Characters of Questionable Virtue

Double Dragon publishes four of fantasy author Gail Z. Martin’s ebooks: The Summoner, The Blood King, Dark Haven and Dark Lady’s Chosen.  In these and other stories, Gail often relies on characters whose choices and actions place them outside the bounds of polite society.

Q:  So we had to ask, what’s so attractive about characters of questionable virtue?

A:  If you want to be truthful, I think everyone has questionable virtue depending on the circumstances.  It’s said that integrity is what you do when you think no one is looking, or no one will find out.  That being said, few people would qualify for sainthood.  Case in point—lonely stretches of highway with no police cars in sight.  How many drivers faithfully keep to the speed limit?

So some of my characters are basically honest people who are thrown into extraordinary circumstances who do what they have to do to survive.  Others are characters who make it a habit to walk on the wild side.  Maybe they were thrust into those situations, or maybe they had a choice, or maybe it’s been so long that they don’t remember.  They follow their own rules, and maybe their own code of honor, but they definitely color outside the lines.  And they’re really fun to write about!

Q:  Your books have a variety of smugglers, thieves, vagabonds, whores, con men, assassins and murderers—and those are the good guys.  How did a nice girl like you end up in a rough fictional neighborhood like this?

A:  If everyone plays by the rules, you might have a cut-throat chess game, but it’s going to be short on action and adventure.  Dangerous times call for people who can think outside the box—and play outside the rules, especially when the society that enforced the rules no longer exists.  Maybe I’m a product of the modern zeitgeist, but I keep being drawn back to stories set during a kingdom’s or civilization’s collapse.  In that kind of a setting, the people who can adapt quickly and think on their feet will be the ones who survive.  They’re going to bend some rules along the way.

Q:  In your new book, Ice Forged, the fate of the kingdom rests on a small group of convicts and a disgraced lord.  How did you decide to write their story?

A:  Society believes it knows how to pick a winner, but history shows that conventional wisdom is often wrong, especially when the rules change and the chips are down.  I thought it would be fun to get to know a group of people who have been exiled and imprisoned, only to find out that when the kingdom is brought to its knees, they may be the only ones who can save the day.  I love it when the arbiters of society are wrong and the ones who don’t fit in end up the winners.  I guess I’m a fan of the underdog.

You can download an excerpt from Ice Forged here: http://www.4shared.com/office/VJ9BoRdD/Ice_Forged_Excerpt_3.html

Reprinted from Juniper Grove blog

Today I’d like to welcome author Michael A. Ventrella to Juniper Grove! Michael is here to promote his book THE AXES OF EVIL!

Michael A. Ventrella’s second fantasy novel THE AXES OF EVIL (the sequel to ARCH ENEMIES) was released in 2010. He is editor of the TALES OF FORTANNIS anthologies, and his pirate short stories have appeared in the anthologies RUM AND RUNESTONES and CUTLASS AND MUSKET. He’s currently working on a novel about a vampire who runs for President.

Michael is one of the founders of the biggest fantasy medieval live action roleplaying groups in North America and currently runs the Alliance LARP. His Rule Books and Players Guides are available in all formats.

He is also the founder of Animato which, in the late 80s, was the first major magazine dedicated to animated films. He has been quoted as an animation expert in Entertainment Weekly and in various books.

At his website’s blog he interviews other authors, editors, agents and publishers to get advice for the starting author.

In his spare time, he is a lawyer.

Michael has graciously submitted to an author interview! Check it out below:

Without giving too much away, can you tell us what THE AXES OF EVIL is about?

One barbarian prophecy says the legendary hero Bishortu will unite the three warring tribes. Another tribe has a prophecy that directly contradicts this, and they want Bishortu dead. And a third tribe, which may or may not be comprised of werewolves, refuses to let anyone know what their prophecy says. Meanwhile, the Duke on whose land the barbarians sit wants them all gone.

In the middle of all of this is squire Terin Ostler, who has been mistakenly identified as the great Bishortu. Under the Duke’s orders to get rid of the barbarians, he heads to their lands without the slightest idea of what to do.

Along the way, he has to avoid crazed assassins, fearsome werewolves, lovesick barbarian princesses, and confused goblins while attempting to figure out the meaning of the magical and mysterious Wretched Axes.

Nobody said being a hero would be easy.

THE AXES OF EVIL is my second novel and is the sequel to ARCH ENEMIES, but you don’t have to read the first to enjoy the second. The first few chapters can be read on my web page: www.michaelaventrella.com It’s available in every format possible (paperback, e-book, kindle, nook) except direct downloading into your brain, but my publisher is working on that.

What was your inspiration to write this book?

You know those fantasy stories about a prophecy where The Chosen One will save the day because he controls The Force or is the Son of a God or possesses some special power no one else has? And then he wins in the end by using the Magical Sword of Noonah that only he can weild?

I thought: Well, what if they got the wrong guy?

So my “hero” Terin is a kid who is mistaken for this Chosen One. In ARCH ENEMIES, he is thrown into the middle of a war and told he’s the one who will save the day. He has no idea what to do, doesn’t know how to use a sword or cast a magic spell, and definitely does not want to be there.

Talk about your reluctant hero!

I really enjoy writing the kind of story where an average person with no super powers saves the day by being clever and resourceful. It says to me that all of us can be heroes by being brave and smart.

THE AXES OF EVIL continues on in that vein, only with a much more complicated and convoluted plot.

Please tell us, in one sentence only, why we should read your book.

I’ll quote from one of the reviews: “Humor, danger, and a twisted tangle of unlikely prophecies makes for a page-turning adventure” – Gail Z. Martin, author of The Chronicles of the Necromancer series.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

Twists and turns. All of my novels and short stories contain numerous unexpected plot surprises. Reviewers and readers certainly have commented upon them!

They all make sense in the long run, however – when the twist happens, you suddenly realize that the clues had all been there beforehand.

This takes quite a bit of preparation and outlining. No one should ever read my books or short stories and think that I am making it up as I go along. Everything is planned, and every scene is important.

What advice would you give to someone who wants to become a published author?

I have lots of advice; it’s the theme of my blog (“Learn From My Mistakes!”) in which I discuss what I have learned in the business as well as interview authors, editors, and agents.

What do you think makes a good story?

Too many unsuccessful authors think stories are about plots. They’re not. They’re about characters. The important thing is not what the story is about – it’s who the story is about. No one will care about your intricate plot if they don’t like your characters.

Do you have any writing projects you are currently working on?

I have a few projects:

First is my third novel BLOODSUCKERS. It’s about a vampire who runs for President. The main character is a reporter who discovers that vampires have been secretly controlling things from behind the scenes for thousands of years. He is framed for the attempted assassination of the candidate but is saved by an underground group that monitors the vampires. He goes on the run, constantly one step ahead of the vampires that want to silence him and the FBI that wants to arrest him. The only way he can clear his name is to prove that vampires exist – but who would believe such nonsense?

Like all my work, you’ll find humor, unexpected plot twists, and constant adventure. It’s currently in the editing stage and should be out later this year.

Second is a middle-grade novel involving a young lad who runs away from an orphanage and joins a pirate crew. I’m combining two of my already published stories and expanding them. It’s called GET KRAKEN!

Third is the second in a collection of short stories that I am editing. The stories are by various authors but all take place in the world of my two fantasy novels. The collection is called TALES OF FORTANNIS and the first book, A BARD’S EYE VIEW came out last spring. (Can you tell I like puns for titles?)

If you could have dinner with one person, dead or alive, who would it be and why?

The live one, because otherwise conversations would be dull.

One food you would never eat?

I’ve been a semi-vegetarian since 1976 when I was just starting college. I still eat fish, though. I try to eat well and avoid canned food and other processed garbage but I do admit liking junk food every now and then.

Do you have any hobbies outside of writing?

Years ago, I started one of the first major Live Action Role Playing groups in America, now known as Alliance LARP, with chapters all over the US and Canada. (See www.alliancelarp.com)

Other than that, I am an attorney so that takes a lot of time, but I also get involved with political campaigns. I used to play bass in a number of bands, but haven’t been involved with that much lately.

Thank you Michael for that insightful interview!

By Stefan Vucak

 

 

Everybody is getting excited these days about head hopping in writing, and everybody is telling you how that kills a story. Perhaps, and then perhaps not. For inexperienced writers, it can be a trap, but if you know what you are doing, it can enhance your writing, making it more vibrant and rich. I am not going to dwell too much on this, as there are endless articles you can pick up that trash this topic to death. But I thought a summary would be good.

So what is Point of View? Most of today’s fiction is written in limited third-person. Pure third-person is when the entire work is narrated from one character’s viewpoint: ‘he did’, ‘she did’. Short stories are often written in first-person: ‘I did’. But if the writer is good, he would use the third-person. Beginning authors often use the first-person approach to tackle their first book or two, as the technique is easy to apply and the author can get on with telling the story. Call it a writer’s training wheels.

Limited third-person is when all characters are referred to by a personal pronoun (she, he, they) and each scene is told from one character’s viewpoint. The purists would tell you that you must not shift points of view within a scene or paragraph, but do it by creating a new scene either with a scene or chapter break. Most of the time, that is sound advice. But those same purists would lead you to believe that this is a grammatical rule that cannot be broken, whereas in fact, it is merely a convention that has grown over the years – one that many famous published authors ignore … to some extent.

I’m not going to talk about the omniscient third-person, where the unseen narrator knows what all the characters are thinking. This is getting too close to what is referred to as head hopping. Look it up if you are interested.

The reason an author wants to shift his Point of View is obvious: to let the reader know what each of his main characters are thinking. It provides clarification and understanding of character behaviour and motive, and brings density and a rich texture to writing. Unless the author is really skilled, it is difficult to describe every character’s feelings, moods, and behaviour from a single character’s viewpoint. The reader can miss out on a lot not knowing who did what to whom and who got paid.

This is where we come to the sinful part – head hopping. A reader identifies with a character the author introduces at start of a chapter or scene, and expects to stay with that character until the scene or chapter changes. Head hopping is where the author jumps from one character to another within the same paragraph or scene without first alerting the reader that he is now dealing with a different character’s point of view. That can be disconcerting, confusing the reader, making him wonder what is going on. The key words here are ‘without first alerting’! Remember those purists? Encountering a head hopping paragraph or scene would make them see red, and most of the time I wouldn’t blame them.

Okay, so how do you handle a shifting point of view? In any story, it is sometimes necessary to change a point of view from one character to another in order to maintain smooth continuity and enhance tension or drama, or simply provide an explanation for what is going on. To achieve that shift by introducing a scene break, as the purists demand, can be awkward and just as jarring to the reader as head hopping. What you need to do is make a smooth transition from one character to another by clearly identifying the new character to whom the point of view has shifted, and not returning to the previous character again within that scene! That way, you will carry the reader, leaving him satisfied and understanding what is happening. In other words, shift your point of view once and leave it at that. Doing it more than once, unless done skilfully, can come close to being head hopping.

If you are going to shift your point of view, it must be done for a purpose! Most editors will allow POV shifts in your writing without having a scene or chapter break, but you have to execute it well or the editor will tell you about it!

Don’t head hop!

HLH Communications

capturing the suspense of creative living

Release The Dragons!

For Immediate Release

The American Obsession With Dragons Proves Profitable For Indie Authors: Tony Chandler and Virginia Chandler

Sometimes we carefully plan the release of creative work around other similar events hoping for the best. And, there are other times that we make no strategic effort and the proverbial “planets” just align. In the case of Tony Chandler and Virginia Chandler, a brother-sister team of indie authors from Georgia, the latter appears to be happening. After over ten years of lingering as a nothing more than a computer file, The Last Dragon of the North, their co-written e-book, was finally released in November of 2011 by indie publisher Double Dragon. Little did the authors realize that, at the same time, America’s love-affair with all things fantasy had reached an all-time high.

According to speculation, this love-affair began unexpectedly after the successful release of Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland in 2010. Ever since both movie and television producers have been clamoring to satisfy the American audience’s seemingly insatiable thirst for all-things fantasy; including, wizards, knights, magic and, of course, dragons. The genre seems to be coming from everywhere. HBO has “Game of Thrones.” ABC has “Once Upon a Time.” And, NBC has “Grimm.”

And, fortunately for the Chandlers, the public’s interest isn’t limited to just visual media. The same phenomenon is happening with books. Consider the unending success of the J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight, and Christopher Paolini’s Inheritance Series Whether the subject matter is witches, vampires, or dragons, Americans can’t seem to get enough.

“Fantasy has always been around through folklore, mythology and fairytales. It’s inherently creative. It asks the question: What would happen if? And, then it answers it,” notes Tony Chandler, who began his writing career in the Science Fiction genre.

And that is exactly the question that Virginia and Tony asked when they first created, The Last Dragon of the North back in the 1993. As the story goes, one evening, they were watching Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park (1993) and, almost simultaneously, contemplated, “What if the dinosaurs were dragons?” Not magical talking dragons. Not vindictive, humanized beasts. No. What if these dragons were real creatures, cold-blooded predators like the T-Rex or that velociraptor of Jurassic Park?

“We didn’t want to create a fluffy dragon that turns good or an evil dragon that hunts our hero. It’s not even a dragon that puts damsels in towers. We did not want a fairy tale. We wanted our dragons to be real with the temperament of a great white shark,” adds Virginia Chandler, a former English teacher and Arthurian scholar.

And that is what you’ll get with The Last Dragon of the North. It is set in the gritty darkness of the 9^th century – a time when dragons were hunted-beasts and heroes were made of steel. It recounts the story of a man’s personal journey to find and kill the last dragon on earth. With careful attention to historical detail, the Chandler’s set their epic novel in a world that one might find in classic tales like Beowulf or Sigurd. But, unlike these stories of old, the The Last Dragon of the North moves fast with the thrills of any modern fantasy big-screen adventure.
With the continued growth in the popularity of fantasy entertainment, the Chandlers are optimistic about the success of their book. They have already garnered positive attention from multiple New York Times Best Selling authors; including, Piers Anthony who called the book, “One rousing dragon-fighting story…”

“Our timing was an accident but it’s been amazing. And, every time I turn around another company seems to be getting on-board. Shortly after we released our book, Elder Scrolls “Skyrim” which is, like our book, all about Dragon hunting,” adds Virginia Chandler.

Even Hasbro’s subsidiary, Wizards of the Coast, has decided to update and re-release the epic game “Dungeons and Dragons” after a very long hiatus of poor sales. And, Hollywood is set to release almost 50 fantasy genre films in 2012; including, New Line Cinema’s The Hobbit and Universal’s Snow White and the Huntsman. With all this hype seeping into every level of entertainment, it appears that dragons, wizards and epic sword play will continue to seize the imaginations of Americans at least into 2012; ironically, itself, the Chinese year of the dragon.

# # #

About:

The Last Dragon of the North is available direct from the publisher or most on line resellers in all eBook platforms; including, the Kindle, Nook, and Sony Reader. It is also available in paperback form via Amazon, the publisher or ordered directly through local book stores.

For more information on The Last Dragon of the North, visit its Facebook fanpage or the authors’ Twitter account: @chandlerbooks.
For more information on Tony Chandler, visit his website.

For more information on Virginia Chandler, visit her website at or her Facebook fanpage.

1. Quickly, give us the title and genre of your book and a 30-word or less tagline:

Water Harvest / SFF
A lunar warlord and his wizard-like accomplices overthrow the preeminent planetary Rule, intending to seize control of the Harvest of atmospheric moisture. New alliances form as old ones fail.

2. How did you come up with the title of your book or series?

My original intent was for it to be a work of hard science fiction, based on an issue that would be plausible no matter where it was plunked down in the universe; that being brutal competition over so precious and finite a resource as water. While that remains the theme of the novel, some unexpected characters turned up and so thoroughly entertained me that I allowed the story to take a more fantastic track than was its founding premise.

3. Who is your favorite character from your book and why?

Oh my, that’s difficult, as I have an attachment to so many. One possibility would be Hacch, but I won’t elaborate and spoil the surprise. There’s also a competition between the protagonist and his sidekick, Dirc Cutter—the latter of whom is prone to tomfoolery—but I suppose I’ll settle on the main character. One of the things I like most about Cairn is that though he is morally strong, he becomes so deeply embittered that he fears he’s lost his soul to a desire for revenge at any cost.

4. How about your least favorite character? What makes them less appealing to you?

If we’re speaking of ‘least favorite’ in terms of being the most vile, I’d probably have to give the nod to the mage Gezladorn over the warlord Teigor Valiir. On the other hand, if we’re speaking of who is most evil by virtue of weakness of character, that would probably be Tai, the prince of House Tyrgon, who is essentially a sociopath too easily molded into a proxy by Gezladorn. A clue might be that the chapter in which he is introduced is titled ‘Kinslayer’.

5. If you could change ONE thing about your novel, what would it be? Why?

The book is still new on the market, and so I could probably better answer that question if I’d spoken to more folk who’d read it. What comes to mind now is that I might try to further simplify the characters’ and places’ names, because one reader did ask me what drug I was using when I made them up .
In all honesty, though, I don’t think thay are particularly cumbersome. I do admit, though, that the first draft was a purple tongue-twister—even I had trouble remembering who was who before I cleaned it up!

6. Give us an interesting fun fact or a few about your book or series:

At the outset I was having difficulty outlining the entire thing to my satisfaction, and I finally just took what I had and started writing, without knowing how everything would fall into place. Though there were admittedly some blank days, that strategy actually worked well for me and in some cases it was almost like reading a novel when surprising events and/or characters made themselves known. Most days I’d end with a long walk, during which I’d furiously brainstorm how the next scene would play out. Sometimes I’d get up in the middle of the night to jot down a thought before it was lost to dreams. Water Harvest doesn’t leave you wanting for a resolution, though there is a loose sequel and I had fun inserting some foreshadowing to pave the way for it. I wonder who will pick up on those tips? The clue at the end is fairly obvious, I believe, whereas the earlier hint is not so much so.

7. Do you have any unique talents or hobbies?

I used to fly gyrocopters (there’s a picture in the “What About Eric?” page on my website), but in more recent years I’ve been satisfied with my life-long obsession with motorcycling. I’m no competition for Jay Leno, but I own four bikes now and my lifetime total is 49 (I’m shooting for 100, but don’t tell Sue). I still write software and coach motorcycle safety classes. My current woodworking hobby is turning on a lathe, but in the past I’ve built furniture and several electric guitars (I play the guitar, but I’m not especially good at it). I’m in the early stages of making a mess on the potter’s wheel.

8. How can we contact you or find out more about your books?

My email is writer@ericdiehl.com, and my website is www.ericdiehl.com). It was the first website I created, and I’ve since just added to it from time to time. It’s kinda funky and I could make it look more “professional” but for some reason I like it and so am leaving it be for now.

9. What can we expect from you in the future?

I’m finishing up the next-generation sequel to Water Harvest, which will likely be titled “Guild of the Viizar”. I’m also seriously considering self-publishing (on Kindle) a collection of short stories I’ve written over the years (a mix of Horror/SFF), and I am still thinking about where I’ll go with my next novel.

10. Do you have any tips for readers or advice for other writers trying to get published?

If you’re at all like me, just sitting down and starting to write helps a lot, as I tend to think more intently while at the keyboard. I’ve read that some authors do a complete outline first, but I believe I’ve read of more who do not and to a greater or lesser extent just go along for the ride. It’s also helpful to read plenty of books about the art of writing (in so doing I saw the error of my early efforts—‘popping heads’ POV, purple-prose, too much back-story, etc.). Also, do a LOT of editing. I’ve spent considerably more time editing than I have with the first draft (if I ever want to really beat myself up, I’ll someday go back and read that first draft—ARRRGGHHH)

11. Is there anything else you’d like to say?

Just that I’ve really enjoyed my efforts. When I started writing I knew that being published was a long shot, but you’ll never know if you don’t give it a try.