or so.  I have a final editor doing a final pass on the manuscript before I get it ready to publish.

As for when it will be published, I expect it to be ready before, or at Gencon,  (around August 16^th) so I can market the book then.  The last time I was this close I was panicking, not knowing how to do this properly and not focusing on the right things (it should have been edited more, frankly, but that was my own impatience.)

After the results of the recent polls this is the most likely description. Small changes to it, including favorite parts of other descriptions are encouraged in the comments or email (the below is actually adapted from someone’s re wording of the “option B” from my poll.

Alnanla has not always enjoyed her life as a Priestess and a teacher, but she, like every citizen of the Island of Nimoa, has always had her needs met. At night she gazes up at the energy shield that keeps everyone safe from the flying monstrosities of legend, and wants more than just existing in her pre-ordained role. When hundreds of innocents are massacred, she finds herself the prime suspect. To clear her name, she teams up with a grieving Bureaucrat, an eternally optimistic Artist, and a gruff Outsider. As they begin to discover the details of what really happened, they find more than they bargained for. Should they expose the dark secrets they find and risk society’s destruction? Or should they quietly disappear to preserve their way of life?

The second novel in the trilogy is doing well, and at this rate I will easily make my own milestone to finish it within this calendar year.  It’s been so easy to write it, and I think feedback from my first novel has a lot to do with that.  Not only do I feel like I have learned as a write since the first one, I feel I know more of what my audience wants too.  Working in a vacuum with only a couple of friends for feedback can be disheartening, and the overwhelmingly positive response of the actual first book released has gotten me over any writer’s block periods pretty quickly.

Also, a road already tread once is much easier to follow the second time.  I recommend anyone going through this the first time to just breathe, and not panic, because it will be a lot simpler later.  That and the panic cause more problems than it helps.

An Epic Fantasy Thriller has the pacing and plot expected from a modern day thriller like James Rollins, Brad Meltzer, Steig Larson, or Tom Clancy.  However it has the trappings and expanse that one expects from an Epic Fantasy with its own culture, world, and magic system.   The difference is there is no magic MacGuffin of Awesome that will defeat the evil Dark Lord.  Survival is what is at stake, no one can be trusted, and on top of that your enemy might shoot fire out of a spear.

Today’s Poll

So originally I was publishing Mandatory Paradise so that when my Exclusive period for The Fall of House Nemeni ended I would still have 1 book available to be in the Kindle Select Program.  However, it has come to my attention that a very major promotion will occur after my current exclusive period ends.  No matter what, I will have Mandatory Paradise available for it.  However the last promotion got a lot of exposure for my book, and I am pretty sure that is where all my good Goodreads reviews came from.  That makes me tempted to renew The Fall of House Nemeni as Kindle exclusive for 3 more months (around August 21^st)and that means it would not be on the nook till around Thanksgiving.  I definitely think it was wise to do this three month period of exclusivity, but forcing my Nook readers to have to wait 6 months total before they can have any books?

Poll Should I keep The Fall of House Nemeni exclusive three more months?

a)Yes

b)No

Also if anyone has any questions about the next book, let me know!

Exposition and Lost Ponderings

One of the fun challenges with fantasy fiction is how to get all the necessary world information without turning chapters into boring walls of exposition.  This task gets even more interesting if the characters and the inhabitants of that world in large have incorrect or incomplete ideas they think of as true of their own universe.  At that point you have to find a way to relay what people think about the world, but not back yourself into a corner so that when you show more of what is going on it is obvious there is not ret conning going on.

I am writing the second book now, and certain characters are starting down a path that will reveal the truth behind things they did not even think to explore (ie this is not about the religion or prophecies) the veracity of.  I am trying to find a way to make these revelations obvious that it was the truth the whole time, but still feel natural from the events and the characters, and not make it seem that this was just a way to cover up inconsistence’s for the internal “world logic.”  I did plant plot seeds to help with this, but it is still a challenging task.

It is important to the overall plot that some of this is revealed to the characters, but I wonder how much is necessary for the characters to know, and how much the readers even want to know. Some people like to see fantasy epics as a tapestry for characters to exist on and stories to be told in, and do not care too much about underlying mechanics or how everything happens in that world.  Other people see the mechanics such as the magic systems, the creatures that live there, and unique things about the world to be just as important as the plot and characters themselves.  These readers prefer if not for everything to be spelled out at least enough information to be given that everyone can draw logical conclusions themselves as to how it all works.

Think of the end of LOST (possible mild spoilers if you have not seen it all yet).  About the half the viewers were fine with the end, and found that the characters arcs were all wrapped up in a satisfying matter, and closure was given to the characters and their drives.  Others hated it, feeling that their many questions about the world and why things happened were never answered at all.

This all leads me to a question I was pondering the other day, and my poll today:

Do you prefer the focus to be on the characters and their personal stories, or have all the questions about the world itself answered?

1)I want the focus on the characters and their stories, I don’t need the in depth details of everything about the world explained.

2)I like characters and stories, but please find a way to answer any major questions or what appear to be inconsistencies to me, or I am not going to be satisfied with an ending.

As for updates on the books themselves:

Fall of House Nemeni is basically moving at the same rate it does normally, minus special events (first few days released, promos, etc).  Although the free promo day was fantastic, I am not definite long term whether going exclusive for Amazon was the best choice but we will only know once I release it on other platforms in Late August.

The second book in that series is started, and currently going on the right pace to make the total time to create it (both editing and writing) be roughly nine months.

The release of the newly edited older work will have at least three editors.  The first editor is 20% or so through it, and when finished I will hand to the next editor after doing suggested re writes.

Also many of my ideas are generated from comments or private mail, so let me know if you have questions or anything to say.  I know several people are in the process of reading the book, so even if not finished your feedback helps (one such conversation prompted this blog)!

Allmother’s Fire

As you can see by my title of this blog, “Allmother’s Fire” will be the name for the series. It was what I was leaning towards before the poll, and same with my editor. Your votes and comments indicated to me this was the best path, and I definitely look at the comments almost as much as the votes. In fact later in this blog, I will put a little bit of information about the series pertaining to the comments, so if you are curious are about things and want me to answer just put them in the comments below. 🙂

The actual title of the book will contain a little bit of jargon in it, but I am hoping the less jargon title of the series will help. Book One is titled, “The Fall of House Nemeni” and the reason for it will be apparent both early and later on in the first book, for two different reasons. The short of it, it’s very descriptive about the book, and you can’t have a revenge story without something falling apart.
Ok now for things related to this poll. I am going to give a few possibilities to give for the book description. This is like what would be on the book flap or the back of the book if published in a non e-book manner. Let me know which one would want to read by the description of it, and as this is not set in stone yet I will take suggestions in the comments for this blog too. Keep in mind by it’s nature it’s a smaller description then the back of many books according to the restrictions on description size and none of these have been tossed towards my editor yet.

A) After a coalition of all the other power players on the floating island of Cenive destroy it’s powerful banking House patricians, a few remnants of that House hide for years. They flee and eventually settle in the seemingly dissimilar worlds of the Church and Air Piracy. Eventually this is not enough for them, and they come back together to exact revenge on everyone that was responsible for the massacre all those years ago. Other forces seem to be at play however, and now even those last few survivors face complete annihilation due to what appears to be traitors amongst their allies. At the heart of it all lies prophecy of flames and destruction, but is it of extinction, or making way for something new to rise?

B) In a reality of floating Islands with a Sun Above and a Sun Below, every noble House has it’s own abilities to break the Grand Laws of the Universe. Years ago the Church and most of the other noble Houses banded together to annihilate the domineering House Nemeni who created clockwork marvels that once let their banking empire span all of the floating islands. Now years later the remnants from that house have left their hiding places that span from the Church to a Piratical Airship to enact a well-planned revenge. Unseen forces and traitors from within cause their plans to careen out of control and soon the few survivors find themselves about to be destroyed. Their only hope lies in finding each other, and attempting to make a final stand.

C) Cenive is a floating island filled with art, culture, and most of all commerce. House Nemeni, the dominant House of the island filled with masters of coin and clockwork marvels, falls to a devastating massacre caused by all the other Houses on the island. Years later the survivors of this purge plan to leave their self-imposed exile as Air Pirates and working within the Church that might have betrayed them in the first place. Something else has plans that directly interfere with the remnants of House Nemeni, and only if the fractious survivors re unite do they have any chance of staying alive.
So in the poll, where it says A, B, or C, that is what I am referring to.

Finally to respond to one of the comments in particular, they were hoping the book did not have a lot to do with Religion, I wanted to explain a little more. This being a fantastical version of the world of Medici controlled Florence, the Church has a large role in tithes world, but for more people it was about secular power and that is largely reflected in the book. However it is a fantasy and between the abilities the nobles have and the fact that the Priestesses (yes it’s a matriarchal religion) seems to nullify their abilities, there is more going on with the Religion then just secular power, but not necessarily what it’s constituents thinks is happening at all.

Due to how some changes in the cover process, I will not have that in my next blog as the poll choice, but something tying into that may show soon. So we will see what it ends up being in two days. By the way if anyone has a twitter account, let me know, I am still figuring that one out, and want to run back to the safety of facebook and other tools like it.