Our Monsters, Our Selves
Faith M. Boughan
The title of this article is taken from a panel discussion at World Fantasy Convention 2012—a panel that had so many voices who wanted to contribute that it had to…
Faith M. Boughan
Fantastical Creatures of Greco-Roman Mythology: The Colchian Dragon
This is the second instalment of a series in which we explore some of the lesser-known creatures and monsters found in Classical mythology, as many of these fantastical beings have…
Arsenic and Old Leaves: The Art of Poisoning Your Fantasy Characters – Part 1
So, you’re contemplating murder. Er, that is, your character is contemplating murder. Effective modes of death and all that. Bloodless versus bloodbath, public duel versus private confrontation, “accident” versus spontaneous…
An Exiguous Exploration of Exposition in Expansive Epics
Thousand-page fantasy novels… a ten-volume series… appendices of historical detail… characters who feel the need to blow hot wind across the pages of every third chapter… what do these have…
Fantastical Creatures of Greco-Roman Mythology: Hippoi Monokerata
Welcome to the final instalment of our series on lesser-known creatures and monsters in Classical mythology! Over the past year, we’ve looked at everything from ancient dragon-like creatures to ancient…
Fantastical Creatures of Greco-Roman Mythology: Ophiotaurus
Ah, monsters. Who doesn’t love a good, unique monster now and then? As great as it is to read about another dragon or giant spider, there’s something special about a…
Five Common Mistakes Writing Fantasy Flash Fiction
During my time as a flash editor for various ezines, I’ve read a fair chunk of speculative flash fiction. Some excellent. Some good. Some bad. Some really, really bad. And…
Fantastical Creatures of Greco-Roman Mythology: The Leukrokottas
Welcome to another instalment of Fantastical Creatures of Greco-Roman mythology! If you’ve been following this series for a while, jump down to the subtitle below. If you’re new, here’s the…
Fantastical Creatures of Greco-Roman Mythology: The Taraxippus
Raise your hand if you believe in ghosts. Oh, come on. You, over there, reading this on your laptop on the bus—go ahead, raise your hand. No one will know…
Writing Fantasy Gender Stereotypes – Part One: Your Heroine is Too Beautiful
I’m not trying to open a can of worms here—I’ll say that right off the bat. I acknowledge that this topic is enormous, complex, and encompasses both a dearth of…
Fantastical Creatures of Greco-Roman Mythology: The Telkhines
In this, the eighth instalment of the series on lesser known creatures and monsters of Classical myth, I want to take you far, far away from where we were last…
Fantastical Creatures of Greco-Roman Mythology: The Myrmekes Indikoi (Indian Ant)
For the seventh instalment of this series on lesser known creatures and monsters of Greco-Roman mythology, we’re going to look at something really obscure. So obscure, in fact, that there…