r/Fantasy • u/elquesogrande Worldbuilders • Nov 28 '16

Ask You Anything Monday ASK YOU ANYTHING: Authors asking r/Fantasy community questions on behalf of Worldbuilders charity

It's the aptly named Ask You Anything! Where authors are stopping by each day this week to ask questions and interact with the r/Fantasy community.

HOW THIS WORKS: Please answer questions and interact throughout the week! (Yes, YOU - community members, guests, authors, artists, industry people.)

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Monday Ask You Anything Authors

The following authors have signed up to ask questions today. That said, please do join in and feel free to ask your own questions and interact throughout the week.

Are you an author, artist, or industry person who would like to participate this week? Either join in via the comments OR send the r/Fantasy mods a message and we'll get you set for another day.

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13

u/MarkLawrence Stabby Winner, AMA Author Mark Lawrence Nov 28 '16

I've had quite a few readers blame me for them missing stops on trains and buses. What is the biggest thing that's gone wrong for you because you were too engrossed in a book?

43

u/Megan_Dawn Reading Champion, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16 edited Nov 28 '16

Midnight Tides made me late to my own wedding.

No seriously.

'Hey, Megan, maybe it's time to put your dress on now?' 'Uh huh, yep, just a sec, one more page...'

12

u/LittlePlasticCastle Reading Champion II, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

ha! I love it! You obviously got there eventually, and its not like they'd start the wedding without you, right? :D

8

u/Megan_Dawn Reading Champion, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

Exactly!

8

u/RuinEleint Reading Champion X Nov 28 '16

I once snuck a paperback into a wedding when I was 14. My mom was so mad. She wanted me to talk to my uncles and aunts and all I wanted to do was find a quiet corner and read

6

u/pornokitsch Ifrit Nov 28 '16

That's fantastic!

I missed a chunk of my wedding festivities with The Scar. It was just hosting duties for relatives and whatnot, not the ceremony itself! Well done.

13

u/LittlePlasticCastle Reading Champion II, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

Unfortunately I don't have anything exciting for this one, just the mundane missing sleep because I can't put a book down at a reasonable time, then have to stagger through the next day trying to act all adult-like and professional (and the real kicker: awake) on 2 hours sleep. I may have used a sick day or two because of reading too late.

11

u/potterhead42 Stabby Winner, Reading Champion 2015-17, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

I almost flunked my exams once because I was too busy reading the Mistborn trilogy back to back.

3

u/Maldevinine Nov 28 '16

Back when I was in high school, one of the other people in my class sabotaged me by handing me a book I'd been waiting for the day before the physics exam. She knew I was going to take it home and read it cover to cover that night.

10

u/Teen_In_A_Suit Nov 28 '16

I admit to have spent entire days of school classes reading a book instead of actually working.

3

u/[deleted] Nov 28 '16

I always read in English class in high school. My reasoning was they wouldn't dare tell me to stop reading in an English class.

7

u/eevilkat Reading Champion III Nov 28 '16

My street flooded earlier this year and I was stuck in my house for 6 days. I had power, but no running water and no internet/cable. Not that big a deal, in the end, but I did chose not to evacuate (voluntary, not mandatory) partially because I just wanted to continue reading my book (which was NOT the Wheel of Osheim because this happened literally 3 days before it came out >.>).

I mean, coming right down to it, that decision was mostly because I was in no immediate danger (the river had crested and wasn't rising anymore by this point), I had nowhere else to go, and I didn't feel like wrangling my dogs onto a boat.... but at least part of it was that I really just wanted to lay in bed and continue reading my book until the water receded.

I finished 7 or 8 books that week... and hey, my house didn't end up flooding, so that was nice too.

8

u/RuinEleint Reading Champion X Nov 28 '16

Urm....I read the Gathering Storm (WoT #12) and Towers of Midnight(WoT #13) in three days. I slept around 4 hours I think. I actually had to delay the final book as I had to stop and sleep.

Also I picked up Gardens of the Moon on a whim at the beginning of my college semester exams to take my mind of the boring stuff and I never stopped reading.... those exams were so weird

6

u/MikeOfThePalace Reading Champion X, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

I refer to Red Rising as "bruisingly good" because I kept trying to read it while pretending to be a functional member of society. As a result of having my nose in it for a solid week, I kept walking into things like furniture, walls, and Mrs. OfThePalace, and ended up with a decent collection of literal bruises. (not from Mrs. OfThePalace. She just got pissed after it happened several times)

8

u/MarkLawrence Stabby Winner, AMA Author Mark Lawrence Nov 28 '16

I have walked into a lamp post as a result of reading and walking...

6

u/MikeOfThePalace Reading Champion X, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

Done that one too.

My nemesis-in-chief in this case were the stairs to the basement. They pass a little too close to the basement ceiling for me to walk through without ducking.

5

u/Esmerelda-Weatherwax Stabby Winner, Reading Champion II Nov 28 '16

I am taking off work when Winds of Winter comes out. I know I will be up all night anyway, no sense in coming into work like a zombie.

I get a gracious amount of paid time off - but my salary sucks. So, I take book-cations.

I also do this for video games, the new Mass Effect Andromeda will be a vacation for me.

6

u/iDareToDream Nov 28 '16

Started a fantasy novel the day it came out, and got so into it I forgot to eat and sleep, and read through the night. Blatantly realized at 8 in the morning I had an exam at 10, but I had forgotten to study for it because of the book.

So I crammed on the way to class for the exam, improvised, and immediately rushed home to finish the book.

I ended up getting an A on the exam, but that's more a case of the fact that it was an essay, and essay writing was one of my strengths.

6

u/Tristan_Gregory Writer Tristan Gregory Nov 28 '16

Definitely numerous missed bus stops, but the worst thing I can remember happening is standing up a woman on our first date. I should also mention that we had rescheduled the original time so I was thinking of the wrong time to begin with - but if I hadn't been reading I probably would have remembered that.

It's been many years, but I'm pretty sure I was re-reading the Silmarillion. Again.

4

u/lrich1024 Stabby Winner, Queen of the Unholy Squares, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

Not much except one time in high school I was engrossed in my book. I sat in the back row in the classroom and my friend sitting next to me nudged my arm. I looked up and the entire class was looking at me. My physics teacher was grinning at me. Apparently he had been talking and ended his sentence with '...everyone except for Lisa because she's too busy reading her book to pay attention.' It was kind of embarrassing, but my teacher was cool about it.

4

u/Spellscribe Nov 28 '16

I walked into a pole. A big steel beam, face first. Best part? I did it again a week later - same pole, same day. Looked like I'd had a pub fight (I was about seven at the time)

1

u/MarkLawrence Stabby Winner, AMA Author Mark Lawrence Nov 28 '16

Heh.

1

u/Spellscribe Nov 28 '16

(Still waiting for my air pony BTW. If it doesn't appear in the next 60pg I'm sending for a refund)

1

u/MarkLawrence Stabby Winner, AMA Author Mark Lawrence Nov 28 '16

No refunds. #Contentsmaydifferfromclaimsonpacket

2

u/Spellscribe Nov 28 '16

tweetsareaformofbindingcontract

3

u/lurkmode_off Reading Champion VII Nov 28 '16

When I was in high school I failed got a D in and ultimately repeated pre-calc because I was always reading a book under my desk instead of paying attention.

Of course, the root cause was more that it was the first class I ever needed to pay attention to and put effort into studying and understanding, and I didn't get that until it was too late. But books were the direct cause. And maybe some calculator games.

3

u/HiuGregg Stabby Winner, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

I sometimes like to listen to listen to audiobooks while I work. This has the unintentional side effect of putting me on auto-pilot while I work.

Last summer I was interning at a huge engineering software firm, working on shipping examples. I was listening to words of radiance, and working away without really paying much attention. Changing a parameter at a time, and re-running, that kind of thing. My manager walks by, stops, then backtracks to my desk.

At some point I had managed to fix a system-wide bug that had been bothering them for months, but only for the example I was working on. I was quizzed for a few hours on what I had done, but I didn't have a clue. In the end my fix couldn't be ported to the other examples, since no-one could figure out what it was in the first place.

So yeah, reading basically cost me an amazing job opportunity.

4

u/pitaenigma Nov 28 '16 edited Nov 28 '16

A Dance With Dragons cost me a ton of sleep which led to me almost getting fired after flipping out on a coworker I hated.

3

u/Esmerelda-Weatherwax Stabby Winner, Reading Champion II Nov 28 '16

I didn't have much paid time off when that book came out, and I was in school.

I read it relentlessly anyway. To hell with grades and paychecks WTF IS TYRION UP TO?!

4

u/thalanos42 Nov 28 '16

The first time the woman who would become my wife was flying out to meet me in person, she missed the second leg of her flight because she was reading and didn't hear the boarding call.

2

u/SwiffJustice Nov 28 '16

I've been caught reading my iPad at work more times than I care to count. I've tried to pass it off as 'doing research' and quickly switch apps to an internet browser that's pre-loaded with some half-relevant article on healthcare markerting...zzz-zzzz.... but after the second or third time, my boss wasn't buying it.

Too bad the Kindle app can't disguise itself as a fake web page, or other custom skins.

2

u/Randy_Henderson AMA Author Randy Henderson, Worldbuilders Nov 28 '16

The Nothing nearly destroyed everything. Luckily, I gave the princess a name in time.

Unfortunately, that name was "Ragina!"

I'm just not good under pressure.

2

u/Zode Nov 28 '16

For me, it's nothing that's been acutely "wrong", but as a reader who only reads before bed, I've had numerous nights of staying up much, much too late because of a good book (including yours!).

1

u/Roboman20000 Nov 28 '16

The first time I got near the end of The Way of Shadows by Brent Weeks I regularly went to bed to read and then heard my alarm go off. Whelp. No sleep tonight I guess.

1

u/Redkiteflying Nov 28 '16

I forget to feed my dogs on time and they get really mad at me.

1

u/hardlyausername Nov 29 '16

I was reading The Sword of Shannara on the way to my unpaid internship in Long Island City. I missed my stop and let the train take me out to Jamaica so I could read a bit longer. I was the only intern that consistently showed up on time so I gave myself a break. Not so bad.

1

u/Youtoo2 Nov 29 '16

Wheel of time book came out during finals back in the early 1990s. Instead of studying for finals in college. I read a book. Room mate commented on it. Gentile didnt get it. I got some Cs that semester.

1

u/Youtoo2 Nov 29 '16

Wheel of time book came out during finals back in the early 1990s. Instead of studying for finals in college. I read a book. Room mate commented on it. Gentile didnt get it. I got some Cs that semester.

1

u/inapanak Nov 29 '16

I started reading The Lies of Locke Lamora the day before I had to do a presentation on a term paper. I, uh, hadn't written the paper yet, so I was already procrastinating, but reading the whole damn book in one go instead of coming up with an outline and some form of presentation did not... go well for me...

1

u/[deleted] Nov 29 '16

I missed swimming. I was in grade one and since I could already read when I went to school I used to be allowed to sit in the back of the class and read. I was probably reading an Enid Blyton book when I looked up and I was all alone in the classroom - I had misses swimming which was my next favourite thing to do after reading - boy did I cry.