C.J. Brightley's Blog, page 13

Awesome Con DC Musings: Celebrities and Media Guests

While I was at Awesome Con DC, I didn’t have the chance/inclination to do a lot of walking around. My back is feeling a bit better now that my parents are here waiting for Baby Brightley to arrive and helping with all the day to day stuff. But at the con, I was hurting, I was tired, and I felt like I needed to be at the table at every moment. It probably was unnecessary, but I tend to feel extra-responsible about things like that. So I didn’t get a chance to see any of the media guests or celebrities.

I did, however, wonder what they think of cons and geek culture.

I’m very much a nerd in the academic sense… I got excited thinking about all the cool classes I could take in college, I went on a big classics kick in middle and high school (A Tale of Two Cities, Les Miserables, The Man in the Iron Mask… all unabridged, of course), and, well, I write fantasy novels. That’s pretty nerdy right there. I like Doctor Who, Serenity and Firefly, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But until Intervention, I’d never been to a convention/con and didn’t really even think about it. Awesome Con was only my second con. I don’t really identify as a member of “geek culture,” even though I’ve always been a nerd. I enjoyed both conventions I’ve been to, but I’m not sure if I would attend them if I weren’t an author. Not because they weren’t fun, but because they’re really not focused on my main interests… writing, publishing, fantasy, etc. Looking at the con and attendees from a newcomer’s standpoint, I wondered what the media guests think.

I met a lot of people that were incredibly fun to talk to… encouraging, enjoyable, and “my people.” I loved seeing people in cosplay, even though I’m not into it myself. Some cosplay was kind of meh. But some pieces were works of art. It’s kind of amazing to see what people can do with fabric, paint, cardboard, wire, and foam. As a jewelry artist in addition to a writer, I really admired the meticulous work that went into the best cosplay outfits.

I also saw some incredibly awkward social interactions. In some ways, I can appreciate that cons provide a safe place for people to interact with a clearly defined set of rules. Creepy guys who want to overstep the rules can be identified, or at least there is plenty of public scrutiny to prevent too much badness from happening. Socially awkward guys who don’t WANT to be the creepy guy but are still learning appropriate social interactions have some guidelines in place to help moderate their behavior.

From my non-actress, nerdy point of view, I see actors and actresses as the “cool kids.” The ones who got invited to the cool parties. The ones with well-developed social skills from middle school onward. Not the gamers or the anime fans or the fantasy readers eating lunch by themselves with their nose in a book. Yet the media guests at cons are those who have played in geeky/nerdy shows like Doctor Who and Buffy and Firefly.

Actors and actresses are not their characters. We all know it’s an act. But we want to meet them because their face means that character to us. Do they like that? I assume most of them enjoyed the shows they worked on (especially if they were on for multiple seasons), so to some degree they must understand why others enjoy them too. But at the same time, that role was only one in a longer list of roles, mostly for non-nerdy shows and movies.

Is it weird if some of your fans are socially awkward and strange? Is it weird to see people dressed up as a character you played? When they go to a con and meet the geeks and the nerds, do they feel “YES! These are my people!” or is it just a thing they do in order to pay the bills?

I’m sure it varies by person, of course. And neither answer is wrong. Some people aren’t geeky or nerdy, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Some people are, and that’s fine too. Different stories and methods of storytelling affect people differently. I can’t blame anyone for not being “into” the things that I’m into.

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Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Awesome Con DC Musings: Celebrities and Media Guests appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Guest Post: How Do They Feast? Portraying Food in Fantasy and Historical Fiction

I’m hosting guest authors through most of April and May, as I am swamped with Awesome Con DC and welcoming Baby Boy Brightley into the world. This guest post was written by Christine Frost, the author of The Veiled Mirror: The Story of Prince Vlad Dracula’s Lost Love and Dark Lady of Doona.

How Do They Feast? Portraying Food in Fantasy and Historical Fiction

As someone who loves to study world history, I’m a stickler for details. When compiling research for historical fiction, I don’t limit myself to studying the major historical milestones or cultural elements for the time and place I’m writing about, I also carefully look at everyday life. While writing about sixteenth-century Ireland, I found great resources on fishing, farming, and homes in rural villages. I didn’t use it all in fear of overloading the reader on historical details, but it was good to know in case just the right scene came to mind as I wrote the novel. Achieving a realistic feel and avoiding anachronism while letting the story be told is a delicate balance, and there’s one aspect that can often be overlooked: food.

Cooking is one of my passions. So is reading. Occasionally, I find myself completely removed from the flow of the story because of an inaccurate detail. In a book set in fifteenth-century Eastern Europe, characters sat around the fire drinking hot cocoa with milk. Yet at the time, Spanish explorers were only just learning about cocoa beans in the New World, where it was served cold, and spiced very differently than how we think of the drink.

As the characters in my novels enjoy a feast, I hope to connect the reader to the experience. Can they see themselves in that world? I began the “How Do They Feast?” series on my blog as a means to share the recipes featured in my stories. I also explore how food is portrayed in other works of fiction.

The idea of creating a realistic culinary experience translates into fantasy as well. Following the lead of J.R.R. Tolkien, who was heavily influenced by ancient Norse literature while working on the Lord of the Rings, many fantasy authors have some cultural base upon which they develop their own worlds. This too requires buy-in from the reader. Have you ever tripped over a detail that doesn’t seem realistic, even in a fantasy world? Perhaps a group of traveling companions hunts with too much ease in a strange land, or they always find fresh water, without fail? What happens if they don’t recognize any of the local plants? Could someone inadvertently be poisoned if they pick the leaves from one plant, believing it’s the same as something they knew at home?

Worldbuilding, be it historical fiction or fantasy, necessitates a hefty amount of research to be done well. As a writer, you need to be able to comfortably maneuver within the world without becoming overwhelmed by the research. There are a few resources that can make this easy, depending on your influences:

Krista Ball’s What Kings Ate and Wizards Drank: A Fantasy Lover’s Food Guide provides an excellent overview of how to portray food in fiction: Which kind of food and equipment can your travelers realistically bring with them, medieval laws concerning hunting (hint: if you get caught in the king’s forest, you may find yourself at the gallows), and many other useful tips about the events that are not often covered often in fantasy, but maybe should be, such as food riots and sieges.

With the availability of public domain books on the internet, you can go directly to the source: There is a host of free, original texts, from Victorian cookbooks to The Forme of Cury A Roll of Ancient English Cookery, compiled in 1390 by the master cooks of King Richard II. Many presses, especially academic ones, offer a broader range of cultures, such the A Baghdad Cookery Book (Petits Propos Culinaires), written in the 1200s, and The Oldest Cuisine in the World: Cooking in Mesopotamia, which explores cooking in the ancient Near East. Cuisine and Empire: Cooking in World History, is a fantastic resource which demonstrates the influences cultures had on one another. Be sure to search for wonderful blogs! Many people followed the Inn at the Crossroads blog’s efforts to recreate the dishes described in George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series before their beautiful A Feast of Ice and Fire: The Official Game of Thrones Companion Cookbook cookbook came to be. The Silk Road Gourmet blog offers detailed history and recipes that span centuries of culinary arts.

Whatever your passion, in food or culture, there is a bounty of resources to choose from to help you build your world and satiate the appetites of your characters and readers alike.

Guest Author Bio:

Christine Frost received a master’s degree in literature and creative writing from Harvard Extension School. Having worked as a beer and mead brewer and an international sales assistant for a record label, she eventually found her career in the world of words, becoming a communications manager and editor, writer of historical fiction, and teaching assistant for college-level literature courses. She’s the author of two novels, The Veiled Mirror: The Story of Prince Vlad Dracula’s Lost Love and Dark Lady of Doona, a novelette, Captured Possessions, and“Moonfall,” a short story, appears in the Shadows of a Fading World anthology. She’s happily ensconced in a place overcrowded with books in the Boston area with her husband. Her website is http://www.herravendomain.com/.

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Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Guest Post: How Do They Feast? Portraying Food in Fantasy and Historical Fiction appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Awesome Con DC Review

This weekend I sold my books at Awesome Con DC. It was lots of fun and I did sell some books, although not as many as I had hoped. Here’s the rundown:

The table cost $250, including two exhibitor badges. I initially had it to myself, but then found a friend, Becca of papertulipstudio, to share my booth. I used both badges, and she bought extra badges for herself and a friend. I’m pretty sure she made more money than I did, but oh well… that’s what happens when you share a booth with a talented artist! She’s a great booth buddy and it was really nice to see her again.

I sold 29 books at $10 each, plus tax. Minus printing costs, that’s not as much as you’d think. It’s DEFINITELY not even close to as many books as I’d ordered for the event, but I may have been foolishly optimistic about sales based on the number of people expected to attend. I didn’t sell any posters, which kind of surprised me. I think they look FANTASTIC and I thought they’d be gone pretty fast. People were buying prints of a lot of art. More on this later though. Only one person bought anything other than the first book in a series, either The King’s Sword or Things Unseen. I had a number of people sound interested in the rest of the series, but not buy before they’d read the first (which is fair enough… it’s what I’d do if I were buying). I sold a lot more of The King’s Sword, which is not Christian but is definitely not anti-Christian, but the people who bought Things Unseen were very happy something Christian was available. I also had a number of people take bookmarks and say they’d check out the ebooks, which might lead to more sales. I can hope. A sale isn’t a sale until it actually happens, but it is still nice when people sound interested.

Projected attendance was 30,000 people. I assumed that probably a third might not make it past my booth at all, because with such a huge crowd, it’s easy to miss something. But even that might have been an overly optimistic estimate. Because the con was so huge, many people were just meandering by looking at their phones or otherwise not paying attention. I got a lot more interest, relative to the number of attendees, as InterventionCon last year. Intervention had 905 attendees and I sold maybe 17 books (I don’t remember exactly). I think the difference was partly just that people get overwhelmed at such a huge con and don’t even look at all the booths. Another factor is that while the number of attendees scaled up dramatically, so did the number of booths, so there was a lot more to compete with.

I spent $40 on parking (total). I’m local, so I didn’t have to pay for a hotel room. I also gave away a ton of bookmarks, which are advertising, which is good, but cost money, which eats into my already minuscule writing profits.

Books don’t spoil, so it’s not like I can’t sell the leftover books later, as well as posters, etc. I’d like to set up a book signing (ideally more than one!), but that’s something for the future.

The con was organized well and lots of people came. However, I realized, especially after talking with Becca, that one reason for my low sales was that I don’t think I had a really good demographic match for the crowd. Awesome Con DC was a general “geek” con… everything from Marvel, DC, and indie comics to manga to anime to video gaming to Trekkies to My Little Ponies to at least one other fantasy author.

Not all those groups are necessarily epic fantasy readers. I was thinking of it in terms of a Venn diagram and realized that manga and anime fans probably have only a very small overlap with epic fantasy fans. Some people love both, but many don’t. Trekkies aren’t necessarily epic fantasy fans. Comic aficionados are not necessarily epic fantasy fans.

I need to be where my readers are. I WANT to be where my readers are.

So where is that? Who reads epic fantasy?

Fantasy book lovers, obviously. And tabletop gamers.

So where can I find those people?

In the future, I’ll be focusing more on small press expos and tabletop gaming conventions. They may be smaller, but the people who will enjoy my books are more likely to be found there.

Will I do Awesome Con again? Maybe. If I can share a table again, it’s probably still worth it in order to get my books out there. I appreciate all my readers, and finding new readers is always a good thing. I enjoyed the con a lot, and would have enjoyed it even more if I wasn’t so uncomfortable, what with being hugely pregnant and all. My brother came up to help and Mr. Brightley stayed home with CutiePants. My brother was AWESOME… it would not have been physically possible for me to handle the loading and unloading by myself. So I would have had to find a babysitter and Mr. Brightley would have come with me to help with the loading/unloading and it would have been logistically more difficult, as well as more disruptive to CutiePants. This way, she got to spend all weekend with Daddy, and she had a wonderful time.

Was it profitable? Um…. not so much. I almost covered the costs of attending. I made nothing for my time attending the con, much less writing the books. I certainly didn’t cover the costs of all the stuff I ordered in hopes of selling it at this con. I’m prepared for future cons with stock already, so it’s not a loss, but it’s not as much of a success as I’d hoped. Given the fact that I’m 38 weeks pregnant and in a decent amount of discomfort/pain with an unhealed stress fracture in my back, it was… um… a trial. Fun, but definitely difficult to get through, even with all the generous help from my brother, Becca, and Mr. Brightley. From a monetary standpoint, it wasn’t “worth it.” But it was good experience, and maybe I’ll get some new fans and friends out of it.

I might also have done better if I had more books to offer – as it was, I had one series with three books and one series with one book available. Another series and/or a standalone book would have probably helped increase my sales a bit. More books = more options for people who are interested in my type of books.  The books I have in the works are the second and third in the A Long-Forgotten Song series, and a fourth book that can stand alone in the world of Erdemen Honor (long after Honor’s Heir, with all new characters). That MIGHT help, but not as much as a completely different series. It’s definitely something to think about for the future. But the books I have started are the ones that I’m excited about now, and I can’t write something just because I think it will sell. It needs to mean something to me.

I also had an interesting conversation with another author about cover art costs, which we’ve discussed previously. My thoughts on it are long enough that I’m going to put them in another blog post, so look for that later if you’re interested.

If you’re a writer or artist, what has been your con experience?

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Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Awesome Con DC Review appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Guest Post: How to be Optimistic

I’m hosting guest authors through most of April and May, as I am swamped with Awesome Con DC and welcoming Baby Boy Brightley into the world. This guest post was written by Mike Reeves-McMillan, the author of Realmgolds, Hope and the Clever Man, and Hope and the Patient Man.

How to be Optimistic

Dystopian fiction is in at the moment, as is the closely related genre of post-apocalyptic. Everywhere you look (especially in the YA market) you see people struggling in a world where things have gone substantially more wrong than usual.

I could talk about sociological reasons why this might be so, but since I’m not a sociologist I’d just be making stuff up, and that’s not what I want to talk about in any case.

I myself tend to optimism. One reason I don’t read much science fiction any more is that so much of it is pessimistic about the future. Not only does this go contrary to my own preferences, but it’s contrary to the general trend of history, or so an increasing number of people are claiming. Violence is dropping, life expectancy is increasing, the general health, level of education, income level and other indicators of wellbeing of the human population have had a strong uptick within my lifetime. A great many things are getting measurably better, though because of the way “news” works, we seldom hear about that; we hear about disasters instead.

At the same time, there’s a difference between “optimistic” and “utopian”. Permit me a brief digression on the origins of words.

Utopian fiction is named after Sir Thomas More’s 1516 book Utopia, the name of which comes from the word for “no place” in Greek (outopos). More was making the point that his ideal society didn’t exist, but if you spell it “eutopos” (pronounced much the same) it becomes “good place”, hence the formation of the opposite, “dystopos” or “bad place”.

The first recorded use of “dystopian” was by John Stewart Mill, the famous economic philosopher, in an 1868 speech to the House of Commons opposing the government’s Irish land policy. He used it to mean “too bad to be practicable”, just as “utopian” can mean “too good to be practicable”. (Source: Wikipedia.)

And there’s one problem with utopian fiction. It generally presupposes a degree of human goodwill, intelligence and rationality that we don’t, in fact, see in real life. By the same token, you could argue (and the SF writer David Brin frequently does argue) that dystopian fiction generally has an unrealistically low opinion of our collective wisdom and ability to work together. Of course, it can act positively as a form of warning, a kind of “if this goes on” lesson that encourages people to oppose a worrying trend. With government surveillance an increasing reality, we owe George Orwell a debt for the concern he created about exactly that, because it gives us a compelling image of where the trend could go if we allowed it to.

Sitting somewhere in the middle, between utopian and dystopian, is optimistic fiction. In optimistic fiction, things are bad at least in part (it’s not utopia), but they can be improved and, crucially, are improving. Because it’s fiction (although this is also true to life), the brave actions of committed people who believe that change is possible are key to making that change happen.

When I was a teenager, I started worldbuilding for a utopian society with the plan of writing about it, but never actually wrote any fiction in that world. The thing is, a utopian society is not only unrealistic; it’s, fictionally, fairly dull. It’s lacking in a key element of fiction: conflict.

As I’ve come to understand fiction better, I’ve gradually learned to move away from utopianism without abandoning optimism. In my recent novel, Hope and the Clever Man, for example, my first draft showed this situation: the gnomes in general are enslaved by the dwarves, but the gnomes we actually see “on stage” are free, because of the enlightened policies of their ultimate employer, the human ruler of the realm in which the book is set. During the course of the story, they help the other gnomes gain freedom.

As I worked with my beta readers and my development editor, I realised that this wasn’t strong enough as a story. It became much stronger when I decided not to pre-solve one of the major problems and opened with that problem still in place: The gnomes we meet and come to like are still under the control of the dwarves, and are personally struggling to be free. The first draft scenario is more utopian, but the final scenario is a far better story.

It’s also, as I mentioned, more true to how change really happens. Look at any of the advances we’ve seen in the west during the past several hundred years: religious freedom; representative democracy, which with all its flaws is still an advance on rule by a hereditary aristocracy; the abolition of slavery; child labour laws; universal education; women’s suffrage; legislation for the equal treatment of various kinds of humans; awareness of the importance of environmental protection and public health. None of these came without a hard struggle by committed people against entrenched, powerful interests. Most of them cost lives. Most of them are struggles that go on today, to some degree, even though the major fight may have been won.

And that’s the other side of writing optimistic fiction about successful struggles for social change. Doing so not only makes for better fiction, but honours the people who have fought for the world we have, and the ones who continue to fight for a world that’s better than this one.

Guest Author Bio:

[image error] Mike Reeves-McMillan has a black belt, which holds up his trousers. He’s not sure why authors make such a big deal of these, but they are certainly convenient, trouserwise.

For someone with an English degree, he’s spent a surprising amount of time wearing a hard hat. He’s also studied ritualmaking, hypnotherapy and health science.

Mike writes strange worlds that people want to live in. He himself lives in Auckland, New Zealand, surrounded by trees.

You can contact him at mike at csidemedia (dot com), his website, and Google+.

His books are Realmgolds, Hope and the Clever Man, and Hope and the Patient Man.

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Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Guest Post: How to be Optimistic appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Things Unseen: A Long-Forgotten Song (Book 1)

It’s done! Things Unseen (A Long-Forgotten Song) is out! Things Unseen is the first book in my new dark, urban, Christian fantasy series. You can read an excerpt here, as well as find purchase links for ebooks and paperbacks.

Check out the fantastic cover art! I love it! I even had the full digital painting made into posters in preparation for Awesome Con DC this weekend. I’m thrilled with the cover designer and look forward to working with him on the rest of the books in the series.

Things Unseen Poster by CJBrightley

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Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Things Unseen: A Long-Forgotten Song (Book 1) appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Guest Post: World-Building and Sequels

I’m hosting guest authors through most of April and May, as I am swamped with Awesome Con DC and welcoming Baby Boy Brightley into the world. This guest post was written by A.J. Maguire, the author of Sedition, Saboteur, and Witch-born.

World-Building and Sequels

It seems easy enough to start a series. You finish one book and then, oftentimes because you’ve fallen in love with particular characters or the world you’ve built, you realize there’s more. There’s more story to be told here, more adventures to be had, and you get excited to continue.

Readers are excited with you because, just like you, they also fell in love with either the world or the characters and their imaginations are running the gamut as well. They can see the potential here too. And therein lies one of the challenges for writing sequels. Because whatever you do in the sequel has to respect the rules of the first book or you risk your Reader’s anger.

So here are four tips to help on your journey from Book 1 to Book 2. (And this is coming from someone who has made pretty much every mistake you possibly can in writing a sequel, so allow me to save you some pain.)

 1) Story Bibles.

They work. They may sound boring but they don’t have to be. Whether you use on online program or a paper notebook (like me) it’s important to get these things recorded in an easy-to-reach place. You do not want to have to search through your first book for the name of that one guy who told you characters how to get from point A to point B without being killed.

That takes precious writing time away. And if you’re like most writers then time is something you don’t have a lot of.

So here’s the tip – read through your first book with your Story Bible right beside you and write down important character names, descriptions and landmarks. Do this before you get too far into your sequel, if not before you even start.

 2) Stay close to your characters.

Let me explain.

If you are using the same characters from your former book then you must remember that they are not the same characters they were when you began. Through that first story they changed. So how they view the world around them will also change. Readers will look for this. If you’ve done your first book right, then the Reader changes along with the character and they expect more.

If you’re using new characters, then the Reader expects those new characters to view the world in a completely different way. It can’t be the same voice. It has to be tainted with the vantage of the person you are telling the story through.

 3) No, really, stay close to your characters.

World-Building is closely associated with Character-Building. You can’t do one without the other. Characters are groomed in the worlds in which they live in. We understand Bilbo Baggins in his relationship to the Shire. He would not be Bilbo Baggins without it.

Conversely, we understand the U.S.S. Enterprise in light of Captain Kirk or Captain Picard, take your pick. Each Captain brought to the Enterprise a different viewpoint, a different vantage, and through them we were able to see the “setting” in which they lived.

So World-Building and Character-Building are intertwined. Writers need to remember this when they’re writing anything, not just a sequel. So stay close to your characters. They will inevitably bring the world to life.

4) Timelines

The passage of time changes everything. People grow old. There are droughts, floods, winter storms, and with each of these experiences the world, and the characters, are changed. If your sequel is starting 20 years after the ending of the first book, then these changes need to be seen.

It’s like your home town. Whether or not you’ve been away from it, it has changed. New buildings have been built. Old buildings have been renovated or torn down. There is a narrative written in the sidewalks, a long memory that stretches back further than any of us can remember.

The same should be said of your created worlds. It doesn’t matter if your characters don’t care about the history of their world. You need to because that history will eventually include the characters on your page.

So be sensitive to the passage of time in your world. Show what has changed. Show what hasn’t changed. And through that your Reader will be able to see what change is about to be wrought.

Guest Author Bio:

A.J. Maguire is a mountain-climbing, martial arts loving, published author with one child and one cat and a borderline unhealthy fixation with the written word.  Currently she has three books out for sale.  The first two books are Sedition and Saboteur, which are a part of a series and were published through Wings ePress.  The third book is Witch-born, published by Double Dragon Publishing.  Her short story “The Man Who Loved Medusa” was featured in the Love and Darker Passions Anthology in June 2012.

She has two releases scheduled for Summer 2014 with Double Dragon Publishing (Dead Magic and Deviation).

 

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Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Guest Post: World-Building and Sequels appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Guest Post: World-Building and Authenticity

I’m hosting guest authors through most of April and May, as I am swamped with Awesome Con DC and welcoming Baby Boy Brightley into the world. This guest post was written by Ben Blake, the author of Blood and Gold (Songs of Sorrow), The Gate of Angels (Songs of Sorrow), and The Risen King.

World-Building and Authenticity

There’s an old quote about building characters, which Stephen King attributes to Thomas Hardy. I don’t know myself, but it goes; “Compared to the dullest human being walking on the earth, the most brilliantly drawn character in any novel is nothing but a bag of bones.”

If that’s so – if we authors can never capture the complexity of a person – how can Fantasy writers hope to create a whole world? This is why there are so many support books for Lord of the Rings. It’s to fill in the blanks, holes in the background. It’s also why I sometimes use real historical civilisations to provide a template for the people I want in my invented world; it gives me a cohesive mythos, and a language, a whole culture that hangs together. I can change anything I don’t want, or dislike – the beauty of poetic license, eh? – but the framework is already there.

I’m sure other guests on CJ’s blog will have talked about world building at length though, so I won’t. All this is a lead-in to my real topic, which is the need to research your own subject, and do it properly – especially if you self-publish online. We e-publishers don’t have editors very often. We have to do their work ourselves.

If I use an ancient culture it means I’ll need its gods and goddesses, its myths, its language and customs. People will dress as they did back then, swear the same way, and so on. So I have to know all those things, and I have to keep them consistent through the novel. In The Risen King that meant learning that Celtic warriors used saddles but not bridles, that they wore striped cloaks and jewellery at the throat, and worshipped a death goddess called the Morrigan, all white skin and ebony hair. I had a character who was afraid of elves in the marshes, which people saw as faint lights at night, and which the Celts really did believe. In another story (not published yet) I have a man from a steppe people like the Ainu, who fears the northern wind and calls his horse his brother, believing that the souls of dead Riders live on in horses. I use Ainu (or Celtic) words for a lot of these concepts, to make them feel strange to the reader, and that means I need to have an understanding of the language too.

This doesn’t come easy. It’s a vast amount of work to learn all this – especially when you consider that 90% of what I do learn ends up unused anyway. But it’s what I meant earlier when I said that without editors, we have to do their work ourselves. The internet is full of writers who churn out rubbish because they just don’t check it over. I was asked once to test read the opening of a historical novel called “Hatshepsut: Egypt’s First Female Pharaoh”, the problem being that she wasn’t first– there were three ruling queens before her. To have such a bad error as that in the title was really careless work, and it’s a good example of what we ought to avoid.

I started with a saying, and here’s another at the end: it’s 99% perspiration. That’s one of the best tips for authors. Inspiration is great, everyone needs it, but all it gives you is a spark, and building up the fire is a lot of hard work. Whether we’re talking about world-building or characters, or anything else, it’s up to us to make sure the work is accurate and consistent. Test readers help – they’re vital, in fact – but in the end it’s you, the author, who’s responsible for your content.

It’s a crowded world in e-publishing, and easy for your book to sink into the mass and vanish. Getting the details right will give you the best chance to avoid that.

Guest Author Bio: Ben Blake

Ben Blake was born in England, and lives in Devon. I’ve written since I was a small boy, but only recently decided to publish online. My books include The Risen King, and the recently released TROY: A Brand of Fire, which is the first volume in a story of the Trojan War.

Away from writing, I play pool and like to hike on the moors, or cycle the bike trails.

You can find me online at the sites below;

Facebook
Blog
Email
Website

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Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Guest Post: World-Building and Authenticity appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Title Reveal: Honor’s Heir (Erdemen Honor Book 3)

I finally have a title! The completed almost-final draft is off to one of my beta readers/my editor right now and I should have it back by the end of the week. I’m on track to publish it by Awesome Con DC in April. AND I should have a cover to reveal soon!

Here’s a snippet from the near the beginning:

The summer I turned twelve, my friend Tirta, his cousin Dathlo, and I were given the second significant test. Otso-ka decreed that we would steal wolf cubs. They would be raised until they were nearly adults and then killed for their pelts. Wolf fur is thick and warm, a fitting tribute both to the ferocity of the animal and the courage and cunning of the man who killed it. Raising a wolf cub was perhaps less courageous than killing an adult, but the cleverness was greater and so the honor was considered comparable. Besides, it was part of the test. A warrior must prove himself both fierce and wily.

First, we had to find a wolf den. In the distant past, our ancestors hunted wolves. They used horses and dogs and lasso poles. Sometimes they used bows, but often the wolves were too fast, or too tough; they could survive long enough to kill a man, even after a direct hit. The better method was to use lasso poles. They would catch a wolf around the neck and hold it in place while a man could advance close enough to club it over the head. Arrow holes in the pelt lessened the value considerably. The dogs were not allowed to kill wolves caught in the lasso poles unless human lives were in danger; they would destroy the pelt. Dogs were essential to the hunt, though. They helped track the wolves when the men were hunting, and they guarded the men and horses while they worked.

That was then. We had long since lost that skill, and our dogs had lost their thirst for wolf blood. The Erdemen soldiers had come often enough onto the tundra to keep the wolf packs in check, and we had not been forced to defend our flocks as often as in the past. Our flocks were smaller now and kept within the camp among the tents. Even the boldest wolves would rarely venture between the tents themselves, and we kept watch at night. We killed wolves, of course, lone wolves scouting around the tents or even small packs that roamed across the tundra. But we had not been on a grand wolf hunt in thirty years.

Although our dogs were no longer in the habit of wolf hunting, they could still follow a trail. Tirta, Dathlo, and I took three of the largest, fiercest dogs with us. They led us some eight leagues northeast, into some of the rolling hills at the base of the mountains.

The dogs sniffed and searched, and hours later we found the entrance to a den. The dogs were excited, but not howling with rage, and we guessed the mother wasn’t inside.

We tried to get the dogs to crawl into the hole first, but even the smallest didn’t get much past his hips before wriggling back out again. A torch we lit revealed a narrow tunnel, but I thought we could make it. We threw a luck piece to see who would crawl inside.

Dathlo won, or perhaps lost. He stripped off his coat and outer tunic and shivered for a few seconds in his undershirt, gathering his courage. We tied a rope around his waist; in case something happened, we could pull him back out. He shoved the torch into the hole, then slithered in after it, knife in hand.

We could see the light in the gaps between his body and the edges of the wall. Then the tunnel turned and his body blocked the rest of the light. Farther. We heard some muffled sounds, and then grumbling as he slid back out.

He shook a few bits of dirt from his hair and sat back on his heels.

“It’s too narrow. I can’t fit. But they’re back there! I could smell them. I heard a tiny sound before they got quiet.”

Tirta and I stared at each other.

“I’ll go,” I said. I didn’t want to. But if I was to be chief, I should be brave. I was smaller than the other two, and I had the best chance of fitting through the narrow hole. Tirta nodded, looking a little relieved.

I stripped down to my own undershirt and shivered. The wind gusted, a few forlorn snowflakes icy against my bare arms. I trembled while Tirta tied the rope around my waist, making sure it was tight enough that it would catch on my hips.

Dathlo tied his parka closed again. He gave me a reassuring clap on the shoulder. “Go on. Make us proud.”

~~~~~

Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Title Reveal: Honor’s Heir (Erdemen Honor Book 3) appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Frustration, Doubts, and Failure

I wrote this post over a month ago, and I’ve only just now gotten up the courage to publish it. What’s different now? Well… Things Unseen, the first book in the A Long-Forgotten Song series is almost done (I’m working on the final copy edits and formatting), and the third book in Erdemen Honor (which still needs a title) is not done but is still POSSIBLY on track to be published by Awesome Con DC in April. Basically, I was so discouraged that I didn’t even want to admit how discouraged I was. Sad, right?

My sales are still excruciatingly slow. I’m a bit more cheerful about writing now because I’ve been newly excited about EH3 and I actually see how it’s turning out, and Things Unseen has gotten some great feedback from beta readers. Encouraging feedback is always helpful. I’m hoping that with four books out, rather than two, my sales will pick up a little. Will that actually happen? Who knows? But I can hope!

~~~begin soul-baring now~~~

I’ve been asked how my writing life is going. “You’re making a lot of money, right?” “Selling a ton now?” and “When are you going to make the bestsellers list?” (Which one?).

It’s easy to brush those questions off with a flippant remark. “Yeah, ’cause writing is definitely the easiest way to riches and fame.” “I’m hoping to be on the New York Times Bestsellers List next week.”

The truth is, though, that I’m always a little frustrated, a little doubtful, and a little discouraged by failure in my writing life. I read this blog post about failure and thought that, while I’m not proud of my failure, I’m ready to own it.

So here’s the truth:

I haven’t sold many books. At all. You’d be shocked at how few. It took over a year from first publishing The King’s Sword to sell a combined 100 copies of The King’s Sword and A Cold Wind, in all formats (ebooks and paperbacks, both in person and online). I also gave away about 20 review copies (mostly ebooks and a few paperbacks) and received only a few reviews (the others are from sales).

I can’t submit my books to some of the major advertising websites until they have more reviews, but I can’t ask friends and family to write reviews for me (even though they would be totally honest and not just “I LUV THIS BOOK SOOOO MUCH!!!1!1!!”). Thus the low sales are likely to continue unless the lightning of Amazon algorithms strikes and suddenly shocks my books out of the depths of invisibility.

Although I love my stories, I find myself reading writing craft websites rather than writing. This is discouraging because A) I’m not making progress, and so I feel guilty, and B) I constantly pick apart the stories that are done and finished and published already. This is stupid and counterproductive. Yes, I should always be learning about writing craft. Yes, I hope that my writing keeps improving since my early novels. But those novels are done, and I need to move on. Picking them apart doesn’t do me any good, it doesn’t do the readers any good, and it destroys what little confidence I have. Focusing only on the minor details I would change, and not on what worked, isn’t an honest view of my work, either.

I doubt my ability to write future books. I’ve been struggling with the third book in Erdemen Honor for over a year, and although I’m finally making progress again, I’ve lost confidence. I love the characters and I’m not sure I can do them justice.

I doubt whether it’s worth it to spend the money on things that I know are required to publish professionally… editing, cover art, and various other things I’d love to do. I don’t doubt that they’re good things to do, I just doubt whether my future sales justify the expense. I’m committed to publishing the third book in Erdemen Honor because it was Kickstarted. I’m also excited about the A Long Forgotten Song series, and I know I’ll publish it. But as much as I love the stories, I feel a bit like I’m pouring money into an expensive hobby that really ought to be paying for itself by now. I never expected to get rich by writing, but I did hope that novel sales would at least have paid for cover art for my short stories by now.

I don’t think of myself as the misunderstood artist, or the too-cool-to-be-popular artiste, or the writer of fringe weirdness that can only expect a few dozen readers. I don’t think of myself as completely untalented or unskilled. I do, however, fear that I’m somehow not quite good enough… not only for runaway bestseller status (because I didn’t ever expect that), but for semi-successful midlist author status.

The reviews I’ve gotten help, as have the emails from readers who say they love my books. I know they’re honest and that my writing has touched some people. But is that encouragement enough? Most of the time it is. Sometimes it’s not. Sometimes the doubts loom larger than the pats on the back.

Will I stop writing? Of course not. But will I take a break after Little Brightley #2 is born? Maybe, and not just because I’ll be busy and recovering from giving birth. I think I need to reevaluate how I feel about success and failure.

I’ve told myself, and deep down I believe, that if I write and I enjoy it, that’s success. If other people enjoy it too, that is also success. If it brings in enough money to buy a cup of coffee every now and then, that’s success too. But only the writing itself is really important… that’s what defines success for me.

But all my life I’ve struggled with the need to prove myself. To prove that I’m good enough, smart enough, capable enough to… what? Be valuable? As a Christian, I know my value isn’t dependent on what I accomplish. I know this, but I still struggle with that need for approval. I’m struggling with it now. Without the pats on the back of sales and reviews, I get discouraged. Maybe discouragement isn’t bad, as long as I remember that how I feel isn’t necessarily a true reflection of what I’m worth, or even what I’ve accomplished. It’s just a feeling. Feelings change.

So what is failure? Giving up because of discouragement. If I decided that writing wasn’t for me because I genuinely didn’t enjoy it anymore, that would be ok. But if I quit writing because I was afraid, that would be failure. I’m not doing that. That’s part of why I’m writing this. I want to own my failure thus far, admit my pathetic sales numbers, and be ok with it. For me, this is being brave. Some people are good at admitting when the results of their efforts haven’t lived up to their expectations. I’m not. This is hard.

I write this blog as a way of sharing my journey as an indie author, but I want it to be encouraging. It would be dishonest to always sound happy with my own sales and my own writing, and I want to be honest about what’s going on, how it feels, and what struggles I’m facing. At the same time I don’t want to ask for sympathy or seem like I’m complaining. I’m not. I don’t think this is unfair, or that others don’t deserve their success. I don’t intend to stop writing, now or ever. Discouragement and doubt shouldn’t prevent you from pursuing something you love. I love writing, and I can’t imagine I’ll ever stop.

Is it a good thing to bare my own frustrations and doubts like this? I don’t know. Maybe it will encourage someone else.

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Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Frustration, Doubts, and Failure appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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Historical Periods I Love

In addition to fantasy, one of the genres I come back to again and again is historical fiction. I also read a lot of international fiction. I love great characters, but I also love that sense of the exotic, something new and different than everyday modern life. Historical periods are wonderful to explore in books… maybe I wouldn’t want to live in revolutionary France, but it makes a great setting for dramatic stories!

These are a few of my favorite historical periods:

England 1000-1400s

The Brothers of Gwynedd Quartet: Comprising Sunrise in the West, the Dragon at Noonday, the Hounds of Sunset, Afterglow and Nightfall; The Marriage of Meggotta; A Bloody Field by Shrewsbury: A King, a Prince, and the Knight Who Betrayed Their Dynasty; and The Heaven Tree Trilogy (The Heaven Tree / The Green Branch / The Scarlet Seed) by Edith Pargeter – I’m not sure whether I love this time period because it was interesting, or because Edith Pargeter makes it interesting. The Early Middle Ages were never one of my favorite periods until I read these books. Sure, knights in shining armor were neat and everything, but Pargeter makes these people larger than life, but still incredibly believable. I’m in awe of how much research she must have done in order to write so convincingly, and in awe of how well that realism is part of the story rather than part of gigantic info-dumps meant to show off the research she did. Edith Pargeter passed away in 1995, which makes me sad on a personal level (because I think she was probably a lovely person) and because there will be no more of her books forthcoming. I cried during almost all of these books.

When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman – Her books actually remind me a lot of Edith Pargeter’s… historical characters made larger than life, meticulous research, and exquisite prose, character development, pacing, and everything else. This is actually the first in her Plantagenet series, but I haven’t read the other two yet. I have also read The Sunne In Splendour: A Novel of Richard III and the Welsh Princes Trilogy (Here Be Dragons, Falls the Shadow, and The Reckoning), which were all AMAZING. She has also written some books set in World War II, but I haven’t read them. Sharon Kay Penman and Edith Pargeter basically set the bar for my expectations of historical fiction, so it’s very high.

The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett – I haven’t read the sequel yet, but I have it in the long to-be-read list. The book was great, and the setting was great, but it didn’t affect me as much as Edith Pargeter’s or Sharon Kay Penman’s did. Maybe it was the characters, or maybe it was because I was little older when I read it… I don’t know. Still, it was a great book, with lots of great setting detail.

France 1600s

The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas – Actually, maybe I just like swashbuckling adventure stories, no matter where they’re set.

Revolutionary France (1780s-1790s)

A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens – one of my favorite books of all time. I wrote about Sidney Carton here. While this was probably a miserable time to live for nearly everyone in France, there is dramatic tension to spare for nearly any kind of story.

The Red Necklace and the sequel, The Silver Blade by Sally Gardner – young adult (YA) fantasy set in France and England during the French Revolution. Magic is part of the story, but not overwhelming. You can tell Gardner was inspired by…

The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy – another of my all time favorites. I wrote about Sir Percy Blakeney here.

1800s China

Empress Orchid by Anchee Min – Although this is based on a real person’s life and many of the historical details are accurate, I think a few critical details are speculative (one particular romantic relationship). Nevertheless, if you read it as a novel, it’s a fascinating look at a difficult time in China’s history, made richer by inclusion of so much research and cultural detail. This focuses on the Imperial Palace and its inhabitants.

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See – Completely different than Empress Orchid, this book focuses on two girls in a remote Hunan province, who communicate via writing on fans they send to each other as gifts. Through footbinding, famine, revolution, marriage, and many other changes, Lily and Snow Flower are connected through shared joy and pain.

I’d like to read more stories set in China and the rest of Asia, but I don’t really know where to start. Please recommend some authors to me!

Others

Sarum: The Novel of England; London: The Novel; and The Forest: A Novel by Edward Rutherford – I can’t place these in a specific time period, but I love them. Every period in each book feels real and alive. They’re big and sprawling and you won’t devour these books in a day or two, but the time investment in reading them is worth it. He’s written books on Paris and Russia as well, which are on my mile-long to-be-read list.

Prehistory, The Ice Age, etc. – I haven’t read many of these stories, but I remember that I picked up The Valley of Horses (second in Jean Auel’s The Earth’s Children Series) when I was about 12 and in a major horse story phase. Somehow I didn’t realize it was the second in a series, either. There’s actually some pretty graphic sex in there (bordering on erotica, which I don’t read as an adult, much less a child), and I skipped over some parts, both shocked and mortified to be reading such things written down, in a book!! Books were sacred places of wonder and not to be tarnished with such icky things. I think my mom eventually glanced through it and was equally shocked, although somewhat reassured that I was skipping over those bits. I think she confiscated the book, which did not upset me at all. Anyway, I did actually really enjoy the setting. Writing in a prehistoric world is challenging if you want to have any semblance of realism, because so much research available is really spotty and sometimes inconsistent. The world may not be accurate, but it felt accurate enough within the constraints of the information available.

Settings I’d Like to Read More Of:

Southeast Asia is fascinating! What little I’ve read though is nonfiction and set in the last 100 years… basically history books, not historical fiction. I’d love to see it as a setting for fantasy or historical fiction.

China before the Cultural Revolution – I’ve read a lot of nonfiction and some fiction set in and around the Cultural Revolution and afterwards, but very little from earlier in its history. China has an immensely long, incredibly interesting history, but I don’t know of many fantasy or historical fiction works that use it as a background. Guy Gavriel Kay’s Under Heaven was amazing (set in a fantasy version of Tang Dynasty China in roughly 755-763 AD). Guy Gavriel Kay is one of my favorite fantasy authors and I loved this book, but I’d love to see more. The Opium Wars are kind of like the French Revolution… not so great for living in, but fantastic for writing.

Japan – Surely I don’t have to explain why Japan is cool. Right? Fantasy samurai. Historical fiction set in feudal or earlier Japan could be fascinating. Or what about Japan as it opened up to the western world? So far, I’ve read The Samurai (1600s) and Silence (1500) by Shusaku Endo; both were incredible books, but also profoundly depressing. I have the utmost respect for Endo (I thought about Silence for weeks after finishing it!), but I’d like to see a slightly more uplifting take on Japanese history too.

Russia and Eastern Europe – I’ve barely read anything about Russia or Eastern Europe before Stalin. I know there’s interesting history, but I don’t know much about it.

If you know of great historical fiction or fantasy books set in these time periods, please let me know!

~~~~~

Please connect with me on Facebook or Google+!

The post Historical Periods I Love appeared first on C. J. Brightley.

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