How to earn a burnout

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So I went and gave myself a burnout, because I don’t learn.

I’ve sent the next Why Odin Drinks story to my editor and decided to tackle the genre that I’ve always found the most difficult: romance. I’ve done a lot of reading first, both of craft books and various sorts of other authors’ romances, noting what I did or didn’t like. I settled on sweet (nothing sexual happens on the page) m/m (it didn’t work, gay men have too many cocks to spend the night cuddling without at least one’s interest getting aroused, so it’s sweet-with-heat now). I started writing the first draft and here’s where I made the same mistake I always make: I stopped watching what I was doing.

I can, as in I am able to, work approximately three hours a day. Unfortunately, tasks that for most people are either unnoticeable or, at worst, irritating chores constitute work for me. Folding the laundry; cleaning the bathroom; cooking something more complicated than an egg; taking a shower; often simply reading. Therapy, obviously. Unfortunately writing is also on that list.

It’s escapism, I love doing it, and it exhausts my energy without me noticing, because I don’t want to notice. If you love your work, it isn’t work anymore, we all know that. So I’ve spent two weeks drafting my romance, navigating the complications and changing the plot as I went, and accidentally completing NaNoWriMo (fifty thousand words – an average romance novel clocks at 60-80 thousand) within two weeks. I wrote every day, of course – “you’re only a real writer if you write every day!” Then, to nobody’s surprise but mine, I crashed. Badly.

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Guest post: Norse Influences by Tim Hardie

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Today I’m delighted to host Tim Hardie, the author of Hall of Bones (SPFBO7 finalist), Sundered Souls, and soon more – so that he can tell us how Hall of Bones came to be and (gasp) how he did NOT read the myths for inspiration!

The floor blog is yours, Tim.

 

 

When Bjørn Larssen asked if I’d like to contribute to his blog, I’ll admit I was a bit intimidated.  Mr Larssen is a scholar [he really isn’t at all – B] when it comes to all things Viking and Norse and for a while I debated whether I should back out.  My reason for thinking this, which I’ll expand on in this post, is my book isn’t really Viking or Norse at all.

This is, of course, a form of imposter syndrome.  I particularly dislike that whole ‘You’re not a fantasy writer until you’ve read A, B, C … X, Y, Z, the short story collection for D, E, F … and the prequels for blah, blah, blah’.  You get the point.  By all means shout from the rooftops about the books you love.  Authors need the support of their readers and fans.  Seriously, though, if everyone had to read all everyone else’s favourites before they were allowed to put pen to paper the literary world would be dead.  It’s a form of elitism which, taken to extreme, stifles creativity.  If you want to write – just write.

As an aside, I’ve not read Malazan, will never pick up The Wheel of Time and I’ve DNF’d The Way of Kings, the first book of The Stormlight Archive.  Bite me.

So, having gotten that out of the way, Bjørn asked me to write about the Norse influences of my book.  I found myself thinking about this for some time, because I tend to describe my series (The Brotherhood of the Eagle) as Viking-inspired fantasy, with an emphasis on the word fantasy.  You won’t find the Norse gods in my writing because my fantasy world has its own mythology and pantheon of flawed deities. It’s interesting how Norse fantasy has become a ‘thing’ in recent years and is now incredibly popular. 

When I set out to write Hall of Bones, way back in 2011, I wanted to use a Viking culture as it provided something a little different to the standard/generic medieval fantasy setting.  I couldn’t think of a comparable title back then.  By the time the novel was finished at the end of 2015 the genre had caught up and that trend has continued apace.

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Guest post: Chaos, Fidelity, and Salt

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Today I am delighted to host Lyra Wolf, the author of Truth and Other Lies, The Order of Chaos, and That Good Mischief – books, in which Loki… you tell’em, Lyra!

Chaos, Fidelity, and Salt

I’ve always been fascinated by the concept of ‘opposites attract,’ and I think you would be hard pressed to find a more opposite couple than Loki and Sigyn. When I started writing my The Nine Worlds Rising series, I knew from the beginning that their relationship was one I wanted to explore, and I cracked open as many books and articles on Norse lore as I could get my hands on.

What I found was that no one really knows who they are as a couple, what their function is, or why they got paired together at all. To make matters even more tricky, we know even less about Sigyn, other than she is very good at holding bowls over people’s heads for long periods of time.

Fantastic for me. Super awesome.

How was I supposed to write a series about a relationship that seemed to hold a lot of weight and power behind it, when all that remains of the lore is essentially a slice of Swiss cheese?

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Thor: NOT God of war (and not a Hemsworth)

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This post is inspired by the following Twitter thread:

I respectfully disagree with parts of the thread (not just the original tweet above).

  1. I have never seen Thor being referred to as a war God. Not even by the “white suprëmacists” (or inbreds for short, a side effect of insisting that they’re Racially Pure in a world where hardly anybody is). The only exception seems to be the National Museum of Denmark, which I’ll get to later, settling for a facepalm for the time being.
  2. Calling Thor a God of fertility, while not incorrect, feels misleading to me. (Some argue that laying of the hammer in the bride’s lap makes the hammer a phallic object, but I think it’s…reaching a bit. In the same way you could say a fork is a phallic object.) I feel that “God of farming” or “God of plenty” would be a better choice of words, as Thor connects the sky and the Earth, bringing rain to the crops. If you’re looking for the God of fertility, I’d send you towards Freyr and his giant erection, or Frigg, the Mother.
  3. Thor is the God of the common folk, especially farmers; he brings thunder, lightning, and rain; he’s the God of blacksmiths (insider info); he’s straightforward, violent only when pissed off, and the only war he participates in throughout the entire lore is Ragnarök – if you can call the Norse version of the apocalypse a war. He doesn’t bring death – he brings food to the table. Yes, his own table tends to be the first 😉 but he’s not above killing his own goats (spoiler alert: they get resurrected) to feed others.

 

War Gods

There are at least three heathen Gods and Goddesses associated with war.

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Creation is out there!

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Creation has now been created and distributed all over the worlds.

The inspiration, again, was Neil Gaiman’s Norse Mythology, because I expected it to be like this. Since he failed to deliver the absurd and slapstick, I had to do it all on my own – there is a saying, “write the book you want to read,” and that’s what I’ve done.

Odin and his brothers, Vili and Vé, are not so great at their jobs – you wouldn’t either, if you suddenly discovered you’re in charge of everything now, but got no training, or at least a leaflet. (Not that it would help, since you also can’t read or write.) They stumble around, creating random cows and forest fires and celery, until… the ultimate weapon comes around. Can you even begin to imagine what it is? Why, yes, of course it’s people. Duh. Even celery is less threatening than THOSE.

Find the book here: www.books2read.com/creation – it’s the first in a series and there will be more. Quite a few more. I am carefully saying “2022,” but unlike Land there might be a second instalment coming before the end of the year… because after 2020 and 2021 we all deserve a laugh, right?

Why Odin Drinks

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A new book, sort of, is coming this summer.

Originally called How to Be a God, Why Odin Drinks explains that when the Gods first found themselves in the Nine Worlds, they didn’t know how to God properly. Similarly to Maya in The Ten Worlds, they have to discover what it is they apparently do, and that can only be done by trial and error. Maya’s task is easier.

Why Odin Drinks is going to be a series of novellas, released as e-books as I finish each one. Initially it looked like Thor and Two Ladies would be ready first. But… before Thor could start admiring the female beauty, he had to be created. But not before the cow Audhumla. And many other things, such as celery…

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Liquid fire

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Guess who this is? (Hint: it is I) Floradorp New Year’s celebration, 2013/2014.

As a kid, I was incessantly bullied. I was fat, bad at all sports, extremely introverted, wore thick glasses, I lived inside books and mixtapes I made. I was so smart I excelled at everything (but sports) but not smart enough to understand that always knowing all the answers and bragging about how I never had to study for tests didn’t make me popular. (Emotional intelligence was not strong in this one at the age of 7.) So I avoided the other boys. I was both alone and lonely most of the time, my companions being books and music, but twice a year I would be rewarded with magic.

Back in the 1980s, every worker was sent on subsidised vacations. We’d pick one out of, I don’t know, three near identical locations, and go there for two weeks, paying silly money – think €10 per day for a family of three. Certain traditions were always observed during those outings. The first evening without rain would be the “evening of friendship,” where the kids would be obnoxious together, adults would get drunk, then at some point the kids would get sent to bed.

Except me.

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We are default people too

/ Children, Interview, Storytellers, The Ten Worlds / 3 Comments

“When we say that someone is ‘writing from the margins’, what does that mean? […] They’re writing about race, or gender, or country of origin, or disabilities, or… the list goes on. But. Why are they still in the margins? Why is it still considered that?” (Morgan Hazelwood, Writing SFF From the Margins)

Krystle Matar and I decided to talk about this topic, and how we refuse to keep both ourselves and our characters on the margins of SFF literature.

Shifting the default: what does it mean to you and why do you want to do it?

Krystle When talking about how much of your characters to include in your books, I’ve seen the advice, “if it serves a purpose to the plot, absolutely talk about their sexuality/identity.” This advice always rubbed me the wrong way. When have we ever asked if a character being heterosexual and male “serves a purpose” in the plot? Why should our characters being full and complicated humans have to be anything more than aspects of who they are? Why should they have to justify their existence by a checklist?

Maybe it’s because I’m a character writer first and a plot writer second—every part of them serves a purpose, but no particular part of them is more important than the other. In my head, they live and breathe. Those of us that don’t fit the default shouldn’t have to “serve a purpose” to be allowed to express ourselves to the fullest breadth of our existence. We should be allowed to just be—and I wanted to give my characters the same multifaceted depth that I’ve seen in the real world.

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No, really…

/ Backstory, Land, My Norse Gods, Updates / 3 Comments

When Storytellers came out in March 2019, I kept obsessing about sales and reviews, refreshing my Amazon dashboard, checking Goodreads four times a day (HAHAHAHA more like forty). My first one-star review didn’t upset me – I knew I was bound to get one eventually and almost felt validated. I was a real, rejected author now! But, also, Storytellers was no longer my only baby and the love of my life. It quietly disconnected itself from me – I was working on my second book, Age of Fire, urban fantasy with Norse Gods in it.

I got a bit drunk on the five- and four-star reviews coming from complete strangers. They weren’t my friends or family members trying to humour me. Now all I had to do was write the next book, then the next one, and each would be better just because I was clearly really good at this.

Big mistake. Huge.

I wrote about video games, which I don’t actually play, then dumped all my knowledge of Reykjavík into it, including which supermarkets were the cheapest (Bonus) and how Icelanders socialised (in the public pools), and I felt so proud of this incredible… 

…turd.

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The True Meaning of Christmas

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Guest post by Elísabet R. Viðarsdóttir

 

The Norse, with their gods and myths, sailed ashore in Iceland, the land of magical creatures both living and dead. In order to settle the island, the Norse knew they needed permission from these creatures.

The living conditions on the island were harsh, especially during the long, cold and dark winters. The only thing alive in nature was the evergreen tree. It truly was Yggdrasil, the eternal tree that holds everything together.

Crops were scarce, leaving little food for the animals. This forced the farmers to slaughter some of them and preserve the meat for winter. Thank goodness for the gods and the otherworldly beings who blessed them and helped them survive through their hardships.

December came and the farmers could finally look forward to longer days and shorter nights.

 

It was time for Winter Solstice, a time to celebrate and honor the gods for all they had done.

The farmers prepared a big feast with the leftover grains, meats, mead and wine. It was the perfect time to celebrate. It was a new season where all the good things in life begin anew with a turn towards brighter days on the Wheel of the Year.

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