• Why Traditional Fantasy Still Casts Its Spell?

 

So, what attracts you to traditional fantasy

I think traditional fantasy uses many familiar tropes that help create a great story: evil villains, believable magic, mythical creatures, dark forces, quests, and much more. Tolkien clearly encompassed all of this with a rich cast of fantasy characters, including elves, orcs, dwarves, dragons, and many others.

One of the key elements that makes fantasy believable is the creation of a richly developed world, something Tolkien did amazingly well. He often revealed only parts of that world, which made it feel all the more mysterious.

Since Tolkien, traditional fantasy has, in some respects, been succeeded by more modern classics, such as George R.R. Martin’s series of books, which present a fantasy world with a rich medieval atmosphere.

So Why Legacy of the Eldric.

When I first started reading fantasy, traditional fantasy was all there was. I loved reading Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, and especially The Silmarillion. I also liked listening to music in the background as I read, and to this day certain songs instantly bring those books back to mind. For example, Supertramp’s The Two of Us always reminds me of Sam and Frodo’s journey through Mordor. It catches in my throat every time I hear it.

I wrote Legacy of the Edric with Tolkien’s rich world deep in my heart. I wanted to capture some of the essence of The Silmarillion. I know it can be a marmite book for many readers—you either love it or hate it—but I greatly admired the fall of the glorious Elven houses, one after another, and the utter despair that followed.

Is the Legacy of the Eldric different?

Some of my reviewers have commented that my books are unique. They do include fantasy elements such as demons, dragons, krell, grakyn, and death knights, but beneath all of that is an original plot with many unexpected twists—some of which even surprised me when I first imagined them.

For example, I explore the idea of a guardian angel, or shaol, as I call it. The challenge in writing fantasy is making your creations believable, so I set limits on what a shaol can do. In my world, most people have a guardian angel drawn from their ancestry. Given the march of time, that guardian may well be a person’s great-great-grandfather, and such a distant connection makes the link to a guardian angel tenuous at best.

Do you or I have a Guardian Angel?

This is something I have always pondered: if there were such a thing as a guardian angel, what could it do? It is a premise I wove into my books, first hinted at in Legacy of the Eldric and then developed more fully in Dragon Rider and Shadow of the Demon.

So what can a guardian angel do in my books? In effect, it is rather like déjà vu: a feeling of familiarity when events or places are experienced for the first time. A stronger link to a shaol allows a person to achieve more, for example by sensing people nearby.

As mentioned, a guardian angel is usually only a tenuous link, but two people in my book benefit from a much stronger connection to theirs—a connection that has consequences for them both.

I also use guardian angels in a different way. In Legacy of the Eldric, there is a faction called the Priests of Ryoch who exploit this idea for evil ends. They recruit children whom they sense have an evil guardian spirit, training them to fight and, in the case of the more powerful ones, to communicate across a battlefield. How useful would that be?

That, to me, is the beauty of traditional fantasy: setting rules that the characters must live by.

I hope I have whetted your appetite to read more about my books. To find out more, visit my website https://www.davidburrows.org.uk/ and immerse yourself in epic battles, fantasy creatures, memorable characters, and, above all, the struggle between good and evil.

David Burrows author of the Prophecy of the Kings series