Fantasist's Scroll

Today is Edgar Rice Burroughs’ birthday!
ERB, as he is often known by fans, was born in Chicago in 1875. He is probably most famous as the creator of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes, which is a series of stories about an English nobleman who was abandoned in the African jungle during infancy and brought up by apes. His first Tarzan story appeared in 1912, and Burroughs followed it with the novel Tarzan of the Apes in1914. He is also the author of A Princess of Mars, which is the first book in a series about a US Cavalry officer transported “mystically” to Mars, as well as, Pellucidar, about a savage world hidden beneath our own, The Pirates of Venus, about space pirates on Venus. Not to mention his lesser known works, including The Mad King and many others.
For many of us, ERB was our first introduction to science-fiction and fantasy. He was a real writer, by which I mean he churned out novels and stories at a furious rate for one reason onlyL to support his family. He is, in many ways, one of my heroes.
So, Happy Birthday, Mr. Burroughs, wherever you are.

Looking for a free forum for fantasy writers?

Well, I don’t have one here, yet, but there is one at FantasyWriters.org. As always with writers, there’s a lot here to read through, but it all seems to be worth it. Of course, I think that anything which helps me get more creative or more inspired to write is worth the effort to slog through, even if some of it is shlock or doesn’t apply to me or my work. Inspiration can take many forms and find its way into my head by strange paths, so I’m always willing to look at another possible inroad to creativity.

Hopefully, you’ll find this site worth the read, too.

So, not too long ago, I brought you a link to an on-line course in writing.

But, by now, I’m betting you’re ready for more stuff on writing science fiction and fantasy. Well, even if you’re not, I found a table of contents on the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America website that has all kinds of great articles about writing. Now, obviously, many of these are geared toward fantasy and science fiction, but some are just general advice about writing and, in any case, they’re all helpful to writers. At least, all the ones I’ve read so far have been helpfull to me! And, as always, this is a free resource, this time, brought to you by the SFWA.

So, go read some inspirational articles and then, get back to writing!

Today is J.K. Rowling’s Birthday!
If you don’t know who J. K. Rowling is, well, you certainly haven’t been paying attention. She is, in short, the creator of Harry Potter and crew. As a divorced, single mother struggling to scrape by on public assistance, aka “the Dole”, in the UK, she wrote Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone which she sold astonishingly quickly for a first time author. The book went on to become a wonderfully popular hit with adults and kids alike. At the same time she wrote the first book, she plotted out the rest of the series and started drafts of those books as well. Each year after that first release a new book in the series has come out, for a total of six, so far, with the seventh on it’s way.
I know many people who dislike the books for their simplicity or how they handle magic or any of a number of reasons, but, as far as I’m concerned, anything that can get so many kids reading books again, instead of suckling at the glass teat, is okay with me.
I hope Ms. Rowling will keep writing after the series is done. She’s a good one, even if she does write kids books!
Happy Birthday, Ms. Rowling!

Building characters is as easy as writing their biography.
Okay, so maybe that’s not quite as easy as it sounds at first. The first step to knowing about what your character is going to do is knowing who they are and where they’ve been. What was their start in life? How has that shaped their desires, fears and goals? Get the answer to those questions and you should know your character pretty well. Of course, if you’ve never done this, it can be a challenge. Or, if you just want to flesh out a character in a game, but aren’t sure what questions to ask, it might be hard to get started.
Well, back in the day, when Advanced Dungeons and Dragons ruled the fantasy role-playing game universe, there was a handy, little magazine called Dragon that was put out by TSR, which got bought by Wizards of the Coast, which is now a subsidiary of Hasbro. One particular issue included an article titled “Characterization Made Easy” by Scott Bennie. Below is a list of questions cribbed from that article that, when answered, will help you get to know your character.

1. Background
• Where was your character born?
• Who raised them?
• What was happening in the region when they was growing up?
• Do they have any relatives? If so, how did they get along with them? What are they doing now?
2. Motivation
• What are your character’s immediate goals (i.e., what would they like to do in the coming year)?
• What are their long-term goals (i.e., what would they like to be doing 20 years from now)?
• What type of person would be their ideal mate?
• Who is their patron deity? Are they a devout worshiper?
• Are they a devout member of any nonreligious cause (i.e., Are they a loyal servant of a king or baron)?
• Is there any race, creed, alignment, religion, or the like against which they are strongly prejudiced?
• What is their greatest fear?
• What is the one task they absolutely refuses to do?
3. Idiosyncrasies
• What is your character’s motto or favorite saying?
• What is their favorite color?
• Describe what they would wear if money were no object.
• What is their favorite food? Their favorite drink?
• What is their favorite animal?
• What habits of their friends annoy them most?
4. Traits

Rate these behaviors for your character on a scale of 0 to 10 (0 means they has no trace of the trait, behaving in a completely opposite manner; 10 means they have great amounts of the trait).

• Courtesy
• Valor
• Self-sacrifice
• Generosity
• Sobriety
• Calm temper
• Optimism
• Curiosity
• Forgiveness
• Cheerfulness
• Patience
• Honesty
• Helpfulness
• Loyalty

Name at least one other trait in which your character possesses a rating of 8 or better.

5. Miscellaneous
• What well-known media figure from sports, movies, or politics most closely resembles your character?
• What would be their theme song?
• If their friends were to write your character’s epitaph, what would it be?
• What would their job be in modern society?

And, here are some stereotypes to avoid:

1. All wizards are old men with long beards and robes.
2. All evil characters wear black.
3. All good characters wear white.
4. All giants are stupid.
5. All fighters are stupid jocks.
6. All thieves are small and cowardly.
7. Evil characters are irredeemably awful.
8. Elves are flighty and carefree.
9. Major bridges are guarded by trolls, who ask for a toll.

Obviously, this is geared toward a fantasy setting, but, with some small variation, it can apply to almost any character in almost any fictional setting.
If you’d like to read the whole article, you can still find it in the Dragon Magazine Archive on CD-ROM.

Ever wanted to write science-fiction and fantasy fiction but didn’t know where to start?

Well, there’s hope. While wasting time at work the other day, I found a free on-line course in writing science-fiction called, oddly enough, Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy. This website is an entire course on writing in the genre available for no charge via the web. They cover everything from the basics of fiction writing to world creation to… Well, just about everything that a begining writer might want to know about writing science fiction and fantasy literature. They even have some topics that go into more depth for those of us who’ve been banging away at it for a little bit.

It looks fairly good and comprehensive. Besides, the price is right: Free!

Yes, actual castles that are actually for sale.
A couple of weeks ago, I saw a beta for a “social shopping network” called Wists.  Now, to be honest, I have no freaking idea what that means, but I bring it up because I found it, via bOING bOING, when it coughed up a list of castles for sale. Yeah, real, genuine castles that people can buy, if they have the money.  Honestly, if I had the cash, or even the credit, I’d snap one of these suckers up just for the joy of living in a castle.

Anyway, it’s Friday, and even shlubs like us deserve to dream a little, so go ahead, click the link.

So, I upgraded to the latest version of WordPress not too long ago so I could test a little project of mine.  Way back in the early days of blogging, when all these fancy programs were new and not so user friendly, I concieved of a beautiful way to present fiction to a large audience for free.  Well, okay, me and about a million other people, but, still, I had an artistic vision.  No, really!  My idea was to keep a journal in the manner and style of a character from a fictional world via a blog.  I saw it as a return to the roots of the novel which, in the early days, used things like journal entries and faux personal letters to tell a story.  Naturally, a blog would be a perfect way to do just that.
But, as a curmudgeon and creative person who was not content to just record something in the standard calendar, I set about trying to adapt the blog I was using to a new, fictional calendar.  Sadly, my first efforts met with very limited success, but, then I upgraded to the first version of WordPress and started learning a bit of PHP.  It wasn’t long after that before I had a decent working plugin that would allow me to make my blog appear to be recorded in the calendar used for the Forgotten Realms setting by Wizards of the Coast, formerly TSR.  It took many, many cycles of development and testing before I was satisfied, but, I finally got something that I thought was worth sharing and, then, they did a major overhaul of WordPress.  So, I waited for all the bugs to get found and fixed.  And, I waited and waited and waited some more for good measure.  Then, a couple of weeks ago, I actually found the time to upgrade to the latest version and test my plugin again.  A few minor corrections later, I had fixed all the quirks I could find and, so, without further ado, I present, for your wacky, fantasy blogging pleasure, the Dale Reckoning plugin for WordPress!

Use it in good health and enjoy!