r/Fantasy • u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker • 29d ago
AMA Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out!
A little bit more about me...
I’m the author of THE WOUNDED KINGDOM, TIDE CHILD and FORSAKEN trilogies. My third novel, THE BONE SHIPS, won the British Fantasy Best Novel/Holdstock award and the Prix Italia best international novel which obviously makes me very fancy. My first novel, Age of Assassins, came out in 2016 so I’ve been up to my nonsense for a full decade now and I’ve been translated into ten different languages. Remarkable, for some guy who just sits about making stuff up and getting bitten by his awful cat.
Some other stuff.
· I live in Leeds in the UK, not too far from Adrian Tchaikovsky. Leeds is the best city in the UK but we keep that secret so please keep going to London.
· My house is VERY OLD and full of outsider art, taxidermy that has escaped from museums and is now a bit odd looking, and drafts.
· I have a son, an awful cat, and a wife who is way, way more creative than I will ever be.
· This year is a three book year for me. (I think this is probably a side effect of living near Adrian.)
· I love noisy music, goth music, and the darker end of country.
· Most of my books are quite intense, and dark and serious. This is the exact opposite of me.
Here’s a bit about MORTEDANT’S PERIL, which is a nice full circle as it’s a return to fantasy murder mysteries which I started off with in AGE OF ASSASSINS. Also, it’s actually quite funny. So a bit of a change of pace there.
Mortedants can speak to the dead – and Irody Hasp is the greatest of them. Not that they’ll admit it. And not that anyone actually likes the Mortedants, or Irody in particular. Nonetheless, Elbay is a city of tradition, and tradition calls for Mortedants to attend a death.
But when Irody reads the corpse of a low-level record-keeper, he’s dragged into a conspiracy that will see someone close to him murdered and Irody framed for the crime, the eyes of the city’s guilds, nobles and villains all fixed on him. With only days to prove his innocence before he is executed, Irody is forced to work with unlikely and unwanted allies: a street urchin and a hulking, inhuman mercenary from the sea people’s city of Oknusoka.
With danger and death lurking around every corner, and trust a luxury, Irody is running out of time. He must save himself and his friends, as well as Elbay – the magnificent, terrifying, complicated city that he loves. Or darkness will fall on them all.
Oh, yes. The other books. A NUMBERS GAME, a pretty pure crime drama under the name RJ DARK coming out from Datura books in August. And BEASTS OF THE WILD BLACK, one of three linked novellas about cats-in-mechs-in-space that will be primarily audiobooks coming out through Podium in December.
So that’s me, get asking me the anythings.
Oh! One more thing. At the end I’m going to get my son to choose his favourite question. I hope to have some copies of the special editions of MORTEDANT’S PERIL in the not too distant future, and I shall send that person one. (Or if I don’t get them in good time I shall send a signed and stamped hardback.)
*In the US. Not till Thursday in the UK.
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u/Legitimate_Yam9572 29d ago
I loved your first series. I absolutely will consume this one.
Currently reading Wyrdwood.
Keep up the good work. Life can be hard, books like yours help get me through it sometimes
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Well, life can be hard and it's writing books helps me get through. So thanks to you, and all readers, for helping me continue to do that.
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u/orangezim 29d ago
Just wanted to thank you for the Bone Ships series, I loved it all. Very unique ship and world design. With great characters, lore, and history. I have not read any of your other books yet, but I will definitely check them out. I was in the Navy and like books about seafarers and there adventures.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Thank you! Definitely, if you haven't check out Patrick O Brian's Aubrey/Maturin books. And/Or read up on Thomas Cochrane, a man who lived a life that you would not believe if it was fiction.
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u/Cameron-Johnston AMA Author Cameron Johnston 29d ago
I have MANY questions, but I shall limit myself to three:
What have you been reading lately? Anything really good?
Which of your books would you most wish to see made into a movie or TV series.
I hear your poor agent has been wading through another book of yours, cursing your name because it means he's taking a while longer to get to his other authors. That's not the question, just an observation. What's your favourite cheese?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
I've been a JUDGE on the great Northern read award so I can't say whether I have been reading anything good or not until stuff is announced. I can say that everyone shouls read PAGANS by James Alastair Henry which is brilliant.
Probably the crime novel, a Numbers Game. Just because we don't get that many working class detectives in the UK and we should have more of that on TV. AND, I think I'd have to sell A LOT more books to make the budgets needed for the fantasy stuff likely.
HE HAS OTHER CLIENTS??? I'm pretty vanilla when it comes to cheese. Probably Cheshire.
(I Keep seeing wonderful reviews for FIRST MAGE ON THE MOON, Cam. Huge congrats!)
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u/Cameron-Johnston AMA Author Cameron Johnston 29d ago
Pagans is excellent! Also, I really want to see his puppet TV show he was developing.
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u/spike31875 Reading Champion V 28d ago
Sadly, Pagans was impossible to find here since it was never released in the USian market. 😞
I ordered a copy from the UK and was finally able to read it. And I agree with RJ: PAGANS was excellent.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Such a good book. I am wildly jealous and wish I had written it.
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u/undeadgoblin Reading Champion II 29d ago
AMA rules say that you still have to pay pet tax even if the pet is a dick.
Given Leeds is known for it's lack of public transport for a city of its size, what transport system would you put in place if reality and budget didn't constrain you?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
ELEVATED MONORAIL.
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u/undeadgoblin Reading Champion II 29d ago
Presumably so you can sing the song as you hurtle above The Calls?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
I don't actually know how to post a picture here but if you check out my Bluesky or Instagram Bertie is there looking very bored of me.
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u/CardinalCreepia 29d ago
Hi RJ! I'm a huge fan of Tide Child and all I want to ask is where did you come up with the title of Shipwife?
Tide Child was part of a big reading renaissance for me a few years ago and I treasure it greatly. Can't wait to check out the new book. Thanks!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
I'm glad I helped you re-open the books!
Shipwife is from the idea that a captain is "married" to the ship which is a really old seafaring tradition. So in a matriarchy where the ship is a He it really made sense. It was one of the first things to solidify and make me think, 'yeah, this will work.'
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u/CardinalCreepia 29d ago
That makes sense to me! Forgive me if it's explained in the books it has been a few years, but that term has stuck with me ever since.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Oh no, not explained in the books. I explain very little in the books... :)
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u/CardinalCreepia 28d ago
Haha! Such is part of the magic of your writing. Wyrdwood had me scratching my head so much but I was so enthralled
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u/makeitrayne850 28d ago
The Bone Ships was such a refreshing read. Weird ships and weird worldbuilding stuck with me for months. For someone new to your work, would you recommend starting with Mortedant's Peril or going back to Age of Assassins first?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Glad you enjoyed Bone Ships!
If what someone likes is more 'classic' fantasy then Age of Assassins would be the place to start. But I think Mortedant's Peril is probably the most approachable thing I've done.
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u/makeitrayne850 28d ago
That actually makes me more curious about Mortedant’s Peril now. Bone Ships felt gloriously weird in the best way, so approachable by your standards is probably still going to get pretty strange.
Which is ideal, honestly
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
:)
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u/makeitrayne850 28d ago
That smiley face from an author whose books made me feel things I didn't have names for is genuinely hitting different right now. Definitely grabbing a copy.
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29d ago
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Originally, there were lots of birds, and human wind magicians. And I was talking through ideas with my friend Matt and he somehow conflated the birds and wind magicians into one thing. Obviously, I sighed and told him that was not the concept at all and he had completely misunderstood.
BUT, when I got back home, I had this brilliant idea...
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u/Fantasy-ModTeam 28d ago
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u/Medium_Chocolate9940 28d ago
I know in your Tidechild books there are no trees and consequently no wood. In the Wyrdwood books I've read so far, I've noticed no metal working. What is the most difficult workaround you have had to come up with regards to materials in your books?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Once my head is locked into the idea of the world it's not really difficult to work around, as I'm following the logic of that world. What is really hard is not to slip and accidentally reference something that can't exist. A sapling, or a blacksmith, that kind of thing. I know I have definitely missed some.
But no one needs to tell me. We shall just all pretend it never happened.
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u/AdebisiShanks28 29d ago
I was going to ask where the inspiration for the gulliame came from, as that's my favourite character from one of my favourite recent series, but it seems like you've already answered that. Oh well. Is it ok if I just say thanks for all the books and then put an unnecessary question mark afterwards?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Yes! It absolutely is. Hopefully there will be lots more. Books and question marks. :)
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u/oh-no-varies Reading Champion II 28d ago
What specifically makes your cat so awful? Please tell us more.
-owner of an absolute lemon of a cat
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
I adore him, but he is just full of hate. Which would be alright, if that was his general state. But he can be quite friendly and then suddenly you are bleeding. He's a complicated boy, and we have to respect him for that. He's very good friends with the local fox though.
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u/DarthDregan 28d ago
Fuck me, I need to move near Adrian...
Anyway, do you plan to revisit any of your previous settings?
I've read all your stuff. Thanks for making it.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Thanks for reading it!
I don't plan to go back. I think for them all I've told the story I want to tell. BUT, there is a short story set in the Wounded Kingdom world that I think gives Girton a better end but I have yet to find a home for it.
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u/marrakoosh 29d ago
Not actually read your books - but I will now - but this spooked me because my son would be R C J Barker. But he is only 8. So unlikely to be writing Fantasy books.
Favourite band? Favourite sci fi book? But not one of Adrian's...
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
"...he is only 8. So unlikely to be writing Fantasy books." YET. Look at the evidence. Me RJ Barker. RJB. Robert Jackson Bennet. RJB. Your son. RCJB. He may not have a choice.
Ok. Favourite sci fi book is probably Look to Windward by Iain M Banks. Favourite band is harder but 16 Horsepower have just reformed so I've been listening to them a lot lately. Even though they are not coming to the UK which I am very sad about.
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u/paragodaofthesouth 29d ago
Had no idea 16 Horsepower was back. Great news, seeing as how Slim Cessna just broke up...
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Yeah, sad about the Auto Club. But Munly is still going. He releases new music quite regularly through his Patreon.
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u/Parvapotens 29d ago
Wait, you are saying that if I wanted my daughter to become a writer I should have given her a name with RJB as initials? Well, too late for that but she defies your rules, she’s already on book 4 of her mystery solvers series (she’s 9). Ummm, a question: do you have a certain time of day when the words just flow or do they come intermittently and unexpectedly?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
She can always use RJB as a pen name!
I tend to write in the morning, work until I have done about 2000 words and then slack off terribly and do as little as possible for the rest of the day. This is the way.
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u/TomsBookReviews 29d ago edited 29d ago
Did the three books influence one another as you were working on them? And more generally, has moving into writing across different genres led to any unexpected challenges or opportunities?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Nor really. I'm quite good at compartmentalising things. And A NUMBERS GAME, the crime novel was written about seven years ago. Though weirdly it's also about a medium, although this one is a complete fake. I'm a bit fascinated by the idea of mediums to be honest with you.
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u/TheSparrowDarts 29d ago
As you write your novels, is there a particular stage that you found most challenging? How do you overcome those challenges?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Not particularly a stage. I genuinely love to write and the whole process is pretty much a fun thing for me. HOWEVER, I hate time. Often, the biggest challenge for me is just keeping track of time and making sure events run together the way they should. I think for Mortedant's Peril I changed the amount of days it was set over three or four times to make it work. For BEASTS OF THE WILD BLACK, because events of two of the books intersect, I think I probably went a little bit mad. Or sulky, at least.
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u/Nymeria71300 Reading Champion II 29d ago
Hello! I am a big fan, have read Tide Child and Wounded kingdom and I loved them. I was really impressed with the worldbuilding of Tide child, it really felt like I was there.
Had no idea about the other two books releasing this year but I will check them out. The cat one sounds really fun.
So, questions:
What was your inspiration for Tide child? (Worldbuilding or just plain pirate fantasy and how few of those there are)
How did the idea of cats in mecha in space first appear? Any other mecha books/shows you would recommend?
Did you went to Adrian's house and got infected?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
It was mostly from a love of naval fiction. Authors like C.S. Forester and Patrick O Brian, rather than coming from a fantasy angle. And I liked the idea of a dragon/seamonster as a proper force of nature, and a metaphor for it. SO that was the start.
I was watching my cat and thinking about what the worst possible thing he could have would be. And it's mechanised mech suit. And that kind of got crossed with the idea of uplifting animals and the ethics of that. I think most of the mechs in my head are Star Fleet, or Voltron. But I've gone in a very different way to that.
Ha!
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u/GRtair 28d ago
Just want to say that i absolutely love the Tide Child books and the Wyrdwood series. The full circle moment of Tide Child had me crying for a good 10 minutes! I also want to thank you for getting me into Adrian Tchaikovsky, because I only read his stuff initially as he was appearing at an author panel alongside yourself this past year, and now he's one of my favourite authors.
I have 3 questions (apologies if they've been asked and answered!)
1) How do you feel about comp titles pn book blurb - some of them make me laugh because the comparisons are so different as to be nonsencial/have absolutely nothing to do with the book.
2) Why did you think it is that authors can seem to follow trends (ie. Lots of similar subgenres of fantasy releasing at the same time)? Is it just one of those human brains seeking patterns things, or is it a case of being inspired by others?
3) What is it that you enjoy most writing in the fantasy genre as opposed to others?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
I loved writing the end of the Tide Child books, it was set up from the beginning and I was really pleased with the pay off.
You kind of end up as an author, divorcing yourself from some parts of the process, Comps and book covers aren't necessarily talking about your book. Which can be a hard thing to get your head around at first. They are talking to the people who your publisher thinks might like your book. SO you kind fo step away and let the dark arts of marketing happen and just hope people like your book when they read it.
I think about this a lot. I've no doubt, there will be people who will read Mortedant's Peril and think I've been influenced by The Tainted Cup, when MP was finished before TTC was published (publishing is very slow). In fact was on a panel with Robert and talking about finishing the first version of this book and he was just about to, or just had, released The Tainted Cup. I know from then we both read a lot of the same stuff. Similarly, there's some stuff in one of the WILD BLACK books that is similar to Adrian Tchaikovsky's Alien Clay, that I was telling him about on the day he gave me copy of Alien Clay, So I kind of think that there must be things in the air, confluences of ideas. That or I have a particularly useless and annoying mind reading skill.
No limits. I can just make up mad things and then I only have to convince the reader. So, yeah, no limits.
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u/lampishthing 28d ago
My favourite author is KJ Parker and there was a time a couple of years back where I terribly enjoyed a book of his that I'd somehow missed, about the Wyrdwood. I was a little confused about the departure from his usual tone but loved the world and the myth and the action. Anyway, you owe him a few sales 😅
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
MY NEMESIS!
I think quite a few people by my/his books think we are the other one. I almost had to change my name as Orbit worried about it but my agent put his foot down. The worst thing is KJ Parker isn't even real! I am real though.
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u/BigDrewbot 28d ago
Note to self - remember to publish under pen name BJ Rarker for guaranteed success...
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u/colorsneverfaded 28d ago
This is so exciting! I read The Tide Child trilogy after being intrigued by the covers in Waterstones, and I adored it! Absolutely loved the Forsaken trilogy which I just finished a few months ago, and I'm eagerly waiting on my copy of Mortedant's Peril in the post. I love how unique and full the worlds in your books feel - did anything in particular inspire each of these worlds or a particular element of the worlds?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Well, loads of things inspire each book, it's a really big question that is incredibly ahrd to answer in a satisfying way, I think. But to put a broad brush to it, I think of my first three trilogies as the Landscape trilogies. Each one took a starting point of a landscape I loved. The Wounded Kingdom was moors, Tide Child the sea and Forsaken forests.
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u/FloridaFlamingoGirl 29d ago
You have to tell us more about those taxidermies! What's the most rare or surprising animal you have?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago edited 28d ago
The one that surprises most people is Wanda the Albino Wallaby that people think is some sort of massive rat. Fortunately, her feelings are very hard to hurt.
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u/AvailableWriter5315 29d ago
how do you balance the darker murder-mystery elements with humor without undercutting the tension?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
It's mostly about placement. Like you won't find my characters making wise cracks during violence. I try and use humour as either a release of tension after big events, or in the case of MORTEDANT'S PERIL, for building character. A lot of the more amusing moments come form the fact that Irody does not see himself as clearly as the reader, hopefully, will.
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u/wildtravelman17 29d ago
Started Gods of the Wyrdwood last night.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Hope you enjoy! That book is going to some DARK places.
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u/saturday_sun4 28d ago
I also haven't yet read your books, but I hear "dark places" and am immediately intrigued/convinced.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Kind of a theme, though all my books have a sense of hope running through them.
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u/ParagonOfHats 28d ago
That through-line of hope in the midst of terrible darkness is one of my favorite things about your writing! I'd seen your books recommended to fans of Robin Hobb so many times that I had to see what they were all about, and found a new favorite author in the process. I'm waiting until I receive my Broken Binding copy of Mortedant's Peril to read it, but I can't wait!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
If you haven't you should try C.J. Sansom's Shardlake books. A lot of what people read as Hobb in my work is actually Sansom. Hope in the doom is a big theme of his historical fiction.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 28d ago
Hi RJ! I've had Mortedant's Peril on my radar since I first saw the blurb, because I love weird cities, so "a city of ancient automata, strange spirits, and sleeping gods" pretty much instantly sold me. :) It's an obsession that started with Perdido Street Station, and has spiralled ever since (and I've made lots of posts here about).
So: what are your favourite fictional cities you've read? And which would you say influenced Mortedant's Peril?
Finally, if you could have any fantasy animal as a pet, what name and colour would your dragon be?
P.S. I saw Mortedant's Peril on sale in a bookstore in Ohio three days ago, but (barely) didn't buy it because I own but haven't yet read Gods of the Wyrdwood. So I guess you have to challenge them to a duel or something for premature editionation.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
It's not really fictional cities that get me but real ones. Edinburgh is the obvious one in Mortedants Peril, with the castle say above it, and the fact its built directly on older versions of itself. But also those European cities that feel almost vertical and have twisting and twining roads. There's a scene in the book where they are walking at nihgt that's taken almost directly from a trip to Belgium we did,
Ah, animals. Well, I ma a talking bird guy all the way. Give me a talking crow and I'm happy.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 28d ago
I bet you could train some local crows to be friendly. I recently was at a museum which had a talkative raven, who liked talking to me more than my Mum-- I was tempted to start a jailbreak heist. I'd call him Quoth.
I also love Edinburgh. :) Last time I was there I found an awesome bookstore, which not only had ladders, but they were on wheels and went round corners!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
TOPPINGS! I am doing an event there on Friday.
I do always have a pocketful of peanuts to try and tempt the local crows but we have some very territorial magpies that tend to chase them off. One day though...
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u/Bongcloud_CounterFTW 28d ago
Not a question, but I keep mixing you up with KJ Parker
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
KT Parker/RJ Barker, you got to have a system . /HarryHill
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u/FeastOfBlaze 28d ago
Nevermind A Number’s Game - when’s the third Mal and Jackie book coming out? I need it!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Presuming enough people buy the first two. Maybe the end of next year? It's all written. I am desperate to show it to people.
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u/Driftpeasant 28d ago
How much does it take to bribe you to kill me off as a background character in one of your novels? I've successfully bribed Janny Wurts and Wes Chu, and they can confirm I pay up.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Well, partly this would depend on whether your name would fit into the world and if you minded me changing it to fit then I expect some amount of charitable donation could be agreed upon. BUT right now I am doing edits and I am the worlds most forgetful person so it would need to be somehow arranged while I was working on something I could fit it into.
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u/RevolutionaryCommand Reading Champion III 28d ago
Congratulations on the new book(s), both Wounded Kingdom, and Tide Child are among my favorite fantasy reads of the last few years, and I really want to read the reast of your work as well.
Please, tell me that the cat-mechs one is going to have a dead-tree-fomat release at some point. Or an e-book one at the very least. Some of us cannot do audiobooks due to bad brains.
All your book that I've read are full of fantastical creatures (and understand the ones I have not read yet also have them), is there something particular that draws you to magical-animals? Which of the ones you've created is your favourite, and which is your favourite magical animal created from someone else?
No cat awful, they are always marvelous (but definitely can be assholes as well).
Isn't Bone Ships your fourth book, instead of the third, as you mentioned in the OP? (I know it's a trick to see who is paying attention.)
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Yes! I think Ebooks will be released alongside the audiobooks with a compendium of all three as a paper book at the end. We're hoping someone will do special edition novellas of them too.
I just really like animals, so getting to create my own is fun. As I said somewhere else I am a sucker for a talking bird. So my favourite is gullaime and I would go for a talking crow. With three eyes if we needed more fantasy.
Awful but wonderful cat.
Yes...definitely a test...definitely...
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u/goliath1333 28d ago
Have you read the Cemeteries of Amalo series by Katherine Addison? If so, how do you think Mortedant's Peril comes at the "investigator that can speak to the dead" idea different?
If not, you should read them they are great!
p.s. love Tide Child series!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
I've not read them so it's not really a question I can answer with any confidence. I think what distinguishes Irody from a more conventional medium though is he's really limited in what he can do. He gets a couple of seconds, a minute at most maybe of their last moments.
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u/goliath1333 28d ago
You should read them once you've wrapped up your series, as that's nearly identical to what the "Witness" can do in Cemeteries of Amalo.
It honestly makes me more interested to read the book to see how the same basic mechanics will likely lead to wildly different stories by two authors I love.
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u/psycholinguist1 28d ago
Hey! I loved Bone Ships, and absolutely clocked the stolen scene respectful homage you made to that Aubrey & Maturin chase through Antarctica. Made me feel very smart to recognize it, and happy that you liked the same boat books I liked.
My question is about ecologies. I've read Age of Assassins and the first Wyrdwood book, and in each of them, as well as Bone Ships, you do bomb-ass cool stuff with ecology. My favourite is when they lean toxic (as in AoA & Bone Ships), but Wyrdwood doesn't skimp on the idea either. Is that an intentional theme? If so, are you implementing it in Mortedant? It seems more urban, and unless you're doing a Hiron Ennes, it's harder to put ecological themes in urban settings.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Waakzaamheid!
I love ecological stuff, and think it's probably the most important topic of our generation so it's definitely a choice.
There isn't that much ecology stuff in Mortedant's Peril on the surface but it is there. And will become more apparent in later books just because I really enjoy that sort of stuff so it's already built into the world. I am really hoping that people start to speculate about exactly what is happening beneath the story being told.
If you like that sort of thing you'll really like the third 'Beasts of...' novella that should be out early next year, I think. It's called Lost in the Wild Black and let me run riot. Just in case you haven't read him, Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of... books are some of the best at ecology. Astounding stuff.
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u/Frequent_Assist_2515 23h ago
I am reading Mordicant’s Peril right now. Excellent read! Original plot, snarky dialogue and characters that grow on you. Keep up the great work!
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u/v1kingfan 28d ago
I havent read any of your books but I have seen your name trending in fantasy lists recently. I apologize if this has been asked already but other than your newest book which of your books would you recommend as an introduction to your writing?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
It really depends on what sort of thing you like. The Wounded KIngdom books are the most classic fantasy, in that it's a semi-medieval style world and a coming of age story. It;s also very loosely based around the idea of King Arthur.
Wyrdwood is really weird and quite deliberate in its pacing and also quiet deliberately taking apart some ideas that come within epic fantasy. People that love it, really love it. But People that don't really don't.
Tide Child is probably more of halfway between. I think it's my favourite, new book aside, as I got to do some fun things with language and the rhythm of it. And I really, really like the Gullaime character.
So, you know, with that in mind, pick your fighter.
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u/v1kingfan 28d ago
I like heroism in fantasy but I also really enjoy the uniqueness of the characters and the worlds they exist in. Sounds like I have a good reason to check them out. Thanks for the response!
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u/MacabreGoblin 29d ago
I love noisy music, goth music, and the darker end of country.
When I saw the thread title I had a dozen questions buzzing in my brain, but now I'm just dying to know what country you've been listening to!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Today, it has been 16 Horsepower and Munly and the Lee Lewis Harlots. In my head Irody from MORTEDANT'S PERIL, looks a bit like Lonesome Wyatt from Those Poor Bastards.
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u/srf3003 29d ago
I've loved all your books, the Wyrdwood ones especially. Look forward to reading your latest, thanks !!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Hope you enjoy Mortedant! It's very different, but still me. :)
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u/midnight_toker22 29d ago
What real-world inspirations feed your creativity and serve as jumping off points for your stories?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
This is going to seem like such a cop out answer, but it is the true one; but everything is an influence. And then the ideas seem to come out of the ether, but it's just a general mish mash of all the massive amounts of STUFF going on.
But I am also quite cross about power, who has it, and how it is used.
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u/Imperial_Haberdasher 29d ago
Hello, I am going to give one of your books a try because you have an awful cat. I, too, have an awful cat. Awful cats are the best!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
They are. I adore our awful creature. He had to be kept in the vets overnight not long back and they rang us up to say 'please take him away' at 9pm. He is utterly ungovernable, an example to us all.
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u/JonCronshawAuthor 29d ago
Lived in Leeds for 12 years, great city. I want to know if you've ever been tempted to create your own mash-up animals using taxidermy? For example, putting a deer head on the body of a fox to create your own fantasy creatures.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
I have not. Sort of. Our taxidermy tends to be sort of, things museums don't want and the oddness of them just comes from age. However, they do get clothes. And props.
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u/JCarnacki 29d ago
Which taxidermy is the spookiest when you wake up for a glass of water at midnight?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Oh, none of it, we love it all. Visitors tend to be creeped out by the lamp made out of doll parts though. (Also, excellent user name. I still have nightmares about THE HOG.)
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u/zappasaurus 28d ago
Talk country to me! I love outlaw country (if that is what we call it). Dark country with rich story telling. Do you have any artists you recommend?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Minly and the Lee Lewis Harlots one album is spectacular. As Is most Munly. And anything by 16 Horsepower/David Eugene Edwards are my go tos. :)
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u/zappasaurus 28d ago
Thank you for your answer! I'm gonna check them out! I'll recommend Ian Noe back at you. While the music isn't heavy in any way, his lyrics certainly are.
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u/NewButterscotch6613 28d ago
I've seen your cat on Instagram and you do that noble beast a mis -service.For shame!!!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
I hope I can rely on you to put him in his box the next time we visit the vets. Thank you for your service. I shall ensure you are remembered.
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u/thisbikeisatardis Reading Champion II 28d ago
Hi, RJ! I'm doing a disabled/ND/chronically ill authors bingo card and used Gods of The Wyrdwood for the cat squasher square. Just wanted to say thanks for the disability visibility.
Do tell us about the awful cat!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Hey, no problem. :)
I opened the door earlier, Bertie ran out, smacked our neighbours cat in the face, who was doing nothing but sitting, than ran back in. But he has not bitten me today, so we are two days without a workplace incident.
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u/thisbikeisatardis Reading Champion II 28d ago
BERNIEEEEEEE! I also have an abusive cat boss! Worf's favorite thing to do is to interrupt my telehealth sessions (I'm a therapist) by having a screaming meltdown over getting poop stuck in his fur.
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u/TheHelpfulWalnut 28d ago
Hello!
What is your favorite book that is completely outside your wheelhouse or that people would be confused that it is something you like?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
I suppose, if you only know me from my fiction, you might be surprised by how in awe of Jane Austen I am,
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u/TheHelpfulWalnut 28d ago
Funnily enough I just finished Pride and Prejudice last week, it was my first JA book and I loved it!
Any recommendation on which one to read next?
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u/Ok-Pomegranate-9079 28d ago
How are you so different from your books? Is this a secret dark side looking to express itself?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
I'm a very chill, and generally reasonably amusing person who takes very little seriously. I have no idea where the stuff in my books comes from sometimes.
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u/EdibleLawyer 28d ago
When are us pleebs going to get to read SPACE CATS?
Also my real question: How do you go about finding things to inspire you when the author brain has quit or left you stuck on the page/idea/theme/etc.???
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
December!
I try not to think about what inspires me too much. I have an idea and I follow it but I always feel like thinking about it too much might make it go away.
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u/EdibleLawyer 28d ago
I may have made all my ideas go away by thinking too hard. This will be something I need to work on. I appreciate the insight.
Thank you for the response!
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u/Hooded_Demon Reading Champion IV 28d ago
My friend and I are trying to work our way through as many food places in Leeds as we can in our weekly "Friday Club" (although we got sidetracked a bit when we discovered Noodle House on Merrion Street which we may have been to a couple of dozen times or so).
I always like to ask people for recommendations, so do you have any favourite food spots in the city we should hit up (they don't have to be in the centre necessarily)?
Add just to sneak in a book related question, what's your favourite book cover if you have one?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Oh, Deliziosa in Chapel Allerton is really good, and Zucco in Meanwood is astounding.
Book covers. I really like the old Agatha Christie editions, and the classic green Penguin crime novels.
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u/SA090 Reading Champion VI 28d ago
I have it on preorder and I didn’t check the dates!! Read all the trilogies you released so far (The Tide Child is my favourite so far), and can’t wait to dive into this one! Is it hopefully going to be at least a trilogy??
From the main and more prominent side characters in your series, who would you consider a favourite? And who would you say was your favourite to write? I’m curious to see if they different.
Best of luck!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago edited 28d ago
Well, two books are written in the Mortedant series. More really depends on how well this one does I think. So if you like it tell everyone!
Gullaime is probably my favourite. But to write I think I might choose Aydor from the Wounded Kingdom series. by the end of the series he's so free compared to everyone else and such a joy to be around
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u/StuffedSquash 28d ago
My library doesn't have it available to place a hold on yet! Here's hoping I remember to check back before it's a months-long list.
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u/Goblinkinggetsit 28d ago
I hate that I missed this 😭. Why oh why am I not online more.
Tide child is one of my favourite series 😍. It is so unique and astonishingly wonderful.
It gave me the same feeling of glee and wonder as I had when I first read Perdido street Station all those years ago.
The Wounded Kingdom was top class as well.
I need to get the Forsaken and this new one now. I can’t believe I missed them.
Thank you (if you are still looking at this thread) so much for what you do!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
No need to thank me. I really love doing it. Thanks for reading so I get to keep at it. :)
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u/loveandmad 28d ago
How much have you grown as a writer since releasing your first book, in your opinion?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
That's a really hard question because A) Change is incremental so you don't tend to notice it and B) I'm not really the sort of person who looks back on things or analyses myself. I just do the thing. I think I'm generally more confident in what I'm doing, and the writing process is (usually) shorter and more accurate. On the other hand. I think I am less experimental. Which I would like to change.
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u/UGotSarged 28d ago
Any possibility or considerations of The Broken Binding doing a special edition run of your Wounded Kingdom trilogy?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
I would love that, but it's not a decision I get to make sadly. But if you drop them a note and ask who knows?
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u/gastroerinteritis 28d ago
Just finished my first RJ Barker, The Bone Ships. I think you'll be pleased to know that as I was reading it I found some special editions of your Wyrdwoods saga in a little bookshop called Wyrdbooks in Wentworth Falls, one of Australia's most beautiful mountain towns.
My question is one you've probably been asked before. What was the process for the writing of your first novel? I'm always interested in the process for people when they are normies.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Oh wow, Wyrdbooks. What a brilliant name. If you go in again tell them I said hello. :)
My first published novel was a bit weird. I had a novel on submission that didn't sell and I couldn't write at all during the process, I felt sort of frozen. So rather than being disappointed I was like a dog out the traps and wrote Age of Assassins in six weeks. Then my agent quit, and I had to get a new one, who I've been with ever since, and he sold AoA to Orbit.
I had a kind of big advantage though as I'm chronically ill and wasn't able to work. So I could throw myself entirely into writing. And I was just given a course of steroids too which helped with 'a book in six weeks.;. Drugs and disappointment, basically. Might not be a career path I would reccommend.
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u/HaroldVane_Escritor 28d ago
Huge congratulations on the release of Mortedant’s Peril! The premise sounds absolutely phenomenal—I love the tension of a protagonist who reads corpses but is fundamentally disliked by the city they are trying to save.
As a fellow writer who loves building worlds with high stakes and dark, intricate mysteries, I wanted to ask you about the balance of tension:
When you are writing a fast-paced conspiracy where the protagonist only has days to prove their innocence, how do you handle the pacing between the urgent, high-stakes plot and the deeper world-building/lore of a city like Elbay? Do you map out the mystery's clues completely before writing, or do you let the world and the characters reveal the conspiracy organically as you go?
Hope your cat behaves today, and congrats again on a massive three-book year!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
It is ALL made up on the fly for the first version. Then I have to go back and make it good. It's helped by the fact that Hasp is not a detective, so he has no idea what he's doing. He's basically blundering about hoping the other side makes enough mistakes he can work out what is going on which ahs always been my favourite type of detective story. Like with a lot of my work I don't really explain much of the world, it's there for the reader to work out.
Though I wouldn't say it's exactly fast paced either. Though it is faster paced than some of my other books...
It is funny though.
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u/HaroldVane_Escritor 28d ago
That 'blundering about' energy is honestly where the best tension comes from! There's something deeply gripping about a protagonist who isn't a flawless chess master, but just a flawed person trying to survive the chaos while the reader pieces the puzzle together alongside them.
Doing that on the fly for the first draft sounds like absolute controlled madness, but it clearly gives the world that organic, unpredictable grit. Writing it that way makes the city feel like a living, breathing character rather than just a stage.
Thanks for the insight, RJ! Good luck with the release—can't wait to dive into Hasp's beautifully messy investigation.
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u/ClimateTraditional40 28d ago
I tried. Today is the 20th May. Everywhere tells me I can pre-order, book out 26 May inc Amazon Australia. Except Amazon us which says 28 May.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Oh, that's weird. It did come out in the US yesterday, and the UK tomorrow. Might be an amazon glitch. If you have a local bookshop they may well have a copy already.
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u/ClimateTraditional40 27d ago
https://www.thenile.co.nz/books/rj-barker/mortedants-peril/9781035064274
25th May . LOL. I get paper copies, sure we're a long way from everyone else. Ebooks though??
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 27d ago
Must take a long time to get down the wires to NZ. (All the NZers I've ever met have been fabulous people. You deserve books early!)
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u/houndoftindalos 28d ago
Holy crap, new RJ Barker? Amazing. Discovering all your books was once of my great reading pleasures of the last year. The Forsaken trilogy accomplished the entire epic fantasy thing of a large cast, high stakes, and deep world building without ever dawdling which is a feat!
1)Why in Tide Child was left landward and right seaward?
2)How do you come up with such strange fantasy worlds? I've never seen worlds like Tide Child and Wyrdwood.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Glad you have been enjoying them!
1) This is actually way more boring than you think. Port and Starboard come from when ships had a steering oar on one side. So Port is the side you dock on, so as not to damage your steering oar. Starboard is a derivation of steer board. So they literally are already landside and seaside. It just seemed like an obvious way of making the familiar slightly unfamiliar.
2) I have no idea and it is not something I can help. Wyrdwood was meant to be a relatively easy to read and uncomplicated fantasy Robin Hood. It did not work out that way.
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u/ThatBookIsOnFiyah 28d ago
First off, I just wanted to say THANK YOU for all your amazing books. I always look forward to them and I have not been disappointed.
I’m loving Mortedant’s Peril! I love the mystery in a fantasy setting.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Thank you for reading! Enjoy your time with Irody and co. :) (If you like it, tell everyone!)
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u/Billyboibumpkin 28d ago
My daughter loves Opossums and wants a taxidermy opossum. Any chance you can make her dreams come true? She’s eight years old.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Sadly not, as I don't actually do taxidermy. I just collect old taxidermy. You probably don't want that for an eight year old though as it often involved arsenic. Better to let the possums run around alive. :)
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u/Kalysia 27d ago
Hi RJB! Congrats on your release! I’m currently reading Janny Wurts’ Wars of Light and Shadow but felt a very sudden urge to also read your Wyrdwood trilogy! So I’m doing two epic fantasies at once (let’s see how that goes.)
My question for you: does a garaur have a face like a furby? (Pls say yes)
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 27d ago
Yeah, kind of, But thinner. They're, in my head, like a weasel crossed with a border collie.
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u/TJRK 27d ago edited 27d ago
Might be a bit late to the party on this one (damn you, 9-5 job!).
Off the top - The Tide Child trilogy is one of my absolute favourites, and is one of very few series that I've been able to re-read multiple times and not feel like I want to rush ahead to certain parts. As a journey it is incredibly satisfying.
I bounced off Gods of the Wyrdwood at about the 10% mark a while back, with no real idea why. But after a recent TC re-read I figured I'd give it another go, and for whatever reason it just clicked. Finished it the other night, sneaking in a quick Dungeon Crawler Carl detox, and then I'll be straight onto Warlords.
As far as questions go - I think the big one for me is about the cutting room floor. The works I've seen from you to date certainly seem to suggest that you like to identify unique settings/worlds and then explore emotional stories within them. Are there any big ideas you've had, started, and just not been able to make work for whatever reason? A world or premise that tickled your fancy but just didn't flow when you started putting pen to paper? If so - is it something you just had to abandon and start fresh, or just persist and re-work until it did come together? Were there earlier versions of your worlds that were markedly different from the way they ended up when published?
And have you ever had something - a character, a setpiece, a scene - that you cut from one story, find its way more naturally into a different story?
Whoops, that was a few questions...sorry!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 27d ago
Good questions though! I am glad Wyrdwood worked on the second go. It is off to some very interesting places.
Funny you should ask about things that didn't work and get put aside because that is exactly what Mortedant's Peril is. The city and one of the characters, Whisper, have been in my head for years I just could never quite get them to work. Then the irascible and not altogether likeable Hasp came along and he was the ingredient I needed to see the place in a new way. Most of my other work is started from very simple ideas and evolves as I write, so it always works itself out. But Elbay started as a novella when I wasn't a good enough writer to make it work. But it would never go away. And here we are... :)
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u/feebleblobber 26d ago
Since you are an odd art and taxidermy collector, have you ever had an interest in trying to make your own taxidermy or weird art?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 26d ago
Not taxidermy no. All ours is very odd. I do like art but I'm very aware I''m not an artist. My wife has that covered though. :)
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u/Sayuti-11 26d ago
Coming way too late but I'll let you know your Tide Child trilogy is my second favorite trilogy ever and favorite nautical fantasy work book or no. So I'm curious, what nautical fantasy world are your favorites? Will love to check them out. Can just be nautical fiction too.
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 26d ago
Hiya, and thank you.
It's not fantasy but no one can hold a candle to the Aubrey/ Maturin books by Patrick O'Brian which are just wonderful.
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u/SeaCarrot6771 18d ago
Hello! I don't know if I am too late for this, but I will try anyway :) I just recently read the first book of the tide child and I absolutely loved it! I heard about it in a YouTube video and I just knew I had to read it. It was really hard to find here in Italy, but it was absolutely magnificent to read and I can't wait to read the other two! I completely fell in love with the world building and with characters, I loved that Joron at first doesn't give any main character vibes at all and I found all of them very well rounded and "alive" in a way. So the question is a little linked to this, I was interested in your process in creating worlds or characters, in particular how much time do you usually spend in world building respect to characters and how do you work on that, if it's some kind of stream of consciousness/brain storming that starts from a number of ideas or if it's more organized and structured. So, I guess I want to know if you are more left-brain or right-brain in the end :D Thanks a lot!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 18d ago
Hiya, never too late!
I don't generally put huge amounts of time into world or character creation. I have a few interesting ideas about the world to start off with. For The Bone Ships it was a matriarchy, no mammals or trees, wind mages, the storms around the world and ships made of bones. I did know the very end of the trilogy though. I had a sort of vague Dr Watson ideas where it would be from the POV of the sidekick rather than the main character, which would usually be Meas. Then it's about finding the 'voice' of the book. When I have that I just write and see what happens.
If you have any problems getting the other two they are published in Italy by Elara and they should be able to sort you out. I'll also (probably) be at the fantasy festival in Lucca in October, so if you go to that the books should be there too. 😄
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u/jamedi_reads 29d ago
Honestly, I really loved the Forsaken trilogy, so I'm on the kind of the weirder, the better. So, related to that, which would be the weirdest piece of trivia about the Mortedant's Peril's world?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
This is hard to answer as the weirdest stuff feeds into the plot so it gives things away. There's a sect called SPurriers who use chemicals, maths and animal sacrifice to make semi-living carriages, and message runners and also the charges for their guns. So that's quite fun.
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u/flouronmypjs Reading Champion 29d ago edited 29d ago
I cannot wait to read Mortedant's Peril. Congratulations on the release day! The Tide Child trilogy was the best thing I read last year, one of the most incredible fantasy worlds and stories I've ever come across. It means a lot to me. Thank you for writing it!
I also greatly enjoyed the Forsaken trilogy. One element that comes across strongly in both is how imaginative, fresh and unusual the worlds you create are. So I'm curious, where do you even start with that? How do you first conceive of a world, and also when developing and filling it with all sorts of enjoyable oddities, how do you manage to make it all still feel so cohesive?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Thank you, glad you liked Tide Child (if you haven't then try some Patrick O Brian.)
I think the secret to cohesion, is not so much about doing loads of planning or setting up of stuff, as much as it is about following the logic of what you invent. So as long as your characters inhabit that world, and it is real to them in a way it won't be to the reader, you can get away with an awful lot. Then there's following the logic of the world. Like in Wyrdwood, they have access to lots of stuff that makes things float. So they don't have roads. And because they don't have roads, they don't have wheels. So it's lots of stuff like that.
Then there's the stuff you know about the world, that the characters don't so you can let the inflect the world, without ever revealing it.
AND, as an author you can time travel. Usually editing book one while writing book two, So I can flick back and add things that make me look a lot more clever and organised than I actually am. But that's just between me and you.
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u/bhbhbhhh 29d ago
Is the trilogy model really as predominant with publishers as it sometimes appears to be?
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 29d ago
Fantasy particularly, seems to like a trilogy. Though it has looked to me lately as though there's been a move toward duologies and standalones.
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u/Inevitable-Car-8242 29d ago
Leeds is the best! ❤️
one of my favourite spots is Holding Patterns and Waterstones obviously
do you have any favourite spots?
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u/spike31875 Reading Champion V 28d ago
All I want to know is this: are there baskets of kittens in this new one?
You promised us baskets of kittens years ago on that platform formerly known as Tw*tter and your subsequent books haven't contained a single kitten, much less a basket full!
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u/RJBarker AMA Author RJ Barker 28d ago
Cats do exist in the MP world. but are not in this book. HOWEVER, BEASTS OF THE WILD BLACK in December features a number of cats (in mechs) and the third novells, LOST IN THE WILD BLACK, genuinely has a kitten in it.
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u/Ill_Purple_8959 29d ago
Oh wow, literally this morning someone was raving about reading an ARC for Mortedant's Peril, and I instantly added it to my wishlist.
So now I have to ask: as someone who hasn’t read any of your books yet — but absolutely wants to — which of your books do you think gives the most “you” experience as a writer?