The inaugural episode of D. T. Kane’s Epic Fantasy Book Club! Each week, he reads from one of his novels and discusses that episode’s reading with his listeners. It’s like a book club, except he does all the work for you!
www.dtkane.com
Purchase The Acktus Trials: https://dtkane.com/books/the-acktus-trials/
Map of Oration: https://dtkane.com/resources/map-of-oration/
*Below is not a transcription, but a copy of my script/notes. I do not read it verbatim during the episode.
Intro
Hello, I’m D. T. Kane and welcome to my Epic Fantasy Book Club. Today is January 17, 2022. We’ll usually start the podcast by jumping right into wherever we left off reading last week, but since this is the first episode, I thought a bit of an introduction made sense.
I’m an epic fantasy author with two series in progress, the Spoken Books Uprising and The Agarsfar Saga. Now, don’t get me wrong. Selling books is great, but I want to get my stories into as many ears as possible. So I figured why not start a podcast and share my stories with anyone interested in listening. Each week my plan is to read one or more chapters from novels that I’ve written and then discuss them with all of you. Think of it sort of like a book club, except you don’t have to do any of the reading or even participate in discussion if you don’t want to. I’ll do all the work for you—you just need to tune in each week and listen! So if you’re an introvert like me and have always liked the idea of a book club, but getting together with a group of people you hardly know and talking isn’t your idea of a good time, maybe this will be more your speed!
I plan to give you weekly updates about my current works in process and life in general so we can get to know each other a bit better, so I’ll only give a brief personal introduction now. I’m a lifelong fantasy reader who only recently came to grips with the fact that I’d rather pursue my dream of being a writer than work a corporate day job for the rest of my life. I’ve released two full-length novels as of this recording, with several more on the way this year. I love reading and listening to and dissecting fantasy stories and I hope to get into some great discussions with all of you in the weeks, months, and hopefully years to come. Each week I’ll give some suggested questions for everyone to consider for next week’s episode, and I also strongly encourage listener questions. I’ll also be giving listeners a mini quest to complete at the end of each episode, so make sure to stay tuned through the end for that!
Alright, enough introduction. Let’s get into the fiction. Today and for the next, oh, 20 or so weeks, we’ll be reading the first novel in my series, the Spoken Books Uprising, which is called the Acktus Trial. Here’s the back cover blurb:
[read back matter of novel]
Alright, let’s get into the actual reading now. For those on YouTube, I’ll put a map of Oration up on the screen and show notes, or you can visit dtkane.com/resources. See you on the other side to discuss what we’ve read. As Deckard Cane once said, “Stay a while and listen.”
[Read Prologue of The Acktus Trials]
Discussion of Prologue
Alright, a lot to unpack here in the prologue. Obviously at this early stage we’re going to have a lot more questions than answers. I’ll try to keep spoilers to a minimum and when I do give a spoiler, I’ll at least try to imply it, rather than simply give something away, but I don’t think it’s really possible for me to have an interesting discussion with you while keeping all my cards entirely face down. I’m sure I’ll be playing around with the format of our discussions, so feel free to send me suggestions on what you like, what you don’t, and what you think I should try.
First Sentence
Let’s start right with the first sentence (re-read). Lots of info packed in here. We’re in the tower of a Great Library—that’s capitalized, so it must be important, right? And some terrible spell has blown its roof clear off, and apparently our narrator feels that spell is going to have long-lasting ramifications for Oration, which the first sentence tells us is our setting. The land of Oration. How’d I do with that first sentence? Gripping enough? I’d love to hear your thoughts, either in the comments on YouTube or shoot me an email, dtkane@dtkane.com.
Names
So from the first sentence, we quickly move on to meet the prologue’s perspective character, and he’s got quite the name, or series of names I guess is more accurate. Pront vi Lextor, Librarian of Tome, Prefect of Saltz, Keeper of the Inks, Protector of the Sheafs. Now, at least one of my readers has asked me where I get the ideas for the names in my novels. Well, how about I answer that with a story? I’m a novelist, after all! Now, as of this recording, we’re just about a month removed from the Christmas season here in the US, and when I was home with my parents we watched The Man Who Invented Christmas, which is about how Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol. Great movie, I’d definitely recommend. Now, there’s a scene where Dickens is pacing his office like a madman, trying to come up with the name of his main character, spewing off all sorts of ridiculous names.
For the most part I’m nothing like that. Sometimes I’ll search real life for inspiration, sort of deforming friends’ or acquaintances’ names to fit into my tales. I guess Dickens also kept a running list of interesting names he came across and used them in his fiction. I do that with lots of other things, particularly descriptions, but not really with names.
A trick for names I do like is to come up with a word that somehow relates to the character and run it through Google translate. I’ll just flip through a bunch of different languages until I find a word that sounds cool and then I’ll shape it into a name. For instance, if I have a character who is really ugly, I might run the word “frightening” through Google translate and see what I come up with (do example live). Other names, especially for characters who aren’t main characters, I’ll often just use the first name I can think of. When I’m writing my first drafts, I try to avoid anything that will break me out of the flow of writing, so I try not to get hung up on names. I’ll ponder briefly and toss the first thing that sticks into the manuscript so long as it sounds remotely appropriate. Sometimes I tell myself I’ll change it later during revision, but I almost never do. By that time, the name has stuck in my mind. Sort of like how you meet someone and their name seems a bit odd at first to you. But hey, it’s their name. You just come to accept it.
Now Pront vi Lextor, though, I don’t really have any story behind. There’s just something cool sounding about it. I think it’s the sound of the three-word name that goes one syllable, one syllable, two syllable. Something about it sounds imposing. The late actor Max von Sydow, of Seventh Seal and Exorcist fame, there’s a good real life example. Pront vi Lextor. The rest of his titles after his name is a pretty common fantasy trope for important leaders.
- Daenerys Stormborn of House Targaryen, the First of Her Name, Queen of the Andals and the First Men, Protector of the Seven Kingdoms, the Mother of Dragons, the Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, the Unburnt, the Breaker of Chains (from Game of Thrones)
- Elayne Trakand, Queen of Andor and Cairhien, Defender of the Realm, Protector of the People, High Seat of House Trakand, and Aes Sedai of the Green Ajah (from Wheel of Time)
All his titles relate to the importance of writing and books in this world, save for Prefect of Saltz. That one’s a bit mysterious, but won’t be relevant for a while so I’ll leave that there. Also, generally speaking someone doesn’t get that many titles unless they’re pretty damn important, so I don’t think it’s much of a spoiler for me to say that you should recognize Pront vi Lextor as someone who’s going to have some importance in the story to come.
Dragon
Alright, enough about Pront’s name. So we see he’s feverishly writing some sort of book, but we don’t learn what it is. And as he’s writing, he’d worrying over these voices he can apparently hear coming from beneath the tower he’s in. Is he crazy? Or is there some dark magic at work here that he’s fighting against? Well, I said I’d give some spoilers, but that would be much too large a spoiler, so you’ll just have to keep listening to find out.
Right, so we get into the meat of the prologue when the dragon arrives. I won’t rehash his entire description, but he’s essentially a white Chinese dragon, right? Slender long body, no wings. Now, his one distinguishing characteristic is the writing that’s all over his body. At this point we don’t exactly know the significance of this, but you know from the back cover blurb that books in this world hold magic powers, so a dragon that’s essentially a flying book, well that’s something interesting I’d say.
Obviously, Pront vi Lextor knows the dragon, greeting him as an old friend. As the two of them talk, we learn that there are more dragons like this one and they’ve been working to rescue books from the Great Library—obviously some great calamity has struck, but we’re still not clear what it was. All the color we really get is when the dragon says “The shelves have fallen.” Now, in a world where books are so important, shelves falling sounds pretty ominous to me, but again, it’s not clear at this point just what happened. This will be important throughout the story, though, so just keep it at the back of your mind for now.
Next, Pront vi Lextor gives the dragon the book he’s just finished writing, making clear he needs to get it to safety to a place called Fortune. The dragon seems surprised that he’s picked him to entrust the volume to and not Helfax or Leamina, who are apparently to other individuals the dragon holds in high regard, which you can tell by the dragon’s reaction when Pront reveals that they both fell holding off a threat, presumably the one that has created the calamity at the Great Library.
Pront then declines the dragon’s offer to take him away, stating instead that he must stay to finish trapping his foes in Under Tome. While Pront doesn’t admit it to the dragon, he’s obviously worried about that task, since as we read, he has to force himself to sound stronger than he feels. The dragon is obviously heartbroken over leaving Pront vi Lextor behind, but also obeys his command and floats away.
The prologue then comes to an end with Pront vi Lextor descending the tower to be about his task of trapping his enemies, lamenting how they’d interfered with some great work he’d been performing, and praying that the book he just wrote falls into the right hands so that it can lead the land of Oration out of darkness. So finally, there’s a hint about the book he gave to the dragon. It holds some sort of secret that will help rescue the land from the threat at the Great Library.
Conclusion
Right! So that’s the prologue. Obviously, pretty much all questions and no answers that this point. But a lot of what happened here will be a touchstone we return to throughout the book, so don’t take it for granted. There’s lots of foreshadowing here that I think you’ll find quite rewarding as the book moves on.
Homework. OK, time for some homework. But remember, this is a passive book club, so unlike school, if you don’t do your homework no problem, because I’ll do it for you! Next episode, we’ll read Chapters 1 and 2, which comprise Part I of the novel. We’ll meet two brothers who are slaves, and you should pay close attention to what the older one is teaching the younger. It’s going to introduce you to this world’s magic system, so see if you can pick up on some of its rules. We’ll also meet the brothers’ master and his giant bodyguard, who are also key characters throughout the novel. Keep an eye on their interactions with one another. I’m looking forward to another great discussion next week!
Right, just a couple other quick things.
Listener Question. Diane in New York wants to know–“D. T., what’s up with the hat?”
Quest: So like I noted at the beginning, each week I’ll have a mini quest for listeners to complete. This week’s quest is a question: What do you think was my inspiration for the dragon we meet in the prologue? Email you answers to dtkane@dtkane.com, as well as any questions you’d like to hear me answer on a future episode. Everyone who sends me a correct answer to this week’s quest will earn 2 experience points! I’ll be keeping a tally and award prizes from time to time to our top experience earners, so be sure to send in those answers!
Quote: “Always speak politely to a live dragon.” -Steven Brust (author of the Vlad Taltos series).
Until next time, this has been D. T. Kane’s Epic Fantasy Book Club.
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