Fantasy’s Tricksters
Trent Cannon
Fantasy loves a big, strong hero, almost as much as we love a big, scary villain. We love to see a good, old-fashioned epic showdown, preferably on top of a…
Star Wars: Bloodline by Claudia Gray
Zachary A. Matzo
Bloodline is best novel of the new Star Wars unified continuity. It’s certainly one of the best Princess Leia tales ever told. Steeped in the myth, lore and continuity of…
Children of Earth and Sky by Guy Gavriel Kay
Eric Christensen
Children of Earth and Sky, Guy Gavriel Kay’s 13th novel, interweaves several individual tales into a larger story highlighting the pain and opportunity and fragility of living between clashing empires…
Game of Thrones: Content vs. Delivery
I’ve just finished the fourth episode of the current season and I’m more engaged with both the show and the world of A Song of Ice and Fire than I…
Faeries and Folklore – Part One: An Introduction
Leo Elijah Cristea
We’re going to talk about faeries. For the purposes of both my sanity and authenticity, leave any and all notions of Disney’s Tinker Bell at the door. Tinker Bell is…
Breaking the Glass Slipper: Podcast Celebrating Women in Genre
Lucy Hounsom
This month, I’d like to officially introduce Fantasy-Faction readers to Breaking the Glass Slipper. The brainchild of Megan Leigh over at Pop Verse, it’s a bi-monthly podcast focusing on women…
HEX by Thomas Olde Heuvelt
Jonathan Thornton
“This is all it takes for people to plunge into insanity: one night alone with themselves and what they fear most.” Witches have a long history running through folklore, myth…
Create Your Own Fantasy Author Frankenstein Monster
Peter Newman
Last year, in the build up to Fantasy-Faction’s Grim Gathering event, it was suggested to me that I would look a lot better if I had Myke Cole’s arms. One…
Otherbound by Corinne Duyvis
Jo Niederhoff
In my life, I’ve found that there are a few different sorts of books I wind up reading. Some are gifts. Some are books I explicitly sought out. And some…
Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off #2: One Reader’s Initial Thoughts
A.F.E. Smith
I’m one of Fantasy-Faction’s readers for this year’s Self-Published Fantasy Blog Off (SPFBO). And now that I’ve read the first chapters of all the books in our set, I thought…
Learning from Script and Screen
Aaron Miles
It’s important for a writer to learn about their craft wherever they can, for most this takes the form of studying the work of successful authors or flicking through a…
When Good Turns Bad: The Reversed Hero’s Journey
Nicola Alter
The typical “hero’s journey” is a structure that can be found not only in fantasy fiction but also in many other genres. You can analyse the twists and turns of…