A Three-Part Nightborn Interview Conducted by Phoebe Yeh

My editor at Random House Children's Books, the wonderful Phoebe Yeh, conducted a three-part interview with Yours Truly to celebrate the release of Nightborn. Part one, "On Norse Mythology, Strong Female Heroines, and Gaming," debuted on the website Brightly. Part Two, "On World Building," appeared on Suvudu. Part Three covers my research trip to Norway, and what being an editor taught me about being a writer. You can read it on SF Signal.

Podcast: Speculate! The Podcast for Writers, Readers, and Fans

I'm a guest this week on Speculate! the Podcast for Writers, Readers, and Fans. Hosts Brad and Greg talk with me about Frostborn,the various games (board, card, and online) spun around the book series, Norway, and editing the editor. Check it out!

They say:

In this episode we talk for the second time to Lou Anders, former editor at Pyr Books during an award-winning career and author of Frostborn,the first book in the middle grade fantasy series Thrones & Bones. We talk about what it’s like to transition from editor to author, how Lou’s somehow managed to get even busier in his new career, and why Kermit the Frog serves as an inspiration…even in Norway! We really enjoyed chatting with Lou again, and we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.

Watch. Connect. Read.: A Glimpse of Neverland

Today, I am a Guest on K-5 teacher/librarian Mr. Schu's Watch. Connect. Read., with a piece called A Glimpse of Neverland, where I talk about the inspirations for my novel Frostborn and some of my favorite books growing up.

"When I was young, an uncle gave me a large, coffee table edition of The Hobbit. I read the book over and over, and I studied the pictures. I taught myself to draw the goblins and I went around singing “Fifteen Birds in Five Fir Trees.” I played Dungeons & Dragons, and I adored films like The Dark Crystal."

Latest Frostborn Roundup

This morning, the wonderful Jay Requard hosts a Q&A with Yours Truly on his blog, where we discuss Frostborn,dragons, RPG games, and Norway.

Sit.Write.Bleed

Meanwhile, yet another bookstore has chosen Frostborn as a Staff Pick. Sue Mason at the Waucoma Bookstore of Hood River, Oregan recommends the novel and says:

"This is being touted as being in the same league with John Flanagan and Rick Riordan. It does have the feeling of a Flanagan story. Frostborn is a great adventure of a young boy and a girl who is half human/half giant.... The boys and girls will love this. Our giantess, Thianna, is a very brave adventurer and saves Karn mostly from himself. This will be a series so it will be fun to see where Thianna ends up next." 

Reading Rumpus Book Reviews, run by librarian Barb Middleton at the Taipei American School in Taiwan, has an incredible review this morning. WARNING: The review is very, very SPOILER heavy, but really says some wonderful things, particularly about Frostborn's depiction of being biracial and a minority. Such as:

"The action-packed, well-plotted story has plenty of humor and a female character that defies stereotypes. A biracial girl named, Thianna, searching for her identity along with the message to girls to embrace yourself no matter what your size makes this story rise above your average fare."  

And:

"Thianna's biracial background captures what it is like to be a minority." 

And concludes: 

"This will appeal to fans of Percy Jackson, The Lord of the Rings series, and The Inheritance Cycle. Don't miss it."

Frostborn, Day Two

So, one day past Frostborn'sdebut, and the interweebs are booming.

Publishers Weekly, who also gave Frostborn a Starred Review, selected it for one of only eleven PW Picks: Books of the Week, August 4, 2014. They write, "Though a lot of elements are in play, Anders ties the novel’s threads together in a neatly satisfying way, crafting a powerful, fast-paced tale."

io9 selected Frostborn for their list "All the Amazing Must-Read Science Fiction and Fantasy Books Books for August."

I answer questions like what is my Patronus and what my favorite sandwich is on Tor.com's The Pop Quiz at the End of the Universe, go into my story's origins in "On the Conception of a World and Birth of a Giant" on Suvudu, and also on Suvudu, discuss trends in "The Truth about Trends."

I am interviewed by Dave Gross for his Creative Colleagues series, and also at My Bookish Ways.

And there's a contest running on Pat's Fantasy Hotlist.

The wonderful John Freeman reviewed Frostborn for SciFi Pulse, calling it "a terrific debut novel in what I’m sure is going to be a great trilogy, crammed with action and adventure, believable characters you can genuinely care about and some wonderfully funny moments as Karn and Thianna battle all manner of foes, including the undead and a really petulant dragon," and adding, "I’m looking forward to the TV series/ films, the game, the figurines… because I can see them coming!"

Fantasy Literature calls Frostborn, "a sweet middle grade story" and says, "Middle Grade readers are sure to love Frostborn and, as an adult, I liked it, too. It’s an exciting fantasy adventure and I’m looking forward to the next THRONES & BONES novel. I listened to Listening Library’s audio version which is 8½ hours long and narrated by Fabio Tassone, a European actor. He gave a great performance. I’ll definitely choose this format for the sequel."

The Librarian of Snark was very unsnarky when they wrote, "I will definitely be recommending this to my fantasy-loving tweens and I think it will easily find its audience."

Mom Read It says, "I thoroughly enjoyed this book; fans of mythology-based fantasy will, too. Anders is a Hugo Award-winning editor; this is his first book, and kicks off a promising fantasy series that will appeal to boys and girls alike. I love that Karn is a 'gamer' – and so are other characters in the book, which will appeal to gamer boys and girls out there, who try to explain to their disapproving parents that games help sharpen their mental acuity. The characters have rich backgrounds, with the promise of more to be revealed in future books, and Anders’ description of various terrain is so vivid, I could feel the chill of the frozen land of the frost giants. If you’ve got middle graders looking for a fantasy series along the lines of Kelley Armstrong’s Blackwell Pages, this is a great place to steer them. The book hits stores today – go get your copy!"

Lou Interview on Diabolical Plots

I am interviewed today by Carl Slaughter on his blog Diabolical Plots. We talk about the criteria that goes into selecting manuscripts for Pyr books, how my admittedly rather diverse media background prepared me for editing science fiction and fantasy, and my philosophy in anthology editing. Thanks to Carl for conducting this interview. Here's a sample, but please check the whole thing out.

You’ve also been nominated several times for anthology editor.  Give us a thumbnail sketch of your vision for anthologies, past, present, and future.
LA:  Well, I don’t know if I’m going to do any more anthologies in the future. I’ve turned my attention to my own fiction, and given the copious amounts of free time I don’t have, any and all snatches of personal time I have that is not claimed by my family goes into my own creations. But when I did anthologies, my goal was to never simply present reprint collections of themed stories, but to ask questions of where I thought the genre was, where it was going next, and where it should be. Each of my nine anthologies are attempts to engage the dialogue of speculative fiction in a moment, whether that was my frustrations with the limits of post-cyberpunk fiction in Live Without A Net, or my desire to explore the intersection of sword and sorcery values with modern, “realistic” fantasy in Swords & Dark Magic(co-edited with Jonathan Strahan). Every anthology is a question put to the field and hopefully a collection of answers.

Even Pissed, Bowie is cool...

Having watched a number of interviews with classic rock stars, it does seem like UK journalists of the 60s and 70s were jerks. And Bowie, even when insulted and irritated, is never less than poised and in control:

The World According to Lou

Sandra Wickham interviewed me yesterday for the Inkpunks blog. She titled the interview "The World According to Lou," which really tickles me. I don't think she knows that it was The World According to Garp by John Irving that first made me want to choose this writing/publishing life. Anyway, I'm grateful for the interview, but please ignore her when she suggests that nonsense about my giving away my beer. Check out the whole interview, but here's a sample:

What must-have qualities would you say an author needs to become published and keep being published in the industry?
 
Talent plus perseverance. I recently asked a group of authors how many times they rewrote their novels before they saw publication. Seven was the average response. And I heard N.K. Jemisin say recently that she had worked on The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms for around ten years before it saw publication. Do you remember that old board game where you pulled levers out until all the marbles but one dropped away? I have probably just dated myself horribly, but that’s how I see a career in the entertainment arts. Banging your head against the wall until the wall collapses, because you sure as hell aren’t going to. Artist John Picacio describes this as, “There’s Plan A. And if that doesn’t work, there’s Plan A. And if that doesn’t work, there’s Plan A.” (Note: He’s not talking about being unrealistically inflexible. He’s talking about never giving up the goal of being a working professional.)

Writing Excuses: The Screenwriting Formula

I'm a guest on episode 6:18 of the marvelous Writing Excuses podcast, talking about "the Hollywood Formula." They write of this episode:

Lou Anders, Hugo-winning editorial director from Pyr books, joins Mary, Dan, and Howard at Dragon*Con for a discussion of the Hollywood Formula. Lou shared this with Mary originally, and she used it to tighten up some of her work. It’s useful enough that we decided to invite Lou onto the ‘cast to share it with everybody else, too.

The formula centers around three characters – the protagonist, the antagonist, and the relationship character. Lou explains how these terms have, in this formula, different meanings than we might be accustomed to.

Among the things that we learn: The Dark Knight has an antagonist none of us could guess, Die Hard and Stargate are third-act movies, and Howard is criminally ignorant of classic cinema.

The Masked Superteam Answers Your Questions

Nine authors & I in participate this morning in a Q&A on Joseph Mallozzi's blog, discussing our superhero prose anthology Masked. It's a mammoth post, with responses from Yours Truly, Matthew Sturges, James Maxey, Paul Cornell, Daryl Gregory, Gail Simone, Mark Chadbourn, Joe himself, and Marjorie M. Liu!

What's more, Joe labels us a Superteam and reveals which hero he feels we each correspond to. Surprisingly, I'm not Professor Xavier. Check out the post, "The Masked Superteam answers your questions."

Masked Discussion Week on Joseph Mallozzi's Blog

Joseph Mallozzi (Stargate Universe writer/co-executive producer, and all around great guy) is hosting a discussion of Masked this week on his blog. He's taking questions for me and some of the contributors.To kick the week off, he invites Gail Simone to talk about her story, "Thug." You can read Gail's guest post here.

Drop by Joe's blog this week with questions for:

Gail Simone (“Thug”)
Paul Cornell (“Secret Identity”)
Matthew Sturges (“Cleaned and Set in Gold”)
James Maxey (“Where Their Worm Dieth Not”)
Daryl Gregory (“Message from the Bubblegum Factory”)
Mark Chadbourn (“By My Works You Shall Know Me”)
Marjorie M. Liu (“Call Her Savage”)
Lou Anders (editor)
Joseph Mallozzi (“Downfall”)