World Building My Fantasy Novel

Talking about a work in progress is one of those problematic writer things, as least for me. Saying too much sort of…takes the wind out of my sails. So I’ve struggled with how much to say in this post.

High fantasy (also called epic fantasy) is defined as a story that takes place in a completely different realm from Earth. Its societies, environment, animals, people, etc, are all different. So no references or comparisons to our world. I frequently ask myself, do I really need to create a new intelligent being, animal or plant for this situation? Or can I just call the broccoli “broccoli” and leave it at that? If you create something new, be it biped, animal, or veg, there must be a good reason in the story. And you need to work it into the narrative without resorting to the dreaded “info-dumping”. Otherwise readers lose patience.

For instance, although there are intelligent species besides humans, my world doesn’t have horses. And no cats (sorry), but I did create a cat-equivalent. The planet is earth-like, with a higher water-to-land ratio, and a lower average annual temperature. There are some hot dry areas, but most zones are temperate or colder, with more mountains and larger frozen areas at the poles. Hooved animals are still necessary for the inhabitants’ development level, but my world's genetics found different solutions to the problems posed by environment, landscape, and climate. 

The herbivores on the main character’s continent evolved in mountainous terrain that’s cold most of the year. I mixed traits from mountain goats, pronghorn, wild sheep and llamas, to come with a few different breeds. Their feet have three or four three-jointed toes, with pads of grippy hairs on the bottom for traction on ice, snow and wet stone. The coat has a soft inner layer and longer hollow-cored hair, and a lanolin-equivalent skin oil that prevents them from becoming water-soaked. They also have horns. 

Over time people domesticated and selectively bred these animals to fit various purposes. One is a riding animal, the takri, with lyrate-curved horns. We think of a lyre shape as being in two dimensions, curving out, in, and out again. These horns add a third dimension to the basic lyre shape by also curving slightly forward from the base, then back, and forward again at the tips.

The takri has three-toed feet with grippy hair pads, a shaggy two-layer coat, and it's built like a large goat/antelope, with body and legs strong enough to carry humans. Compared to a horse, the head has a wider forehead tapering to a narrower nose, longer ears, and vertical-slit eyes. They’re intelligent animals that form strong attachments to their owner, and live to 30 years or more.

Takri were partly inspired by pronghorn antelope. We see those regularly here on the open range. It fascinates me that pronghorns are one of the few animals remaining from the Pleistocene. I’ve always wondered - what is it about pronghorns that’s helped them survive so long? In creating the takri, I took the answers my imagination dreamed up and ran with them.

(BTW, animal horns, what an unexpected rabbit hole! I could make up nearly anything and it’d be just as likely as what actually exists. These are just the more common antelopes. https://similarbutdifferentanimals.com/2018/05/30/antelope-horns/)

If you have time, please humor me by making a test comment.  Say hi, or give me a book suggestion. Thanks for reading!

Fantasy Books I've Loved

Inspired by Valentine's Day.

As a would-be author you hear it a lot, “Read in your genre.” I’ve been reading in my genre since finding Andre Norton and Madeline L’Engle in grade school. But now that I’m writing with a serious intention to publish, I’m learning more about the craft of writing, including understanding the style of writing that's popular now.

We’ve all been influenced, to various degrees, by film, social media, anime/comic books, and short-form writing of all kinds, and it’s informing our reading as well. It’s probably changed my preferences more than I realize, hardcore Tolkien fan that I am. Most readers now expect fiction books with an action-packed beginning and a brisk narrative, fewer scenes of character introspection and fewer world-building details. 

Just the other day a friend was talking about re-reading some old Spec Fic favorites. He was surprised to find the things that resonated with him the first time are different now. And in some cases the story/writing wasn’t as good as he remembered. So I wondered, would I still love my all-time-favorite fantasy books? By all-time I mean the formative books, with moments that lingered in my head long after I finished, and influenced my reading choices going forward. So I made a list, and discovered my all-time favs are all pretty “old”, in the publishing trend sense.

What this tells me is I really have to read more fantasy published in the last 5-10 years. For one thing, I'll need recent titles for “comps” (comparison titles) when I start to query agents. But who knows, maybe I’ll find some new all-time favorites as well!

In no particular order, here’s my list. It’s entirely possible I’ll find ones I’ve forgotten when I look for these, and my list might change. But these are the titles I recalled easily.

Doomsday Book, Connie Willis

Antarctica, Kim Stanley Robinson

Always Coming Home, Ursula K. Le Guin

Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien

Once & Future King, TH White

The Deeds of Paksennarion (series), Elizabeth Moon

Golden Witchbreed, Mary Gentle

Curse of Chalion (series), Lois McMaster Bujold

My plan is to hunt these down (all paperbacks I own) and either re-read in full, or skim through to help myself remember more. I’m curious to find out; will these books still feel as meaningful now as the first time? Which important things will be different? Will I find the writing as gripping now as it was then? And perhaps most importantly for a hopeful author, what qualities of the writing and plot made it such a good read?

To start with, I’ll talk about “Doomsday Book”, by Connie Willis, published in 1992. Willis received both a Hugo and a Nebula for this one.

The main character time-travels to England, mistakenly arriving in 1348, later than intended. For various reasons she can’t return to her own time right away. She’s a stranger in the village, but she forms friendships, helps to nurse people through the plague, and then loses many she cares about to the disease. In the 1300’s England lost approximately 40-50% of its population to plague, although the exact number isn’t known.

When I read this in 1994 I was living in England. British history was already an interest of mine, so the blend of science fiction and history caught my attention. The main character’s reactions to the chaos and pain of the plague years read as genuine and deeply felt. During the weeks I was reading the book we visited St Mary’s Church, Ashwell, Herts. Many old churches in the UK have bits and pieces from different eras. St. Mary’s is mostly 14^th century, with many of its original features. It also has some significant 14^thC. graffiti. One, scratched on the church tower’s wall during a plague epidemic in the reign of Edward III, struck me:

“MCT Espente miseranda ferox, violenta Superest plebs pessima testis, MCCCL”

The church information booklet translated this as: 

“1350 Miserable, wild, distracted 1350. The dregs of the mob alone survive to witness.”

A real person wrote that, someone experiencing the same pain and loss as the book's main character. It was such a strong real-life echo that the experience of reading the book has stayed with me ever since. Willis did a wonderful job blending real history and science fiction, with strong characters I could relate to. Will I still feel that way if I re-read it? I’m going to find out.

What are your all-time favorite SF/F novels, the ones that affected you in a lasting way? Any suggestions for fantasy novels published in the last 5-10 years that I might want to try?

Why a Pen Name?

Hello All.

Here I am on the NEW new blogger account. Evidently you figured out what was going on from my email. Thanks for following me here.  Today I'm talking about names, and choosing a pen name.

Pen names have advantages and drawbacks. I decided to use a pen name for the sake of privacy. My personal Facebook and Instagram accounts are set to Friends Only. I prefer to interact with my friends without worrying about unpleasant comments from strangers or creepy friend requests. But authors these days are expected to actively promote their books on social media, which of course means author accounts have to be open, so people can find them.

I wasn't completely comfortable with that, so I'm using an author pen name. It will separate my writing life from my personal life, including the social media aspects. From a business point of view the disadvantages of a pen name are minimal, for me at least. If I do manage to get a book publishing contract and adjustments have to be made, I'll deal with it at the time.

Back to names! Most of my life I've been fascinated by names, their meanings and history, how they look on the page, how they sound. To me, the look and sound of a name carries emotion, meaning, and an additional layer showing a person's character. I'm having trouble explaining what I mean, but it's similar to synesthesia, in a way. 

In my youth, before the internet, I discovered name dictionaries and baby name books in the library. Some long-time favorites are "New Age Baby Name Book" by Sue Browder; "Character Naming Sourcebook" by Kenyon, Blythe & Sweet; and "What Shall We Name the Baby" by Winthrop Ames. From those I learned the origins and meanings of common names, which incidentally became an entry point for learning their root words in Latin, Greek, German, or whatever language.

I love choosing names for characters in my stories. I want the name to feel *just right*. Sometimes I'd choose a name with symbolic meaning, and sometimes I'd just make up a name that sounded cool and looked good on the page (Eventually I learned those "cool and exotic" names were hard for people to pronounce. I'm trying to do better now. :-)

But having a chance to choose another name for myself? Pretty much irresistible! 

It took me a few months to figure out a pen name. I started with online name dictionaries, including The Name Generator, https://www.behindthename.com/random/) and https://babynames.com/. I also found blogs and interviews where writers discussed the do's and don't's of choosing a pen name, and how they chose one.

Some things I learned;

• Choose something with a personal meaning or connection to you. You could be tied to that pen name for a long time. It needs to be something you'll still love years from now.
• Check the nickname and initials of the name for rude or embarrassing meanings.
• Do a search on the name. Partly to make sure it's not already being used by a published author or media personality. And partly to see how common it is. You want to stand out from the crowd.
• Make a short list and live with each name for a while. After a few days it might become irritating or sound stupid. You can cross it off the list and try the next one.

When I had a list of five possibles, I pretended each name was mine for a few days. That helped me narrow down to a first and last name I liked most, Rowan Swynford.

Swinford is one of my ancestral family lines. One of the oldest Swinford ancestors is Payn de Roet, father of Katherine de Roet Swynford who married John of Gaunt. It's unlikely my line of Swinfords in America are directly related to de Roet's line, but the history is interesting.

Unfortunately, an online search for Rowan found it was a very common name for authors. Not ideal. Then I thought of that ancestor, but I mis-remembered the spelling as "Roen". When I looked him up again I saw I'd got the spelling wrong. But by that point I was so attached to Roen I decided to use it anyway. Even with the quirky spelling, both names have a personal connection to me, and are unusual enough that I haven't found anyone else using them.

Thanks for reading, and feel free to comment.

First Post!

Well, I’m taking the plunge. This is the first post on my new author website, RoenSwynford.com. For now it’s going to remain invitation only. Many many thank-you’s for accepting my invite. I appreciate your support.

If we’ve talked at all this year, I probably mentioned I’m writing a novel, high fantasy. It’s something I’ve wanted to do all my life, but never really had time. Yes, many people work full-time and write books. I wish I was like that, but after 60+ years I feel pretty confident saying I’m not. My day job required sooo much narrative writing, I didn’t have the mental energy to write for myself after work. But with retirement I have the freedom and time to do it, so I decided to go for it! When both my parents died 10 months ago, it made me realize my own time is running out. And if I don’t take my writing seriously, I can’t expect other people to.

I’ve been learning as much as I can, reading books on writing craft and attending online writing conferences. One thing I’ve learned is how much publishing has changed in the last five to ten years! Self-publishing through Amazon and other services is much more common, with less stigma attached. With increased competition, traditional publishing houses have cut staff and funding. The best way to get trad published is still to become ‘agented’. But even if you sign with one, many agents want new authors to have a following. Or at least a list of email contacts for their newsletter. 

That seems so weird and backwards to me. Probably to you too. What the heck am I going to say, and how do I accumulate followers when I haven’t finished a book yet!?? And why would I spend precious writing hours on blogging and social media? I’d rather be writing!

But publishing is a business. A debut author with a following has a group of potential readers who will (hopefully) buy the book, making the author a better financial risk. 

It’s also highly recommended for writers to have a presence on social media platforms, but there are varying opinions on how effective that is. And lots of writers, like me, are not comfortable on some of those big platforms. And the content on social media websites belongs to those big companies.

The platform I am comfortable with is my own website. There’s been talk recently about a resurgence of online blogging. Neil Gaiman, for one (https://calnewport.com/neil-gaimans-radical-vision-for-the-future-of-the-internet/). You have control on your website. You create the content, you “own” the space, you decide who comments and who sees your work.  I will be cross-posting on Facebook and my Bookstagram account (those accounts are still in development). The important things will be here, on this site.

As far as the book itself, the plot is sketched out to the end, characters are outlined, world map is drawn, and world building has progressed far enough to start, although it continues as I write. I’m using four or five character POVs. I’ve written about 20k words so far, all the opening events. Next is the middle, where all the important action happens. My intention is to finish a first draft by mid 2024. That seems really far away now, but it’s not!

Finished fantasy novels average around 80-90k. I expect my first draft to go well over that. But then there’s the editing. Lots and lots of editing, polishing, re-organizing, etc. I plan to submit to agents, eventually, but that’s another long process. We’ll see how it goes.

 I appreciate that we’re all busier these days, and there’s so many people asking for your clicks, likes, views and retweets. So I’m keeping this first post fairly short. After all, as I may have mentioned, I’m writing a novel!  And the thing about writing is - you have to spend time writing! :-) My plan for this website is to post at least once a month, to begin with. In my next post I’ll talk a bit more about the book itself.

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