A haven of magic, myth and mayhem! Blog stops, books, reviews, interviews and more. The site of fantasy author, poet and blogger A. L. Butcher.
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Spring Surprise will be on sale for $2.99 until 28th April
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Here Be Dragons will be on sale for $3.99 from 1-May-18 through 5-May-18
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Tell us about yourself: (Name, race/species, etc.)
Oeliana, Nymph of the Shimmering Forest, Guardian of the Maiden’s Grove, Keeper of the Sacred Pools. I am a nymph – what you would call a forest spirit. I am born of the forest, and it cannot die whilst I live… but creatures of magic like myself are hunted and destroyed, so I live in seclusion.
I have skin the colour of polish oak, and hair as green as ivy. To you I’d look like a tall humanoid, to an elf I appear more Elvish, I can be the wind in the trees, or the bubbling springs.
Which book/world do you live in?
My home is the Shimmering Forest, which is located in the land of Erana. Once the Great Forest covered all the land but then the gods, in their wisdom, gave life to the elves and trolls – who honour the forest, and the humans and fae – who do not. The Shimmering Forest is not live your forests, it is the Primal Forest, the Mother of All. It is magical; primal, raw and wild magic, like the days when the land was young, and the gods still walked here. My Glade is a Sacred Glade, of the old times, now the magic is fading, dying.
My story? My legend is told in The Legend of Oeliana, a short tale (I wanted more – one cannot recount a life of centuries in a few pages) and this, in turn, features in larger works, so I am told. I also feature in The Shining Citadel, when I assist the Lady of the Light, and the Lord of the Storm, with their quest to find the Shining Citadel of Lor’Arthinis. For when the Blood that Flows with Light again walks among us the magic will rise again! It will either save us or curse us to oblivion.
The Legend of Oeliana – Single https://bundlerabbit.com/products/detail/legend-oeliana
How do you see your world?
My world is dying. Magic sustains it and once it was everywhere and in all things to some extent. But the races warred, and the Plague came, and the magic began to die or hide. Some say magic is alive, and yes if the wind is alive, or fire, or water. It does not think as you or I think; it knows, it senses and it gives sentience when it chooses. It wants to live, and to replicate. It wants to flow through the land, circle in the sky and pour through the rivers. But the Plague fed on magic, sometimes corrupting, sometimes destroying after the Plague hit the Elven Kingdoms worst of all, and their civilisation fell to dust the Civilisation of Men arose on the ashes. And they blamed the elves for the Plague and the wars, and as the elves wielded the greatest magic all who were magical were hunted. The land wept, and is weeping still.
What part do you play in this tale?
I am the Keeper of the Heart of the Maiden – one of the Items of Power needed to unlock the spell on the Citadel. But in my own tale I saved an elven prince from the mighty Indis the Fierce – the lord of the forest. I see you think him a man of some sort? Humans are weak, their lives are fleeting like a summer breeze in the trees. No Indis was and is a Dire Boar and even the Great Cats walk in fear of the Tusked Lord. People, generally, are more foolish than beasts and thus this prince, Rii’Athellan – the Morning Star, took into his head to hunt the great Indis.
Perhaps I should have let Indis have his victory, I should not have interfered. This prince was handsome, and I was lonely, you see. Even a creature of magic craves a mate, and offspring.
I knew not that this prince had a wife-in-waiting and for the outcome to that dilemma you must read.
Do you consider yourself a good person/creature?
What are good and evil? That depends on one’s point of view. I do not kill without necessity, but I often do not save when I could. I have taken life and preserved it. I do not abide by the laws of men or elves, for they are not my laws and mean nothing to me. I do not think myself cruel – for cruelty serves no purpose except for its own sake.
The destruction of the forest, and the ruination of magic are wicked, and I will protect both my forest and my magic how best I may.
Do you follow any religion?
I have seen the gods, long ago, and I have consulted with the Lady of the Skies when the drought, or the snow comes. But I am not ‘religious’. I do not have to ‘believe’ in what I know to be real. Things either are or they aren’t. If they are then respect them, if they aren’t then there is no bother. The gods are not evil, nor are they good. They are the gods and do as they please.
What is your favourite colour/food/music (pick one)?
My favourite colour is green, my favourite food is the wild mushrooms which grow near to my cottage, and my favourite music is the bubbling of my pool in the full moon.
Excerpt
When the world was young, and the wild magic flowed like the Great River, there lived a nymph, a spirit of the forest. Such beings once walked beneath the sun and moon; they were creatures of magic, incarnation of tree, of water, and the very essence of life itself. Oeliana was the nymph’s name, for this was also the name of the pool, deep, still and silver, from which she had been born when first the sun caressed the land. Fish swam among bright green fronds, scales of silver and azure, frogs and toads rested on dark grey rocks, long tongues feeding on the hovering flies and dragon-flies which darted above, seeking even smaller creatures for their dinner. Deer, wild goats and boar fed upon fallen apples and the widespread fungi; the Shimmering Forest was bountiful to its inhabitants, animal and person alike. Herbs grew there, thick and tall, even in winter. The herbs of the forest provided medicine for those who knew their power. Wild-goats, now tamed, provided both milk and a substitute for the companionship she lacked.
Hers was a life of duty, she was custodian of the trees, the forest creatures and pools, and so her time passed, timeless as she was. Even the common elves visited Oeliana, seeking guidance and the wisdom of the forest, and occasionally healing when their own healers had failed. They would bring gifts of food and polished stones or shells and the pool slowly filled with the gifts, for what use were trinkets to a nymph? Yet she was lonely for those who came and did not stay, they came for their own ends, and left with no further thought of the nymph. The spirit of the forest craved the touch of another, for she had seen the lovers who sometimes came to her glade and heard their words of love and their cries of pleasure. Never had she been loved nor experienced the passion which fascinated her as the lovers moved together on beds of moss and leaves. Magic demanded a high price and Oeliana was a creature of magic, and loneliness was the price she paid. So she watched, longing for a companion, and she prayed to the ancient gods, for even immortals need the favour of higher beings on occasion.
Rii’Athellan, the Morning Star, was a hunter, magic showed itself in many ways and the elven princeling was graced with a goodly portion. This day he had given his entourage the slip. The forest contained many dangers, even for one of his bloodline, but he preferred to hunt alone; the larger and fiercer the beast the more it pleased the elven prince. As silent as the grey fox and confident as an eagle, Rii’Athellan crept towards the clearing on the trail of a huge dire-boar. His father thought him reckless, but the young man craved danger, bored as he was from the politics of court and wishing he was allowed a little more excitement. He was not the heir, and he had not yet found his place in the world; he cared not for diplomacy and was jealous of his brother. He knew the Grove of the Maiden; oft before had he brought the girls whom he also liked to hunt and capture, although they were more willing prey and his favoured weapon was not a bow. These passions were conducted, if not in secret then with discretion, for this lord of the elves had been promised long since to Almethea, the daughter of the house of Il’thricken, a house both powerful and magical. This bride he cared not for, but duty-bound he would suffer the marriage. Such a one had little choice; alliances were all when elves made war.
This particular beast was Indis the Fierce, large, ill-tempered and canny; even the Great Cats walked in fear of Indis and the boar himself feared nothing, for he had never yet met his match. As tall as the elf at the shoulder, the hooked tusks of the boar were as long as his forearm. The elf murmured a prayer to his gods and nocked his bow as the boar snuffled among the trees, gobbling orange fungus and fallen apples. Occupied with filling his mighty jaws, the boar did not hear the elf, nor perceive the threat.
Links to book etc.
And as part of
Immortals Bundle
Monsters, Myth and Mayhem Vol 2
Universal Link https://books2read.com/Immortalsbundle
Bundle Rabbit https://bundlerabbit.com/b/immortals
Also features in Tales of Erana: Myths and Legends
Universal Link https://www.books2read.com/talesoferanaMyths
And The Shining Citadel
Universal Link https://www.books2read.com/ShiningCitadel
Author name: Sherry D. Ramsey
*Please tell us about your publications. I enjoy writing both short fiction and novels. I have a series of science fiction novels published by Tyche Books (Alberta, Canada) (The Nearspace series: One’s Aspect to the Sun, Dark Beneath the Moon, and Beyond the Sentinel Stars); a middle-grade fantasy from Dreaming Robot Press (New Mexico, USA) (The Seventh Crow); and a self-published urban fantasy/mystery (The Murder Prophet). I also have two collections of previously-published short stories, To Unimagined Shores and The Cache and Other Stories.
What have you found the most challenging part of the process? I feel somewhat frustrated that I don’t write faster—in the current publishing climate there’s a certain pressure to publish consistently and often for greatest success. I see many authors publishing three or more books a year, and I just don’t seem to work at those speeds. Last year I had a short story collection, a new novel, and a couple of short stories come out, and that seems like a lot for me. I know it’s usually not a good idea to compare oneself to other writers, but I would like to be able to work a little faster. I’m not a perfectionist—but I am a bit of a procrastinator. Maybe I need to work on that!
Are you a ‘pantser’ or a ‘plotter’? I’ve always been a pantser, for sure. A long time ago I tried outlining a novel, and then found that I was no longer interested in writing it; the fun of “discovery” seemed to have disappeared during the outlining process. Lately, though, I’ve begun to find a middle ground—I’ve discovered that minimal outlining actually helps my writing process and reduces the chance that I’ll run out of steam/ideas on a project. So now I guess I’m a hybrid between pantser and plotter. Plantser?
If you could have dinner with any literary character who would you choose, and what would you eat. I think I’d have to choose Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe to have dinner with. No doubt he’d wax forth on some fascinating topic for dinner conversation, and of course the meal would be superbly prepared by his chef, Fritz. We might have corn, “roasted in the husk in the hottest possible oven for forty minutes, shucked at the table, and buttered and salted,” since Wolfe considered that to be ambrosia. It’s probably cheating, but I expect Archie Goodwin would also be there for dinner, so I’d get two characters for the price of one. If I were particularly fortunate, Wolfe would show me his orchid collection after dinner. The perfect literary character interaction!
What are your views on authors offering free books? Do you believe, as some do, that it demeans an author and his or her work? I think that offering some work for free can be a valuable promotional tool for writers who would like to find new readers. Many readers are wary of taking a chance on a new-to-them writer, and most of us watch how we spend our hard-earned dollars these days. It’s also a way to introduce a new reader to a series or character. I don’t think it’s demeaning to authors or their work when it’s done sensibly, professionally, and as a promotional choice.
Sort these into order of importance: Good plot, Great characters, Awesome world-building, Technically perfect. For me, the characters come first. Sometimes a character arrives on the doorstep of your mind with a suitcase in hand and not even a name, but they have a story they want you to tell. You can’t turn them away. I think most of the time, we keep reading a book or put it down forever because of the characters. If you love the characters, you can forgive a lot of other sins in a book. Plot comes next—the smooth, flowing experience of reading a well-plotted book is such a rewarding experience for a reader, I think we should always strive to create that as writers. World-building is important, of course, and sometimes the world can even be like another character in a book—but the most fabulously-imagined world can’t carry a book if the characters and story are not strong. Technical perfection—I’m not convinced it exists. I do some work as an editor, with two co-editors, and even working as a team I don’t think we’ve ever ended up with a technically perfect work. It’s important to create the best work you can, but striving for perfection might mean no-one else ever gets to read it. I think we have to learn when our work is “close enough” to perfection, and let it go.
How much research do you do for your work? What’s the wildest subject you’ve looked at? I write many flavours of both science fiction and fantasy, so I’ve done research on topics from medical nanomachines to particle accelerators to how magic might be fueled by different minerals. One of the most interesting things I researched lately was the question of how two machines/computers, each created by a different alien species, might learn to communicate. I learned a lot of fascinating things about both computing and language acquisition!
Which authors have influenced you the most? I read a LOT, and over the years I think there have been many authors who’ve influenced me in my writing. I love to write humour and humorously convoluted situations, so the influences of Douglas Adams, Terry Pratchett, and Connie Willis are there. I love science and the future, so Nancy Kress, Jack McDevitt, and classics like Arthur C. Clarke and Frederik Pohl have left their mark. And I love to work with the wide reaches of imagination in fantasy, so Dave Duncan, Maggie Stiefvater, and Elizabeth Bear have made an impression. So many more I could name!
What is your writing space like? I’m very fortunate to have a small but wonderful office at home. I have a normal sitting desk and also a treadmill desk, where I try to spend at least part of each writing day. Too much sitting is not good for me! The walls of my office are covered with overflowing bookshelves and inspiring artwork, and I have a large southwest-facing window that gets lots of light and houses many plants. There’s one extra chair so a friend or family member can come in and visit. This sounds idyllic, but now add in lots of notes, maps, knickknacks, filing cabinets, binders—and some folks might find it too cluttery! For me, it’s inspiring and comfortable, though, and although I might sometimes write elsewhere in the house with a laptop, I always come back to my office as my main creative space.
Tell us about your latest piece? Coincidentally, one of the projects I’m currently working on is another Olympia Investigations story, featuring Acacia Sheridan, the main character from “The Goddess Problem.” Acacia is a private detective with a special gift – she can communicate and interact with supernatural creatures of all sorts. Her clientele includes ghosts, demons, fae, and many more denizens of the otherworld…which makes for some interesting cases. In the new story, her client—who is also a suspect in a series of murders—is a vampire, so I’m having some fun playing with traditional vampire-story tropes.
What’s your next writing adventure? I have another Nearspace book underway, and several other partially-finished projects trying to get my attention. I’ve also seen a few interesting calls for short story submissions in the past few weeks, so ideas are percolating for those as well. I may write slowly, but there’s never a lack of things to write!
What is the last book you’ve read? I just finished listening to the audiobook of Blade Runner by Philip K. Dick. Although of course I shouldn’t have been surprised, I was struck by how much deeper the book is than the movie (although I’ve always loved the movie) and what themes and ideas did not make it into the movie, despite being central to the book. I never expect movie adaptations to be particularly true to a book—the demands of the media are completely different, after all—but the book gave me a lot to think about in terms of choices made at the time concerning what to include and what to leave out. How do we decide what’s vital to a story? Can you separate out certain themes and still have a complete tale? Lots to ponder.
Links
Website: http://www.sherrydramsey.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/sdramsey
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sdramsey/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SherryDRamseyWritingNews/
Bio
Sherry D. Ramsey is a speculative fiction writer, editor, publisher, creativity addict and self-confessed Internet geek. When she’s not writing, she makes jewelry, gardens, hones her creative procrastination skills on social media, and consumes far more coffee and chocolate than is likely good for her.
Her books include the Nearspace series from Tyche Books, One’s Aspect to the Sun, Dark Beneath the Moon, and Beyond the Sentinel Stars; the middle grade fantasy The Seventh Crow; The Murder Prophet; and two collections of short stories. With her partners at Third Person Press, she has co-edited six anthologies of regional short fiction and a novel. A member of the Writer’s Federation of Nova Scotia Writer’s Council, Sherry is also a past Vice-President and Secretary-Treasurer of SF Canada.
Sherry lives in Nova Scotia with her husband, children, and dogs. You can visit her online at www.sherrydramsey.com, find her on Facebook, and keep up with her much more pithy musings and visual life on Twitter and Instagram @sdramsey.
Sherry’s book The Goddess Problem features in Immortals
Universal Link https://books2read.com/Immortalsbundle
Bundle Rabbit https://bundlerabbit.com/b/immortals
Kobo https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/the-immortals-bundle
Amazon http://amzn.to/2BiYsIh
Barnes and Noble https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-immortals-bundle-a-l-butcher/1127826108
I Tunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id1335201648
Character Name
Katherine de Gand, but everybody calls me Kaylyn
Which book/world do you live in?
Tell us about yourself:
I was born in born in AD1130 and I had just married Baldwin de Gant (brother of Gilbert de Gand, Earl of Lincolnshire) when he went on pilgrimage and died at the siege of Damascus, (1148) and was reborn as child-of-darkness. I was 20 when I was turned (2/11/1150) since he came back with his maker who also made me. I’ve been a daughter-of-darkness since. I was 150 when I meet a handsome warrior of the Kingdom of Mewar, Rajveer, who became my brother-in-darkness…
What are your greatest strengths and weaknesses?
As an Anglo-Norman lady I was used to relying on the men of the house, be it my father or my husband. I’ll admit it took me centuries to become independent and then I was taken prisoner and lost my independence again. So I guess my weakness is still my lack of independence. My strength might be the power to mesmerize mortals into giving me their blood willingly. I never abuse that power and I’ve never killed anyone who didn’t want to die. But I did bring merciful death to old or sick people who had enough of their lives.
Name three important people/creatures/institutions in your world (such as lovers, pets, government institutions, leaders, gods etc).
One is my maker, Bran the Raven. He took care of me after Baldwin got himself killed by his own stupidity. I consider him a father and never tire of his presence. Two, my brother-in-darkness, Rajveer. Let’s just say I don’t really see him like a brother. Three, his fledgling, Shashank, who has taken care of me during the imprisonment years… as you can see I’m still pretty much dependent on men in my non-life.
What does ‘heroism’ mean to you?
Considering how many men I’ve seen destroy themselves in the name of heroism, I’m against those forms of warring heroism, but I admire people who have the strength to live through the centuries and change accordingly. Like Bran says, it takes stamina to live for centuries, and I think that’s a form of heroism that I aspire to.
What do you think of your ‘creator’?
I’m happy she’s writing down our stories.
Give us your favourite piece of advice:
Go with the flow. Be fluid and you can live forever. As long as you don’t crave being the centre of everybody’s attention. Being discreet is the best way to survive the passing of time.
Links to book
universal E-book links (geolocated, just pick your favourite distributor)
Paperback on Amazon, Barnes&Noble and other retailers.
Universal Link https://books2read.com/Immortalsbundle
Bundle Rabbit https://bundlerabbit.com/b/immortals
Kobo https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/the-immortals-bundle
Barnes and Noble https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-immortals-bundle-a-l-butcher/1127826108
I Tunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id1335201648
Gods, nymphs, vampires, deathless clones, cursed mages and those who serve them face perils where immortality acts as either curse or blessing or…both. Souls and selves lie at stake in this eclectic bundle.
Featuring:
The Goddess Problem by Sherry D. Ramsey
Glamour of the God-Touched by Ron Collins
A Man and His God by Janet Morris
Unnatural Immortal by Russ Crossley
First Chosen by M. Todd Gallowglas
Walking Gods by Leah Cutter
Rainbow’s Lodestone by J.M. Ney-Grimm
Brainjob by David Sloma
Silver Dust by Leslie Claire Walker
Vale of Semūin by Eric Kent Edstrom
Fate’s Door by J.M. Ney-Grimm
Kaylyn the Sister-in-Darkness by Barbara G. Tarn
The Legend of Oeliana by A. L. Butcher
Jamal & the Skeleton’s Heart by Ezekiel James Boston
Library of Erana 