I’m a guest on the Dragon Page Cover to Cover podcast today, episode #389A, talking with Mike & Mike about my two forthcoming anthologies, With Great Power
Podcast: Lou Anders @ The Dragon Page Cover to Cover Read More »
Michael A. Ventrella has conducted a wonderful interview with James Enge, talking about his background, his influences, his thoughts on fantasy literature and classic myth, and, of course, his novels Blood of Ambrose
VENTRELLA: Creating a fantasy world is never easy, because it must be rooted in believability. What have you done to make your world both fantastic and believable? Have you found it difficult?
ENGE: I try to maintain a certain tension between free invention and concrete realism. My favorite bits in my own writing are physical descriptions which are probably invisible to everyone else. In my first story, the hero has occasion to peer through “a dark shoe-shaped patch of nothingness”. It makes perfect sense in the world of the story, but it’s not something that you’re likely to see on the street on your way to work.
Meanwhile, C.S.E. Cooney has posted a great review of This Crooked Way.
In this book, the monsters are satisfyingly juicy and crunchable. The villains are terrifying – hardly less so when they’re desperate and likable than when they’re cackling and self-assured. The heroes are… wonderful. They bleed on everything. And Morlock’s main nemesis (why spoil it?) is utterly charming and wholly horrible and occasionally sympathetic. Egad, I liked this book.
What’s even better is she starts out saying the “episodic novel” might not be the form for her, and ends up loving the book. Nice.
James Enge: The Tension between Invention & Realism Read More »
Age
The Man Behind the Magic Read More »
I’m interviewed, along with 13 other editors, in a two-part article called “Dirty Hands and Invisible Words: Speculative Fiction Editors Speak Out” in Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 34, July 2009.
Here is a taste:
What is entailed in editing a book? Or, put differently, what exactly do you do as the editor?
Anders: This is a big question, particularly in my case as I am the “editorial director” of the Pyr line, a role that encompasses more than just acquisitions. In this regard, I read all manuscripts that come in, select the very small percentage of these that I am interested in acquiring, present them to my parent company for approval, negotiate with the agents or authors for the sale, work with the author on any structural changes or clarifications/improvements that need to be made to the manuscript, select and hire the cover artist, art direct the cover, oversee/approve the internal layout of the book that is laid out by typesetting, write the back cover copy (in conjunction with the author and an in-house editor), art direct our in-house design staff for the typography and layout of the book’s jacket, advised marketing on how best to advertize it, work with publicity on same, assist in all the various outward focused efforts that require book descriptions, help compile comparative buys for online retailers, and serve as an advocate both inside and outside of the house for the book. Inside the house, because my parent company publishes 100 titles a year on average (out of which Pyr is about 30), I am the book’s advocate to remind all the various departments what the book is about, why it is important, and how to market and package it. Outside, I maintain our newsletter, blog, Twitter and Facebook pages/accounts, and travel about once every other month to speak at conventions and libraries on our book line. I also get asked for interviews about once a week now (which I happily/gratefully agree to, thank you), and I scheme constantly about how to get books into readers hands. So, basically, I eat breath and sleep science fiction and fantasy, and it’s not uncommon for me to wake up at 3 am with something in my head like “OMG, we need to put a map in the front of Joel Shepherd’s latest fantasy novel. I better get on that ASAP” or “Have I checked in with Stephan Martiniere to make sure the cover for The Dervish House is on track?” or “Did we switch that author photo of Mike Resnick on the jacket flap out with the new one he prefers?” With all of that going on, actually sitting down with a red pen and a manuscript seems like a very tiny portion of the job description.
The whole interview was very enlightening (for me too!). The other twelve editors are:
Philip Athans has been a full-time staff editor at TSR, Inc. and Wizards of the Coast since 1995.
Victoria Blake is the publisher and founder of Underland Press, an independent specialty press.
Paula Guran is the editor of Juno Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster’s Pocket Books.
Gabrielle Harbowy is a freelance editor, and editor-in-charge at Dragon Moon Press.
James Lowder has worked as an editor for both large publishers and tiny independents, on projects that include New York Times bestselling shared world novels and small, critically acclaimed creator-owned titles.
John Jarrold has run three science fiction and fantasy imprints in the United Kingdom, worked as a freelance editor, and now runs the John Jarrold Literary Agency.
Susan J. Morris the Forgotten Realms® line editor at Wizards of the Coast.
Darren Nash is the editorial director at Orbit UK.
Patrick Nielsen Hayden edits books for Tor Books, among other publishers.
Chris Schluep is a Senior Editor at Ballantine/Villard/Del Rey.
Simon Spanton is the editorial director at Orion/Gollancz Books in the United Kingdom.
Deb Taber is the senior book editor of the Apex Book Company, an independent specialty press.
Jacob Weisman is the founding editor and publisher of Tachyon Publications, an independent specialty press.
Dirty Hands and Invisible Words Read More »
James Enge, author of Blood of Ambrose,
Here’s a sample:
Q: I liked the fact that you chose to reveal back-story for these characters and their world throughout the book rather than write a prologue to explain these things at the beginning. What went into this decision?”
A: About prologues… the more of them I read, the less I like them. I think some writers confuse the process they go through (in creating the world, the characters, the backstory) with the process the reader goes through. If the reader feels like he or she is reading “Report on Planet X” or “Fodor’s Guide to Middle Earth” then the writer has blown it somehow. A successful beginning is more like introducing two people. If you want Bob to meet Shlomo, you don’t start by reciting Shlomo’s educational background, vocational aptitudes and credit history. You say, “Bob: meet Shlomo. Which one of you is buying the next round?” (Or something like that. I’m still working on that whole social skills thing.)
James Enge @ Joe Mallozzi’s blog Read More »
The wonderful Charles Tan has posted an interview with Yours Truly on Bibliophile Stalker. I think it came off rather well, if I do say so myself. Here’s a taste:
How has Pyr adapted to the changes in the publishing industry?
More trade paperbacks, fewer hardcovers. We’re getting serious about ebooks.
But I want to give a shout out here to our Director of Publicity, Jill Maxick, who I think was somewhat ahead of the curve on reaching out to online communities and bloggers. These days, that’s a no brainer, but five years ago when we were just starting out, Jill launched us out of the gate with a heavy outreach to bloggers, and treated online review venues with every bit as much respect as traditional print venues. Again, these days, that’s not a big deal, but the climate was different in 2004, and she deserves massive credit for being one of the first to get it. And that was essential when it came to Pyr making the splash it did.
Stalked by a Bibliophile Read More »
James Enge, author of Blood of Ambrose,
I believe that the greatest danger to genre fiction nowadays is not the denial of respect from some notional group of literary tastemakers but the very real likelihood that sf/f may become respectable. Those who thirst for the foamy gray poison of respectability should consider the fate of jazz, once a popular medium, now respectable, ossified and ignored.
James Enge Interview up at Fantasy Book Critic Read More »
There’s a fantastic interview with Blood of Ambrose
The genesis of Morlock was, I think, frustration with two of my favorite writers, Tolkien and H.G. Wells. I was annoyed that Tolkien so obviously favored elves over dwarves, and that Wells did the same with Eloi over Morlocks. Morlocks did stuff—they worked and learned and thought and created. They seemed to me more authentically human than the empty, shiny Eloi. So what if they lived underground and weren’t so pretty? The cannibalism is a little harder to stomach, as it were—but I’m sure that’s exactly why Wells put it in. That’s his thumb on the scale, trying to tilt our judgment of his characters.
Then over at The Agony Column, Rick Kleffel and I talk about Steampunk, Victoriana and Elizabethan SF, with a bit about Chris Roberson, George Mann, and old series Doctor Who. Here’s a direct link.
Meanwhile in response to my accidentally traumatizing her with an offhand statement, Justina Robson asks What is Fantasy About? Please go join in the discussion. I sense brilliance on the verge of conception.
Then Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review gives an 8 out of 10 to Matthew Sturges’ Midwinter.
…a book that any fantasy fan will get a lot out of. …there is no denying the sense of urgency that leaps out off the page and drives the story along [at] a very fast pace. The constant plotting and scheming underneath the surface adds to this urgency as well as giving the reader the best possible reason to keep reading. There are loads of questions that all need answering and it’s all credit to Sturges that these are the kind of questions where you care enough about the answers to invest more time in reading the book. You also cannot deny the dangers that our travellers must face on their journey and these make for some great moments where anything could happen and spectacle is the order of the day!
Hey, I’d be rushing out to get that now if I hadn’t read it already. But if you need more convincing, Jessica Strider at Sci-Fan Letter interviews Matthew Sturges, about the book and the craft of writing in general.
I was doing a presentation about writing comic books for a group of fourth-graders, since I’m most known as a comic book writer. Most of the questions were what you’d expect from nine-year-olds: Who’d win in a fight between the Hulk and Superman, that kind of stuff. Just as the questions were dying down, a kid in the back raised his hand and asked, “How much do you make?” I paused for a second and said, “I do okay, I guess.” He wasn’t satisfied, “Can you give me a dollar amount?” “That’s an inappropriate question,” said the teacher, embarassed. “Why?” said the kid. “How can I tell if I want to do that job if I don’t know what it pays?”
Meanwhile, The King of the Nerds (what a title!) has some very positive thoughts about Tom Lloyd’s The Twilight Herald:
…one heck of a wild ride, with action, excitement, danger, violence and epic confrontations occurring left and right… I’m not certain I would say The Twilight Herald is an improvement over The Stormcaller
but Lloyd at the least reveals an impressive level of verstatility in terms of style between the two novels. Furthermore he maintains an ability to include a subtle over-arching theme of revenge across the entirety of the novel that is never overwrought or glaring. Lloyd is keeping me guessing with the series and, criticisms asside, that is something I can definatley appreciate.
And that’s enough news for one morning, right?
Update: Well, no, because there’s a terrific interview with Tom Lloyd that is up at Fantasy Book News & Reviews.
Enge, Sturges, Robson, Lloyd and Me Read More »
Tor.com has just uploaded my conversation with James Enge, author of the just-released Swords & Sorcery novel, Blood of Ambrose.
Morlock, as suits his ornery nature, was born out of annoyance. I’d just been rereading Wells’ The Time Machine and I was annoyed because I thought (and still think) that Wells stacked the deck unfairly against the Morlocks. Somehow this merged with a longstanding grievance I have against Tolkien: JRRT worked too hard to make elves the good guys, often at the expense of dwarves. And—because I was reading a lot of Arthurian source material at the time—I realized that “Morlock” looked like a lot of names in Arthurian legend: Morgan, Morgause, Morholt, Mordred. And so this character named Morlock Ambrosius was born, who was supposed to be to Merlin something like what Mordred was to Arthur.
A Conversation with James Enge Read More »
Genreville’s Rose Fox posts Nuts & Bolts: Tom Lloyd today. This interview with the author of The Twilight Herald
Here’s a taste: “The idea evolved over several years. I’d had the first scene stuck in my head for a while, a dream originally, so it was the natural start for the book, but I didn’t actually have a plot to begin with. When I started writing I just started sketching out ideas for the world and how I’d like it to be populated. I’ve always loved the quarrelsome gods of Norse mythology and decided that I wanted more involvement from gods than most books I’d read.”
Nuts & Bolts: Tom Lloyd Read More »