Andrew Moore's Blog, page 59

How to Make Your Dragons More Intimidating

German. Which is scarier, a dragon or a drache? Check out other languages too. I imagine there are some. I don't know of any.

Videogame Corner

Enough about Metroid. How are Youtroid? Doing all right? Lording it over those unicorns?

Addendum

Maybe George R. R. Martin can write a book about the first Praesident, Dorj Blashington. Stark and Lannister. Yeesh.

The Death of Fantasy

Fantasy's had a good run, or maybe it hasn't, but we have to accept that the future of speculative fiction is just history but all the names are changed for some reason. A Song of Ice and Fire already started it (Stark and Lannister? Are you kidding me?), Glen Cook continued it, and it's too late for anything to be done. Now all we need is a term for it.

Sovereignty's Mettle

The king issued this dreadful proclamation from his stern throne. "Every child born this year is to be slain."
The people heard him and said this: "No."
"But there was a foretelling that . . ."
"No."
"I sent carts of wealth to the oracle. We can hardly ignore the warning."
"No."
And lo, the kingdom fell as prophesied, because a king who cannot even make his subjects sacrifice their children is no king at all, his crown ever unsure.
Finis

February Club

Who's making every month in the fantasy setting twenty-eight days and just not telling the readers? Feels good, doesn't it? Kind of scandalous. A little bit of intrigue, you know, some mystery.

Addendum

For science fiction however, you can just go with hypergold.

Tired of the Same Old Currencies?

Gold, crowns, potch, we've seen it all before. We've seen some of these, too, but that won't stop me.
- casholeons
- blucks
- monni
- gramgrams
- glizzies
- dollarios
- borts
- spinkles
- zouches
- foddor

Bang!

No wonder people don't want guns in fantasy. That onomatopoeia doesn't look tough, sound tough, or resemble the actual sound at all. We'd better put together a committee to come up with a new one.

Addendum

Fiction is already fake. It doesn't gain anything by being double-fake. I decided to add that statement of principle in case anyone didn't share my distaste for those ideas. Now you all agree with me, right?