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?
- PROCESSING YOUR PROCESS fantasyhandbook.wordpress.com/2020/05/05/pro… #writing 46 minutes ago
- Who cares about plagiarism? Words by Stuart Ritchie worksinprogress.co/issue/who-care… 1 hour ago
- The Year in Review: Events that shaped 2021 splcenter.org/news/2021/12/2… 3 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: August 2019
COULD YOU WRITE A RANDOM FANTASY NOVEL?
Honestly, if I saw this post out there by anyone else I’d be the first person to start throwing rotten vegetables at it. Of course you can’t randomly generate a novel—a work of art—using some computer program or set of … 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, characters, Dungeons & Dragons, fantasy movies, 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, monsters, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, Story Structure, websites for authors, websites for writers, writers to authors, 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, Wizards of the Coast, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice, writing exercises, writing process
3 Comments
LUISMA’S RETURN: EXPLORING WEIRD TALES Vol. 5, No. 1—PART 21
I’ve been feeling better lately, more positive in general. I’ve started exercising again, working harder—back on top of my workload, and so on. And I’m also a little nervous about how much like the dreaded reviews these things are starting … 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, characters, fiction writing blog, fiction writing websites, help for writers, helping writers become authors, how to write fantasy, how to write fiction, how to write horror, how to write science fiction, intellectual property development, monsters, Publishing Business, Pulp Fiction, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, Story Structure, websites for authors, websites for writers, writers to authors, Writing, writing advice, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, creative process, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, Philip Athans, Publishing, Science Fiction, Weird Tales, Writing, writing advice
Leave a comment
SURF, THINK, WRITE, REPEAT
In June, in a post entitled “Read, Think, Write, Repeat,” I once again urged y’all to read and allow your own writing to be informed by what you’ve read. I also shared my habit of scribbling notes in the margins … 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, characters, fiction writing blog, fiction writing websites, help for writers, helping writers become authors, how to write fantasy, how to write fiction, how to write horror, how to write science fiction, intellectual property development, Publishing Business, Pulp Fiction, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, websites for authors, websites for writers, writers to authors, Writing, writing advice, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, creative process, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, read more, Science Fiction, Writing, writing advice, writing process
Leave a comment
WHEN CHARACTERS MEET TECHNOLOGY
I like to define science fiction as stories in which the impossible is made possible by the use of some imaginary technology or scientific discovery. In other words, if the hero gets to a distant planet via a starship it’s … 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, characters, 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, intellectual property development, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, science fiction technology, SF and Fantasy Authors, Story Structure, technology, transmedia, websites for authors, websites for writers, writers to authors, Writing, writing advice, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, best fantasy novels, Books, creative process, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice
1 Comment
Fantasy Author's Handbook 