Adrian FaulknerFantasy Author

It occurred to me whilst driving home the other night that we live in the first age without heroes. A combination of greater openness, social media and press intrusion means that we no longer hear a one-dimensional description of people portraying them as true heroes through and through in the classic sense of the word. That soldier who risked their life to save their comrades commits domestic abuse, that Olympic sports star has been found cheating on their partner. That nurse who went to some disaster ravaged country to help give aid has a conviction for drug abuse. Instead heroes have been replaced by heroic acts.

Not sure if something is wrong with me or if I’m coming down with something but I’m falling out of love with Epic Fantasy. For years, I would say my subgenre of choice was the Epic. I love the whole ‘bigness’ of it all – vast casts, vast worldbuilding and story with such massive consequence. I want it bigger with greater consequences. I want it to take my breath away.

But lately nearly every epic fantasy I’ve read, just fails to deliver for me. The only exception has been Steven Erikson’s Malazan books. I can’t put my finger on just one problem with the others but it’s as if the orchestra is too big for the conductor.

I’ve thought about books I’ve truly loved over the last few years, not just at the time but ones that have stayed with me and proved to be just as excellent during a second read through. And most of them have been swords and sorcery rather than straight up epic fantasy. Lies of Locke Lamorra is a true masterpiece and my favourite debut last year (and a book I just would not shut up about) was Douglas Hulick’s Among Thieves.

True, in this sub-genre blending world that’s not exactly a huge shift, but for me it’s a significant one. I don’t know what impact this will have on my own writing, but my current project that I’m plotting is definitely more a swords and sorcery story than an epic fantasy one. I doubt I’ll totally drop the epic elements as I continue to flesh out ideas so it’ll be interesting to see how this one turns out.

The wonderful thing about ideas is that they never present themselves at the right time. In fact, they usually turn up at entirely the wrong time. They come out of nowhere and hit you sideways.

Last night, an idea for a Swords and Sorcery novel dumped itself in my head. I’ve been thinking for the last couple of days how much I enjoy the whole “rogue’s tale” subgenre (a subgenre that includes Lies of Locke Lamorra and the brilliant Among Thieves). As much as I love big epic fantasy, I find that it’s sword and sorcery that is leaving me fulfilled these days.

The important thing is that this wasn’t an idea I was looking for. If anything, the idea I want is some added element for Gods of the Wild Frontier. But over the 10 minutes whilst I was cooking last night, I came up with an opening scene, a concept and four main characters. Not bad, and I think the book could be a lot of fun, both to write and read. On the downside, it’s a bit safe for me. It sits firmly in Sword and Sorcery. There’s no spaceships or helicopters, and I can’t help but wonder if the idea has been seen before.

So I after cooking I basically sat down and pitched the novel to myself in an additional note to my file of ever growing novel ideas. It depresses me to look at this list. I really need to be able to write a complete novel in about 2 months to ever get through this backlog. I’ll be glad once I move, so I can get down to some very serious writing, although at this time I have no idea what I will be writing.

Disassociated thoughts rattling around my brain today:

Illness has continued for me this week. Gone is the fever but a dry cough lingers that feels like a 500lb gorilla sitting on my chest. Even simple things like a small shop leave me feeling drained.

Couple this fatigue with settling into the new job and I’ve had a week where I just want to get home and veg out. So unsurprisingly, I’ve found this week filled with movies and TV. I’m progressing my way at a respectable slower-than-normal pace through the Game of Thrones box set, and have had the last two Harry Potter movies as a backdrop whilst I do other things.

So whilst my mind takes a time out from writing, I’ve still been surrounded by a variety of fantasy, (even more if you count my Warcraft Guild’s raid nights). And I’ve found my mind subconsciously deconstructing each of these properties, trying to look anew and find what it is about these vastly different series that I love. Whilst this might not seem to be about writing, I’m finding the beats, the twists of character and the genesis of my empathy of them. Similarly, my mind is picking out those building blocks of story I do not care for, understanding through this process what my own personal loves and hates are.

There won’t be a Game of Thrones meets Harry Potter mash-up that comes out of this. Instead, I suspect this will subconsciously give me a clearer view of my own flavour of fantasy and will feed into something much more original.

I honestly believe that if you want to *be* another author, you’re doing it wrong. I write because of the stories that are trying to burrow out of me, of a love and frustration with the genre, of finding an audience, of a hundred different things. Don’t get me wrong, there are authors I love, but I love them for being them, not because I want to be them.

That said, it’s inevitable that as you read you’ll notice some authors do some things incredibly well; enough, sometimes, to make you jealous of their talent and try and up your game. But seeing as it’s the weekend – and that I ‘ve had a busy week – I thought we’d have some fun.

If there’s a skill I’ve yet to master it’s commenting on friends’ books. It’s inevitable that as you get yourself involved in the writing community that sooner or later someone you know will be the author of a book you read.

Of course, reviewing a book should be no different whether you know the author or not; what I’m talking about is those times you meet at a convention and signing and mention you’ve read their book.

Inevitably, the author will ask you “what did you think?”

I never want to respond with just a “I thought it was very good” as that sounds very hollow. It’s an empty compliment. I want to show I’ve really read it, considered it.

But at the time I don’t want to come across sycophantic or false, so feel I must come across as balanced.

And so inevitably I end up saying things like “It wasn’t the sort of book I’d normally read, but I really enjoyed it” or I start going on (at length) about how I think it will get people interested in the classics.

Urgh!

I think they are just looking for “I thought it was very good.”

I have a love/hate relationship with the Fantasy genre. I think that most writers within the genre do to some lesser or greater degree. It’s that quiet dissatisfaction with the stuff that you love that makes you think you need to pick up a pen and write those stories you feel are missing.

Now let me start from the outset that I love fantasy’s breadth. It’s a genre so wide that it’s possible to love one end and hate the other, and because we are creatures of individual tastes, when I say hate, I mean “not to my taste” not “bad”. There’s little more interesting than talking about the genre with people, sharing a love of some books and then raising an eyebrow at one of their choices and saying “really?” I love that there is a diversity of opinion and think that’s really, really healthy for the genre. And at the end of the day, it’s just that… an opinion. My personal tastes are no benchmark by which to judge against.

If you want to get anywhere today, you just… well… do it. You jump on a train or into the car and off you go, sat stationary as landscape whizzes past you. And let’s not talk about tube journeys where you disappear into a black hole only to emerge somewhere else. Journeys nowadays are uneventful. Yes, I know that sometimes there’s an accident and the landscape stops moving or you have to suffer a slightly different parade of landscape as you divert, but still, travel has become a passive thing. We don’t interact with the landscape any more, it’s just scenery.

I wrote one of my first novels when I was aged 8. It was called “Where the Wind Blows” and involved anthropomorphised animals on a bus. The bus went through the countryside picking up more characters. I abandoned it after about 30 hand-written pages as I had about the same number of characters and no idea of what they were doing.

It was inspired by two things: Watership Down and my school bus journey, in particular one place. We went through a place called Bedgebury Cross. It’s little more than a T-Junction with a few cottages and a field. However, as we continued from our stop towards Kilndown, we’d proceed into a wood (which I now have found out is called the excellent ‘Black Dog Wood’) and I loved how the surroundings changed. Gone was the view of country domestication: the cottages and fields and now we were in the wilderness of the wood.