Author: Oli
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The Blackswords S1:E7 ‘Marching’
The Blackswords is a serial set in The Inner World, following the misadventures of the eponymous mercenary company. In Marching the company is on their way to a new engagement, when trouble finds them on the road. Read S1:E6 ‘Counting Coins’ here. Content warning: threat/peril, language Marching It was a…
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Everything that Worldcon taught me about indie authors that I didn’t know I needed to ask
Well, so that was a Worldcon. Oof. I mean, it was wonderful. It was intense. It was people. It was information. It was magic. It was science. It was huge. It was joyful. It was exhausting. I haven’t quite put it into order in my head yet. Worldcon, if you…
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The Blackswords S1:E6 ‘Counting Coins’
The Blackswords is a serial set in The Inner World, following the misadventures of the eponymous mercenary company. In ‘Counting Coins’ the company is taking stock of their booty, when they discover an unexpected bonus item. Read S1:E5 ‘Prize Fighter’ here. Content warning: language Counting Coins Amudr knew that their…
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My top 10 imaginary worlds, part 2
Click here to read Part 1 Welcome to the second part of this article about my top 10 imaginary worlds. Imaginary worlds are very real to their enthusiasts. While I would never wish to question the reality of millions of French, Spanish, Italian or American people, or the inhabitants of…
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The Blackswords S1:E5 ‘Prize Fighter’
The Blackswords is a serial set in The Inner World, following the misadventures of the eponymous mercenary company. In ‘Prize Fighter’ the company’s second-in-command is attempting to assess a new recruit, but his efforts are hampered by an impromptu wrestling match. Read S1:E4 ‘The Yellowbird’ here. Content warning: language Prize…
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My top 10 imaginary worlds, part 1
This is a blog about writing, but it’s about the specific aspects of writing that I’m most interested in. Probably top of that list is worldbuilding. In fact, I’d go so far as to say I’m interested in worldbuilding first, and storytelling second—although I’d also suggest that you can’t do…
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The Blackswords S1:E4 ‘The Yellowbird’
The Blackswords is a serial set in my fantasy world, The Inner World, following the misadventures of the eponymous mercenary company. In ‘The Yellowbird’ Ashurra, twin sister of the sorcerer-warrior Maghîllin, is dangerously bored as the company sails away from the fall of Dorna… Read S1:E3 ‘Free Beer’ here. Content…
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In conversation with Priya Sharma
In the first of an irregular series of interviews, I spoke to the horror and speculative fiction writer Priya Sharma about her working life as a writer. If anything has become clear to me in the time I’ve been taking an interest in writing, it’s that writers are an exceedingly…
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The Blackswords S1:E3 ‘Free Beer’
The Blackswords is a serial set in my fantasy setting, The Inner World, following the misadventures of the eponymous mercenary company. In ‘Free Beer’, the archer Umbaral is riding point, trying to guide what remains of the company to the docks of Dorna, to escape the city before it is…
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What is worldbuilding?
It says right there on the home page of my blog that I’m interested in worldbuilding. This is something, as you may have noticed, that a lot of fantasy and science-fiction writers talk about. It may be something that you do yourself, or you may be wondering what it is.…
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The Blackswords S1:E2 ‘Lights Out’
The Blackswords is a serial set in my fantasy world, Olnezea, far to the south of the area in which my novel in progress takes place. In this second episode, the mercenary commander Ukhand is eating dinner with the commander who hired him, in the besieged city of Dorna. The…
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Extraordinary people, or how to meet writers like you
Hell is other people, or networking for writers It has been suggested that hell is other people. For someone struggling to write, that might well seem to be the case—if only they would stop distracting you, if only they would stop saying things and wanting things, then you might get…
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The Blackswords S1:E1 ‘Cheap Wine’
More than ten years ago, when I had recently embarked on my hubristically ambitious worldbuilding project, I started writing a serial for this blog. I posted several episodes, and then it petered out. As I’m now close to finishing a novel set in my world, I thought I’d revive the…
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What in the world?
Welcome to my blog. I’m a fantasy fiction writer, and I’m going to write about the process of bringing a project to fruition, and finding it a home in the publishing world. Hopefully it will be an interesting story, and if you’re an aspiring or early career writer, it should…
Oliver Arditi 