On Being a Fantasy Writer in Wales: Ian Wood

Ian Wood

The obvious is obvious and while it deserves our attention can often blind us to what is also important. Now, the obvious when writing a fantasy novel is that you need to use your imagination. How proud you are when you stare at a blank wall and dream up a brand new race of beings. I’ll never forget when I dreamt up the gliding Furlins for my second novel, The Elven Solution. That picture of a blank wall is imprinted on my brain. Great! I’ve got my first chapter, but is that it?

Marathon not a sprint

I believe that too many fantasy authors leave it at that and then proceed. They have one original idea and off they go. But is that enough? Think about it. Can one original idea pull off a novel? You’ve got your start but a novel is a marathon, not a sprint. What are you going to do now? Too often, fantasy novels start off with a great idea and then they flag. Authors resort to rehashing what they know, what has succeeded in the past. Think of how many poor man’s Lord of the Rings are out there. How many fantasy novels have you read where you think, ‘You know what. That main dude who is a magician, mage, warlock, druid, whatever – you may as well call him Gandalf’?

Do the research

What is the solution? Obviously, fantasy needs imagination – we can all agree on that. What is the less obvious component for a successful fantasy novel which is engaging, original and strikes the reader as realistic? It is research. Writing a novel set in a medieval setting, like my first novel, The Unending War? Then do your research. Have you got lots of battles? Do your research. There is no excuse. There are plenty of excellent books out there on history and warfare.

If you do your research, not only is it interesting, but you get plenty of ideas. Research medieval battles and attitudes, and suddenly, your battles have the potential to be full-bodied and convincing. Do your research and suddenly you have loads of ideas about how your characters will react to certain circumstances. Your novel has the potential to develop depth.

Spartan elves

The next point is, resist the temptation to show off. The reader does not need to know you are some academic type who has read loads of books. They are there for the story. How many readers will read my second novel, The Elven Solution, and realise that the elves are based on the social structures and phalanx warfare of ancient Sparta? I’ve yet to meet one. That’s not important. What is important is that the novel exists on its own two feet. At the end of the day, The Elven Solution is a novel, not a historical treatise. It is totally irrelevant if the reader can see the history behind it. What is important is that the reader finds the novel convincing and interesting.

What can be most useful is where the historical record is lacking. You want to write a novel which is inspired by Ancient Wales (or Ancient Britannia, depending on your historical perspective). Let’s have some Druids, but not just Gandalf Part 2. Do your research. This is actually easy as very little is known about the Druids, but you’ll get a bit of information, much of it not very nice like human sacrifice and groves full of rotting heads. But still, very little is actually known. So here you can use your imagination, make it all up. You can even leave out bits like rotting heads and human sacrifice.

Real Druids

Ultimately, your Druids might bear little relation to their historical counterparts, but who cares? You are writing a fantasy novel. My point is that your research has inspired you to ask pertinent questions and to create characters and scenes. Hopefully, you will avoid the trap of a poor man’s Lord of the Rings with loads of Gandalfs running around. No one, in my opinion, needs to read your poor man’s version when they have Tolkien’s marvellous original to hand.

Ultimately, it’s a dialectical contradiction. A fantasy novel obviously needs imagination. But, if you do the opposite – research, that research will interact with your imagination, deepen it and hopefully create a world which the reader will find interesting, engaging and realistic.

Ian Wood’s novels to date are The Unending War, The Elven Solution and The Misfits. All are available on Amazon and Kindle.