depend on the author. For me, it plays a huge role. I wrote my first book, Echoes of the Fourth Magic, way back in 1982–1983, longhand, by candlelight, to Fleetwood Mac’s amazing Tusk album. That music acted as a conduit to my writing “trance.” When Stevie Nicks sang of the sisters of the moon, I envisioned the witch Brielle dancing on a moonlit field. I even named Brielle’s daughter Rhiannon, with ties to the Welsh witch that Ms. Nicks made famous in the late ’70s.
I choose my mood music carefully now. The theme from World of Warcraft makes for great scene-setting for large-scale battles, I find, and no one sets a soft wintery mood better than George Winston.
And I’ve still got my Fleetwood Mac, of course—only on CD and not LP.
Q: Is the Oliver deBurrows character really based on your dog?
—Neil R., King George, VA
RAS: You’ve got that backwards. My oldest dog, Oliver, is three years old. When we got him and began our name search, my wife decided that we should name him after one of the lesser known characters in my books, since he was, in effect, our sidekick. Well, since he’s a Japanese Chin, and all of ten pounds, we considered Oliver, and as his rather strange personality became apparent, the name stuck.
The following year we lost one of our cats, who had become Oliver’s best friend, and I replaced him with a gift to my wife on her birthday: another Japanese Chin. This one is even smaller and possessed of a personality that can be quite devious. His name is Artemis.
The following year, to pay me back for the curse of Artie, my wife woke me up at 4:30 on my birthday in January 2005. “Just trust me and follow me,” she instructed and in a few minutes we were on the road heading for Boston’s Logan Airport. When I saw that we were going to Pittsburgh, I got excited, as my beloved Patriots were playing in the AFC Championship game against the Pittsburgh Steelers that very weekend. In fact, one of our Boston sportscasters was sitting on the plane not far from us.
But no, we were going to see the Japanese Chin breeder, who met us at the airport with yet another of the little beasties. This one’s the biggest and the toughest, a snarling fiery beast named Ivan (Bouldershoulder). Go figure.
Q: Oliver deBurrows, highwayhalfling, is one of the funniest characters you’ve come up with in my opinion. Where did his accent come from?
—Sean S., Portland, OR
RAS: Ah, Oliver again. Truly he’s one of my favorite characters ever, and so much fun to write. In the very broadest terms, I consider him a cross between Inigo Montoya of The Princess Bride and the little French guy on the wall in Monty Python’s Holy Grail. There’s your accent—sort of a Gascon-Cockney cross, with a few Crimson-Shadow-world idiosyncrasies thrown in for good measure. If anything draws me back to this world, it’ll be Oliver, that’s for certain. I love the little guy, and miss him dearly.
Q: You wrote the Crimson Shadow trilogy early in your writing career and I have often heard that it helped you when you wrote Demon Wars and the Drizzt novels. What was the biggest thing you learned from writing the Crimson Shadow trilogy that reflects on your later works?
—Andy G., Austin, MN
RAS: I wrote the Crimson Shadow at the same time I was cutting my teeth on the early Drizzt and Cleric Quintet books. I wanted to create my own world more fully than I had in my previous original series, the Chronicles of Ynis Aielle and the Spearwielder’s Tale, both of which were intricately attached to our world.
Unfortunately at that time, my writing schedule was such that I simply didn’t have the time I needed to fully flesh out the world. So I focused on the characters most of all in Crimson Shadow.
But I did get a taste of what was involved in creating my own world, my own Forgotten Realms or Shannara or Middle-earth. This series began the process, truly.
Q: Have we heard all there is from Luthien and Oliver? Might there be more to their tale?
—Tom C., Bellflower, CA
RAS: I purposely left the ending of The Dragon King with possibilities for sequels. I fall for my characters (those that survive). I always want to go back and see what they’re up to. Right now, my contractual obligations prevent a peek at the pair, but I never say never.
I did consider an Oliver book, but I have to tell you, he’s a hard character to write. I started a file on my computer called “Good Stuff,” and every time I come up with something ridiculous that Oliver might say, I add it to the note pile. When I get enough . . .
As for further exploring the world without these guys, I don’t expect it. One caveat is that this world might roll into another, larger one that I’ve created, and if that’s the case, then of course we’ll see much more on the history of the place.
Q: What role does fantasy literature play in today’s world?
—Jeremy J., Boiling Springs, SC
RAS: The short answer is that fantasy literature plays the same role as the rest of literature. To expand on that, today’s fantasy genre is wildly diverse, and with many authors writing for many different reasons. It would be wrong of me to speak for all of them, and I’m hardly qualified to do so.
For me, fantasy can fill several roles. First and foremost is the joy of escapism. As Peter Beagle beautifully explained in his intro to the Tolkien books many years ago, “escapism” isn’t a bad word.
Fantasy can also reinforce a sense of right and wrong, for its heroes are most often men and women of conviction who have a belief in something larger than themselves. And in fantasy, of course, one hero can often make a difference, can throw Sauron’s ring into Mount Doom or slay the dragon that has terrorized the countryside. That goes back to the first role of fantasy as well, because isn’t it wonderful to feel like you’re in a world where you can actually make a difference?
Without going too deeply into the psychology of the genre, fantasy can also deliver comfort on a higher level. There’s something very spiritual about a world where not everything can be explained by science, where magic is real.
I had a fellow at a convention telling me that my audience had grown up over the last nineteen years and, thus, my books should grow up with them. He wanted them to have more “adult” themes and situations. I got the feeling he was talking about sexual situations here. (Of course, after listening to his complaint, I asked him if he had read my Demon Wars novels, and he said he hadn’t.)
Here’s the thing of it for me; here’s the reason I write fantasy: There is no better genre for getting young people to fall in love with reading. For all the reviews and all the heartfelt stories of a reader feeling a personal affinity for one of my characters, or for someone telling me that Oliver helped him through a bad time in his life, the letters that I most enjoy are the ones from teenagers that begin, “I never read a book until . . .” or from the parent of a teen, saying, “I couldn’t get my son/daughter to read until I gave him/her one of your books.” That for me is the ultimate high. Tolkien did that for me during my freshman year of college. His books literally changed my life and got me into serious reading, and not because they unlocked the mysteries of the universe to me. No—they did it because they reminded me how wonderful an adventure in a book could be.
I wouldn’t want to be an English teacher in a high school today. Between the video games, AIM, message boards, and all the rest, the competition for a kid’s time is fierce and unrelenting. So how do you get a kid to actually sit down and read a novel? There’s only one answer: Give him a novel that he enjoys. My experience has shown me that among teens, fantasy has the highest reader retention rate by far. Helping turn teenagers on to reading is something this genre is almost uniquely poised to do.