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The Wood Between the Worlds: Does Grimdark Fantasy Belong in the Canon of Speculative Fiction?Why Am I Reading Grimdark? Recently I decided, for reasons that will become clear later this summer (how’s that for a teaser?), to explore the...
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The Craftsman’s Workshop: Cultivating ImaginationSpring is springing! Flowers are blooming, and life returns after the death of winter. How fitting for the end of Lent and the coming of...
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The Craftsman’s Workshop: Slow Productivity and Better Stories1. Do fewer things; 2. Work at a natural pace; and 3. Obsess over quality The post The Craftsman’s Workshop: Slow Productivity and...
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How to make the best creative use of your Coronavirus “free time”How are you all coping, dear friends? I’ve had quite a range of emotions, ranging from freaked out to excited about the opportunity for...
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The Consolation of FantasyStorytelling and enjoying fairy tales is not a childish or simple-minded pursuit. It’s a noble calling, in some ways, especially in times of...
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How to Build a World in Both History and FictionThis post originally appeared on November 14, 2019, on A Light So Lovely. I’ve been thinking, lately, about the question of worldbuilding. For...
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Forming the Moral Imagination with Fairy TalesThis post originally appeared on September 29, 2020, on A Light So Lovely. I recently received a wonderful question from one of the listeners of...
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How to Achieve Artistic PerfectionPeople are drawn to beauty. There’s no denying it. The Greeks believed in perfection of form, a kind of harmony that had the power to objectively...
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In a Certain Kingdom: The Story of Nikita the TannerListen on: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Soundcloud | Ancient Faith In our second dragon-themed tale, Kiev the great city’s...
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What the Kingfisher Can Teach Us About Living Well in CrisisIs there anything more perfect than this photo of a kingfisher? It won an audience award a few years ago. For obvious reasons. I was...
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How to Finish a Novel in Ten DaysWhat a crazy time to live in. Suddenly, the consumptive author shutting himself in his attic to suffer the pangs of creation in front of the blank...
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Your Quarantine Reading ListWell, it’s official. There’s at least another month of lockdown/quarantine/social distancing going on in the US. Rather than lose...
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Come and Navigate the Sea of Story with Me!Have you ever had the surreal experience of realizing you’re inside someone else’s breakthrough moment? When you’re seeing the...
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Why is This (slightly embarrassed) Fantasy Author Reviewing Golden Age Mysteries?I can’t help it. I don’t care about genre conventions. If there’s a book that grabs you by the throat, turns you upside down,...
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In a Certain Kingdom: The Three SonsWhen a mysterious old woman visits the house of three brothers, unexpected gifts begin to abound. But the greatest gift is sometimes the smallest,...
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Fantasy For Our Time: Cute Monsters and the Problem of EvilWhatever happened to the good old days when we recognized that some things are ugly, some things are monsters and you can’t fix them? In...
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In a Certain Kingdom: Ivan the Peasant’s SonIvan, the third son of a peasant family, refuses to be left behind when his brothers go to war against a dragonish monster. And a good thing, too!...
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Fantasy For Our Time: Caped Crusaders and the Common GoodShould we avoid violence in media? Are certain portrayals of violence in media better for us than others? This week I continue our discussion on...
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Fantasy For Our Time Special Episode: Sample Audiobook Chapter From Nicholas Kotar’s Raven Son SeriesTime, despite my best efforts to conquer it, has, yet again, conquered me! In all of my busyness, I wasn’t able to sit down and record my...
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In a Certain Kingdom: The Third SonThe Third Son, a Carpatho-Russian fairy tale, starts like the well-known parable of the talents. But this time, we’re looking at it from the...
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Fantasy For Our Time: Empathy vs Compassion – What Game of Thrones Gets Wrong (Among Other Things)Isn’t empathy a good thing? Well, yes. In moderation. But we seem to live in a world where immoderate empathy is causing widespread...
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Fantasy For Our Time: Should We Be Inspired by the Masters or Subvert Them?In this throwback episode, I officially get publicly and loudly angry about The Last Jedi. Seriously, though, paying homage to those masters who...
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Fantasy for Our Time: The Power of Story – A Conversation with Author and Illustrator Vesper StamperIn this wide-ranging conversation with YA author Vesper Stamper, we talk about the power of story, the ways trauma can lead to suffering, but how...
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Fantasy for Our Time: The Green Knight and the Secular ApocalypseGenerally, I like to focus on the ways that fantasy stories help form us and make us into better humans; but, is it possible for certain types of...
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Fantasy For Our Time: Touch the Darkness Again . . .Could this be the Star Wars of our time?! . . . . no. Definitely not. Together, Richard and I discuss the final episode of The Rings...
