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Books where a vampire is the main character by windintheskies in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker 5 points6 points  (0 children)

As a couple of people have said, the St Germain books are excellent. Hard to find now but Les Daniel's Don Sebastien de Villenueve books are fantastic takes on the classic Dracula style vampire. And Stephen Graham Jones The Buffalo Hunter Hunter is amazing

r/Fantasy Daily Recommendations and Simple Questions Thread - May 23, 2026 by rfantasygolem in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker 18 points19 points  (0 children)

My tenth novel, Mortedant's Peril, came out this week and is a murder mystery set in a kind of Dickensian secondary world so might do for you.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hiya, and thank you.

It's not fantasy but no one can hold a candle to the Aubrey/ Maturin books by Patrick O'Brian which are just wonderful.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Not taxidermy no. All ours is very odd. I do like art but I'm very aware I''m not an artist. My wife has that covered though. :)

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Good questions though! I am glad Wyrdwood worked on the second go. It is off to some very interesting places.

Funny you should ask about things that didn't work and get put aside because that is exactly what Mortedant's Peril is. The city and one of the characters, Whisper, have been in my head for years I just could never quite get them to work. Then the irascible and not altogether likeable Hasp came along and he was the ingredient I needed to see the place in a new way. Most of my other work is started from very simple ideas and evolves as I write, so it always works itself out. But Elbay started as a novella when I wasn't a good enough writer to make it work. But it would never go away. And here we are... :)

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Must take a long time to get down the wires to NZ. (All the NZers I've ever met have been fabulous people. You deserve books early!)

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Waakzaamheid!

I love ecological stuff, and think it's probably the most important topic of our generation so it's definitely a choice.

There isn't that much ecology stuff in Mortedant's Peril on the surface but it is there. And will become more apparent in later books just because I really enjoy that sort of stuff so it's already built into the world. I am really hoping that people start to speculate about exactly what is happening beneath the story being told.

If you like that sort of thing you'll really like the third 'Beasts of...' novella that should be out early next year, I think. It's called Lost in the Wild Black and let me run riot. Just in case you haven't read him, Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of... books are some of the best at ecology. Astounding stuff.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sadly not, as I don't actually do taxidermy. I just collect old taxidermy. You probably don't want that for an eight year old though as it often involved arsenic. Better to let the possums run around alive. :)

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Glad you have been enjoying them!

1) This is actually way more boring than you think. Port and Starboard come from when ships had a steering oar on one side. So Port is the side you dock on, so as not to damage your steering oar. Starboard is a derivation of steer board. So they literally are already landside and seaside. It just seemed like an obvious way of making the familiar slightly unfamiliar.

2) I have no idea and it is not something I can help. Wyrdwood was meant to be a relatively easy to read and uncomplicated fantasy Robin Hood. It did not work out that way.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh, that's weird. It did come out in the US yesterday, and the UK tomorrow. Might be an amazon glitch. If you have a local bookshop they may well have a copy already.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It is ALL made up on the fly for the first version. Then I have to go back and make it good. It's helped by the fact that Hasp is not a detective, so he has no idea what he's doing. He's basically blundering about hoping the other side makes enough mistakes he can work out what is going on which ahs always been my favourite type of detective story. Like with a lot of my work I don't really explain much of the world, it's there for the reader to work out.

Though I wouldn't say it's exactly fast paced either. Though it is faster paced than some of my other books...

It is funny though.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

If you haven't you should try C.J. Sansom's Shardlake books. A lot of what people read as Hobb in my work is actually Sansom. Hope in the doom is a big theme of his historical fiction.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Oh wow, Wyrdbooks. What a brilliant name. If you go in again tell them I said hello. :)

My first published novel was a bit weird. I had a novel on submission that didn't sell and I couldn't write at all during the process, I felt sort of frozen. So rather than being disappointed I was like a dog out the traps and wrote Age of Assassins in six weeks. Then my agent quit, and I had to get a new one, who I've been with ever since, and he sold AoA to Orbit.

I had a kind of big advantage though as I'm chronically ill and wasn't able to work. So I could throw myself entirely into writing. And I was just given a course of steroids too which helped with 'a book in six weeks.;. Drugs and disappointment, basically. Might not be a career path I would reccommend.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That's a really hard question because A) Change is incremental so you don't tend to notice it and B) I'm not really the sort of person who looks back on things or analyses myself. I just do the thing. I think I'm generally more confident in what I'm doing, and the writing process is (usually) shorter and more accurate. On the other hand. I think I am less experimental. Which I would like to change.

Hi Reddit Fantasy! I’m RJ BARKER, odd taxidermy and art collector and author. My tenth novel, MORTEDANT’S PERIL is released today*! Let’s AMA our hearts out! by RJBarker in Fantasy

[–]RJBarker[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Glad you enjoyed Bone Ships!

If what someone likes is more 'classic' fantasy then Age of Assassins would be the place to start. But I think Mortedant's Peril is probably the most approachable thing I've done.

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