{"id":10696,"date":"2011-12-30T06:30:10","date_gmt":"2011-12-29T17:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=10696"},"modified":"2011-12-27T14:54:49","modified_gmt":"2011-12-27T01:54:49","slug":"the-best-of-on-anything-really-2011-an-interview-with-daniel-abraham-author-of-the-dragons-path","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2011\/12\/30\/the-best-of-on-anything-really-2011-an-interview-with-daniel-abraham-author-of-the-dragons-path\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best of ‘… on Anything Really’ 2011: “An Interview with Daniel Abraham, Author of ‘The Dragon’s Path'” “"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>“Introduction:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Last year I was alerted to US author Daniel Abraham and The Long Price <\/strong><\/span>Quartet by the review site Risingshadow.net<\/strong><\/a>. I found the series intriguing, but also realized that I was late to the party: the series had been completed in 2009, but never distributed in New Zealand. So I was delighted to learn that Daniel Abraham had a new Fantasy series, The Dagger and The Coin<\/span>, being published this year and that it would be released here. The first novel in the new series, The Dragon\u2019s Path<\/em><\/strong>, is recently out in the bookshops and I seized the opportunity to talk with Daniel Abraham about it.<\/p>\n

The Interview:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Helen: <\/strong><\/em>The Dragon\u2019s Path<\/strong> is the first in a new series, titled <\/em>The Dagger and The Coin<\/span>\u2014can you give readers an idea of what its about?<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel:<\/strong> It\u2019s an epic fantasy series that borrows as much from Dorothy Dunnett as it does from Tolkien. It\u2019s about war and banking, love and truth and murder and dragons.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen: <\/strong>In what way \u201cDorothy Dunnet\u201d?<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/em>Daniel:<\/strong> Dorothy Dunnett is one of the underappreciated masters of historical fiction and, frankly, fantasy. She and Tim Parks were the people who convinced me that medieval banking was a powerfully cool thing. Plus which, I\u2019ve read her House of Niccolo<\/span> books through more times than almost anything else I own.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen: <\/em><\/strong>Do you agree that it\u2019s fair to describe The Dagger\u2019s Path<\/strong> as classic epic fantasy, with elements such as a medieval world, the legacy <\/em>of a long ago past reawakening, a journey\u2014the title reference to dragons even! What drew you to this very traditional, storytelling form?
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel:<\/strong> The first epic fantasy series I wrote \u2013 The Long Price Quartet<\/span> \u2013 was built to be unlike anything else I\u2019d seen in the genre. A different setting, an unfamiliar structure, and a story that wasn\u2019t the usual at all. I\u2019m very pleased with how those books came out. And having been there, I wanted to come back to the things that are the core strengths of epic fantasy and see how the lessons I learned out there on the borders of the genre could apply to those issues and concerns. That sounds a little pretentious now that I say it out loud. I was drawn to it because it\u2019s what made me fall in love with the genre as a reader, and I wanted to come home to that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen:<\/strong><\/em> Is there any sense in which you feel the story you are telling subverts the formula, either subtly or openly?<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel:<\/strong> Probably there is. I\u2019ve taken out the traditional farm boy chosen of prophecy and put in a girl raised by a medieval bank, which is hardly the standard. And I\u2019ve certainly taken a different perspective on the traditional dark lord. But subverting? I don\u2019t know.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m sceptical of subversion for subversion\u2019s sake. I think that there\u2019s a real pressure to subvert the genre out of a sense of almost shame. It can be like a pre-emptive apology. I\u2019ve done things that are different, but I\u2019ve done them in an effort to reach the same places and effects, so I don\u2019t think of it as subversive.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen: <\/strong>Could you expand a little more on how you feel that you\u2019ve taken a different perspective on the traditional dark lord?<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel:<\/strong> A few years back, I was at a convention with Tim Powers. He was on a panel, and I was listening. He said that he didn\u2019t just want his villains defeated. He wanted them humiliated and destroyed. I don\u2019t. I want my villains understood and, if possible, forgiven. The Dagger and the Coin<\/span> has its dark lord, and his rise to power and the things that come from that are central to the book. But he isn\u2019t the kind of faceless \u201cI\u2019m evil because that\u2019s what it says in the script\u201d<\/em> inhuman force that you have in Sauron. He\u2019s sympathetic. You like him. You see the joy he takes in things, and the fear that drives him, and the pettiness. I think most evil isn\u2019t pure, any more than most good.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen: <\/strong>Writers are also readers\u2014so what are the elements that <\/em>\u201cspin your wheels\u201d when reading fantasy? How do you approach incorporating them into your own writing?<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel:<\/strong> More than readers, writers are thieves. I was very careful planning this series to take all the things about fantasy that spun my wheels and put them in there. Epic fantasy is, I think, a genre about war and \u2013 in the best ones \u2013 an ambivalence about war. There are plenty of fantasies that are triumphalist, but the ones that really last are frankly melancholy. The Lord of the Rings<\/em><\/strong> was a massive epic fantasy about disarmament and the cost war has on the individual. A Song of Ice and Fire<\/span> is among other things an essay on the futility of war. The aspect that I\u2019ve taken in The Dagger and the Coin<\/span> is the way that the story of a war, be it propaganda or history, outstrips the war itself. That\u2019s at the large scale. The thing that I find myself going back to in books that I love are the characters. So I\u2019ve peopled these books with characters I like spending time with. But I suppose that\u2019s true in any genre.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen:<\/strong> So which are the characters in The Dragon\u2019s Path<\/strong> that you most enjoy spending time with? And why?<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel:<\/strong> I like them all. I\u2019d better. But for different reasons. I like Marcus Wester because he has so many of the good lines. I like Cithrin because she gets to think about economics and power and how you set prices and sell dresses and things that I actually find really involving. I like Dawson because he is so utterly opposed to everything I personally believe and he\u2019s so much in love with his wife that I like him anyway. I like Geder Palliako because he\u2019s a kind of character that I find wholly challenging. And there\u2019s Clara. I\u2019ve written a whole book since Dragon\u2019s Path<\/strong><\/em>, so I\u2019ve been able to spend a great deal of time with her, and she\u2019s probably my favorite. For the moment at least.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen: <\/em><\/strong>One thing that impressed me in your earlier series, The Long Price Quartet<\/span>, was how well you wrote women characters. Amat Kyaan and Idaan Machi<\/em> particularly stand out for me <\/em>but there are many more. So I couldn\u2019t help noticing that in terms of major characters <\/em>there is really only one, Cithrin, in The Dagger\u2019s Path.<\/strong> It sounds as though Clara\u2019s going to come into it more, but in this book she\u2019s still very much a bit part. <\/em>Was this approach a conscious decision on your part, or in some way driven by the plot?<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel: <\/strong>Clara Kalliam is one of those main characters who actually has a relatively small role in the first book, which is always tricky with these long, multi-volume stories. She is a tremendously important and central character, too, but you won\u2019t see her as much until King\u2019s Blood<\/em><\/strong>. Then from there on out, there are about as many primary women characters as there are men. That was intentional.<\/span><\/p>\n

For secondary characters, I actually didn\u2019t want Cithrin surrounded by very many women. I hadn\u2019t thought about this until you asked, but part of what makes her story interesting to me is the sense of vulnerability and isolation growing into strength and community. We\u2019re still in the first part of the series, so the vulnerability and isolation are more in the mix here.<\/span><\/p>\n

One thing that\u2019s interesting about these books that I didn\u2019t consciously plan was the number of dead mothers. Two of the major characters \u2013 the two major characters really \u2013 lost their mothers very young, and in both cases I see that loss forming who they are.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen:<\/strong> In what way, \u201c<\/em>the loss forming who they are\u201d with the two main characters\u2014can you expand on that more?<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel:<\/strong> Cithrin is the girl at the center of the bank, and the thing that makes her individual and fascinating is the way she analyzes everything in economic terms. Where other people grew up with parents, she had a merchant and a manipulator. And what he gave her wasn\u2019t love, it was an understanding of negotiation, gamesmanship, and trade. I think if she\u2019d had a mother to take as a model, she\u2019d have been an utterly different person.<\/span><\/p>\n

Geder Palliako had a father growing up, but not one who was particularly nurturing. I see him as someone who, if he\u2019d been loved a little more, might have developed more of a soul. Geder and Cithrin suffered the same kind of absences when they were kids, and I think it deformed them in similar ways.<\/span><\/p>\n

Helen:<\/strong> <\/em>So far, <\/em>The Dagger and The Coin<\/em><\/span> series is quite different in \u2018feel\u2019 to The Long Price Quartet<\/span>. Do you see yourself trying something different again <\/em>once this series is complete or would you like to continue with epic fantasy?<\/em><\/p>\n

Daniel:<\/strong> It feels like every book I write is there to help build the tools for the book after it. What I\u2019d really like to do after The Dagger and the Coin<\/span> books are done is take what they teach me about accessibility and pacing and the strength at the core of epic fantasy and combine them with the unfamiliarity and strangeness of The Long Price<\/span> books to make a single-volume story. I\u2019ve told one story in four books. This one will be in five. I would love to use the things I\u2019ve learned from them to write something that\u2019s almost distilled. I don\u2019t know what that book is yet, and I won\u2019t for a few years, but I\u2019m a little excited about it already.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Helen:<\/strong> Daniel, having read both the <\/em>Long Price<\/span> books and now The Dragon\u2019s Path<\/strong><\/em>, I am very much looking forward to it, too\u2014although with three books yet to write in <\/em>The Dagger and The Coin<\/span> series, I suspect I may have to \u201cbide a wee\u201d yet! In the meantime, thank you very much for agreeing to do this interview\u2014it\u2019s been fun and I am sure readers will enjoy the insight into your book and series as much as I have. <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>About the Author:<\/em><\/h3>\n

Daniel Abraham is the author of the critically acclaimed Long Price Quartet. He has been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy Awards, and won the International Horror Guild Award. He also writes as MLN Hanover and (with Ty Franck) as James S. A. Corey. He lives in New Mexico.”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

You can read the original interview plus comments, here<\/span><\/a><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

For all the blog interviews I have undertaken, see Categories: Interviews<\/span><\/a><\/span> in the right hand side bar.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Introduction: Last year I was alerted to US author Daniel Abraham and The Long Price Quartet by the review site Risingshadow.net. I found the series intriguing, but also realized that I was late to the party: the series had been completed in 2009, but never distributed in New Zealand. So I was delighted to learn […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bestof-on-anythingreally"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10696"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10735,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10696\/revisions\/10735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}