PLEASE DONATE! Fantasy Author’s Handbook is brought to you free of charge, but if you can spare a one-time donation of $5, $20, or maybe $5 per month, that would really help keep Fantasy Author’s Handbook happily handbooking into the 2020s.
Fantasy Author\’s Feeds
Fantasy Author’s Datebook
Are you following me?
- You define the “no go areas” in your own #writing — don’t think you have to obey some unwritten list of rules from… twitter.com/i/web/status/1… 2 hours ago
- SUBSCRIBE TO A LITERARY MAGAZINE fantasyhandbook.wordpress.com/2022/01/25/%ef… 4 hours ago
- Though surrealism is most commonly thought of as a 20th-century movement, its legacy, or at the very least the disc… twitter.com/i/web/status/1… 5 hours ago
!NEW!
- Find me on Kindlepreneur: Master Guide to Selecting the Best Book Editor
- Longwinded One Podcast: Episode 158: Philip Athans: The Years of Phil
- The Best of Fantasy Authors Handbook …is now available–58 revised and expanded essays from the first five years of FAH!
- Inside Storytelling: Writing Monsters, Creatures & Villains
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
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.
- 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!
Communicate With Me
- Twitter @PhilAthans Admit it, you need to keep up with me at least a couple times a day.
- LinkedIn Here’s my public profile on LinkedIn, for what it’s worth
- Athans & Associates Creative Consulting Creative consulting services from an IP development pro.
- GoodReads Join me at Facebook-for-readers
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.
- Publisher's Weekly “Is the Universe Expanding or Contracting?”
- 10 Questions with…ME! I get grilled by Ryan Schneider.
- How to Write Horror: Reading, Breathing and the Long Sentence (at Writer’s Digest)
- SF Signal Mind Meld: Aliens I join other SF/F authors and editors on the subject of what makes a good alien.
- Writer's Digest Interview: On Writing F&SF.
- Porter Anderson vs. Movie Examples: With some nice things to say about my Living Dialogue seminar at the Writer’s Digest conference.
- 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.
- The Fanitarium Podcast: Interviews Philip Athans
- Writer's Digest Guest Blog: How to Make a Vampire Not Suck
- Ask the (Book) Editors: Panel video from 2013 Emerald City Comicon!
- Worldcasting: I join the guys from Worldbuilding Magazine for a chat about… everything!
- Roleplaying Tips: Interviews me!
- Monsters in D&D, Books, Movies… Dicegeeks Podcast interview with Phil!
- 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 Monsters With Philip Athans The Creative Penn Podcasts me!
- Classic Monsters, Modern Love: How a New Generation of Fans is Keeping the Universal Monsters Alive
Past Posts
Monthly Archives: March 2017
LOVECRAFT’S FIVE DEFINITE ELEMENTS, PART 4: WHAT MAKES IT SCARY
This week we continue a five-part series inspired by H.P. Lovecraft’s essay “Notes on Writing Weird Fiction” in which one paragraph stood out for me as the beginnings of a horror/weird fantasy manifesto: Each weird story—to speak more particularly of … Continue reading
Posted in Books, characters, Dungeons & Dragons, horror movies, horror novels, how to write fantasy, how to write fiction, how to write horror, how to write science fiction, monsters, Publishing Business, Pulp Fiction, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, transmedia, Writing, writing advice, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, best fantasy novels, Books, creative process, Dungeons & Dragons, e-books, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, H.P. Lovecraft, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice, writing exercises
4 Comments
“WRITE BETTER CHARACTER DESCRIPTION,” SAID THE 6’3”-tall, 349-pound, BALD WRITER WITH BROWN EYES AND GLASSES, WHO WAS A MALE HUMAN
It’s okay, I know I’m fat. I also know that I see characters described in this way far, far too often. I’ll be honest—once might seem to be far, far too often. Describing what a character looks like is no … Continue reading
Posted in Books, characters, freelance editing, freelance writing, horror novels, how to write fantasy, how to write fiction, how to write horror, how to write science fiction, Publishing Business, Pulp Fiction, Romance Novels, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, Story Structure, transmedia, Writing, writing advice, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, best fantasy novels, Books, Conan, creative process, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, Writing, writing advice, writing exercises, writing process
6 Comments
LOVECRAFT’S FIVE DEFINITE ELEMENTS, PART 3: WHAT IT ACTUALLY DOES
This is the third part of a five-part series inspired by H.P. Lovecraft’s essay “Notes on Writing Weird Fiction” in which one paragraph stood out for me as the beginnings of a horror/weird fantasy manifesto: Each weird story—to speak … Continue reading
Posted in Books, characters, Dungeons & Dragons, horror movies, horror novels, how to write fantasy, how to write fiction, how to write horror, how to write science fiction, monsters, Publishing Business, Pulp Fiction, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, science fiction technology, SF and Fantasy Authors, Story Structure, transmedia, Writing, writing advice, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, best fantasy novels, Books, creative process, Dungeons & Dragons, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice, writing exercises, writing process
1 Comment
ISOLATE YOUR CHARACTERS
Choosing to be isolated from others is a trait we don’t routinely recognize as healthy. Worse, we often see it as either the result of a dangerous psychological imbalance or the cause of a dangerous psychological imbalance. This is true … Continue reading
Posted in Books, characters, fantasy movies, horror movies, horror novels, how to write fantasy, how to write fiction, how to write horror, how to write science fiction, monsters, Publishing Business, Pulp Fiction, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, Story Structure, transmedia, Writing
Tagged author, authors, best fantasy novels, Books, creative process, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice
2 Comments
Fantasy Author's Handbook 