Posts by Juliet Marillier
Please note: This interview was conducted by fantasy author, and WU contributor, Juliet Marillier.
In the third part of her interview with Writer Unboxed, bestselling author
Read MorePlease note: This interview was conducted by fantasy author, and WU contributor, Juliet Marillier.
Jacqueline Carey’s unique brand of epic historical fantasy could be described as confronting, erotic, violent, romantic, complex, emotional, intricate … The list goes on. In this part of the interview, Jacqueline talks in more depth about the themes and structures of her current series, Kushiel’s Legacy.
Part 2: Interview with Jacqueline Carey
Q: One aspect of the Kushiel books that impressed me from the start is your flair for depicting different cultures – something many fantasy authors do imperfectly, perhaps because of a limited knowledge of history and/or languages and cultures other than their own. Your two most recent novels take Imriel on increasingly long journeys in which he visits various lands, in effect attending university in Italy, settling in northern Britain, and pursuing a vengeful quest up toward the Arctic Circle. How conscious are you about using language, and dialogue in particular, to establish the cultural differences between these places? Do you become so immersed in your world that this comes more or less instinctively? What languages other than English do you speak yourself?
JC: I try to be very mindful about using language to give a sense of a culture’s flavor, though I have to confess, in most cases I’m totally faking it. I only speak rusty French and Spanish, and a tiny bit of modern tourist Greek. But I love the look and feel of words, and spicing the prose and dialogue with a few choice foreign ones makes it feel much richer. I once got an email from a linguist dying to know what was the basis for my Illyrian language. (Albanian, for the curious). Names, including place names, are important. I like to research the origins of place names. Sometimes I’ll use an old version, sometimes I’ll put a spin on it. Eg, the name Barcelona derives from its founder, Hamilcar Barca. I named my fantasy analogue city Amilcar. That bit of history isn’t anywhere in the pages of the books, but I feel it’s there under the surface, waiting to tickle the fancy of the odd historian who recognizes it.
Q: The foundation of the Kushiel books is the mythology – the d’Angeline people are descended from Blessed Elua, who was born of the earth when the blood of Jesus Christ mixed with the tears of Mary Magdalene. Elua and his companions are essential to the psychology of the d’Angeline characters and their main precept for living, ‘Love as thou wilt.’ It seemed to me that, in this second trilogy, interesting moral questions arose from the way the central characters dealt with that precept. ‘Love as thou wilt’ seems on the surface a pretty harmless dictum. But it can also be quite a selfish one. In Kushiel’s Justice, Imriel and Sidonie make a selfless choice for very sound political reasons, and in doing so they deny Elua’s precept. That leads to terrible tragedy and points out very clearly that ‘love as thou wilt’ is not necessarily going to work well for the non-d’Angeline characters. I was left feeling quite ambivalent about the whole thing. Can you talk about that a bit, and tell us to what extent the moral and […]
Read MorePlease note: This interview was conducted by fantasy author, and WU contributor, Juliet Marillier.
Jacqueline Carey sprang to prominence with the publication in 2001 of her debut novel, the dark erotic fantasy Kushiel’s Dart. The book garnered critical praise, winning the Locus Best First Novel Award, and won Jacqueline a horde of devoted fans. It also spawned a flurry of imitators. Since then, this talented author has penned four more novels in the Kushiel’s Legacy series as well as a two-book epic fantasy, The Sundering. Her most recent book, Kushiel’s Justice, was published in June 2007.
I’ve been a fan of Jacqueline’s work since I first met her on a memorable book tour in 2001. Here are some of the glowing comments her writing has inspired:
Credible and gripping, this is heroic fantasy at its finest. (From a starred review of Kushiel’s Scion in Publisher’s Weekly)
Intelligent, sexy, heartbreakingly human, Carey at her intoxicating best. (from a Booklist starred review of Kushiel’s Scion by Paula Luedtke)
I was delighted when Jacqueline agreed to an interview for Writer Unboxed.
Part 1: Interview with Jacqueline Carey
Q: Kushiel’s Scion and Kushiel’s Justice are published in the USA by Warner Books. The first three books in the Kushiel’s Legacy series, and your duology, The Sundering, were published by Tor. I’d be interested to hear what the issues were with switching publishers and editors, in effect, mid-series, since the new books continue Kushiel’s Legacy.
JC: It came down to a matter of creative differences. When I proposed continuing the Kushiel’s Legacy series, I thought my editor would jump for joy, but she had reservations about my switching to a male protagonist. She was concerned that it would alienate my female readership, while I felt strongly that Imriel was the logical choice to extend the dramatic arc of the series. In the end, I turned down Tor’s offer because I wanted to work with an editor who was excited about the project. I found that at Warner, and the transition was quite seamless. But I’ll always be grateful to Tor for launching my career, and I did get a lovely note from my editor there after Kushiel’s Scion was released saying she thought I’d pulled it off after all.
Q: One of the great strengths of the Kushiel books is the elaborately realised variant on Renaissance Europe that forms their world. It’s like an enhanced version of ‘real world’ history. I especially enjoyed the section of Kushiel’s Justice that takes your protagonist, Imriel, into the territory of the Cruithne and Dalriada (Picts and Gaels) because that provides such a dramatic contrast with the glittering courts of your ‘European’ countries. It seems to me that to create such a clever trope on real European history, you must have done very extensive research on everything from language to weaponry to trade routes. What is your research process and how much time do you spend on it?
Read MoreMost of us know the basic facts of Charlotte Brontë’s life. Raised in an isolated Yorkshire parsonage; lost two sisters to illnesses contracted at boarding school; later worked as a governess. Shared an elaborate invented world with her talented siblings; wrote novels, with her sisters Emily and Anne, that were published under male pseudonyms. Brother Branwell drank himself to death; Emily and Anne died of consumption. Charlotte married late and died at the age of 39. A woman of limited means, shy, myopic, socially isolated and living in the straight-laced society of Victorian England, Charlotte penned the spirited, passionate Jane Eyre. Anyone who has ever written a Gothic romance, or enjoyed reading one, owes her a debt for creating that unforgettable prototype.
The facts of Charlotte’s life are sobering – she lost all three younger siblings within a year. But the facts don’t tell the full story. I’ve just finished reading a book called The Brontës: A Life in Letters by Juliet Barker. It contains selections from Charlotte’s letters – we can be glad that her friend, Ellen Nussey, chose to break a promise to Charlotte’s husband that she would burn the many missives Charlotte wrote to her – and correspondence to Charlotte from friends, family and business contacts.
The book was a revelation.
Read MoreMy new novel for young adults, Cybele’s Secret, has been released this week here in Australia. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to share Kinuko Craft’s gorgeous cover painting with you. Unfortunately, the American edition doesn’t come out until September 2008, so anyone wanting a cute Knopf hardback to match their copy of Wildwood Dancing has a long time to wait. Macmillan’s UK hardback comes out in December 07 and, of course, both that edition and the Australian one can be purchased online.
Cybele’s Secret was a fabulous book to write. My protagonist, Paula, accompanies her father on a merchant voyage to Istanbul in early Ottoman times. This story gave me a great excuse to visit Turkey myself in search of information about Islamic religious faith and practice, Anatolian folklore, commercial wheeling and dealing, and Black Sea piracy. The characters come from many different cultures and speak a variety of languages, so there were all sorts of challenges in getting the details right and telling a good story at the same time. I hope I succeeded. It was certainly fun.
Now it’s back to the work in progress, an adult fantasy novel that will probably end up with the title Heir to Sevenwaters. I’d love to say I’m at the polishing and refining stage, but actually I’m still writing the last couple of chapters and THEN I have to revise some of the earlier part before I’ll be quite happy with the ms. But at least I have reached the section of the book that more or less writes itself. By this stage, the story knows exactly where to go. The loose ends tie themselves up, the characters resolve their difficulties, the sun comes out and we all live happily ever after … Well, maybe not that. I’ve never believed that the happy endings of fairytales apply for every single character. There’s always darkness to balance the light. But I do at least allow my protagonists the hope of a bright future.
Research for this book has been a different kettle of fish.
Read MoreWhat makes a book a ‘keeper’? Why is it that Book A, a critically acclaimed literary masterpiece, venerable classic or New York Times bestseller, can be given away without a second thought while Book B instantly earns permanency on your small shelf of those titles you must own? Why can Book C be returned to the library while the borrowed copy of Book D must be replaced with a bought one that can be loved and treasured longterm?
I’ve talked about something similar before when I mentioned The Crow Road by Iain Banks, which is not only one of my keepers but also exists in the form of a mouldy old paperback we can’t bear to give up. It’s a slightly different phenomenon when you hang onto a particular copy of a book like this: it could be classified as a mild form of family lunacy and I don’t expect anyone else to follow my example. When I talk about keepers I mean any book you love so much you feel you must own a copy. I wondered what it was about these special books that makes us love them so much, and whether what is on our keepers shelf says anything about us as writers.
Read MoreI’ve caught myself sounding tired and negative in my recent posts—I put this down to a lengthy struggle with the current wip. This started out as a book called Heart’s Blood, then when I was about five chapters in and under contract in Australia and the UK, the US rights were sold for that novel and another stand-alone book on the proviso that I delivered them in the reverse order. The deadline was the same. I had to put away what I’d been working on and start writing a new book that only existed as a short synopsis at that point. Very fortunately, the Australian and UK publishers agreed to publish the second book first, or I would have been in real trouble.
It just happened that all sorts of interruptions got in the way of progress on the novel. Some months down the track, I was seriously unhappy with what I’d written, and not only because there wasn’t enough of it. The new novel, an adult fantasy set in early medieval Ireland, has the same setting and some of the same characters as my first series, the Sevenwaters Trilogy. The expectation is that it will be closer to the mode of those earlier books than to that of my more complex, more historically based later books. It was much harder than I expected to return to that simpler and more emotive style, and to the restrictions of first person viewpoint for a story that had to include battles and journeys as well as domestic elements. My writing has developed a lot since I began the Sevenwaters series—I’ve written seven other novels since the last in that trilogy.
Read MoreEvery speculative fiction writer seems to have a personal blog these days. The better ones provoke some great discussion on writing—see, for instance, the Romance discussion on recent Andre Norton Award winner Justine Larbalestier’s blog.
Some writers’ blogs include as much about the minutiae of their health issues / crises with pets and children / coffee and chocolate consumption habits as they do about books and writing.
Unfortunately, not everyone’s life is constantly fascinating. That’s one of the main reasons I don’t keep a personal blog. Most of the time, my life would make pretty humdrum reading. On the rare occasions when it gets dramatic, the last thing I want to do is share the details with the whole online world. Another reason for not having a personal blog is that writing one would gobble up time better spent (in my case, at least) on writing books.
Of course, some writers do a great job of keeping their personal blogs lively and entertaining. Dip into this one by Australian expat fantasy writer Glenda Larke, who lives in Malaysia. Either her life is more interesting than most, or she just has a talent for writing well about it! The very readable life observations are complemented by some excellent posts on the craft of writing and illustrated with wonderful photos. If you haven’t read Glenda’s novels, try Heart of the Mirage, the first in her current series, The Mirage Makers.
Read MoreLast month I posted about a workshop I’d presented for young writers and included some of the very good questions the participants had asked. Someone suggested I should post my answers as well, so here’s a sample:
Q. How old were you when you began writing?
A. About five—my first year of school. I was an obsessive storyteller from the start. My first “long” story, about ten pages, was about a scientist discovering a plesiosaur in the fjords of New Zealand. I was a speculative fiction writer even then.
Q. Which of your books is your favorite book?
A. Whichever I’m writing at the time someone asks this question.
Q. How old were you when your first book was published?
A. Old by your standards. I turned fifty the year my first book came out.
Q. Do you like to write in the first or third person?
A. It depends on the story. First person allows me to get under the skin of the protagonist, and helps me to make that character so real the reader will closely identify with her. It worked very well with my Sevenwaters Trilogy, which was closely focused on three generations of women. Third person allows me to see characters through the eyes of other characters, to go deeper into the motivations and feelings of more than one character, to share the narrative more evenly between two main protagonists and to include a wider range of settings and events. In an early medieval, real world setting, it is hard to put a young female narrator in the middle of battle scenes, for instance. Having said that, I find first person flows more easily.
Q. Do you prefer to find characters or plotline or setting first?
Read MoreWriters are simple creatures with simple needs. A firm hand and a consistent approach will solve most problems. The following steps are a failsafe guide. Bear in mind that patience may be required with the more strong-willed writer.
1. Seating: Establish your place on the chair before your writer sits down to work. She should be restricted to the front edge. Ignore any whining about ergonomics. If she sits down first, jump up behind and push until she makes room for you. Do not give ground. Note: larger breeds should adopt a work position close to, or underneath, the writer’s desk. Cushions and a heater / fan are essential. Shiver / pant as appropriate if these are slow to arrive.
2. Breaks: Train your writer to take frequent breaks. Jump on and off the chair. Roll a ball across the floor or drop it beside her foot. Repeat until your writer responds correctly. Whining can be effective. However, if a deadline is looming your writer will become blind and deaf to all the usual cues. See Deadlines, below. Breaks must be long enough to accommodate ball play, a drink and a snack. Hint: positive reinforcement is the best form of training. Allow your writer a drink and a snack too if she has performed well. Ball play is good for her (see ergonomics, above.)
Read MoreRecently I presented a session on the challenges of writing a novel. This was for a school holiday writing course, age range 12-16. At 16 a student generally has a good understanding of writing techniques and the capacity to plan and execute a big project. At 12, young writers generally gain more benefit from letting their imaginations run riot than from trying to apply discipline to their work.
I’d been quite stressed about this session because of the difficulty of designing a workshop to suit everyone in this awkward age range. There were some keenly interested older students – the creative buzz among the 15 and 16 year olds when I walked in was almost palpable. We worked mainly on planning, using a well-known story as the basis for drafting a synopsis. I took too long over this and ran out of time for reading aloud and general chat. I would grade my overall performance as a C minus. This was definitely not one of my better efforts. Factors beyond my control didn’t help – a crowded venue, no real facility to spread out for practical exercises and a lack of advance info on the makeup of the group. But my own miscalculations were the main problem. I was disappointed that I failed to tap fully into the vitality shown by the older students. The energy level for the session was, at best, low to medium.
So what should I have done differently?
Read MoreSo there I was, wrestling with a scene from the WIP. There’s been a lot of that recently, not to speak of cursing, fidgeting and running off to make cups of tea. It’s got worse since my new editor decided the two books under contract should be delivered in the reverse order, meaning I had to down tools for the current project and get a whole new one written by the same delivery date.
Anyway, there I was a moment later, suddenly in the groove and writing away, and before I knew it a great scene had appeared on the page before me, a scene in which a character interferes with a juggling display by lobbing extraneous items into the mix with mischievous intent, all the while juggling brilliantly himself … I was thrilled with the scene, which had pretty much written itself. But halfway through the celebratory cup of tea, something began gnawing away quietly in my brain. I had read something very like this scene before.
Read MoreA fantasy novel that includes a convincing, original imaginary world AND a great story AND complex, memorable characters is a treat to be savoured. Sadly, for every one of those I discover, there are ten books I can’t get through. Poor research in fields I know about, such as music, is one major turn-off, and wayward choice of character and place names is another.
Hang on, you say – in an invented world, doesn’t anything go? If I make up a language, a mode of speech, a set of names, they belong to me, the author, and it’s not up to anyone else to say they do or don’t work.
Not so, at least not in the opinion of this rather picky reader. A slapdash approach to the linguistic framework of an invented world will turn me and others like me right off your book. The most basic tenet of fantasy worlds is that they should be internally consistent. You need not be Tolkien to achieve this in your naming. A philologist has the advantage over most of us in inventing languages. But I believe a basic knowledge of the way languages work is an essential tool for a fantasy writer.
Read MoreKathleen and Therese step in for a second to officially welcome Juliet Marillier to the forum. This is her first post.
The hummingbird is constantly in motion, a high energy creature, nervously darting from flower to flower, desperate to maintain enough nutrition to keep herself going at top speed. This flower, now this one, no, maybe that one, oops, here comes a predator…
The owl perches very still. She watches. She swoops. She returns to feed. Efficient and focused, she’s a planner.
I discovered only recently that some well-regarded and successful novelists have hummingbird muses. Such writers begin their books with no clear idea of where the story is going. Some reasons I’ve heard for this approach are that the author likes to be surprised by the characters, that she prefers to let the story follow its own path, and that she just can’t write any other way. This is sometimes called flimmering (flimmer = to flicker or move erratically.)
What astonishes me about this is not so much the fact that people can write an extended piece this way, but that they can produce one that apparently works on a structural level. It seems a little like building a house by starting with the brick in the bottom left hand corner and working on upwards. My muse is definitely an owl – I don’t begin to write the novel until I have the framework firmly in place. I generally do a long outline, a shorter synopsis and a chapter plan before I start on the book proper.
You’ll read in my bio for this site that I view myself as an intuitive writer. How is this possible when I sound like a complete control freak? Well, all the preliminary planning allows the subsequent writing of the book to flow freely and not be held up by thorny structural issues along the way. I’d normally do something like this:
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