Recent content by Mad Swede

Hmm. What are these intriguing themes that feel timeless that you feel need an ancient setting to explore? Is there any reason you think they couldn't be explored in a modern setting? I'm not sure I agree that some themes need a certain sort of setting to explore, so I'd be interested to hear...

Maybe you need to take a step back and think about what sort of story you want to write. Where is your focus? I ask that because in my experience the sort of story you write has an impact on how you set up the deities and on the impact they have in the setting. As a simple example, in a high...

Mig veterligen är det inte ett lokalt eller dialektalt uttryck, så du har kanske inte sprungit på det någon gång. Och jag som trodde det var ett välkänt begrepp...

Har du aldrig hört någon säga "si-och-så är ett riktigt träsktroll"?

In Swedish we would say "träsktroll", meaning someone who doesn't really give a stuff about the image they project (particularly appearance) and who doesn't really try to conform.

Welcome Manny. As a publsihed author with English as a second language I suggest you develop your writing skills in your own first language and then think later about doing a translation - it is much easier.

You do understand how long a period you are looking at, don't you? It took about 1000 years (yes, ten centuries) to convert the whole of Scandinavia - the last conversions took place amongst the Sami peoples in northern Sweden and Norway in the late 1700s. Beliefs, values and worldview form...

Writing this both as a traditionally published author who's books have been translated and as someone who has used translation tools professionally. Translating a text is as much about interpretation as it is about translating words from one language to another. To properly convey nuances you...

Write. Just write. Until you get words down on the page you won't know how you write, or what your writing is like. Don't worry about things like structure at this stage, just write.

My simple advice would be to write your story, and to ask a few simple questions as you do so: What do the main characters do for a living, and how do they get paid? Where and in what do they live? Where does their food come from? If they want to buy something (food, clothes, weapons etc)...

No, you don't have to start the book with the main character. With that written, if you start a story with another character then this character must have or must quickly develop a link to the main character and the main character needs to turn up in the second chapter (or first if you use a...

I'll dare to be different and say that I don't hate any trope. What I hate is bad writing. Tropes are a way of analysing the structure, characterisation and (sometimes) themes in a story. I don't generally analyse stories in that way when I read them, I just enjoy the story, even when the story...

There are times when I get sick of hearing the word "trope". There's a distressing tendency to think of creative writing in terms of the tropes one should or should not use in any given part of the story. And that's not to mention plot devices, structures and all the other supposed tools needed...

Of course, what you could do is have the map develop as the reader gets further into the book and the characters find out more about their own world. One (childrens) example would be Arthur Ransome's book Secret Water, where the reader is presented with a series of maps as the book goes on, each...

I did think about Bröderna Lejonhjärta, but given what that novel is really about I didn't think it was quite social fantasy. The Mumin books would count though, especially Trollkarlens Hatt, Trollvinter and Pappan och Havet.