Hello! I found this lovely meme via ‘Nathan Smith, and I’m going to do this for the novel SHADOWTIDE I am even now finishing up! I’ll be expanding the answers on this post by editing, so if you’d like to be notified when that happens, just drop a comment below! (MC in these means “main character,” but I have three of them, so I’ll be answering those questions three times.)
1: Introduce yourself!
My name is Joseph Carriker, and I’ve been doing professional game design, writing, and development since 2001 or so. I am also a baby novelist, having released a novel SACRED BAND in 2017. SHADOWTIDE will be my second, for Nisaba Press!
2: Pitch your WIP
When two of the Sovereign’s Finest go missing in the smuggler’s hold of Serpent’s Haven, a trio of envoys are assigned to quickly find and recover them. Though Ydah, a mourning night woman ranger; Soot, a rhy-raven adept and veteran envoy; and Morjin, a Roamer spy, normally all work alone, they’ve got to navigate the dangers of Serpent’s Haven with only one another to depend on.
3: Your MC in five objects.
Morjin: A pack of Royal Road cards, a brocade waistcoat, a selection of thin blades easily hidden, a wine goblet, the key to a handsome stranger’s room
Ydah: An arrow-head necklace, her broadsword and shield, her worn traveling boots, a traveling tent for one
Soot: An envoy’s pendant, a copy of his book “Of Wing & Haunch” (a guide for medical treatment of those with animal bodies), a quill made from one of his own feathers, a cup of apple brandy, something shiny that he picked up today (but is too embarrassed to admit having done so).
4: A line capturing your WIP’s atmosphere.
“The difference between the Marsh Dragon and the Bog Hollow was — not to put too fine a point on it — one’s gag reflex.”
5: Does your WIP focus on the “queer experience?”
I’d say it is *a* queer experience. It’s set in a somewhat socially utopic setting (that of the RPG Blue Rose), in which most folks identify as bisexual, and orientation-based bigotry is pretty rare. I’d say that while it’s an experience not necessarily common to our world, it is one created by living in our world as a queer person: sometimes, we all wish for a place where those were not the things that mattered, to some degree, save to those we love and who loved us in return.
6: What inspired this WIP?
A Facebook post! I talked about wanting to see a James Bond figure, except one who was bisexual, and who instead of callously loving-and-leaving people he met during his missions, he had the bad habit of actually Developing Feelings for them, further complicating his missions. Thus was born one of the MCs of this book, Morjin.