Are these possible?

[LWFlouisa]

Does any epic fantasy need to be a large novel, or multiple books in order to be considered an epic in scope? Or is the main requirement that it has large scope revolving around kingdoms within the context of the plot, but can still be within 20,000 words?

As someone who tends to level off around 20K.

 

[skip.knox]

The key word here is "need" and the key variable is who is doing the needing. If you're talking about an agent who will pick up a book for traditional publishing, then yes it does need to be large. There are some guidelines around, just do some searching.

Or, if you are thinking of self-publishing and you are thinking about the keywords you will use in the description, then once again yes. Certainly if I saw a book that called itself epic fantasy, I'd be first baffled and then uninterested in anything only 20k words long. There wouldn't be sufficient room for both adequate world building and engaging character development.

OTOH, if you are talking only about yourself, then I'd re-cast the question. Why do you want it called epic? Why can't it just be fantasy and call it quits?

 

[LWFlouisa]

I could reasonably call it fantasy and satisfied with that.

I tend to do more of the episodic historical that borders on fantasy anyway.

Thanks for answering.^^

 

[psychotick]

Hi,

The problem is that it's hard to do a complete world build involving multiple kingdoms, lots of plots and sub plots, endless characters and POV's in only 20K. Some have tried. You might check out Stephen Donaldson's shorter works in Daughter Of the Regals. A good title story if tending to head into his perpetual morass of darkness. Fascinating world build and magic schema. There's also another story in it called The Reeve, which does an interesting world build. And for an alternative in the same book there's Unworthy of the Angel - one of my all time faves of shorter fiction.

I'm not sure that any of these are truly epic. They're more slices of an epic work. But they all fit well within the framework of what could be larger series of books set in the same epic worlds.

(Also if you get the book out you should read the story about the conquering worm. It's darkly funny.)

Cheers, Greg.

 

[LWFlouisa]

I'll have to check those out. I'm not even sure if I'll be ready for epic. Mine tend to focus on one continent, one kingdom, and then everyone else under an angry ruler.

 

[ThinkerX]

Fritz Liebers 'Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser' series set one of the old standards for fantasy writing, along with Howards 'Conan.' All of the original tales in these series were on the short side - 40,000 words tops, and usually far less, if memory serves. Same situation with HP Lovecraft, another SF/Fantasy elder - he wrote a mere two or three novels over the course of his career, but scores of shorter works. The works that established his mythos were all on the short side.

I am doing something similar in my writing: I have a fairly well developed world, with...'known situations and events,' some bunched close together, others scattered in space and time. What I do is write stories focusing on those events, using recurring characters. Sometimes, a major character in one tale will have a walk-on role in another.

Many of these tales are set at various points in the decades long 'Traag War.' Most fantasy epics dealing with such a conflict focus on the actions of a handful of prime characters. I took a different approach, viewing it as the stories of a great many people, and wrote accordingly. Many of these tales were entered into various competitions in the 'Challenges' sub forum.

 

[Mythopoet]

Fritz Liebers 'Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser' series set one of the old standards for fantasy writing, along with Howards 'Conan.' All of the original tales in these series were on the short side - 40,000 words tops, and usually far less, if memory serves. Same situation with HP Lovecraft, another SF/Fantasy elder - he wrote a mere two or three novels over the course of his career, but scores of shorter works. The works that established his mythos were all on the short side.

But none of these works are considered "epic fantasy". Lieber's and Howard's stories are quintessential Sword and Sorcery. Lovecraft is generally considered either Horror or Dark Fantasy, definitely not epic.

I do think most epic fantasy readers (and I count myself one) expect a certain... abundance of material to get immersed in. It doesn't have to be all at once. You don't have to write 700 page novels. Roger Zelazny's epic fantasy series The Chronicles of Amber is comprised of 10 novels that are quite short by today's fantasy standards. My complete volume only comes in at about 1200 trade paperback sized pages. (That's like... one George R. R. Martin book, right? ) But it's one of the most epic series ever written, imo. I'm sure you could do the same with shorter works, novellas or short stories, in a series.

But I doubt that a stand alone novella or short story would have the kind of epicness that most epic fantasy lovers look for. I won't say it's impossible, because I don't believe anything is impossible in storytelling. But it does seem unlikely.

 

[Incanus]

A slight clarification to psychoticks post: There are two Donaldson collections, Daughter of Regals and Reave the Just. Both are excellent and there are a handful of novellas in them that contain some minimal world building, but I don't think they could really be considered 'epic'. Notable entries in addition to what psychotick said: Ser Visal's Tale (from Daughter), and The Killing Stroke (from Reave the Just)

 

[AndrewMelvin]

For me, 20,000 words is a novella, and the description "epic fantasy novella" doesn't really ring true. As others have said, it's hard to do the necessary world building in such a small space, once you've taken into account character development, plot, etc.

I wish you luck, but I would simply call it fantasy.

 

[skip.knox]

I am following up to my post above, specifically wrt self-publishing and choice of genre.

First, your choice of genre is going to be dictated by your publishing service (Amazon, etc). That's going to be Fantasy. Some offer a subsidiary genre and there you're going to have to look more carefully. If you're like me, you'll find none of them fit exactly and a few are in the neighborhood. I suggest you look at a bunch of books in each subsidiary genre to get an idea of what can be found there. Keep in mind, these are author choices and some may have chosen foolishly. About all you can do is to be honest with yourself about what you would *expect* to find if you searched on "historical fantasy" or "epic fantasy" or "grimdark".

Then there are the keywords. These are open. Authors differ on how important they are, but I think all would agree it's a mistake not to have them. There, you will have to look objectively at your book (hah!) and decide what keywords capture its essence. In particular, which keywords would make you, were you to search on one and then find your book, think yes this is exactly what I was searching for.

All of which is by way of saying that it's not so much a matter of whether some arbitrary length can qualify as epic fantasy, it's more of fitting your book into the slots provided by Smashwords, Scribd, Amazon, et alia.

 

[LWFlouisa]

I'm finding I most fit in Post Apocalyptic Fantasy. Which I'm not sure if that currently exists yet. I know there were stories by more well known authors where the hero has failed.

Though that's what I mean by post apocalyptic. I mean it in the more, a hero rescues what little remains in a poisoning wasteland against a tyrant dark night. It's quest like, though I wouldn't call it epic really.

I guess I'll have to see.

Thanks for the answers guys.^^