The Steel Remains *SPOILERS*

[red snow]

It was, to put not too fine a point to it, fucking fantastic, thanks. I posted some impressionistic stuff on my blog to try to convey the impact. Whole other space out there.

I'm not feeling especially demonic today (for one thing, my jet-lag is gone and the weather in Glasgow last weekend was better than the stuff I left behind in Sydney). Someone had some questions?

I'm pleased you enjoyed it, weird wash-bags as potentially venomous creatures aside.

I was looking forward to "the cold commands" (the alliterative part of me still loves the original title- could you compromise on "the dark demands"?") anyhow but if the the Takavacs conspiracy isn't an in-joke my anticipation has at least doubled.

[delete this account pls]

It was, to put not too fine a point to it, fucking fantastic, thanks. I posted some impressionistic stuff on my blog to try to convey the impact. Whole other space out there.

I'm not feeling especially demonic today (for one thing, my jet-lag is gone and the weather in Glasgow last weekend was better than the stuff I left behind in Sydney). Someone had some questions?

Damn, I had no idea Morgan just toured Australia. I got to pay more attention.

[Jerol]

Someone had some questions?

OK, I'll bite. Is this setting a future Earth? Will humans evolve into Kir or Dwenda?

How about an appendix, or a map? You've got a lot going on here and just to keep things straight it would be really nice to have these to play with. Or maybe post it online if the publisher doesn't object. It's a helluva complex world you've built here. I love being plunged into a book without any exposition or reference but ultimately I like to have some background material.

[Richard]

Well, there's a map coming in the MMP edition of TSR, out in the UK next month.....

As for the rest - can't really tell you. For me the whole strength of fantasy lies in what is not known. Mysterious creatures only stay mysterious as long as you can't be sure what they are; shrouded destiny loses its mythic power as soon as it's un-shrouded; the gods themselves become pretty dull and prosaic once you know what they're up to; and a prophesy is only interesting as long as you don't know whether it's set in stone or just the co-incidental mumblings of some charlatan (or best of all, a fumbling half-comprehended semi-charlatan's attempt to grasp something part-seen through obscuring mist. Or not).

Truth be told, I've never really understood the desire to map out a fantasy world in minute, certain detail, because it seems to me that the moment you achieve that mapping, you've reduced what was once shivery, ghostly and darkly powerful to the same prosaic level as a police incident report or an Economist country survey. The world of The Steel Remains is meant to imply many things, to seem hauntingly familiar, to show the shrouded lines of a form you think you might recognise - because that's exactly the frisson I'm interested in creating, and more importantly sustaining. The book is that vague silent figure sitting across the room and watching you as you stir awake alone in bed at 3 in the morning; I'm just not interested in the bit where you turn on the lights and realise it's just your discarded clothes making a pattern on the chair. That just spoils the effect.

This isn't to say that I'm being coy here. Truth is, I literally do not know myself what these things might (or might not!) signify. I very carefully haven't bothered to refine it down that much. So I honestly couldn't tell you which of the seeming portents the book contains are actual supernatural phenomena and which are just the result of superstition and an overactive imagination on the part of this world's inhabitants; I can't tell you if this is the far future (or the distant past!) of our Earth, some phase of a parallel reality Earth, another world altogether or something else again - because I haven't decided those things myself. And similarly, I don't know who the dwenda, the kiriath, the akyia and the dwellers actually are (though I do have my suspicions).

Rest assured, there will be some revelations in the next book - but they're going to be revelations to me as well. And just like the revelation at the end of The Steel Remains, they will probably beg more questions than they answer.

[Werthead]

There is a working map here by the guy who won the Gollancz competition. I believe it's a somewhat altered and updated form of this map that will appear in the paperback.

[red snow]

I can't tell you if this is the far future (or the distant past!) of our Earth, some phase of a parallel reality Earth, another world altogether or something else again - because I haven't decided those things myself. And similarly, I don't know who the dwenda, the kiriath, the akyia and the dwellers actually are (though I do have my suspicions).

I'd rather it has nothing to do with earth than it be set in the distant past - a certain sci-fi show just soured me to that "surprise" ending.

As for the rest, I'm starting to get the impression we did summon a djinn or takavach after that cryptic response.

I know how you feel about genre definition but people would traditionally call what you have described as horror. There's nothing wrong with the two existing together of course; Alien and nigthmare on elm st are scifi/fantasy - horror. Would you ever consider writing a straight up horror or do you prefer to mix it into other stories much like you would, thriller, erotica, mystery etc? all of these elements may eventually be replaced by film classifications eg "scenes of mild peril" or "scenes of physical intensity" ;)

[Jerol]

Well, there's a map coming in the MMP edition of TSR, out in the UK next month.....

As for the rest - can't really tell you. For me the whole strength of fantasy lies in what is not known. Mysterious creatures only stay mysterious as long as you can't be sure what they are; shrouded destiny loses its mythic power as soon as it's un-shrouded; the gods themselves become pretty dull and prosaic once you know what they're up to; and a prophesy is only interesting as long as you don't know whether it's set in stone or just the co-incidental mumblings of some charlatan (or best of all, a fumbling half-comprehended semi-charlatan's attempt to grasp something part-seen through obscuring mist. Or not).

Truth be told, I've never really understood the desire to map out a fantasy world in minute, certain detail, because it seems to me that the moment you achieve that mapping, you've reduced what was once shivery, ghostly and darkly powerful to the same prosaic level as a police incident report or an Economist country survey. The world of The Steel Remains is meant to imply many things, to seem hauntingly familiar, to show the shrouded lines of a form you think you might recognise - because that's exactly the frisson I'm interested in creating, and more importantly sustaining. The book is that vague silent figure sitting across the room and watching you as you stir awake alone in bed at 3 in the morning; I'm just not interested in the bit where you turn on the lights and realise it's just your discarded clothes making a pattern on the chair. That just spoils the effect.

This isn't to say that I'm being coy here. Truth is, I literally do not know myself what these things might (or might not!) signify. I very carefully haven't bothered to refine it down that much. So I honestly couldn't tell you which of the seeming portents the book contains are actual supernatural phenomena and which are just the result of superstition and an overactive imagination on the part of this world's inhabitants; I can't tell you if this is the far future (or the distant past!) of our Earth, some phase of a parallel reality Earth, another world altogether or something else again - because I haven't decided those things myself. And similarly, I don't know who the dwenda, the kiriath, the akyia and the dwellers actually are (though I do have my suspicions).

Rest assured, there will be some revelations in the next book - but they're going to be revelations to me as well. And just like the revelation at the end of The Steel Remains, they will probably beg more questions than they answer.

I am comfortable with this. Every author works in different ways and if making it up as you go along works for you, so be it. I am working on my own fantasy work right now and I have to know in advance where I am going. I do like the possibility that there might be actual supernatural or it might be superstition. It's still far better than the lengths Erikson has gone to yank my chain.

Two points regarding map, 1) for me I can immerse myself in a world better with a map. It helps in framing where the characters are and what may yet be explored. 2) Wert, your damn link doesn't work for non-subscribers.

[Richard]

I wouldn't define the uncertainties I've described necessarily as "horror" (though clearly some of them would work okay in a horror tale). In some cases the frisson engendered by not knowing is more akin to sadness, or wonder, or just the good old condition of being locked inside a human head and gazing at a universe we were never designed to comprehend. It's an ache, a doubt, a brooding sense of something out of reach.

Obviously, the lack of defined certainty is something you can use in non-fantasy fiction as well - for example, I'm a big fan of character motivations sometimes being obscure or ambiguous (or both!), and so leaving the reader to make their own decisions about why someone did something. Likewise, in any kind of fiction you care to name, you can allude to events in a character's past just enough to give an impression of what sort of thing seems to have happened, but never bother to define it more than the minimum the narrative requires. (Finest example of which is, I think, in a Roger Zelazny short story called "Half-jack"). The dynamic I'm describing need not be for terrifying/soul withering purposes per se. I see it more as a piece of advanced literary technique with multiple applications. Fantasy just happens to be the ideal theatre to deploy that hardware in because so much uncertainty is up for grabs there.

I don't know that I'd ever be interested in writing "horror" specifically - or even know how to. My impression is that (as you're pretty much implying, Red Snow) pure horror doesn't really exist as a literary genre anymore, at least not outside the short story form. Stephen King's earlier (and let's face it, best) novels were as much works of character and social comment as they were frighteners. Clive Barker's novels were as much fantasy as horror, right from the get go - there was always something at least as wondrous as scary about the things he conjured up. And so forth. Maybe someone else can think of an example of a pure horror novel, but off the top of my head I can't. (Movies are another matter - that's a whole other post). Horror seems to me, rather than anything as solid as a genre, more a mode, a mood even, and I suspect it probably always was; publishing hyperbole maybe had us thinking otherwise for a while, but the game seems to be up. So while I'll happily deploy that mode from time to time, I wouldn't ever try to build a whole book out of it.

[red snow]

I don't know that I'd ever be interested in writing "horror" specifically - or even know how to. My impression is that (as you're pretty much implying, Red Snow) pure horror doesn't really exist as a literary genre anymore, at least not outside the short story form. Stephen King's earlier (and let's face it, best) novels were as much works of character and social comment as they were frighteners. Clive Barker's novels were as much fantasy as horror, right from the get go - there was always something at least as wondrous as scary about the things he conjured up. And so forth. Maybe someone else can think of an example of a pure horror novel, but off the top of my head I can't. (Movies are another matter - that's a whole other post). Horror seems to me, rather than anything as solid as a genre, more a mode, a mood even, and I suspect it probably always was; publishing hyperbole maybe had us thinking otherwise for a while, but the game seems to be up. So while I'll happily deploy that mode from time to time, I wouldn't ever try to build a whole book out of it.

That was my implication, yeah, but you summed it up far better. Stores having a horror section (sometimes with Fantasy there instead) has always bugged/confused me.

[Adz of CCAA]

Sorry that I revive this thread.

I don't even know if this is the right place to ask. :blush:

But I'll ask my questions anyway and hope that someone will answer me. :)

Is it mentioned anywhere in the book what Ringil's eyes look like? I know he has the name Angeleyes but that doesn't say anything special about his eyes.

And what about the dwenda's eyes? I really cannot remember if they are described at all. :leaving:

[Werthead]

Not answering the question above as I can't remember and my copy of the book is currently in another country, but just pointing out the UK mass-market paperback of the book is out and it indeed has the map I linked to above in it ;)

[Jerol]

I don't remember any description of the dwenda's eyes. I'll try to search through the book and find something.

[Adz of CCAA]

Oh thank you, that would be great. :)

I don't have the book at the moment and so can't look myself.

And it is bothering me a little bit. :(

[vanye]

I'm assuming this isn't spoilerish:

p 228 of the UK edition: Re dwenda's eyes: "The eyes were pits of pitch, just the way the legends had it, but even in this low light Ringil saw how they flung back the same faint rainbow glimmer as the dwenda's nails."

Ringil's eyes: For some reason I think they're blue, but I don't remember reading it anywhere. However, p 333, according to Archeth: "mostly it was the eyes that told the story; that made her think Ringil had not survived the dwenda encounter..."

[Adz of CCAA]

Thank you for looking things up. :)

I think I remember that bit about the rainbow glimmer of the dwenda's eyes. :)

I think Ringil's eyecolor is not mentioned anywhere. Perhaps for a reason... ;)

I also don't remember if it is described anywhere WHY he has this "nickname" Angeleyes. Seems to be that there is something special about his eyes. Although it's somehow funny that no other character says anything about them. If they are so special...

Perhaps we will learn more in the next book. :)

[vanye]

You may have a point about his eyes. I only took the "Angeleyes" as a lead-in so the mom could follow up with the comment "Demoneyes suits you better today."

[gentleman_bastard]

I've just finished re-reading this, taking it a lot slower. I now have a bit of theory that I'd like to some comments on:

The whole Ringil as Dark lord thing.

Maybe its a case of him fighting for rationality and an end to slavery etc, things that would overturn the fabric of his world. This would lead to him being seen as a Dark Lord by the revelation and the slave traders as he threatens everything that they hold dear.

Morgan has form on dystopian settings where the character feels trapped by the social order. Maybe he wanted to write a book where someone actually did something about it...

Either way it'd be great to read a book from the perspective of a Dark Lord.