The Fantast Talks: Becoming a Writer, Researching Elemental Council, and Why Horses Are Weird

In a recent post on the /r/BlackLibrary subreddit, I asked redditors to help me brainstorm topics to discuss on The Lingual Fantast. (You'd think a fantast could come up with this stuff himself.)

Thankfully, people offered tons of marvelous ideas to the Altar of Content. If you're one of those people, rest assured that your idea is either destined for the melting pot of topics that we'll touch upon at length in later posts or planned for this series that I'm launching today, which is part of a program I call Ask the Fantast:

Ask the Fantast is an opportunity for you to send questions for me to discuss in my blog posts. Just remember: I can't speak officially about Games Workshop or the Warhammer hobby — and that includes questions about lore. If you're not sure if your question is okay, just submit it and let me worry about it.

As often as I can, I'll publish a post called The Fantast Talks, where I touch on topics you've asked about. If you'd like to throw ideas into the ring for consideration, please do. But as noted above, keep in mind that I will not speak to Games Workshop's official stance on anything. That includes what constitutes "official" Warhammer lore, even in my books; I can only share my own personal, genuinely held opinions about the setting. (In other words, no backstage passes — I know as much as you do.)

Of all the topics redditors suggested in response to my post, none seemed more relevant than Elemental Council, which was released in December 2024. That's what we'll focus on today... but let's take the long way to get there, shall we?

Readers and Friends: welcome to the inaugural entry for The Fantast Talks.

Becoming a Writer, Being a Writer

Among other things, /u/L1VEW1RE asked:

I’d like to hear about your backstory into writing and what [led] up to writing for BL.

Frankly, I can't think of a better place to begin. Why did I start writing to begin with?

To be very honest, I had no other way out of my head.

I grew up in an unhappy family, and I can count on one finger the amount of times anyone asked about my feelings as a child. Family aside, there is also a real taboo in the world against men displaying weakness. (In my experience, society has always considered displays of emotion as weakness.) This taboo is even stronger among killers and meat-eaters like US Marines, for whom displays of fraternal affection are so heavily veiled that they are suffocating to even attempt. In my time as a Marine grunt, expressing affection meant I had to obfuscate my words, usually with irony.

Oh, the cult of irony... As mentioned in my previous post, I believe irony plagues America. Irony makes it feel impossible to have one authentic moment with anyone, at least casually. (Or is it only me who feels like that? Share your thoughts in the comments.)

Throughout all of this, I wrote. Writing was my path to freedom. I journaled about girls I adored and family. I wrote of my fears and the forbidden. My diary became the stuff of stories, which I reimagined and rewrote, fantasies I drooled onto the page. When I was sixteen, I once reread my diary. The sight of my feelings so shamed me that I snuck out at night and burned the pages, then brushed the ashes into the trash.

But still I wrote. Warhammer was my addiction from an early age, and I absolutely adored science fantasy, so I wrote similar stories. During college, I wrote half a novel. During my first deployment, I wrote half another novel. I rambled into journals and sketched feelings in my pocket notebook. (And I still keep both. If you're a writer, keep a journal and a pocket notebook. Write in them, make it a habit, and make it precious. You'll get good, writing to yourself. Just stay honest.)

In 2013, I finished my first novel, then half-assed an attempt to query it. If you don't know, the query process involves crafting a pitch for your novel and sending it to literary agents. Literary agents represent authors in the publishing market, helping them sell their work to acquisitions editors at publishing houses. For aspiring authors interested in traditional publishing, literary agents and acquisitions editors are the gatekeepers to success.

Even though my query attempt was half-assed, believe me when I tell you I got some full-assed rejections. Disheartened, I gave up writing for a long time. I focused on my studies and learning Russian. Every now and then, I'd pen something — a diary entry, a thought in my notebook, pieces for an online Star Wars roleplay with my friends. Nothing serious.

Then, during a hard time in 2017, I decided to write another novel. I wanted a book, bad. I wanted to illustrate all the ways I felt I had grown in the last decade or so. For two grueling years, I woke up early every morning and stayed up late every night, slaving over the book. This was hell. Not the writing — that was a pleasure. But I had so much uncertainty, so much fear, about whether I was really cut out for this. I had no idea if my efforts would be rewarded with anything like success, and I couldn't bear the thought of failure.

This period is a rite of passage for any author. But by the time I had finished this marathon, I had learned to write a good book. And I knew mine was good, because despite all my despair — despite my held-breath and preparations for more rejection — my first query landed me a literary agent. It was unbelievable. I had thought I would need to send at least a hundred queries. (I'll admit, my reconnaissance and target selection was probably on point: I had spent a lot of time researching agents before submitting.)

My agent tried to sell my novel to ten publishing houses. Although we received some sterling feedback, we ultimately failed. In the process, my agent asked if I was interested in trying to write tie-in fiction. When I learned it was Black Library he had in mind, I played it cool, even though I was burning with joy.

Introductions were made; I underwent a pitching process. Before I knew it, I had finished my first short: Vova's Climb, which was eventually published in an Inferno! collection.

That's how I became a writer, and that's how I started writing for Black Library. /u/L1VEW1RE suggested some more topics about writing and ideation, but I'm saving those ideas for another day — they are better examined in detail. We'll talk a lot about writing in my posts about Vietnam, which is where I forged my writing career.

Thanks, /u/L1VEW1RE. And for anyone considering their own writing career, just remember: It always feels hard. That's part of it.

Conducting Research for Elemental Council

/u/Separate-Flan-2875 asked:

What was your research process like for writing Elemental Council?

Ah, geez. Where should I even begin?

Hell, let's do it. Let's go all the way back.

Codex: Tau (3rd edition), 2001.

The greatest book ever published.

I owe my vast affection for the Warhammer setting to the first army book released for the t'au. This damn book captured my imagination, as did the universe of Warhammer 40,000 that it introduced me to. The portrayal of the t'au in their first codex gave me a tremendous appreciation for the faction, and I suspect it even woke my passion for languages. (If you haven't seen it, that codex included the first constructed lexicon for the t'au.) I personally suspect that everything about my rendition of the t'au in Elemental Council really grew out of impressions from this codex, even if I did make serious efforts to harmonize those impressions with later material.

And that is where the true research process began, folks. If you're writing tie-in fiction, you are obligated to brush up on existing material for the intellectual property (IP) in question. So before setting pen to page, I did my damndest diving into what had already been written for the t'au. That included material written by other Black Librarians, some of which I had already read as a fan. I made paid attention to detail, noting minor things, because I wanted to write a story from a lived-in universe. That meant ensuring that actions from other emotionally meaningful works have had repercussions with downstream impacts. Attention to detail is important.

Take meticulous notes. Here is some of my research on established t'au terminology from various publications. (Research bonus: You get to enjoy some awesome stories while you prepare.)

Understanding existing background material is only the tip of the iceberg. For Elemental Council, I wanted a deeper understanding of certain real-life phenomena I meant to evoke in my writing to enhance the story's depth.

In this case, that meant learning more about Islamic and East Asian culture, history, and values. Real-life inspirations don't usually get ported directly into work. Even when engaged in the most elementary worldbuilding, my goal here is simply to broaden my horizons so that my portrayals are not shackled by my own limited experience. My choice of Islamic and East Asian culture for Elemental Council was semi-arbitrary; no one pointed me in this direction, and I don't think t'au were necessarily inspired by either — or even that they should necessarily be framed from that perspective going forward. (Trust the author! And authors — trust yourselves!)

The East Asian part of this research was easy. I'm married to a Vietnamese woman, so I'm comfortably familiar with Confucian and Buddhist values. I read much and often. I recorded observations of the Vietnamese with whom I was acquainted, such as their extraordinary reverence for their teachers. My research brought me away from East Asia toward South Asian, Bhutanese, and Nepalese cultures. At this point I began to learn which denominations of Buddhism were popular where, and how they were differed, and why they differed. The diversity and complexity fascinated me. I strove to draw upon that complexity and diversity in my depictions of t'au culture, to lend the t'au in my story feel a cultural depth like that of any real-world culture. (Did it work?)

The Islamic part of my research was much harder. Personally, I've always seen parallels between the T'au Empire and the early Islamic caliphate. Consider the following text, part of a letter supposedly sent by the Prophet Muhammad to secular rulers in 628 CE:

"In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful. From Muhammad, the slave of Allah and His Messenger... Blessed are those who follow true guidance. I invite you to embrace Islam so that you may live in security. If you come within the fold of Islam, Allah will give you double reward, but in case you turn your back upon it, then the burden of the sins of all your people shall fall on your shoulders..." (source)

Now obviously, no official source that I am aware of depicts the t'au as religious. However, capturing the religious zeal bleeding from the letter above seemed like a great way to portray secular zeal.

Moreover, consider the historical parallel. In 628 CE, the Arabs were nobody: fanatical upstarts on a desert peninsula, converting their neighboring idol-worshippers. Meanwhile, the Byzantine Empire that dominated the world of that time had been part of a continuous Roman Imperial tradition for the better part of a millennium. Byzantium's only serious rival was the latest of many imperial Persian dynasties, who ruled an empire that had also stood for centuries on end.

It would have taken nothing for either the Byzantine Romans or the Persians to crush the Arabs in their desert cradle. And yet neither power — both ruled by Emperors, mind you — ever made the effort.

The Byzantine Romans and the Persians concluded the "Last Great War of Antiquity" in the very same year Muhammad sent his letter. Within two-and-a-half decades, the Muslims had already toppled the Persian Empire and were wresting control of precious territory from the Byzantine Romans. All because no one had recognized the existential threat that the Muslims would come to present. All because no one had seen their potential.

The potentiality of early Islam was only the first element I wanted to understand for the book I was writing; I tried to do it through a deeper study of Islamic culture, history, and values. The second element I wanted to understand was far more personal. Writers are often told to write what you know. Well, I'd had the pleasure of serving with — and against, I suppose — Muslim fighters in Afghanistan. Believe me when I say they had left an impression.

An anecdote: In Helmand Province, Afghanistan, 2010, my platoon served closely with soldiers of the Afghan National Army (ANA). We nicknamed one of the soldiers we trusted most Lucky, because he was stocky and his hair and beard were red, so he reminded us of a leprechaun.

This old bastard, Lucky, was hard. He wielded a belt-fed M249 squad automatic weapon (SAW), which only old hands can employ effectively. If you've never heard a SAW in combat, just know that when it's on your side, it sings the sweetest song you'll ever hear. Lucky carried one like he was born with it. He would sit cross-legged, swaying over the Q'uran, as he disassembled and cleaned his weapon. And in Marjah in 2010, as bullets skipped off the ground and buzzed overhead, we unblooded Marine boots dove for cover while Lucky stood in a wadi with his SAW propped up on his leg, gazing round.

This dude looked at us all and sneered. He was so unimpressed.

Lucky was one of many examples, and so much about all of them reminded me of holy warriors. I really wanted to understand where that vast well of zeal and courage came from for my depiction of the t'au fire caste — and trust me when I say I had a lot of reasons to think it was their Islamic faith.

So how does one research this? The answer is however one can. I wish I could have interviewed one of the fellows I served with, but that felt fraught. Instead, I did a lot of tab-surfing on the Internet. A lot of digging into how media presented Muslims respectfully. One quotation I found really striking was the prayer of Ahmed Ibn Fahdlan from The 13th Warrior:

"Merciful Father, I have squandered my days with plans of many things. This was not among them. But at this moment, I beg only to live the next few minutes well. For all we ought to have thought, and have not thought; all we ought to have said, and have not said; all we ought to have done, and have not done; I pray thee, God, for forgiveness." - Ahmed Ibn Fahdlan, The 13th Warrior (adapted from Eaters of the Dead by Michael Crichton)

As mentioned above, none of this was ported directly into my work. It was all about inspiration. That is what a lot of the research process is: Assembling conceptual ingredients, throwing them into your mind-blender, and then seeing what spills out of the black box onto the page, trusting that your research has elevated it.

As a whole, the process is fairly stop-and-go. If you're an aspiring writer, just make sure you have an idea of what you need to learn before you begin. If you hit a roadblock in your writing, return to your research, and it may help clear up your blockage. Be careful, though: Don't use research to procrastinate. The book still needs to get written.

Thanks for the topic, /u/Separate-Flan-2875.

Horses Are Weird

We're ending on something light-hearted. In my reddit post, /u/Stir-fried_Kracauer asked:

After reading Godeater’s Son and Celestial Spear, I'm really curious: what do you have against horses?

(Some necessary background: In my books, I've occasionally presented horses as alien creatures that the main characters are unfamiliar with.)

This remark was clearly somewhat tongue-in-cheek. /u/Stir-fried_Kracauer clarified that he understood what I had set out to achieve, depicting horses as strange as a way to turn a common hallmark of fantasy on its head. In fantasy, the heroes always have horses. Everyone knows what a horse is.

Not so in my books

The goal of this, as /u/Stir-fried_Kracauer surmised, was to defamiliarize my setting. It's a good technique. In 1917, the literary theorist Victor Shklovsky coined its name: остранение ("ah-stra-nyen-iye"), which can be translated to defamiliarization. My application of the technique was different from Shklovsky's, who had in mind a sort of anti-Orwellian prose. (That is, the use of poetic language rather than practical language to make the familiar appear strange. The common comparison is stained-glass windows — i.e., lyrical, stylized writing — versus transparent panes of glass — i.e., Orwellian prose that is pragmatic and focused on clarity.)

I believe the principle of остранение still holds true when applied to worldbuilding. So does Brandon Sanderson: In one of his lectures, Sanderson addresses the appropriate balance of the familiar and the strange for fantasy settings, arguing that fantasy fans enjoy a little bit more of the strange, a little bit less of the familiar. (And you're not going to argue with Brandon Sanderson about fantasy, are you?)

As far as horses fit in here, this might be one of those cases where an author got caught up in his own method. You see, in trying to accurately portray how my characters might conside horses to be strange, I first had to consider the matter myself. That meant researching horses. Watching them, too, as much as I could. There's a horse stall down the street, where I can see them when I go for a run. Sometimes I'd stop, sweating and breathless, to watch one of the stallions graze. I pretended I didn't admire his shiny coat, or his sparkly eyes. His graceful movements, his bulging rump. And his whinnies, his whickers, dreamy like velvet laughter...

That's when it hit me: I'd fallen in love with a horse.

PLOT TWIST.

I'm kidding. I just looked at a few pictures of horses and concluded that yes, they are weird. Seriously — just stare at them:

• Their snouts look funny.

• The position of their mouths and eyes is disgusting.

• Have you ever seen one sweat? I advise you avoid it.

• Their legs are really long and thin — but their bodies are thick trunks.

• (If they break a leg, apparently you have to kill them???)

• Why is the hair on their neck and butt long and luscious, but then all the hair on their bodies is short and bristly?

Wait. Hang on a second.

Funny-looking faces...

A lot of sweat...

Long legs, broad torsos...

Selectively long hair...

... Are we the real horses?

"aH-sTrA-nYeN-iYe"

Thank you, /u/Stir-fried_Kracauer, for defamiliarizing us all. See everyone next time.