Katherine Vick's Blog, page 7

The Merry Band is Here!

Announcing the arrival of the sequel to my debut fantasy satire novel The Disposable – The Merry Band!

The Taskmaster Strikes Back!

Fodder successfully rebelled against The Narrative once, but now everything’s going completely and horribly wrong.

It soon becomes apparent that his own companions are even more unstable than he realized, between Flirt’s suicidal rashness, Shoulders’ increasing desperation to keep his head attached to his body, Princess Pleasance’s unwillingness to speak, and Prince Dullard’s inability to shut up.

Unfortunately, Fodder has bigger problems, because the Taskmaster is finally getting serious. That means it’s not just the Heroes hunting Fodder anymore; there’s an entire pantheon of gods after him.

It’s too late to turn back, and Fodder wouldn’t even if he could. He’s determined to unveil the secret of the Quickening, even if it means saving the world while he's at it.

UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Merry-Band-Katherine-Vick/dp/1951471083

US: https://www.amazon.com/Merry-Band-Katherine-Vick/dp/1951471083

https://www.facebook.com/LadyKatherineVick/

https://realmofkatherinevick.blogspot.com/

And for those of you who’d like to start at the beginning, The Disposable can be found here:

UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Disposable-1-Plot-Bandits/dp/1951471024

USA: https://www.amazon.com/Disposable-1-Plot-Bandits/dp/1951471024

The Narrative Must Be Obeyed

Everyone in the Taskmaster’s Realm knows how the story goes: the boy of destiny goes on a quest, defeats the dark lord, and gets the swooning princess. It’s a great story, if you happen to be a knight or a wizard or a hero. But it’s pretty odious if you’re Ordinary: a barmaid who has to inflate her bosom and have her backside pinched, a homely prince who can’t buckle his swash because his face doesn’t fit, or a soldier who gets killed over and over and over again just to progress the plot.

Fodder of Humble Village is one of those soldiers, and, frankly, he’s sick and tired of getting speared, decapitated, and disembowelled twice a day so the good guys can look glorious. In fact, he’s not going to take it anymore.

No matter what The Narrative tries to make him do.

Author Interview - The Merry Band

 Author Interview - The Merry Band

For those who are curious, here is an interview I did with my publishers Thinklings about my upcoming The Disposable sequel. The Merry Band! I hope you enjoy it. :)

The Name Game

 The Name Game

I have a confession. I love names.

I’m an avid collector of them. For example, there are some wonderful historical names my mother has uncovered in the course of her family history research – the winners so far being Valentine Pratt, Strange Peacock and brothers Wildsmith and Griffin Badger (the latter two being indeed a part of my genetic make-up!). As a child (sad as this makes me sound), I used to pause the credits of films on video and list any interesting names I found there. I have a number of name books, both conventional and slightly more unusual – my books of Cornish and Celtic names are an especially good source of fantasy names. And any time I come across a good name in normal life, I have a little notebook on hand to write it down.

Strange to confess, I don’t do this purely to collect names for my writing. I do it because I like names. But, of course, it does come in handy in that regard. I’ve seen a number of discussions hither and thither on the internet about how various writers chose a name for their story characters. Some are determined to assign a name with meaning, others name in tribute or that simply suits – I even saw one fantasy writer claim to smack his hands randomly on the keyboard and then tidy up the results!

And me, with my wide-ranging name resources, do I have some great strategy, some master plan, some clever way or means?

Ummm, no. Not really.

I’m quite an instinctual namer. I’m never really sure where they come from, especially the fantasyesque ones which are, in essence, pulled out of thin air. I just see what suits the person and if it works, I roll with it. In my fanfiction days, I went out of my way to assign a secret meaning to every name I gave, scouring my name books for the relevant options and whittling it down until I found one that worked. But with my other works, which are mostly set in far distant kingdoms, I simply hunted around in my brain until the name appeared. That’s certainly what happened when creating the Narrative names for the Merry Band in The Disposable – I found something off the top of my head which I felt suited the character in question and I rolled with it. Where it came from, I couldn’t tell you. Sometimes from my books, sometimes out of nowhere. I just found them.

I do have one odd quirk that sometimes helps in this respect. I see words and names in colour in my head. Every letter of the alphabet has its own distinct colour and the combinations of these give any names I chose a distinct colour too. So often, I chose a colour I feel best represents that character, start with that letter and work outwards. Whether a name is bright and bold or dull and brown really depends on who they are.

As I’m sure you can imagine though, naming Fodder and his friends in the Realm was a whole new experience for me. These were names that had to mean something – but not necessarily what you’d expect. This was a world where people were named after their intended Narrative function rather than their own personality. So, rolling with the irony, Prince Dullard, raised to play pompous imbeciles, is a genius and Princess Pleasance is foul-tempered. But I also wanted to add hidden meaning – Flirt may not flirt with men but she likes to flirt with danger. And while Shoulders may not always have his head, he does bear the weight of the world.

And, in the Realm, names can change. A Boy of Destiny cannot be called Bumpkin and become a prince – when the Quest is done, he’ll rebrand himself. And indeed, I am very much aware that Shoulders wouldn’t have always been called Shoulders – that nickname would have risen and stuck after the beginning of the great Clank vendetta. But what was he called before? I couldn’t say. Because Shoulders suits him too well to think of anything else.

And that’s the key really. Whether scouring books of names for the right meaning or pulling a collection of random letters out of thin air, the name has to fit the character. It has to say to both writer and audience that this is who this character is. And at the end of that day, that’s what the name game is all about.

Very Short Story - The Heart In Glass

 I wrote this short story for a challenge long ago as a little poke at the fantasy/scifi idea of the sole hope for salvation and why it might not be a bad idea to have a backup...;)

The Heart In Glass

In ancient times, in ancient lands, there was a man.

Admittedly, this was not unusual.

But this man was faced with a terrible evil and he knew that what must be done could be done only with cold steel in the place of his heart. And so it was, he called upon the ancient light of power to pull all the love out of his soul and, sealing it with a glass container, he buried it high in the mountains, deep in the snow of year long winter, to be hidden from weak temptation by the roll of oncoming storms. But he feared, and he was right to fear, that with cold steel in place of his heart he would forget himself and so before he acted, he wrote what he had done and concealed that too within a beacon that would manifest should he fail to return for the love in his heart within ten thousand days.

And he did not. For his fear was true – the man forgot himself within the grip of cold steel and lost love and rose to become a scourge as great and terrible as the evil he sought to suppress. And the people were sore afeared and knew not what to do until one night, over the winter snows, a beacon rose glowing like a distant star and two brave souls did follow the call of the siren light and find within the letter of their terroriser.

Hope sprang within their hearts. In the name of their poor, suppressed people and in sympathy for their terroriser, who they now saw had fallen pray not to evil but to his own sacrifice in their name, they battled forth, fighting creatures sent to thwart them and magic sent to burn, struggling through howling gales and violent blizzards as they fought their way into the mountains and therein towards the place where the love of the monster who had once been a man was concealed. And they dug and they dug within the visceral grip of snow until at last one man’s fingers fell upon the cold touch of glass. Frantically, he pulled the vessel forth.

And it was empty. A large crack snaked its way along one side. The storms it seemed had taken their toll upon the slender glass.

The love had dripped away.

And then the creatures came and the brave souls and all their hope were slain as evil ran triumphant with no hope of reprieve.

And the moral of this grim and morbid tale? If one is going to hide away one’s sole hope for salvation in dangerous and storm-wracked mountains, seal it inside something that isn’t fragile.

The Merry Band Video Sneak Peek

I'm a little short on original material today so I hope you'll forgive me if I simply take this opportunity to share a sneak peek of what is to come in my upcoming sequel to The Disposable. The Merry Band, coming to you on 2nd August 2021! :)

Very Short Story - What's in a Name?

 I wrote this quickly off the top of my head a few weeks ago off the back of a conversation expressing the idea that certain names create certain… expectations in a character and can sometimes be used by an author as a shortcut to do some character developmental heavy lifting. The female name especially highlighted in this matter is the one I have used below. ;)

What’s in a Name?

“Freeze, demon spawn!”

“Why, hello dear. Whatever is the matter?”

“Oh, give it up, your sweet little old lady act is fooling no-one! We know it was you that released the hell hound into the football stadium!”

“Hell hound? Oh no, dear, I’m much more of a cat person. See here, on the tea cosy? And my cushion covers? And the little knick-knacks on the mantlepiece, now that one on the left is my favourite, isn’t his face the sweetest thing?”

“I don’t care about your… oh, it is quite sweet, look at that little smile, bless, what a…hey! Stop trying to distract me with cats!”

“You seem very angry, dear. Perhaps if you took a seat right here, helped yourself to a chocolate digestive? Or I have brownies fresh out of the oven, or the cupcakes I made yesterday are right over here…”

“I don’t want your devilish food. God alone knows what manner of diabolical ingredients can be found in… Ash! What are you doing?”

MUNCH MUNCH. “Well, the cupcakes looked so tasty! And they’re great, you should try…”

“We aren’t here for that! We’re here to stop the fiend!”

“Yeah but… are we really sure it’s her? I mean, she makes crochet frogs, Dan…”

“We went through that phone book from top to bottom. You saw her name as well as I did!”

“My name, boys? Goodness, what’s the matter with my name?”

“It’s Lilith DeWinter, ma’am!”

“Yes, of course it is. Is that a problem?”

“Well… yes! It’s… it’s evil.”

“Evil? My name?”

“Yeah! Lilith is a name of the darkness! Everyone knows if you are called Lilith, you’re tough and cold and plotting the ultimate destruction of the human race! It’s just… inevitable!”

“I wouldn’t know about that, dear, I’ve too much baking to do to have time to plot anybody’s destruction. But… perhaps you should try the gentleman down the street? If you go to the front window, it’s the big, black house with the turrets and the portcullis and the screaming teenagers climbing out of the window - do you see it? I understand some very strange noises have been known to come out of his cellar and there seem to be fairly regular lightning strikes on his tower, even in the best of weather. And he does wear that long dark robe covered in mystic symbols and stroke his black goatee all the time. Perhaps you could ask him about the hell hound?”

“What, Kevin Shufflebottom?”

“That’s the one, dear.”

“Oh no, there’s no way it’s him with a name like that! Come on, Ash. I guess we’ll have to start over…”

Very Short Story - The No Brainer

 A very silly dialogue only short piece written for a writing challenge to the prompt "No Brainer". I took my usual unconventional approach to this...;)

The No-Brainer

“Ummm…. Master?”

“Now, now, now, yes! The body parts are all stitched together – lovely backstitch by the way, Igor…”

“Thank you Master, but…”

“The lightning rod is in place – yeeesss! And a perfect storm is bubbling away, hahahaha! This is going to be magnificent!”

“Yes, Master but…”

 “The equipment is ready, I’ve got my goggles and my white overalls – all the stains came out beautifully, Igor, do commend the cleaner…”

  “Actually, I believe she’s the right buttock, Master. But…”

“Everything is ready! Soon the power will surge into it and my creation will rise, rise,RISE!!!!! Hahahahahaha…”

“But Master…”

“What is it, Igor? Can’t you see I’m being melodramatic?”

“Master, haven’t you… forgotten something?”

“No, I don’t think so… Monster, storm, lightning rod, goggles, overall, evil cackle… I think I’ve covered the full mad scientist gamut. What are you implying?”

 “Master, I think you may find that you have not yet acquired… the brain.”

“What? Wait, no I must have. What about that psychopath from the asylum we kidnapped?”

 “He ate his way out through the wall plaster and escaped, Master. I did leave you a post-it on the fridge.”

 “But what about the back up brain?”

 “The milkman drowned himself in semi-skimmed, Master. That’s why your coffee has been black for the past three days.”

 “But we must have a brain, we must! The storm, the lightning rod, everything’s ready! There must be someone else in the castle whose brain we can use…”

 “There’s no one here but you and me, Master….”

 “Just you and me?”

 “Yes, Master…”

 “Igor, my devoted servant, perhaps you wouldn’t mind, as a special favour…”

 “No, Master.”

*trumpets fanfare through cyberspace*

 Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to reveal to you the cover of my approaching sequel to The Disposable. Brace yourselves for The Merry Band, coming August 2nd 2021! :)

Emotion and the Narrative – Feelings from Writing

 Maybe it’s just me. It could be. A lot of things are. But does anyone else who writes out there sometimes find their feelings about a certain scene or story they’ve written can be unduly influenced by how they were feeling when they wrote it?

Take Grim. Please. Yes, I know that sounds odd, to speak thus of one of the characters of my own work. But the trouble is – I associate him with trouble. I think I must have spent more time on that section of The Disposable, the scenes with Grim at his Fortress, than any other part of the book. Certainly, with only the possible exception of the opening of the second book of my trilogy (we’ll get to that some later day!), it’s the most rewritten and the most problematic scene I’ve ever written. Grim the Dark General has been through so many incarnations, so many different ways of responding and being that I honestly struggle to remember which one I ended up with. I’m still not even entirely sure to this day that it’s right. In my head, I’m not sure it ever can be.

And so, whenever I read that scene back now, I get that heavy associated feeling of difficulty. I remember the struggle it was to write it, how many times I had to write it and the frustration of it all. That scene and I have been through too much together for me to read it impartially.

On the other hand – there are the joys. The days when the writing just flowed. The days when it was easy, when the characters pretty much wrote themselves. I love re-reading those scenes – I get a big smile on my face. The scene with the AFCs by the waterfall is one of those – I had so much fun that day, it was ridiculous. And then there’s Dullard’s first scene – I came to him having struggled and fought my way through Grim (and not as it turned out for the last time) and it was like he was just there, fully formed and waiting politely in the wings for me to notice him and usher him on stage. He sprang effortlessly to life and took the story on with him and I was so grateful to him for that.

I can’t help these associations. They’ll always be there. But the matter I can never quite resolve with myself is – can anybody else tell?

I always assume somehow that dissatisfaction must leave its mark on a scene. And perhaps it does. But that isn’t always the case. Back in my fanfiction writing days, being a fool, I didn’t like the idea of leaving people hanging on my longer stories and so committed myself to regular updates – two chapters a week initially, reducing to one as life crowded in. And once I’d announced that, there was an obligation. So when I became ill during the writing of one, I nonetheless had to press ahead. And I associated the chapters I wrote over those tough weeks with strife and trouble and didn’t think much of them. But then, years later, I came back and re-read that story, having forgotten by then which specific chapters had been the offending ones and found I couldn’t tell which ones they had been. Certainly the association had tainted my opinion of the quality of the writing.

Do I have a point? I’m not entirely sure, to be honest with you. I just find it interesting the way the memory of feelings can affect judgement of quality. I can’t say I’ve ever read a book and thought – “oooh, the author was having a bad day when they wrote that scene” and yet I still can’t quite escape the paranoia with my own work that people can tell. I don’t know if anyone else, be it writer or reader, can relate to this. I don’t know if people really can tell. Because as I said – maybe it’s just me...

Ask the Author – April 2021

 

Ask the Author – April 2021

My second round of Ask the Authors questions is this month’s offering to blogdom – please find the questions and answers below, I hope they pass muster!

From Jeannie Ingraham

If you didn't write fantasy, what other genre do you think you'd try? 

I suspect I would be writing either science fiction or historical fiction. I know some people bunch scifi and fantasy in together but to me they are both opposite ends of the imaginative spectrum – science at the base of one and magic at the base of the other – while sharing the same creative new world-building-and-exploring traits. And in many ways, historical fiction, setting characters in a different cultural society and seeing how things pan out, is of a similar ilk – they all involve playing about in a world not quite our own. As a lover of geography, history and imagination, I need to have that kind of playground. I couldn’t write stories set in our own, ordinary, modern world – I prefer to spend my imaginative time somewhere far away from reality!

And is there a book cover to tease us with?

Not yet, still waiting on that one but hopefully soon. :)

From Sarah Awa

Do you know anyone in real life who's had problems similar to those your characters have? 

That’s a tricky one to answer – I can’t say I know a great deal of people who’ve had to find ways to cope with having their head cut off! ;) I think I said in a blog long ago, all my main characters have character traits that have been borrowed from me in some ways, so when it comes to wishing the world was a fairer place, being frustrated by the impracticality of others, being worried about everything, wishing I had more time to learn and study, being nervous of the reactions of others and angry at the same time, the closest person to having those problems would be me! And in more general terms, anyone out there who is struggling to free themselves of the stereotypes that culture and society have thrust upon them would, I hope, be able to find something in my characters to relate to.

Is it hard writing a whole, long book that's a comedy? I've only ever done non-comedic novel-length stories, only have written short humorous pieces; it seems to me like it would be harder to keep up the humour for so long. Or does it come easily to you?

The most honest answer to this is simply that I didn’t consider myself to be writing a comedic novel. As far as I was always concerned, I felt I was writing a serious story with humour inserted into as appropriate and it felt quite odd when the time of publication came and it was being marketed as a comedic book because my mindset of not considering it that way was so strong! There is nothing more fatal to funniness that deliberately trying to be funny so I didn’t – I wrote the story and let any humour that came into it come in its own way. I then let the reader judge the quality or not for themselves!

What Hogwarts Houses would you put your characters in?

Well, I think it’s fair to say that Dullard has Ravenclaw written down to his very core. Fodder, I would have to sort into Gryffindor for his courage in pushing forward his idealism, though I suspect some of the other heroic types in there would really get on his nerves! Flirt, loyal and practical as she is, could only really be a Hufflepuff and probably Shoulders too – for all his griping, he’s stuck with his friends. Pleasance is where things get rather tricky – she’s bright (believe it or not!) but not really Ravenclaw standard, she’s loyal in her own way but not exactly Hufflepuff, she can be brave (again, believe it or not!) but not necessarily heroically and she’s ambitious but not calculating in the way Slytherins are portrayed. I suspect she’d be home schooled. ;)