Simple things that a lot of Fantasy Writers get wrong in their books....

K. Trian said:

Your astronomer friend might be right there. Mars has two satellites; I'm not sure could you get some confirmation on the subject from reading about the phases of Deimos and Phobos?

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He actually sent me a graphic that demonstrated what multiple moons would look like in different parts of the sky given the sun in one place. I wish I'd have kept it, as it was interesting.

I tried to write multiple moons into a story once so I could eventually swamp the characters with a high tide they weren't expecting (they weren't natives). But it got so complicated I gave up.

I use this site for finding the moon phases (and calender) for my historical fantasy:

Time and Date

A couple things that bug me:

How about having two moons and each being in a different phase? Yikes.

Having magical powers because your bloodstream is full of microscopic organisms?

Civilizations that rely on money when they have had replicator technology for decades.

knight_tour said:

I wish I could see what you thought of my fight scenes. I feel I do them well and realistically, but I haven't had any readers who are experts on warfare so far.

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I'd be glad to take a look at your fight scenes. Just send me a PM and we'll carry on from there if you want

Tezzirax said:

A couple things that bug me:

How about having two moons and each being in a different phase? Yikes.

Having magical powers because your bloodstream is full of microscopic organisms?

Civilizations that rely on money when they have had replicator technology for decades.

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Two moons could be in different phases if they are in different positions relative to the sun and the planet. For instance, if they are on opposite sides of the planet, one could be new and one could be full, etc. If they're offset by a smaller amount, they could also be in different place in the sky at the same time and in different phases.

Now there are other issues related to two moons and an Earth sized planet. Tides, for instance, would be whacky (and if the moons are ever lined up and in the same phase at the same time, the tides would be huge). When/if they're ever perfectly offset [edit, I mean at right angles to one another here] in phase, the tides would be nil. Also, there's the issue of their interfering with each others' orbits and one eventually hitting the other, though of course. There's even a hypothesis that the Earth had two moons early on (when everything was still hot and squishy) and that they sort of melded together. It's used to explain the disparate topography of the two moon faces, but I don't think it's got a lot of support.

The whacky tides were what I wanted. I had the characters wondering why there was all this land that went unused. Then they were going to find out....

The size of a moon is an issue. I believe Earth's moon is the largest in the solar system relative to its planet. (Excepting Charon on the downgraded Pluto). Smaller or more distant moons would have smaller effects.

I generally use hand wavium "I must get Al Abaster to explain the moon phases to me," said the slab like Gran Ite.

Ms_Sassypants said:

I thought when writing books you can't go into details about every single thing... especially the character's bowel movements! Imagine the hero pissing or take a shit every chapter. That would totally kill the fantasy!

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Elizabeth Lynn approached that... frex, when people got up in the morning, she'd mention that they went outside and pissed into a bush. That was kinda her general style, that minor daily events would be seen, I think as a form of immersion.

You cannot write to what other people think they 'know' is right

If you did your research and you know it's right, then it is. A lot of people may not know it, but have other conceptions and may well diss your book for it. But you have to take the rough with the smooth. Man, I got slated for showing 9th century vikings as pagans (and because their religion wasn't Christianity that made it paranormal....lol wut? Because...well actually I'm not sure...)


In the UK, we have a show called QI (quite intelligent) and the big point of the show is showing you what you thought was true actually isn't (got my boy into trouble at school - how many moons has the Earth got. Well Miss, depends. One, two or five...)

And you cannot account for what other people hold to be true. You just do the best you can

Tezzirax said:

Civilizations that rely on money when they have had replicator technology for decades.

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Why? Money is a representation of value. Even if replicators remove value from physical resources, work itself might gaine value. Or time. I've even wondered if raw data itself might one day become a traded currency (in many ways, we're approaching that now).

Once you have a system that can satisfy all your physical wants, maybe you have the listless, frivolous world that Steven Lawhead describes at the beginning of his Paradise War series. Or maybe you believe Gene Roddenberry and everyone will work for the good of society under an interstellar federation.

Or people will still want to keep up with the Joneses, and money will provide them a way to compare themselves to those mean old Joneses.

Some of us work for and trade in a currency based on "full faith and credit" of government as opposed to hard resources. I can see where replicators can undo that. But I can also see where they wouldn't.

Mr Flibble said:

In the UK, we have a show called QI (quite intelligent) and the big point of the show is showing you what you thought was true actually isn't (got my boy into trouble at school - how many moons has the Earth got. Well Miss, depends. One, two or five...)

And you cannot account for what other people hold to be true. You just do the best you can

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Wish we had a show like that here. We have myth busters , but that's a bit different. There are an amazing number of things "everyone knows is true" in biology that aren't, and quite a lot of things almost no one knows that are.

RichardGarfinkle said:

All the seasons of QI can be found on YouTube. It's hosted by Stephen Fry and is an incredible amount of fun and, just as it says on the label, Quite Interesting.

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I always learn something on that show

And ofc it led to the phrase 'If Stephen Fry said it, it must be true'

LOG said:

The first thing that came to mind though was systems of magic. To me, magic that works according to laid out rules has taken a large step away from magic, and become more about science. I prefer the kind of magic you get in The Last Unicorn. There may be stuff you can and can't do, but systems or explanations of how it all works aren't things I usually enjoy.

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I'm the opposite. I like magic best when it's explained. Not explained to death, but some basic rules that keep popping up. Like The Dresden Files or Brandon Sanderson's stuff. I still read books where the magic isn't explained though--It's just not the magic that interests me, in those cases.

QI however does get things wrong itself.

AVS said:

The size of a moon is an issue. I believe Earth's moon is the largest in the solar system relative to its planet. (Excepting Charon on the downgraded Pluto). Smaller or more distant moons would have smaller effects.

I generally use hand wavium "I must get Al Abaster to explain the moon phases to me," said the slab like Gran Ite.

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I made the three moons on my planet all much smaller than our moon. I still make the oceans crazy to deal with, though.

There is the idea of how much reality to leaven your fantasy with. Just because astrophysics works a certain way in our reality doesn't mean it has to in your fiction. In fact, if you want an historical anchor/touchstone, astrophysics is a prime example of what shouldn't work in a realistic way. How long did various civilizations think the Sun revolved around the Earth, or that the Sun was actually a god? It's one of the many charming things about Pratchett's Discworld, and it can work in serious fantasy as well.

But if you are writing scifi, it is worth noting that the reason we have reasonable seasons is the moon biasing the Earth's precession around the Sun. Things would be different in a worse way (from the perspective of current lifeforms) if we either didn't have a moon or had many small moons. Also, large moons that revolve around large rocky planets tend to be pushed away over time, as the Moon is being pushed away now, because of gravitational tides associated with the primary's rotation, as the Moonward bulge of the earth slingshots the Moon further out by very tiny distances over time. The Moon used to be very much closer and absolutely huge in the sky.

davidh219 said:

I'm the opposite. I like magic best when it's explained. Not explained to death, but some basic rules that keep popping up. Like The Dresden Files or Brandon Sanderson's stuff. I still read books where the magic isn't explained though--It's just not the magic that interests me, in those cases.

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I agree as well. I like it when magic follows the laws of thermodynamics and has real limitations, costs and consequences and that interfaces with the physical world. Doesn't mean it has to be explained in painstaking/boring detail. But magic that's completely unexplained hand waving is in danger of devolving into something that can be invoked at any time to get characters out of jams rather than being a plot driving element, per say, or one with limitations the characters have to find ways around.

Not that I have anything against books like The Last Unicorn, where the way magic was presented worked fine for the plot. I just think there's a lot of interesting way different writers have presented it and explained it in recent works. Everything from the old fashioned "cold iron is antithetical to magic" approach to Brandon Sanderson's allomancy.

Unrealistic actions by seemingly logical characters bothers me. I love the Wheel of Time Series, but Jordon's main characters for some reason or another never share important information during their reunions throughout the series. It really bothers me that they this happens. I know that it helps add tension and suspence to the story when one character doesn't know something that would drastically change the outcome of their descisions, but you would think that they would not intentianally with hold knowledge that could save their friends and family. Wheel of Time is filled with moments that have me screaming at the pages for a MC to tell the other MC about such and such.

I'd love to see a fantasy fight scene workshop on here.

I worry mine are too dry. Some I've read are silly without meaning to be.

Sarpedon said:

I'd love to see a fantasy fight scene workshop on here.

I worry mine are too dry. Some I've read are silly without meaning to be.

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Good idea. Maybe just a thread where folks post short fight scenes and others help beat them into shape.

The main problem I see in fantasy fight scenes is describing everything blow-by-blow. To move along well, a fight has to read nearly in realtime, which means you must hit the highlights but can't describe every movement. Thus:

He picked up his axe in his right hand, being careful to hold it near the end of the handle, swung it in an arc to above his shoulder, then brought his arm sharply forward and let go of the axe, which flew at the monster that was running toward him.

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Moving just a tish faster:

He scooped up his axe and flung it at the oncoming monster.

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[Wow, even I didn't know I could cut that many words! ]

The first rule of Fight Scene Club is that we do not talk about...

D'oh!

Dude, a Fight Scene Club would be amazing. Somebody please start one!