“They can keep their heaven. When I die, I want to go to Middle-earth.”
George R. R. Martin
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“Many readers, many critics, and most editors speak of style
as if it were an ingredient of a book, like the sugar in a cake,
or something added onto the book, like the frosting on the cake.
The style, of course, is the book. If you remove the cake, all you have left is a recipe.
If you remove the style, all you have left is a synopsis of the plot.
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“This is partly true of history; largely true of fiction; and absolutely true of fantasy.”
Ursula K. LeGuin
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More common even than the atrocious, “I’m writing a book!” seems today to be the follow-up statement “It’s a fantasy epic!”
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Let me start (or amend my opening, leastways) by saying this: I love fantasy. I love writing fantasy, I love reading (good) fantasy, I love finding fantasy movies and watching them. Even when they’re bad, they’re still fun to watch. I began in fantasy, and it’s all I initially wanted to write. Or perhaps I should admit something and identify the problem with the fantasy genre at the same time: All I wanted to write was The Lord of the Rings.
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