You raise some interesting issues about how humankind uses--or misuses--it mythologies. Certainly the power of any myth arises from the credence that people give to it, nor from whether or not that myth is actually "true". And I must confess that a related theme seems to be creeping into "Fatal Revenant". But "myth" per se is not a common (or conscious) focus in my work. I'm already too familiar with (not to mention disgusted by) the kinds of distortions you describe. As a storyteller, I'm more interested in the way that knowledge can lead to hope or despair--or both. And in the strange power of "belief" to bring about its own fulfillment (for example, the manner in which the Lords insist on trusting Covenant eventually helps him to become trustworthy). It's pretty obvious that this process (belief bringing about its own fulfillment) *works* in the real world. (11/01/2006)

I'm posting this as a matter of general information. I believe that the Books on Tape program of the Library of Congress includes the "Covenant" books (I could be wrong), but that doesn't make them generally available. Your approach seems rather ingenious--and (if you don't mind my saying so) rather effortful. But then, I don't happen to enjoy listening to books. btw, you're absolutely right about the copyright issues. (11/01/2006)

Ultimately I think we have to blame Lord Foul. It's an effect of the misuse of power--and it does not bode well for Drool's future. <grin> (11/01/2006)

I don’t have any writing-related superstitions in the common sense of the term. I don’t, for example, have to wear socks of a particular color, or spin my chair three times before starting a sentence. I don’t even need a particular font, or a cocoon of sound: I’m writing now without either of those benefits, and I’ve written fiction on airplanes and in hotel rooms that lack virtually everything I find congenial to creative concentration. But anyone as ADD and OCD as I am is bound to have a broad range of eccentricities. Mine tend to involve the most mundane and even trivial aspects of daily living, like how I choose what clothes to wear on any given day. (11/06/2006)

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Well, if it were me, I wouldn’t choose a “Covenant” book at all. I’ve always thought that the safest thing to do is pick one of my short story collections: “Daughter of Regals” or “Reave the Just”. That way, people can find out if they like what I do without committing the time and energy to a novel that doesn’t even tell a complete story. Ordinarily I would consider “The Mirror of Her Dreams” a relatively safe choice, but it’s longer than any “Covenant” book. But if you *must* have a “Covenant” book, indulge me by starting with LFB. You found TWL to be “a fine introduction”: I suspect that many other readers would disagree. (11/06/2006)

Hmm. I’ve never really known what to do with the old “show not tell” dictum. What exactly does it *mean*? After all, we’re talking about storyTELLING: the “telling” is sort of implied by the nature of the process. So I assume that when I tell you what Linden Avery, for example, is saying or doing, I’m “showing,” but when I tell you what she’s thinking or feeling, I’m “telling.” Well, literature offers fine examples of the “show not tell” dictum. Hemmingway leaps to mind, as does Elmore Leonard--not to mention Shakespeare. But then, literature offers many examples of other approaches as well. If “show not tell” were the only valid approach, we would have to get rid of all of Faulkner and James, never mind Dostoevsky and Dickens. In the end, I think, every writer has to find a balance between showing and telling: a balance which a) suits his/her abilities, and b) fits his/her subject matter. Personally, I try very hard not to “cheat” in my use of “3rd person limited”. But I’m pretty flexible in how I use it. Since my own experience of being alive at any given moment (including this one) involves a wide range of mundane external perceptions and intimate internal reactions pretty much simultaneously--in other words, since nothing about my own experience of being alive takes place “completely inside” my own head--I strive to re-create that experience in storytelling. Which, I hasten to add, is impossible: first, because storytelling is stubbornly linear, one word after another, while in real life a wide range of things can happen all at once; and second, because storytelling imposes disciplines (for example, the necessity of communicating in a way that the reader can understand) which are largely absent from moment-by-moment real life. But within those constraints, I do the best I can. With (very) rare exceptions, I don’t let my readers see anything that my POV character could not have seen, or know anything that my POV character could not have known. (On the other hand, I do often strive to encourage my readers to feel things which are different than what my POV character feels. But that’s a completely different subject.) (11/06/2006)

But seriously…. How would *I* know what’s common, or uncommon, or preternatural to the point of freakishness? *I’m* not inside anyone else’s head. I only know what makes other people quail when they tell me; and they only tell me (if they tell me) one at a time. Frankly, I can’t even speak for the people I can see from where I’m sitting. I can really only speak for myself. However. I’d be willing to bet cash money that it is not UNcommon for writers of every description (aspiring, novice, experienced, professional, awe-inspiring, whatever) to quail at putting birds, er, words on paper. It’s a daunting prospect, writing. But what makes each individual writer quail? Ah, that’s less certain. In my case, it’s the fact that I *do* know the story that strikes terror into my heart. But for other people--I imagine--staring at that first blank page (or screen) is like peering into the bitter eyes of the abyss. And I know at least one writer on whom the ghouls pounce in the *middle* of a story: starting is just fine, fun in fact, thank you very much--but those MIDDLES <shudder>, oh my God. I would hazard a guess that having a character pop in out of nowhere, fully-formed and doomed (or not), is not at all uncommon. Some of us even *like* the surprises that our unconscious minds spring on us. But more than that I really can’t say. (11/11/2006)

I can’t speak for anyone else. But here’s what I know. 1) Life is becoming more complex. Or reported perceptions of life are becoming more complex, which amounts to the same thing. Spend ten seconds comparing WWII with the war in Iraq, and you’ll see what I mean. So it seems only natural that fiction would follow life. 2) Whether or not life is becoming more complex, *I* am becoming more complex. An inevitable consequence of the fact that I’m older, I’ve experienced more, I’ve felt more, I’ve seen more, and I’ve refused to stop thinking about it. Everything I look at has more sides than it once did, which may well mean that what I’m looking at has become more complex, but which *certainly* means that I have become more complex. It seems only natural that this would be reflected in my storytelling. 3) Whether or not life (and/or I) has (have?) become more complex (and I sinCEREly hope that the syntax gods aren’t listening), I still have to compete for readers. I have to give my readers reason to believe that I’m offering something they haven’t seen before, or can't get anywhere else. (Which is actually impossible. “There is nothing new under the sun,” etc..) And in this competition, I don’t simply have to compete with my contemporaries: I have to compete with every writer who ever contributed to the foundations of the kind of story I want to write. (OK, OK, every writer I *know about* who ever contributed.) So it seems natural that I would try to, well, put more in. Of course, we don’t have to work at it very hard to come up with other explanations. Series sell: the longer the series, the more money the writer makes: therefore (some) writers want to stretch out their series(es)(es)(oh, fudge): and there are only a finite number of ways to stretch out a series, adding complexity being one. But if I suspected myself of doing that, I’d--well, never mind. I’d write something else, let’s leave it at that. (11/11/2006)

As a rule, I give myself however long it takes my readers/editors to read. Of course, I need a bit of rest. But rewriting uses different mental muscles that writing does, so I don’t need a *lot* of rest. What I DO need--and it’s vital to me--is something that flips the switch in my head from Creative to Critical. Apparently (brace yourself: understatement coming) I’m not very good at flipping this switch for myself. I’m actually quite good at rewriting--once I’m in Critical mode. But to get into Critical mode, I need a reader--and, ideally, a reader who is willing to say, “What the ***** is *that* supposed to mean?” (11/11/2006)

The Land is a region on a globe in the same way that, say, Greece is region on a globe. The Land happens to be isolated on every side, the sea to the east and rugged mountains everywhere else. But if you go through the mountains, as the Ramen do with the Ranyhyn, you come to other lands. Well, I designed the Land that way for a variety of reasons, one of which was to make it a metaphorical arena. A place where the same issues that confront people everywhere are *concentrated*: a place where--in a manner of speaking--Earthpower flows much closer to the surface of reality. (Hence the name "*the* Land," as if it were the only place that matters.) That's why it's possible to get out from under the Sunbane. Or from under Kevin's Dirt. I haven't provided maps for any other regions of the globe because they aren't necessary to the story I'm trying to tell. (11/11/2006)

Gee, and I was SO hoping there wouldn't be any more Creator questions.... <rueful smile> OK (he said, girding up his loins), let's break this down into Creator questions and LF questions. Creator questions. You could say that the Creator trapped LF within the Arch by accident. (There's some textual justification for this view.) You could say that the Creator was solving his own "problem of how to deal with evil" by putting the bad guy in prison. (I can't think of any textual evidence, but the interpretation itself is probably defensible.) Or you could say that the Creator was taking a more holistic, even Zen approach to the situation: how can a living organism (the creation) grow if it doesn't have something both to strive for and to strive against? This is an extremely risky way of being a Creator: it requires him to give up on the whole notion of "perfection," and to face the very real prospect of complete failure. But it may conceivably be the most *loving* way of being a Creator. LF questions. Well, of course, misery loves company. In my experience, people who are in intense, chronic pain usually "punish" the people around them; anyone who happens to be within reach, including innocent bystanders. Such individuals ease the sting of their own pain by feeling empowered when they cause pain in others. But LF also has a better reason for being so nasty. He can't break the Arch of Time himself: only power wielded by other people has the potential to free him from his prison. So the ultimate aim of everything he does is to goad other people into extreme--and extremely destructive--acts of power (like the Ritual of Desecration). And, of course, if the people who are being goaded are in intense pain, they are more likely to exert power destructively. Meanwhile LF remains trapped because a) the Law of Time is the most fundamental--therefore the least easily damaged--of the necessary Laws, and b) Covenant's self-sacrifice (voluntarily becoming an inherent participant in the Arch) has made the Law of Time stronger rather than weaker. (To call Covenant "nothing more than a tool" is to disregard the voluntary nature of his sacrifice.) I hope that's clear. (11/11/2006)

1) Of course, the editors involved understand the reality of the problem you describe. So they talk to each other. They try to work out their differences. And they usually decide to emphasize different aspects of the book, so that I'll be able to satisfy one without disappointing the other. It's actually quite civilized. And new, in my experience. Until "The Last Chronicles," my UK editors have simply kept their mouths shut: instead of putting me in an untenable position, they have chosen to accept whatever my US editors accept. 2) I approve of anything that keeps my books in print. Personally, I don't like omnibus editions because they're heavy and the print is small. But that's a trivial concern compared to keeping my books in print. (Keep in mind, however, that the publishers are doing it to save money, so they certainly aren't going to pay for any "extras". The potential profits on books are much smaller than on DVDs.) 3) LF wants to alienate the people of the Land from Covenant (as if Covenant weren't already doing that for himself). The more the people of the Land distrust Covenant, the less likely he is to become the Land's redeemer. (11/11/2006)

Sadly, there's nothing original about it. There's an old joke that can be paraphrased as: "I used to enjoy getting married because I was in love. But that never worked out. So now whenever I feel the urge to get married, I just find a woman I don't like and buy her a house." Wired magazine asked me for a six word story: they didn't ask me to *think*. <grin> (11/12/2006)

As I learned when I was working on the first “Covenant” trilogy, there are some very real advantages to getting the whole story (in that case, three books) written before publication. The most obvious advantage has to do with internal consistency. If you slam into a problem in book three, you have the option of trying to solve it by changing book one. And because there’s so little “lag” between books (you don’t have to go through all the mechanical stages of preparing a manuscript for publication), your creative process itself can be more focused, therefore more consistent. As a result, I’ve often suspected that writing them all before any of them were published might produce better books. In a “pure” world--a world where I didn’t have to worry about either money or publishers--I might have wanted to write the whole of “The Last Chronicles” before releasing any of it. But of course I do have to worry about money. And publishers do have to worry about what I call “keeping an author’s name alive”: when a decade or more passes between books, readers might be forgiven for forgetting that an author exists. Even as matters stand (a book every three years) my publishers are understandably afraid that readers will simply get tired of waiting. Hence the unfortunate fact that I now get paid less than at any other time in my sf/f writing career. And then there’s my hunger to be read. I suspect that this is a universal and even congenital issue among writers. Writing is pretty da*n lonely, and being read eases the loneliness. I doubt that I’m a strong enough person to spend 12 years working on “The Last Chronicles” without *some* sort of connection with people who read my work. (11/13/2006)

So far, I’ve been pretty good at fending off the effects of “instant feedback”. Oh, sometimes the feedback does help make me aware of something that I might have missed; something that can make what I’m working on stronger. I’m human: I’m perfectly capable of doing what I call “dropping stitches.” And I’m grateful for anything that helps me avoid that problem. But does feedback inspired by “fan fascination” cause me to augment or diminish aspects of the story (a character, perhaps, or even simply an explanation)? I don’t think so. (OK, OK, maybe it *does* cause me to increase or decrease the amount of explanation.) I respond diligently to the feedback that I get from the people who read for me *while* I’m working on a book. The feedback, speculation, enthusiasm, disinterest, etc. that come in after I’m done with a book have no influence *that I’m aware of* on the future of the story. (11/13/2006)

1) No, I haven’t seen “The Man Who Wasn’t There.” And I must confess that I’ve rather lost interest in the whole “Covenant”-film question. I don’t believe it will ever happen. To my way of thinking, that’s a good thing. I suspect that “Covenant”--unlike, say, the GAP books--is essentially un-film-able. But (just my opinion) I certainly wouldn’t cast Billy Bob Thornton as Covenant. “World weary cynicism” seems to be Thornton’s best vein, and that wouldn’t suit my story. 2) Of course, I’ve never been in the situation you describe, so I don’t know how it would affect me. But I like to think that I would experience a brief period of mild disappointment, and then get back to the things that really matter to me. I have no say over whether or not a movie ever gets made; I have no say over whether or not the movie (if it ever gets made) is any good; I have no say over whether or not the movie (if it ever gets made) is both good *and* respectful of my intentions; so what would be the point of taking any of this personally? Meanwhile I suspect that working with the kinds of committees that make movies would drive me completely crackers. (11/21/2006)

I’m not sure I had much choice. On the one hand, I really am not a linguist. On the other, that whole “EnglishEnglishColloquialEnglish, he said in Spanish” thing seems like cheating. And on one of the remaining hands, writers who simply give the dialogue in Spanish (or French, or German, or whatever) and don’t translate it vex me. So I tried to think of a way to say things in English so that they would *sound* like Spanish (formal, perhaps, or courtly, rather than exotic). (11/21/2006)

No, actually, I wasn’t aware of it. Chalker certainly never asked my permission (or even my opinion). And although I met him once many years ago, I didn’t really know him; so I can’t speculate about his attitude (homage/in-joke/dig/whatever). However, I’m confident that no harm was intended--and that no harm was done. (11/21/2006)

With the understanding that this is Just My Opinion…. It seems to me that you can have “craft” without “art,” but you cannot have “art” without “craft”. Craft involves things like skill, intelligence, training, clarity of intention: things that can be learned (and yes, I do believe that “intelligence” can be learned--although perhaps not directly). Art requires craft because the elements of craft are essential to communication. But it also requires something more. What that “something more” *is* is open to discussion--and it may vary from artist to artist--but I think of it as “imagination” (in the sense of the term described by S. T. Coleridge), or “passion,” or “instinct,” or some blend/synergy/gestalt of the three. (This, by the way, is just another example of that penetrating lucidity which has made me the man I am today. <grin> “Mommy, Mommy, what’s the strange man talking about?” “No one knows, son. No one knows.”) I enjoyed your quote from Pratchett. But speaking as a man who distrusts his own impulse to rely on cliches, and who lo-o-o-oves his adjustable spanner (any home repair that can’t be accomplished with an adjustable spanner and duct tape isn’t worth doing), I’m not sure I agree. (11/21/2006)

Hmm. Well, EVeryone--including the author--refers to “Covenant” by his last name (if you don’t count Giants and Lords and such, who prefer titles). There are probably several explanations. One is that I attended a very “old-school” school in India, where we were taught things like Men Must Be Referred To By Last Name, Women By First Name. (You have no idea how difficult it was for me to break this habit for the sake of the GAP books; but I solved it in “Mordant’s Need” by only letting my characters have one name each--with the obvious exception of Terisa Morgan, who is always called Terisa.) But in addition…. Doesn’t the text say somewhere that Covenant doesn’t like being called Tom? (That’s not a detail I can check where I’m sitting at the moment.) And then, well, I wanted from the beginning to emphasize “Covenant” rather than “Thomas”. Thomas the Doubter is already abundantly present as the Unbeliever. But in the Bible there are two “covenants,” the Covenant of Law and the Covenant of Grace. On both the micro and the macro levels, that aspect of my (on-going) story has always been essential to me. So by the time Linden came along, referring to Covenant as “Covenant” was so deeply embedded in my intentions that I could not have rooted it out if I had wanted to--which I did not. (11/21/2006)

I wish I could remember your original question--or my response to it. And I wish that you had included an e-mail address, so I could send you a personal apology. It is not my intent to mock my readers. But sometimes my sense of humor gets a bit carried away. And sometimes I become impatient or vexed. That's not your fault, of course. But it does happen. Quite frankly, I use myself as a model for the Land's Creator. Since *I'm* not bored, I assume he isn't either. Please accept my regrets. (11/23/2006)

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I can't always explain my choices of names. Sometimes they just sound right to me. When that happens, I trust it. I learned long ago that it's a bad idea to censor my subconscious mind. Of course I was aware that "Gibbon" is a kind of monkey. But I'm still happy with the name. (11/25/2006)

Of course, I'm no expert on Flaubert, so I'll have to speculate. But at a guess, I'd say that he uses "dramatize" to mean "showing". If I want you to know how a character feels, and I resist the impulse to just tell you, then my only recourse is to reveal (show) how that character feels through action and interaction: drama. None of this affects my "beliefs" as I've already expressed them. I want my stories to be as dramatic as possible; but since storytelling is, by definition, "telling," I try to make that work for me. (11/26/2006)

You're right: I don't want to answer your question. <grin> And you're right again when you observe that none of the previous "Covenant" books were constructed with cliff-hanger endings. (I did use cliff-hangers in "Mordant's Need." But none of the GAP books end the way "The Runes of the Earth" does.) Let me point out, however, that the construction of "The Second Chronicles" is very different than that of the first trilogy. Different stories require different storytelling methods. (11/26/2006)

I do watch “24”. As a student of what I call “long-form storytelling,” I’m interested in almost anything that promises to tell a coherent and interesting story in more than 42 minutes (or more than 242 minutes, for that matter). The problem with “24” is that it seldom delivers what it promises. More often, it conveys the sensation that the writers and directors are scrambling, even floundering, in a desperate attempt to stretch their story beyond its natural limits. The result is more and more implausibility as the episodes go by. (Just my opinion, of course.) Years ago, I followed “Babylon 5” for much the same reason--and gave up on it when I began to believe that the wheels had come off. Every storytelling medium has its inherent advantages and disadvantages. Visual forms like film and theater are especially good at silences--and gestures--and action of all kinds--and (since these forms usually include sound) voices. (Of course, “silence” can be seen as a sub-set of “sound,” but that’s not really the point here.) Images-with-sound allow the storyteller to communicate several messages simultaneously. They are not so good at managing emotional complexites--or at enlisting the imagination(s) of the audience. It’s probably pretty obvious that I handle “silences, pauses, absences of action” by using those opportunities to delve into the hidden depths of my characters. (11/27/2006)

Tough question. (Bad dog. No bisquit.) And here I thought this was supposed to be easy…. <rueful smile> In response, I want to pull my Don Quixote trick: get up on my horse and ride off on all directions. For instance, I want to observe that you are comparing unlike situations. (Almost by definition, Covenant’s first encounter with a Giant--after he thought that all of the Giants had been slaughtered, and Foamfollower died saving his life as well as the Land’s--carries more of an emotional “charge” than Linden’s validation by Stave.) And unlike characters. (The Giants have a very different emotional valence in these stories than the Haruchai do. And Covenant in the passage you quote has become a much more open--or less clenched--person than Linden is at the end of “Runes”.) Also I want to point out--mainly in self-defense <grin>--that much of what you quote from TWL is exactly the sort of prose my present editors would beg me to cut. (E.g. the passage you quote retells a big chunk of Giant history; and my editors would protest, “But you’ve already told us that several times before.”) And then there’s the whole “show v tell” issue we’ve been discussing. But in addition to all that--well, the truth is that my writing *is* changing. Can’t be helped. I’ve made a very conscious effort to preserve the style of the first six “Chronicles”. But I’m simply not the same person--or the same writer--who produced those books. I have strengths now that I lacked then--and I’ve lost strengths that I had then. No matter what I do, I can’t erase the effects (positive and negative) of the past 20+ years (not to mention the past 12+ books). And fighting against this fact can only paralyse me. So I suspect that what we’re dealing with here is evolution (or devolution, depending on your point of view <grin>) rather than stylistic choice. But my point of view is too subjective: in a sense, I’m less qualified than you are to comment on such things. (11/27/2006)

Approaching this in reverse order: Earlier in the GI, I’ve discussed the names of the Ravers. Put simply, the “human” names (Sheol, Herem, Jehannum) express how other people think of the Ravers. The Ravers’ “personal” names (moksha, turiya, samadhi) express how they think of themselves. There are many ways in which I can’t account for my abilities as a writer. The process by which I learned or developed them is too subjective (not to mention unconscious) for me to explain. But I do have a LOT of experience with evil that thinks of itself as good--which translates pretty easily to Evil that thinks of itself as Good. (11/30/2006)

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