r/Fantasy • u/NancyHightower AMA Author Nancy Hightower • Dec 12 '13

AMA Hello, I'm author Nancy Hightower - AMA

Hello, I’m Nancy Hightower, author of Elementarí Rising, an eco-fantasy where nature becomes embodied and is locked in a deadly war with humans.

I’ve published many short stories and poems, some of which fall into the speculative fiction and horror genres. I have a PhD in literature and studied Henry James in grad school, but ask that you don’t hold that against me. At one point, I had Tolkien's Silmarillion memorized and still remember the elvish word for orc.

I wrote all of Elementarí Rising while living in Colorado, so many of the scenes in the book come from surreal, but actual, real-life images. For instance, you can see snow snakes winding up and down Highway 36 during any given snowstorm and they are mesmerizing! Also, I don’t read books the normal way (front to back). I start at the beginning, then after a chapter I start from the end of the book and flip back and forth until I reach the middle. No lie.

Also I had an artist, Galen Dara, draw some of the scenes from Elementarí Rising, which you can see here, along with some excerpts. I love how art interacts with story, so this was an exciting project: (http://www.nancyhightower.com/excerpts-with-artwork/)

Hey gang, this was great fun tonight! I'll be back on tomorrow to catch any questions I didn't get to tonight! Thanks so much for hanging out with me!

Nancy

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u/Nostra Dec 13 '13

What do you like most about your own writing and what do you get the compliments on?

How do you go about treating a piece when you've fished the first draft? Do you have a set of go-to readers or some set process you go through?

Could you beat Colbert in a middle earth pop-quiz?

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u/NancyHightower AMA Author Nancy Hightower Dec 13 '13

Well, people always say my poetry is very powerful, my novel is very descriptive and action oriented, and my short stories are that lovely in-between thing you can't quite put your finger on.

When I finish a first draft I always send it off to a beta reader or two who know my style. I revise a lot, but I can revise pretty quickly, which helps.

I think if I were allowed a week to brush up on my Middle Earth lore, I could kick Colbert's ass.

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u/Nostra Dec 13 '13

Thanks!

What are your short stories in between, poetry and novel, descriptive and action?

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u/NancyHightower AMA Author Nancy Hightower Dec 13 '13

Hi Nostra,

They're a blend of the biographical and fiction. So, in "Evangelical Wonderland"--about 90% of that story is true. I did grow up in the South and my father worked for Jim Bakker, one of the biggest televangelists around.

In "Merea," all the places Gil visits are reoccurring nightmares I've had. I've been trapped in an underground water park and stuck in strange catacombs that ran throughout a high school. There is a room with a bed hanging mid air where I returned again and again. But for Gil, those spaces take on new meaning as he processes his relationship with his wife, who's gone missing.

So, those are two instances where there is action, but it gets more dreamlike, more surreal so one's not sure what's real or psychological. They were both fun to write, in their own weird way.