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Books on Writing
- The Guide to Writing Fantasy and Science Fiction The book at the heart of all this!
- Writing Monsters Advice for SF, fantasy, and horror authors
- The Best of Fantasy Author's Handbook Volume I, 2009-2013
Buy My Books
- Six Guns & Spaceships Featuring my space opera western story “Rendezes”
- Devils of the Endless Deep My trip into the Fathomless Abyss
- Write to the Cover Featuring my story “Bella Lucky and the Titan of Tarvos”
- Australians, Buy Here! Order from Boomerang Books in Australia.
- The Best of Fantasy Authors Handbook …is now available–58 revised and expanded essays from the first five years of FAH!
- Tales from the Fathomless Abyss The anthology that started it all!
- The Haunting of Dragon's Cliff with Mel Odom, a new sword & sorcery barbarian is born!
- Completely Broken A novel of contemporary horror
- Annihilation My entry in the Forgotten Realms series R.A. Salvatore’s War of the Spider Queen
- A Reader's Guide to R.A. Salvatore's the Legend of Drizzt An essential companion to the greatest hero of the Forgotten Realms world
- I Made a Friend An alternate history/dieselpunk story for your Kindle!
- Morbid Dread of the Dawn Read my story in The Pulp Horror Book of Phobias!
- The Dogs Are In the Alley Again: A new horror story in Jitter #7
- Harbinger Asylum: Published one of my poems!
- The Lighthouse Keeper That Left A new poem in Harbinger’s Asylum!
- MegaTraveller: MANHUNT: Thirty-two years late, but better than never!
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Interviews & Guest Posts
- CLARKESWORLD INTERVIEW 1: I took part in a roundtable interview with other speculative fiction editors.
- MAKE-BELIEVE MONDAYS INTERVIEW: Debra Parmley’s Make-Believe Mondays is a must-read blog for SF/Fantasy fans, and she’s interviewed lil’ ol’ me!
- Celebrity Game Table: A detailed look at my Tegel Manor Campaign from 2003.
- Monsters in D&D, Books, Movies… Dicegeeks Podcast interview with Phil!
- Longwinded One Podcast: Episode 158: Philip Athans: The Years of Phil
- Classic Monsters, Modern Love: How a New Generation of Fans is Keeping the Universal Monsters Alive
- Publisher's Weekly “Is the Universe Expanding or Contracting?”
- Hunting for MANHUNT: The behind the scenes tale of my lost MegaTraveller adventure!
- Inside Storytelling: Writing Monsters, Creatures & Villains
- Porter Anderson vs. Movie Examples: With some nice things to say about my Living Dialogue seminar at the Writer’s Digest conference.
- 10 Questions with…ME! I get grilled by Ryan Schneider.
- SF Signal Mind Meld: Aliens I join other SF/F authors and editors on the subject of what makes a good alien.
- Ask the (Book) Editors: Panel video from 2013 Emerald City Comicon!
- Writer's Digest Guest Blog: How to Make a Vampire Not Suck
- Horror Authors: How to Scare the Heck Out of Your Readers A guest post at The Write Life with practical tips for scaring the crap out of your readers.
- Writer's Digest Interview: On Writing F&SF.
- How To Write Monsters With Philip Athans The Creative Penn Podcasts me!
- Roleplaying Tips: Interviews me!
- The Fanitarium Podcast: Interviews Philip Athans
- How to Create a Magic System: M.S. Farzan and Storyteller’s Handbook features The Guide to Writing Fantasy and Science Fiction
- How to Write Horror: Reading, Breathing and the Long Sentence (at Writer’s Digest)
- Worldcasting: I join the guys from Worldbuilding Magazine for a chat about… everything!
Past Posts
Monthly Archives: December 2013
JUST ONE RESOLUTION
What a busy year, 2013. It’s been a long time since I’ve had a year this busy, both professionally and personally, and even though today is the last day of the year, it’s just as busy. A deadline has come … Continue reading
Posted in Books, E-Books, indie publishing, POD, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, transmedia, Writing, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, creative process, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, resolutions, Science Fiction, watch less TV, Writing, writing advice, writing process
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2013 in review
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2013 annual report for this blog. Here’s an excerpt: The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 19,000 times in 2013. If it were a … Continue reading
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A PICTURE INSPIRES A THOUSAND WORDS
I recently sat down, via Skype, with Pro Se Productions’s Tommy Hancock to talk about new pulp, my story in his anthology Sixguns & Spaceships, and a new project I’m working on for him: a short story based on an … Continue reading
Posted in Books, creative team, Dungeons & Dragons, E-Books, horror novels, indie publishing, POD, Publishing Business, RPG, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, transmedia, Writing, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, creative process, Dungeons & Dragons, e-books, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, Forgotten Realms, genre fiction, new pulp, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, pulp fantasy, pulp fiction, pulp horror, pulp science fiction, robots, Science Fiction, Wizards of the Coast, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice, writing exercises, writing process
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“SOME BASIC DIALOG TIPS,” PHIL SUGGESTED
I have taught my one-day seminar Living Dialog a few times already and have had the best time with that session. It’s coming up again in the spring and I’ve been thinking about it, and thinking lately about some basic … Continue reading
Posted in authors helping authors, authors to writers, best fantasy blogs, best genre fiction blogs, best horror blogs, best science fiction blogs, best websites for authors, best websites for writers, Books, fiction writing blog, fiction writing websites, help for writers, helping writers become authors, horror novels, how to write fantasy, how to write fiction, how to write horror, how to write science fiction, Publishing Business, Romance Novels, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, Science Fiction Story, SF and Fantasy Authors, transmedia, websites for authors, websites for writers, writers to authors, Writing, writing advice, Writing Community, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, children's book, creative process, e-books, editor, Fantasy, fantasy-romance, Fiction, genre fiction, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, punctuation in dialog, Science Fiction, teen books, Writing, writing advice, writing dialog, writing exercises, writing process
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MISSING DAY
Apologies, Fantasy Author’s Handbook fans, but today’s post was set aside for a family medical emergency. All’s well now, but here it is 11:30 p.m. in the Seattle area, and I’m just now getting to the computer. How about a … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, transmedia, Writing, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, creative process, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, Writing, writing advice, writing exercises, writing process
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Fantasy Author's Handbook 