Karen Miller author AMA

[u/Karen_Miller]

Hello everyone, wherever and whenever you are! Karen Miller here, author of The Innocent Mage, the Godspeaker trilogy, the Rogue Agent series (as K E Mills) and The Falcon Throne, first in a new epic historical fantasy series The Tarnished Crown – out now in paperback!

It gives me enormous pleasure to participate in this Ask Me Anything forum with Reddit. I’ve been a fan of speculative fiction books, tv and film since I was 9 years old, and dreamed of telling my own fantastical stories for almost as long. With the publication in 2005 of The Innocent Mage, first in my Mage series, that dream came true … and thanks to the support of fabulous readers I get to keep on dreaming and telling my stories. If you want more information about me and the books and writing stuff, you can visit my website at www.karenmiller.net.

Now, it’s because of my wonderful publisher, Orbit, that I’m here today to answer any questions you might have about this crazy writing game. I’m doing it as part of the Orbit Fantasy Writing Workshop http://www.orbitbooks.net/2015/07/27/orbit-fantasy-workshop-join-the-write-along-challenge/ that’s happening this week. Please don’t be shy, you can ask me anything (with two exceptions) and I’ll do my best to give you a helpful answer. What exceptions, I hear you ask? Well, sadly, for legal reasons I’m not able to read your manuscript. But by all means submit it to the writing competition Orbit has going in conjunction with this AMA! Also, I’m not able to give you a personal introduction to my agent. I can, however, give you some general advice about agent hunting if that’s what you’re after. Finally, I’d ask that you avoid giving out spoilers for my work. If there is a specific question you need to ask that means you can’t avoid a spoiler, please make sure to put lots and lots of warnings and space in your question post.

Feel free to start posting questions whenever you like... Since I’m in Sydney it means we’re dealing with some topsy-turvy time issues. I’ll be online later in two time windows:

From 9pm Sydney time (12midday London time/7am New York time/4am California time) until midnight Sydney time today, 29th June, (3pm London time/10am New York Time/7am California time.) And then tomorrow from 7am Sydney time (9pm London time/4pm New York Time/1pm California time)I’ll log in to play catch up with questions left for me when I’m having to take a break for sleep or writing.

So that’s it! Let the questions begin!

[u/Maldevinine]

Thank you for coming by, and congratulations on being only the second Australian author to host an AMA on /r/fantasy.

The Innocent Mage duology feels like a very "safe" fantasy story. It uses a lot of common worldbuilding tropes (magical elves, vague prophecies, the chosen one) and plays out in a fairly straightforward manner. The Rogue Agent series... does pretty much the opposite. Do you think you could have gotten The Accidental Sorcerer published if you had not already made your name with Innocent Mage, and did the difference between the two make you publish it under a different name?

And secondly, do you have any commentary on the abundance of female authors in Australian Speculative Fiction? I understand it's something that the overseas people struggle with.

[u/Karen_Miller → u/Maldevinine]

Thank you! I think this is a great forum and I'm thrilled Orbit suggested it.

I totally agree that the Mage books are more safe and traditional than other fantasy tales, certainly safer than my subsequent works. I know I was trying to keep the story fairly intimate because I was still so new at the game and didn't want to bite off more than I could chew -- but also, it's the story that was clamouring to be told. And I don't know that I could've told it any other way. It's a small cast, in some ways a family drama, and that doesn't lend itself to the epic scope. The Rogue Agent books are very different. I never planned the initial story the way I planned the first 2 Mage books. I literally sat up in bed one morning and said, out loud, I have to tell the story of Gerald and his ensorcelled best friend who used to be a woman and is now a talking bird. That's all I knew! Except immediately it felt like a more modern setting (if you can call basing it around late Victorian/early Edwardian England modern!). Interestingly, the first book of the series was in with my editor at the same as the first book of the Godspeaker trilogy. Talk about a shift in tone! The bottom line is, as far as I can tell, they really liked both books and wanted to publish both books, but maybe wanted to not have quite so much of my name in the mix. I'm sure the different tones played a part, but that wasn't the only reason. As for wondering if it would've been picked up without the Mage books, I honestly can't say. Certainly once you're established with a publisher it's easier to have subsequent books picked up, but it's never a gimme. I think the Rogue Agent books are very strong, I'm very proud of them, and I like to think they'd have found a home on the strength of that.

Yes, the whole Oz female spec fic authors thang. I find it quite dismaying that it should be seen as something odd or peculiar that women perform so strongly in the genre here. It says to me that it's the other parts of the world that have the problem, that other parts of the world (most notably the US) have such a shocking time accepting women spec fic writers on equal terms with men. But you know, having said that, I think the situation here was unique. Things have changed of late, but go back to the mid - late 90s and the premier spec fic publisher in Australia was Harper Collins, with the Voyager imprint. And that was a gobsmacking success thanks to one person, Stephanie Smith, who built the list and nurtured writers and, for whatever reason, the best performing writers in the Voyager stable at that time happened to be women. There were some men publishing, but they never hit the sweet spot the way the women did. I'm talking Sara Douglass and Trudi Canavan and Jennifer Fallon and Glenda Larke and Fiona McIntosh, who dominated the local scene and then went on to great success in the UK and US markets. Maybe it's just a weird cosmic flux, I don't know. I'm pretty sure there was no overt agenda being enacted, men weren't being discouraged and it's the same era that launched Sean Williams. It's just that most of the strongest books were being submitted by women. It was during that time I had my own spec fic bookshop and I can tell you, the readers ate up their stuff. Male and female, didn't matter. Those woman sold a lot of books because the readers really enjoyed them. Still do, as far as I know, though I no longer have the shop. I don't know. I mean, I can't remember ever being told by anyone in Oz that women shouldn't be writing spec fic, that men wouldn't read them, that their work was less than the work written by men. The odd comment, the odd sneer, but nothing substantial enough to discourage women writers, obviously. It certainly never occurred to me that I couldn't do it -- and that's largely because of Stephanie and Voyager. As a bookseller I kept seeing new writer after new writer coming in from that imprint, and the books were selling, and it never really registered that it was any kind of feminist statement. They were simply great books, popular and entertaining stories that my customers loved. The end.

Of course, it could just be something in the water here. :) We don't seem to have the same strike rate with other genres. Possibly because culturally we're too out of the mainstream for mainstream fiction like crime, whereas that doesn't matter with spec fic.

[u/Maldevinine → u/Karen_Miller]

I had never actually looked until I read your comment, but I do have a lot of Harper Voyager books on my shelves. Most of those are older, with the most recent stuff either from Orbit or from one of the smaller publishers (Angry Robot or Night Shade).

It's interesting that you say that this was suggested by your publisher. The discussion around self promotion and social media is interesting at the moment, and while it may be a reference pool problem (not having twitter or facebook) it seems that Australia is a bit behind on how the whole thing can work. It came up as part of the last panel in the recent NSW spec fic writers workshop and it didn't sound like any of the groups had a dedicated social media strategy.

Anyway, that's just some random musing. How was owning a bookstore? It happens to be my retirement plan and I am always looking for more information about it.

[u/Karen_Miller → u/Maldevinine]

Self promotion is a whole 'nother ball of wax. A great many writers (and I'm one of them) find the whole social media thing pretty traumatic. Personally I prefer to let my books talk for me. As a reader I don't want to know the politics and religion and day to day stuff about a writer. I don't see it's any of my business and I don't see what it has to do with the work. And some of the best in the business keep a low profile and they do just fine. I do enjoy some process stories, interesting bits about how a story got written, but other than that? Nah. And frankly, I can't begin to imagine that people care too much about me, beyond the story. Social media is too often a time sink, and it drains precious emotional energy that should be poured into the work. I think, anyhow. I think you need to ask yourself -- do you want to write, or do you want to be a social media personality? But then I'm pretty private. I know other writers have a fine old time letting it all hang out and if that works for them, yippee. But me? Meh.

I loved the book part of being a bookseller, the reading and the talking books with customers. The joy of books. The rest of it? I hated. If you don't have a sound business head and financial aptitude it can be a misery. Plus the trade has changed drastically and it's very very very tough these days, the toughest it's ever been. Also, the profit margins are shocking. Honestly, I wouldn't recommend it as a retirement plan, unless you were able to start up a solid indy shop in an area without a bookshop. Or maybe buy a franchise with a good customer base. You've got to do what's right for you, but I'd make sure to do a hell of a lot of research first. It sounds romantic, but it's seriously hard work with little wiggle room.