David B Coe

Dark Eyes

Faith Hunter

Blood Cross

A J Hartley

What Time Devours

Misty Massey

Mad Kestrel

Making Historical Characters Your Own

Did you know that Eleanor of Aquitaine, in addition to being married to two kings and giving birth to three more, and in addition to riding to the Holy Land with the Second Crusade, spent sixteen years of her life in prison (by order of her second husband) and outlived all but two of her [...]

Talking About Magic Part Three

I love the idea of real magic. Surrounded every day by traffic and buildings, by dishes that need washing and trash that needs emptying, I can’t help desiring a world in which something sparkling and strange could be right around the corner. When I was a kid, I used to wander in the [...]

A Thief, A Ranger and a Dogman Walk Into a Pub…

Lately I’ve been talking about building magic into your world, and I found that I often mention using role-playing games as resources. There’s something I should point out before we go much further. The story that’s created out of a gaming session is rarely one that will function between the covers of a [...]

Talking About Magic Pt Two

In fantasy, you can make a complete break, and you can put people in a situation where they are confronted with things that they would not confront in the real world.
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Talking About Magic

I just gave up on a book. Once upon a time I read every book I picked up, regardless of whether or not I was enjoying it. I felt that I owed the book that much, to finish. But now that I’ve become old and persnickety, I just don’t have the time [...]

Finding Real Magic in Writing

The magic system in my first series — the LonTobyn Chronicle — had three elements:  the mage, his or her familiar (usually a bird of prey), and a crystal or ceryll, as I called it, that focused the power sourced in the psychic connection between bird and mage.  Each person’s crystal, and by extension, each [...]