K.M. Alexander's Blog, page 41

My SPFBO Interview

SPFBO 4 is in full swing. Some folks are advancing already while others have been eliminated. Eventually, the final ten will emerge. It’s been fun watching the community rally and support one another. Yeah, this is an award contest, and we’re all each other’s competition, but it is also very good-natured and encouraging which is really refreshing. We need more of that in the science fiction and fantasy community.

To celebrate the contest, author Michael R. Baker had undertaken a bold quest. He is attempting to interview every one of the three hundred contestants. An admirable and impressive goal. Believe me, I know. Blog posts take a lot of work. Yesterday, it was my turn, and you can read our conversation by clicking on the button below. It was a lot of fun. We discuss my projects, The Stars Were Right, inspiration, the advice I have for aspiring authors, and a whole lot more.

SPFBO Entry Interview: K. M. Alexander

Big thank you to Michael for the opportunity. You can follow him and his crusade at his blog at thousandscarsblog.wordpress.com, and be sure to follow him on Twitter. Likewise, make sure to check out his dark fantasy novel The Thousand Scars—also apart of SPFBO 4.

Good luck to the rest of the entrants! I look forward to reading all of your interviews with Michael in the coming days.

They Know It

“People say, ‘What advice do you have for people who want to be writers?’ I say, they don’t really need advice, they know they want to be writers, and they’re gonna do it. Those people who know that they really want to do this and are cut out for it, they know it.”

—R.L. Stine

Mapping Resources for Authors (and GMs)

“But I can’t draw…”

How many times have we heard that from our fellow fantasy authors? It’s said when we discuss web design, book cover design, email marketing design, cover design, but it gets said most often when we discuss map designs for our various fantastical projects. Fantasy readers love maps. They draw fan into your world—and while they’re not a requirement, they’ve become expected to some extent.

That expectation is what stresses folks out—but there are solutions out there that can help! There are all sorts of tool that will get you a useful map so you can get back to writing. To help, I’ve put together this post. Here you’ll find all sorts of mapping resource from the simple to the complex. This will not be a definitive guide, merely a handy set of tools I’ve used that might empower you.

If you have a suggestion for a tool I should check out or an article or guide I should read, feel free to leave a comment or send an email to hello@kmalexander.com. I’ll be happy to update the post after I check it out for myself.

Contents

The Lazy Way — Map Generation
The Hybrid Solution — Easy Map Creators
The Time Sink — Making Your Own Maps
Further Resources

The Lazy Way — Map Generation

If you are not picky about your map but want a base to annotate consider one of these free map-generation tools. Please note, most of these are fine for personal use, but you should check their licensing options if you plan on including these in your manuscript. (I highly recommend you hire an illustrator to redraw your map when you get to that point. You’ll get a style that fits your book and you’ll avoid any licensing lawsuits.)

[image error]

Uncharted Atlas

In-depth mapping generation focus on creating realistic and random landscapes. If you’re not picky, these are an excellent starting point. I highly recommend running through the whole tutorial to see how the process works. Be sure to follow the Uncharted Atlas Twitter account for new maps generated hourly.

Upsides: Unique maps that pay attention to realistic geology

Downsides: Small images, no easy way to download high-resolution files.

[image error]

Azgaar’s Fantasy Map Generator

In-depth mapping generator that allows for a wide variety of themes and customization. Azgaar has a great blog where he goes into detail about his process, and I’d encourage you to check it out.

Upsides: Loads of customization, download of editable vector .svg files

Downsides: Bit buggy. Occasionally crashes some browsers.

[image error]

Planet Map Generator

When you’re looking for something a bit larger, this planet map generator helps you expand to a global scale. Simple choose a seed and then customize to your heart’s content.

Upsides: Loads of customization, a lot of customizability

Downsides: Maps can be a little ugly

[image error]

GM World Map

An expansive generated map that allows for custom levels of zoom. Loads of options and an excellent base for world maps.

Upsides: Lots of random generations make for unique maps, WYSIWYG saving

Downsides: No customizability

[image error]

Watabou’s Medieval Fantasy City Generator

If you’re looking for generating something a bit smaller than continents or worlds, then this city generator is perfect. It allows for some style customization and a few other little treats.

Upsides: Highly detailed, fun visual customization, WYSIWYG saving

Downsides: Occasional strangeness w/ output. Oddly shaped buildings. No zoom.

▲ RETURN TO CONTENTS

The Hybrid Solution — Easy Map Creators

Often, we authors have something particular in mind, and auto-generated maps won’t quite work out for us. But it would be nice to have some sort of program that achieves the style we want without learning cartography. The tools below are designed for just that.

[image error]

Roll for Fantasy

Using tile-based imagery, this site allows you to create a wide variety of maps. Tiles can be rotated and mirrored creating a lot of customizability.

Upsides: Loads of customization.

Downsides: Maps can be a little plain. Time-consuming.

[image error]

Inkarnate

This is one of my favorites. Inkarnate lets you draw maps quickly and effectively, and they look good. The Pro account allows for even more customizability.

Upsides: Easy to use. Lots of options.

Downsides: One specific style, it’s a good one, but a limit.

[image error]

World Spinner

If you want to get into the nitty-gritty of political borders and imperial expansion, then World Spinner (subscription-based) might be the right fit. Plus it includes a neat Heraldry Designer as well.

Upsides: Focus on countries and borders for fantasy. Heraldry designer.

Downsides: Not totally customizable.

▲ RETURN TO CONTENTS

The Time Sink — Making Your Own Maps

Sometimes auto-generated images won’t hack it. Either you have a specific world in mind, or you want complete control over the placement of mountain ranges, cities, towns, harbors, and rivers of your world. I get it, I too suffer from that sickness. Thankfully, there’s a lot out there to help make your map be the best it can be.

First, let’s start with some advice…
Crafting Plausible Maps

What does it take to craft a world that feels authentic and realistic? How much of your design will be rooted in fantasy and how much will be based on scientific principles? In this in-depth article, Brandon Kier takes you through the dos and don’ts of fantasy cartography.

Tolkien’s Map and The Messed Up Mountains of Middle-earth

I’ve always felt there’s something a little off about the classic map of Middle-earth. Author and geologist Alex Acks agrees. In this article for Tor.com, he goes into details on the strange geology of Tolkien’s classic.

Fantastic Cartography Tips From the Guy Who Mapped Game of Thrones

Jonathan Roberts has an extensive pedigree when it comes to fantasy cartography. In this quick article for Wired, he discusses the things he keeps in mind as he embarks on each and every commission.

10 Rules For Making Better Fantasy Maps

A map should help enhance your story, and Lauren Davis has ten tips you can use to improve your project.

Now, let’s check out some tutorials…
Fantastic Maps — Map Making Tutorials

Jonathan Roberts (from the Wired article earlier) has a ton of handy guides on his blog—Fantastic Maps. In his posts, he shares how you can quickly sketch out portions of your map using only a pen and paper. Be sure to check out his Tips & Tricks sections.

Ascensions’ Atlas style in Photoshop

This step by step guide is often duplicated and for a good reason. It goes into great detail explaining how you can make a custom and unique atlas-style map for your setting.

Learn to Draw a Stunning Map Using Photoshop

Over at the World Building School, Nathan Smith goes into detail about how he creates a stylized map using Photoshop.

A Magical Society: Guide to Mapping

The key here is plausible worlds. This free downloadable PDF goes into great detail on constructing a map that feels realistic. The art is up to you, but the planning is solid.

This is a time-consuming process, and to create something memorable it’ll take a lot of trial and error. Especially if you’re just starting out. But the end result is something that fits your vision perfectly. Plus, like generated maps, there’s always the option of hiring an illustrator to redraw your creation. Just make sure to get those core ideas down on paper.

▲ RETURN TO CONTENTS

Further Resources

If you are looking for additional help. Here are a few more resources for you to explore.

Making Magnificent Mountains

A free Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop brush set I created which allows you to recreate hachure-style mountains to lend a turn-of-the-century feel to your maps.

r/Mapmaking

Reddit’s map making subforum has a ton of great advice and a lot of inspiration. While you’re at it make sure to check out their Mapmaking Wiki. It’s basically this post but with a ton more tools listed.

Cartographers Guild

This online community has been around for a long time and has a ton of great members who are happy to share process, tips, tricks, and tools with the community. It’s also a great place to look for illustrators that can turn your sketches into a work of art.

Old Maps Online

Inspiration can come from anywhere. This handy site allows you to zoom into specific areas on the map and find old maps related to that area. Never know what cool stuff you’ll stumble across.

▲ RETURN TO CONTENTS

This is just a small list of tools I’ve tried and liked. There’s a variety of sites and programs out there for a variety of authors and more coming along each day. As with everything, map creation is about finding the tool that works for you, fits your vision, and keeps you writing. As I mentioned in the beginning, if you have a site or resource you like that’s not on this list, let me know! I’d love to continue expanding this post.

Now, go make some maps.

Monuments to Ourselves

Which is the truth, the biography or the autobiography? Certainly, one could argue that both are true, but both are often quite contradictory of the other. Two people can experience the same event and come away with a different understanding. The same goes for how we perceive ourselves and how others perceive us. One’s own perception isn’t necessarily truth. Everyone is the hero of their own story, and few see themselves as a villain. We build monuments to ourselves, not acknowledging that our sole perspective on what is right, just, and correct is tainted by our own personal history, experience, and emotion.

Lately, I’ve been thinking about the concept of personal and external perception within the age of social media. The curated life has become commonplace. We architect a presence online as an extension of our personal brand. We mold it to present ourselves a certain way. It’s not just artists, personalities, and celebrities: everyone does it. Are our lives always the brightly lit brunch photos, snarky tweets, smile-filled vacation pictures, reshared articles, and moody black-and-white urban landscape? We curate reality, sculpting ourselves as we would like to be seen—we write an online autobiography in posts, tweets, snaps, grams, and selfies—but is that the truth?

Often we’ll hide blemishes and strive to present ourselves without scars. We’ll argue, insult, defend, mock, pressure, praise, congratulate, and compliment, all in an attempt to manipulate reality for our comfort. It is the defense of our truth, our castle doctrine of individuality. Given a chance, we’ll dictate others perceptions. I’m not that way, I’m this way. See? Look here. Look how happy I am, we’ll say. Look how sophisticated. Look how woke. Look how outrageous. Look how indifferent. Look how successful. Look how offensive or offended. Look how cool and chill. Look how thoughtful and considerate. Look. Look. Look.

What if someone’s perception differs? What if they look but see something else? What if they reject our perceptions? What if they see something other than our desired presentation? What if the monument is cracked and tarnished? What if the biography tells a different story from the autobiography? Does that make it any less correct? Does that make it any less true?

The SPFBO 99¢ Fantasy Book Sale

Today, August 1st which marks the beginning of the 2018 Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off and to celebrate the kickoff many entrants are offering our books on sale for only 99¢!

The Stars Were Right is a part of this year’s entrants, and I was happy to participate in the sale. So if you’re looking for a genre-bending Lovecraftian urban fantasy thriller to sink your… uh, tentacles into for the summer, now is an excellent time to pick it up.

The sale runs August 1st through August 5th, and along with my own book, you’ll find over one hundred twenty others on sale spanning a multitude of fantasy subgenres. It’s a great way to support the participating authors and save yourself some money. You can see the full list by following the link below.

Shop the 2018 SPFBO 99¢ Fantasy Book Sale →

Big thank you to Andrea Domanski for heading this sale up. It’s a lot of work to get this sort of thing off the ground. Make sure to check out her Omega Group book series—the first novel, Crossfire is on sale, and is an entrant in SPFBO 4. It’s currently slated to be reviewed by Lynn’s Book Blog. (You can see the full list over at Mark Lawrence’s blog.)

Welcome to SPFBO 4 everyone, and good luck to the participants.

Want to stay in touch with me? Sign up for Dead Drop, my rare and elusive newsletter. Subscribers get news, previews, and notices on my books before anyone else delivered directly to their inbox. I work hard to make sure it’s not spammy and full of interesting and relevant information.  SIGN UP TODAY →

 

Visual Inspiration: Sebastien Ecosse

Recently, as I’ve been ramping up my research for Book IV of the Bell Forging Cycle, I came across the work of illustrator Sebastien Ecosse. It’s no secret that I’m a fan of genre and concept art, longtime readers will immediately understand why Ecosse’s work stands out for me.

I was first drawn in by his landscapes, his cityscapes in particular. They’re layered, rich, and beautifully textured. Places of light and shadows. You can almost feel the humid air against your skin, smell the mix of bizarre aromas, and hear the tapestry of sounds echoing throughout. In many ways, they could be cousins to the megalopolis of Lovat from my novels. With his other work, Ecosse manages to capture a sense of foreboding and dread that lends itself well to horror—in particular, his Lovecraftian work. I’ve posted some of my favorites below, as always you can click to view them larger.

Ecosse has prints available for purchase, and you can see much more of his work over on his website: sebastienecosse.com. You can also find him on ArtStation and Deviant Art. Be sure to check him out on Facebook or over follow him over on Twitter. Perhaps, like me, you’ll find yourself inspired.

Trip Report – Whidbey

In celebration of our fifteen-year anniversary, Kari-Lise and I skipped town for a few days and did a bit of exploring in our backyard. Our destination was Whidbey Island, located centrally in the Puget Sound, a short drive north of Seattle.

[image error] I’m a sucker for hand-painted signs and The Captain Whidbey’s didn’t disappoint.

We have been to Whidbey before, usually to hike the always exceptional Ebey’s Landing, but we’ve never spent much time on the island. We wanted to change that and ended up finding a weird 111-year-old inn (yeah, same age as Bilbo Baggins) on Penn Cove called The Captain Whidbey that became our home for a few days.

We came onto the island via the highway that crosses Deception Pass and connects Whidbey Island to Fidalgo Island and the mainland. We hung out there for a few hours and took a quiet walk along the beach before we made our way to the hotel. After settling in, we found ourselves a short drive from Coupeville, a teeny fishing village that has been around since the 1850s. It also resides alongside Penn Cove, and its little waterfront is a great spot to grab a bite, especially if you like mussels and shellfish.

[image error] Deception Pass viewed from Macs Cove on the north side of Whidbey Island

The second day, we walked on the ferry that runs from Keystone Landing to Port Townsend and spent most of the day there. Taking the ferry is a great way to visit the town, which is easily one of my favorite places in Western Washington. A lot of history there, it’s nearly as old as Coupeville and full of ornate Victorian architecture.

At one time there was a hope it’d become the largest seaport in Washington, but today it’s mostly focused on tourism. That said, it’s picturesque, quite chill, and full of places to explore and eat. While there I met an old woman who was sitting outside her apartment listening to a folk band, and she told me how every building in town was haunted and how you can see all the ghosts during thunderstorms because of the static electricity in the air. GHOST SCIENCE.

We returned to Whidbey that afternoon. Right next to the Keystone Landing is Fort Casey, a decommissioned U. S. Army emplacement designed and built to protect the Puget Sound and the Bremerton Navy Yard around the 1890s. The Pacific Northwest is dotted with these little emplacements and they come in all shapes and sizes and in various states of dilapidation. I haven’t seen one as intact and explorable as Fort Casey. Poking around was fun. We climbed ladders, checked out the disappearing guns, and dared ourselves to delve into the deep spaces within the fort that our tiny cell-phone lights couldn’t penetrate.

[image error] Fort Casey huddled behind its bluff

Our last day consisted of exploring a rhododendron forest garden, a little art farm that also sold cheese, and a quiet drive south where we caught the ferry to the mainland. It was a good trip. I read a book, we both relaxed, and we came away knowing Whidbey a bit better. All in all, it was a lovely little flash-vacation, and I’m glad I got to spend it with my favorite person. You can check out a few photos from the trip below.

Want to stay in touch with me? Sign up for Dead Drop, my rare and elusive newsletter. Subscribers get news, previews, and notices on my books before anyone else delivered directly to their inbox. I work hard to make sure it’s not spammy and full of interesting and relevant information.  SIGN UP TODAY →

Raunch Reviews: Battlestar Galactica

Raunch Reviews is a series about profanity. Not real profanity, but speculative swearing. Authors often try to incorporate original, innovative forms of profanity into our own fantastical works as a way to expand the worlds we build. Sometimes we’re successful. Often we’re not. In this series, I examine the faux-profanity from various works of sci-fi and fantasy, judge their effectiveness, and rate them on an unscientific and purely subjective scale. This is Raunch Reviews, welcome.

[image error]The Authors: Glen A. Larson, Ronald D. Moore, David Eick
Work in Question:  Battlestar Galactica  (1978 & 2003)
The Profanity: “Frak”

As far as worldbuilding goes, Battlestar Galactica is a hodgepodge. It blends all manners of stuff: Ancient Greek gods, modern mythology, faster-than-light travel, politics, fear of the internet, murderous robots, weird visions, spaceship dogfights, strange paper with missing corners, and underwear worn over tee shirts. Yet despite its silliness, the 2003 reboot remained internally consistent and for a long time and—at least for its first two seasons—it was some of the best sci-fi on television. As a result, some of the silly points become charming, but sadly, “frak” isn’t one of them.

The word first appeared in the original series (1978) where it was initially spelled “frack”  — it wasn’t until later (2003) that producers changed it to “frak” to make it a four-letter word. (Gasp!) It’s clear what it’s meant to replace, but it comes across more immature than serious. I dislike one-to-one replacement words, they’re lazy. There’s plenty of circumstances from the backstory that could have been effectively tapped for the purposes of faux-profanity. “Frak” is adolescent in tone, does little for the world, and effectively reads as an overt and clumsily minced-oath—nothing more than an attempt at sneaking naughty content past the censors. We all know what they were saying… well, except for KFC.

Score: [image error][image error][image error][image error][image error] (1.0)

Previous Raunch Reviews

“Jabber” from China Miéville’s Bas-Lag
“Storm it”/”Storms”/”Storming” from Brandon Sanderson’s The Stormlight Archives

Have a suggestion for Raunch Reviews? It can be any made up slang word from a book, television show, or movie. You can email me directly with your recommendation or leave a comment below. I’ll need to spend time with the property before I’ll feel confident reviewing it, so give me a little time. I have a lot of books to read.

[image error]

The Unread Story

“The unread story is not a story; it is little black marks on wood pulp. The reader, reading it, makes it live: a live thing, a story.”

—Ursula K. Le Guin

A few years ago I helped back a beautiful little documentary on Le Guin’s life. If you haven’t seen it, I highly encourage you to seek it out. Le Guin was a fantastic writer and remains an inspiration not only to me but to a thousand other writers. You can view the trailer below.

[image error]

 

Garden of Horrors: Hydnellum Peckii

Sometimes nature is downright bizarre. Take the Hydnellum peckii, commonly called the “bleeding tooth fungus” (it’s also called “strawberries and cream” by people who, I assume, have never had strawberries or cream before.) When young the Hydnellum peckii produces a fluid that makes it look like a mushroom murder victim. It appears to “bleed” a red juice that in certain light looks an awful lot like blood. I’m not kidding, it’s kind of horrific.

[image error]A young Hydnellum peckii “bleeding”

The bright red fluid actually contains a pigment that is known to have anticoagulant properties, but it doesn’t stick around for very long. Once the fungus ages the “bleeding” stops and the Hydnellum peckii dries out and looks rather dull.

Despite its appearance, Hydnellum peckii is not poisonous, but the fungus is so bitter it’s considered inedible. Besides, why would you want to put this thing in your mouth anyway? That’s disgusting. Don’t be nasty.

Want to stay in touch with me? Sign up for Dead Drop, my rare and elusive newsletter. Subscribers get news, previews, and notices on my books before anyone else delivered directly to their inbox. I work hard to make sure it’s not spammy and full of interesting and relevant information.  SIGN UP TODAY →