Link: Katharine Kerr's blog series on creating magical systems

Over on the Book View Cafe blog, Katharine Kerr talks about systems of magic and how shedeveloped the one in her Deverry series. This is the first of a series well worth following, whether you write fantasy or love to read it.







 She says,

I personally am of the opinion that fantasy magic systems are stronger and more emotionally moving when they have one foot in reality, as it were.  Historical magics, whether the disconnected spells and charms of folk magic or the elaborate systems of the elite, address deep human longings and concerns. Wanting to have someone love you, the fear of being harmed, the desire for revenge on an enemy, fear of what the future might bring, desire for riches, and above all, the fear of death — most folk magic revolves around emotions like these. The elaborate systems of Natural Philosophy, the late medieval/early Renaissance magic of the learned, center around the desire to understand the entire universe, to converse with beings other than ourselves, and to use this knowledge for . . . drum roll . . . most of the same reasons as ordinary folk had. Well, the natural philosophers did worry less about love charms.

Strong emotions, strong motivations. In ordinary life, we use the word "magic" to describe many of these experiences, even when we don't ascribe a supernatural element to them. Magic based in strong emotions is more accessible, more understandable, to the reader who has also shared some version of those longings and fears. They also make for great storytelling!

GUEST BLOG: Katharine Kerr on Writing Long Series

Saga, Series, and Just Plain Long Books

There is nothing an author today has to guard himself more carefully against than the Saga Habit.  The least slackening of vigilance and the thing has gripped him.

            -- P.G. Wodehouse, writing in 1935

            How little things change!  I too am a victim of the Saga Habit.  Fifteen Deverry books, four Nola O’Gradys -- and I haven’t even finished the Nola series!  Now SORCERER’S LUCK, which I   a “Runemaster trilogy”.  Over the years, a number of people have asked me why I tend to write at this great length.  I’ve put some thought into the answer, and it can be boiled down one word: consequences.  Well, maybe two words: consequences and characters.  Or perhaps, consequences, characters, and the subconscious mind, above all the subconscious mind.  You see what I mean?  These things multiply by themselves.

meant to be a stand-alone, is insisting that it’s only the first volume of

            Not all series books are sagas.  Some are shaped more like beads on a string, separate episodes held together by a set of characters, who may or may not grow and change as the series continues.  Many mystery novels fall into the episode category, Sherlock Holmes, for example, or James Bond.  Other series start out as episodics, but saga creeps up on them as minor characters bring depth to a plot and demand stories of their own, for instance, in Lois McMaster Bujold’s Miles Vorkosigan series or Ian Rankin’s detective novels.  What determines the difference in these examples comes back to the idea of consequences.