April 2017 – Q&A
This is a compilation of questions that have been emailed and messaged to me recently. I’m incredibly busy at the moment and it’s taking longer than usual to get back to people – I will still try to respond to everyone, but your patience is appreciated.
If you want to ask anything, you can post a comment here or get in touch through the contact page (and newsletter subscribers can just reply to any of my emails).
I’ve been posting Q&As for a while now, so if you’ve found this one interesting, you can look back at previous Q&As here.
Austin asked on Facebook: Which of your books would you recommend I read first? If you had to pick your favourite?
Warhammer – The Doom of Dragonback.
40K – Path of the Seer (or preferably the Eldar Path trilogy).
He also asked: In a split second you had to name your favourite Space Marine chapter, which one?
Blood Angels.
Nikoli also contacted me on Facebook: How do you motivate yourself to create and complete a character and how do you keep it up to date?
It’s a little different when I create characters, as they are usually for a project that is going to help pay my bills – that’s a great motivator! Keeping them interesting to write about is another matter, and that comes down to making sure they have a personality and motivation beyond a single story. If a character has their own goals and motivations it simply becomes a case of putting them into a situation and working out how they would react. When you can do that, the trick is to come up with the most interesting situations to put them in…
On the second part, I think that if you have the character settled I wouldn’t worry too much about other events – see the changes as an excuse to add to their story rather than change it, if that’s possible.
Lee contacted me on Facebook about a novel-in-progress: I am doing a Revilers book, a second founding chapter of the Ravens. Do you have any tips for a new guy to the process? I have had problems in the past finishing my projects and I am dedicated to the idea of writing the whole novel even if it doesn’t get published.
Regards finishing a novel, perhaps check out some of my posts that deal with planning: https://gavthorpe.co.uk/tag/writing-advice-planning/
I believe you can’t finish something until you know what you are trying to finish.
Another Facebook one, this time from Richard: Will the Black Library have another submissions call soon?
As far as I know they still have some subs from the last one to clear, but will have another window when they’re done. I would expect that to be in 2017, but don’t have anything more than a hunch.
Garren left a post on my Facebook Page: Hey so with all the things going on in 40k with papa smurf being brought back and now your short Eye of Night out I keep wondering to myself if this is actually the end times even tho everybody has said it’s not. I mean I can’t really see something as big as a primarch being brought back not being capitalized on in the books.
It’s not the End Times, in the sense of the way Warhammer became Age of Sigmar. The events of the Gathering Storm changed the ‘present’ 40K background but that is to establish a new story dynamic rather than to pave the way for a complete relaunch of the entire lore. Other changes will continue to happen as new models get released – maybe even new factions, who knows? – but nothing different from what was happening previously.
Devon commented on Facebook: [Are any audio dramas] starring the Living Saint, Celestine herself coming up?
Nothing by me. To be honest, I’m not sure I’ve got my head around the idea of Living Saints in the way they’ve been portrayed. I prefer my depictions of faith to be more ambiguous. Then again, if I could have a crack at writing an Ecclesiarchy novel I’d give it a go!
Andy asked via Facebook: Gav, I have been a fan for years and consider you the Eldar expert. I’m wondering if you happen to know of any official eldar symbol for the Black Library. I’m an archivist and would love to get a tattoo that not only shows my love of archives but of 40k and Eldar. Is there some GW doodle somewhere that depicts the black library in eldar symbology?
I don’t recall a specific Black Library symbol, I’m afraid. Wracking my brain for where it might be – something Harlequin related? Jes Goodwin might have created one at some point but I don’t think it’s on any of his published sketches.
James had a question on Facebook: Hope you don’t mind me asking, but I was wondering if you could give me the chronological reading order of your Raven Guard stories for the Horus Heresy?
I can point you here – https://gavthorpe.co.uk/a-readers-guide/
Nathaniel asked via email: I would like to ask a question regarding the writing process for Black Library: does BL limit what you can do with the canon? I am wondering if there is a guide dictating what can and can’t be done with certain characters, factions etc. If not, is it the job of the editor to protect canonical integrity?
There are certainly limitations to what can be done, though Games Workshop does not have a ‘canon’ in the sense that word is usually used by fans. The background is mutable and changing, so everything is always about a particular writer or developer’s point of view at that time, for that project. Hopefully most authors understand the style and overview of the property and how the universes work, and the editors are just on hand to smooth out any details. With a series like the Horus Heresy there are also other continuity issues to be borne in mind, to add to the complexity for both authors and editors.
[My ‘Thinking Outside The (Game) Box‘ blog might also be of interest]
The following was asked anonymously in response to my Author’s Notes for Asurmen: The Darker Road: Mr. Thorpe, are you going to dedicate a separate novel to Arhra in your upcoming Phoenix Lords series?
There’s no set plan for which of the Phoenix Lords will be covered or when (or by whom) but it was certainly my intention when I started thinking about the Phoenix Lords that Arhra would be covered at some point. How much detail it would go into would be up to the editors and GW regarding the incubi and all of that. You can see some of my further thoughts about Arhra in a response to the March Q&A here.
Bryan asked via email: I was wondering if could ask you a few questions and a favour?
1) How long did it take you to come up with the Battle Hymn of Vengeance? And what was your thought process for this?
2) Is there any chance you could write one for the Ravenwing? As I believe that the Battle Hymn of Vengeance is obviously a Deathwing/Inner Circle litany and refers to the Ravenwing on the second line “By cry of raven we are drawn”. And I would really like to know a cool litany for the Ravenwing as well (if possible)
I’ll answer these both in one, if I may. It didn’t take too long to write after I had created the general form – after that it was just a matter of getting the meter right for the lines. If you look closely you will see that not only are ravens mentioned, but in subsequent lines we see references to: iron, dread, storm, fire and death. If you add –wing to the end of each of those you have all six Wings of the Hexagrammaton, the original organisation of the Dark Angels. So this is a battle-hymn for not just the Deathwing of 40K but the ancient pre-Caliban Dark Angels Legion.
Shawn asked via email: Why is it that the Dark Angels have a force within their chapter called the Ravenwing. Shouldn’t the Ravenguard have like a Ravenwing force?
The dark Angels and the Ravenwing were referenced before the first publication of the Twenty Founding Legions list (and the naming of the Raven Guard), and it’s a muddy, complicated history since then. The Chapter has undergone various iterations ranging between monkish knights to plains Indians-inspired warriors and their iconography and naming conventions are similarly contorted. Given that ravens appear in a number of different folklores and myths, it isn’t surprising that they also make an appearance in the cultures and cults of several different Legions / Chapters. For instance, Odin’s ravens would inform parts of the Space Wolves background, while Graham McNeill referenced the Corvidae in his treatment of the Thousand Sons.
Will asked via email: I know that you are quite busy both with your writing as well as the developing Big Stompy Robots, but, do people your readers in particular ever send you stories for critique and or suggestions to improve their story to ready it for submission to a publisher? I have been reading your post about the process and was curious.
I am often contacted by people that would like me to read their work but I have to send them all my standard reply, which is basically a polite decline to protect myself against accusations of plagiarism and because providing quality feedback takes time which I don’t really have. I understand it can be really frustrating for writers who are hungry for feedback, but it’s just not feasible for me to provide it.
James asked on my blog: Gav, I know you probably aren’t the one to ask (from what I’ve seen you’re a die hard loyalist to the imperium) but would it even remotely be possible for a dark apostle to go rogue and create a splinter group of word bearers within the eye of terror? I’ve had this idea floating around inside my head for a while and I’d like to know if it would actually be possible before I start trying to do anything with it. I’d ask some of the more chaos oriented authors but knowing my luck, they’d hide a daemon summoning glyph somewhere in the answer and the last thing I need is a bloodthirster chilling on the couch.
The thing to remember about Chaos and the Traitor Legions is that the vast majority of them operate now as a fractured collection of warbands. Even though Lorgar remains, he cares very little for the actions of his former legionnaires, and the individual ambitions and plans of mortals are beneath him. In the case of Chaos followers going ‘rogue’ is the norm!
Buck asked on Facebook: I’ll pose a question. Would gw ever consider letting forge world release the old ranges of rogue trader and pre 4th edition wf in resin or plastic or metal. Think there’s a limited release market for us older guys that missed out all those years ago. We pay through the nose on eBay.
We’ve recently seen a couple of Old Skool Blood Bowl teams put back on limited release. The biggest problem with Rogue Trader-era models and other older miniatures is whether the master moulds are still in existence or have perished. I’m pretty sure that as a limited release initiative GW might be open to the idea – try contacting them via the Warhammer Community Facebook page.
And finally, Josephine wanted to know something a bit different on Facebook: I wanted to ask you a silly fan question no-one else will think of, but felt a bit embarrassed to do so! But I’ve worked up my courage now! I was wondering, what makes you laugh and are you ticklish? If so, where are you the most tickly?
I’m all for silliness, so as for what makes me laugh – my three year old boy Sammy keeps me laughing on a daily basis. And I’m ticklish on my sides!
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