Fantasy is missing the horror element

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The epic MightyThorJrs blog was kind enough to host me for a new guest post, this time discussing the curious lack of horror in the fantasy genre. Some excerpts follow:

As much as I will always treasure those books and how they shaped my youth, that aspect of the genre doesn’t ring true for me. I can’t think of a single time that eagles ever swooped down – literally or metaphorically – to save me from certain doom. The local cleric has never brought a loved one back from the dead. Standing up for the oppressed very rarely results in recognition or reward, and can be actively dangerous.

When I was writing Light Dawning, I didn’t want to just surgically remove all those aspects of fantasy that felt like wish fulfillment or vicarious living through written characters – I wanted to viciously hack them apart, violently ripping them out with tooth and claw before throwing them into the uncaring fire. My take on the genre consists of forcibly colliding fantasy with an unpleasant dose of grim reality, then injecting some looming cosmic horror elements to take it all one step further into the abyss.

Check out the full article right here and be sure to check out the other recent posts there covering some killer new grimdark material!