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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
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- 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
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- The Lighthouse Keeper That Left A new poem in Harbinger’s Asylum!
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- Longwinded One Podcast: Episode 158: Philip Athans: The Years of Phil
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- 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.
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- Writer's Digest Interview: On Writing F&SF.
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- 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
Tag Archives: J.M. McDermott
BOOKS FOR FANTASY AUTHORS XXI: MY TEN FAVORITE HORROR NOVELS
From time to time I’ll recommend—not review, mind you, but recommend, and yes, there is a difference—books that I think fantasy authors should have on their shelves. Some may be new and still in print, some may be difficult to … Continue reading
Posted in Books, characters, horror movies, 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, transmedia, Writing, writing advice, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, best fantasy novels, best horror novels, best sellers, Books, creative process, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, Halloween, horror novels, J.M. McDermott, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, read more, Science Fiction, Wizards of the Coast, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice
5 Comments
AN EVIL EMPIRE, BENT ON SELF-DESTRUCTION (BUT WHY?)
Though I tend to shy away from a direct examination of current politics, let’s dip our toes in another troubling month in this country and take a look at present day America as a worldbuilding exercise. This could be considered … Continue reading
Posted in Books, characters, 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, transmedia, Writing, writing advice, writing fantasy, writing horror, writing science fiction, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, Books, creative process, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice, writing process
3 Comments
LEST WE FORGET THE ART
I’ve been writing a lot lately about what we can learn from the old pulp magazines, about grabbing your readers in the first paragraph, and lots of stuff about action and adopting an active writing style. And now I’ve started … Continue reading
Posted in Books, horror novels, how to write fantasy, how to write fiction, how to write horror, how to write science fiction, 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, best sellers, Books, Conan, creative process, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, read more, Science Fiction, Writing, writing advice, writing process
7 Comments
WHAT PULP CAN TEACH US
I know I’ve been talking about pulp a lot lately, but bear with me. I’m in the middle of teaching a two-session Pulp Fiction Workshop, with the second session coming this Saturday. Students have been sending me their stories and … Continue reading
Posted in Books, horror novels, how to write fiction, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, transmedia, Writing, writing advice, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, creative process, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, new pulp, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, pulp fiction, Science Fiction, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice, writing exercises, writing process, writing pulp fiction
6 Comments
SCIENCE FICTION CAN BE FUN AGAIN
But that’ll be up to us. I tend to read both science fiction and fantasy from the opposite ends of the spectrum. I love new, avant garde, experimental (whatever you want to call it) literary SF and fantasy by the … 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, comic books, creative team, E-Books, 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, indie publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, science fiction movies, Science Fiction Story, SF and Fantasy Authors, 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, best sellers, Books, comic books, creative process, e-books, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, Writing, writing advice
6 Comments
BUY MY E-BOOKS, PLEASE
Tuesday again, so soon? What to write for this week’s Fantasy Author’s Handbook post? Ideas abound, but this morning I thought, hey, maybe it’s time for a little shameless self-promotion. And it might just kill two birds with one stone. … Continue reading
Posted in Arron of the Black Forest, Books, creative team, E-Books, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, The Fathomless Abyss, transmedia, Writing, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, author self-promotion, authors, best fantasy for Kindle, best fantasy for Nook, best fantasy novels, Books, creative process, e-books, e-readers, Fantasy, fantasy author on Twitter, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, jay Lake, Kindle fantasy, Mel Odom, Mike Resnick, Nook fantasy, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, Writing, writing advice, writing process
6 Comments
NIRVANA GATES AND MY TENDENCY TO AVOID GROUPS
What could these two things possibly have in common? A couple weeks ago, in my class at Bellevue College, we were discussing how characters interact with the world they live in, and we went through an exercise inspired by the … Continue reading
Posted in Arron of the Black Forest, Books, creative team, Dungeons & Dragons, E-Books, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, The Fathomless Abyss, Writing, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, Brad R. Torgersen, Cat Rambo, creative process, Dungeons & Dragons, e-books, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, Forgotten Realms, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, jay Lake, Magic: The Gathering, Mats Minnhagen, Mel Odom, Mike Resnick, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, Wizards of the Coast, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice, writing exercises
2 Comments
FALL INTO THE FATHOMLESS ABYSS
It’s up! There’s nothing more satisfying than having a book out there for sale. It’s done. It’s out there. And I’m happy with it. That last bit? That’s the hard part. I’ve written here about some of the trouble this … Continue reading
Posted in Books, creative team, E-Books, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, The Fathomless Abyss, Writing, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, Brad R. Torgersen, Cat Rambo, creative process, e-books, e-readers, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, jay Lake, Kindle, Mats Minnhagen, Mel Odom, Mike Resnick, Nook, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, shared world, worldbuilding, Writing, writing advice, writing process
1 Comment
DEVILS OF THE ENDLESS WRITING PROCESS
If you’ve been following Fantasy Author’s Handbook for the past few months, you’ve heard me talk about my love/hate relationship with my current work-in-progress, the Fathomless Abyss novella Devils of the Endless Deep. I started with a report on my … Continue reading
Posted in Books, creative team, E-Books, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, The Fathomless Abyss, Writing, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, creative process, e-books, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, jay Lake, Mel Odom, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, writer's block, Writing, writing advice, writing process
4 Comments
EXCERPTS FROM THE FATHOMLESS ABYSS
THIS JUST IN: Tales From The Fathomless Abyss is on sale NOW for the Nook! THIS JUST IN: Tales From The Fathomless Abyss is on sale NOW for the Kindle! Just this morning I posted Tales From The Fathomless Abyss … Continue reading
Posted in Books, creative team, E-Books, Publishing Business, Science Fiction & Fantasy Novels, SF and Fantasy Authors, The Fathomless Abyss, Writing, Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy
Tagged author, authors, Books, bottomless pit, Brad R. Torgersen, Cat Rambo, creative process, e-books, editor, Fantasy, Fiction, genre fiction, J.M. McDermott, jay Lake, Mats Minnhagen, Mel Odom, Mike Resnick, Philip Athans, Publishing, Publishing Business, Science Fiction, shared world, worldbuilding, Writing, writing process
1 Comment
Fantasy Author's Handbook 