The majesty of fantasy and scifi that is Sword Art Online

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I know I’m going to get some hate mail from anime fans out there for this post. But, I am determined to write this anyway. I LOVE SAO! I’ve watched anime since the 60s, and nothing has struck home to me like Sword Art Online. It’s fantasy, sci-fi, and video games… All wrapped into one. Like I said, it’s everything packaged neatly together for any anime geek or nerd. I fell in love with this anime the first time I watched it … The settings, the characters, the storyline. 

I can’t explain what it is, but I think its like having a great ensemble cast in a movie. When a group of characters mesh so well together, it’s like magic. That’s the way I feel about these characters. By themselves, they are interesting on their own but not something to wrap a story around. That’s why together, I just can’t get enough.

For anyone reading this who never watch Sword Art Online, don’t wait, do it now. It’s great for binge watching. But just in case, here’s the basic plot. In 2022, a virtual reality massively multiplayer online role-playing game called Sword Art Online (SAO) is released. With the NerveGear, a helmet that stimulates the user’s five senses via their brain, players can experience and control their in-game characters with their minds. 10,000 players log into SAO’s mainframe cyberspace for the first time, only to discover that they are unable to log out. Akihiko Kayaba, the game’s inventor, appears and tells the players that they must beat the game if they wish to be free. He also states that those who suffer in-game deaths or forcibly remove the NerveGear out-of-game will suffer real-life deaths.

It’s from that single storyline that this world was created… The years spent in SAO, trapped through the NerveGear; beating the game and escaping; Alfheim Online and freeing Asuna; investigating Gun Gale Online (GGO) and mysterious deaths; and more. This anime has every storyline imaginable built into this world. The power and draw of SAO, to me, is the believably of these stories. Their villains are quite real, and downright scary. The love is true and honest, even if every girl in this anime are in love with one man. It’s a complete story, from start to finish. 

Wallpaper art, Sword art online, Sword Art Online, CAO, Kirito, Sinon images for desktop, section сёнэн - download

There are storylines within the SAO universe that makes even a grown man like me cry. In the SAO II arc “Mother’s Rosario” it was discovered that a terminally ill girl was using the “full dive” VR system to keep her from feeling the pain brought on by her illness. She died in the VR world surrounded by her friends. It was one of the saddest moments in the series. I never thought I would cry watching an anime, but that did it.

The other thing that is rather intoxicating about SAO is the music. Anime theme music is some of the best out there. I have an entire playlist on Amazon of just anime theme music. Eir Aoi and Lisa are two of the best in Japan and their SAO theme songs are just incredible. I mean, Eir Aoi’s “Ignite” from SAO II is like a James Bond theme in anime form. Just watch the video and you’ll see what I mean. Even the music from the SAO movie, Ordinal Scale, was just amazing, especially the final song. Again, tears…

The latest arc, “Alicization” and “War of Underworld” has been phenomenal with a whole new VR world, new technology, new (and old) villains, and what appears to be a wonderful conclusion to this series. Like I said, if you haven’t watched it, do so. From the series to the movie, it’s a great ride for any fantasy/scifi fan!

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

The nightmare that is research all writers must face

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Researching elements for your next novel can be as time consuming as writing it. Depending on the subject matter–whether its fantasy, science fiction, supernatural, or historical–any author worth their pen and paper want their stories to make sense. Accuracy is the key to all this research. But even then, you sometimes have to make concessions for the sake of storytelling.

You can take one subject and find hundreds of different interpretations of the same mythology or history. Take the Arthurian legend of which the Forever Avalon series is based. Did you know that more than 70 authors have used King Arthur as the basis for a novel? There are six adaptations in musical theater of the King Arthur mythos, and more than 20 plays of classic verse. (Yes, I am including Spamalot! in my numbers!) Additionally, there have been 11 operas, 42 feature films on the characters (plus 22 more considered parodies) and five television series. This is not even counting the numerous episodes from Doctor Who to Japanese anime that feature characters from the Arthurian legend. Safe to say, there is plenty of material to research this one topic.

So, for the sake of argument, lets talk about research in general. In today’s day-and-age, Google is your best friend. I have used that search engine for everything from names (first and surnames), language translation, cities and countries names, historical references, etc. It is a one stop shop for everything a writer needs. I even found a reference sheet of “Other words for said” depending on the emotion of the moment. You can’t beat it from spending countless hours in a library, fighting over reference materials. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with spending hours in a library. Those are some of my fondest memories. But this allows you to do the research in your pajamas, something most libraries frown upon.

Happy Birthday, Jules Verne: 70 years of fantastic comic-book classicsThere is a broad basis for research, but to me, some of the best research is in the stories I read. Other writers give me inspiration, tips on writing styles, and ideas behind the story itself. For example, I love alternate history novels. Harry Turtledove is one of my favorite writers of alternative history. That gave me pause when I started working on my own alternate history, a world where Nikola Tesla and Jules Verne met and created a “steampunk” future with Tesla’s inventions and Verne’s inspiration. To do that, I had to research their life story to see if they were every in proximity to meet. Fun fact:  They were! Tesla worked for the Edison Company in France while Verne lived there. That gave me the track to create my story.

This is the importance of research. Even for a fantasy or science fiction story, you need to base what you do in fact. There are times that the story can actually inspire the real thing. Did you know that Steve Jobs got the idea for digital music and the iPod after watching an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation? Gene Roddenberry inspired one of the greatest inventions of our time, not to mention cell phones, iPads, etc. That’s the power of the writer.

The moral to the story is to do your research with all the vigor and vitality you put into writing your story. Even with otherworldly elements within most fantasy/sci-fi stories, they are based on our own history. For Forever Avalon, I researched every know mythology known to mankind. Did you know that Dwarves are featured in the mythologies from Norse to Germanic, Anglo-Saxon to Russian. There are more myths on creation than you can shake a stick at. You have to read through all of this information and cut it down to fit what you’re writing about.

The biggest thing you can do is have a plan. I started my own writing “on the fly” based on my the story that was rattling around in my head, but that doesn’t always work. My subsequent novels have been more planned out, outline oriented. I still start writing the ideas down “on the fly” but I found that I needed to write things down more as I go along, outline it, make a list of everything from character names, city and country names, even languages used as a basis for magic spells. All of this makes it easier to build the world I am creating within my story.

I hope I’ve given you some good tools and examples of what to do and what not to do when researching subjects for your novel. I think astronaut Neil Armstrong said it best … “Research is creating new knowledge.” However, I like this quote even beter:

“Research is what I’m doing when I don’t know what I’m doing.” — Wernher von Braun

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

A broken heart is the worst kind of writer’s block

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Science proves how you can actually die of a broken heart ...

Writer’s Block is something I talk about a lot, probably because in recent weeks (or months) I’ve had a serious bad case of it. The question is, how do you write when your heart is broken? The heart, to me, is the soul of the writer. It’s where the inspiration emanates and flows into the pen (or keyboard) for any writer.

“Every secret of a writer’s soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind, is written large in his works.” — Virginia Woolf

I don’t mean to get personal here, but I think that this might help me get over my own writer’s block. You see, about a year ago, my oldest daughter stopped talking to me and my wife. In fact, she has pretty much disassociated herself from us, her brother and her sister. And the sad part is, it was over something as stupid as politics and a cultural/social disagreement.

You hear a lot about that nowadays in today’s harsh political climate. Families torn apart because some are on the left and some are on the right when it comes to political and social views. My case is just one of many to see the light of day in this so-called new age of enlightenment. It has made my oldest daughter distance herself from her family because our political views are different.

I’ve had differences of opinion on politics my whole life in my family. I never really saw eye-to-eye with my parents or my sister, but I never totally dismissed them because of it. We simply agree to disagree and not talk politics whenever I visit. And yet, my daughter seems to think that because I don’t agree with her views, I don’t support who she is or her way of life, and therefore she wants nothing to do with me. This happened over a year ago, and to this day, I haven’t been able to write like before. Little bits, here and there, but the inspiration is faltering because my heart is broken.

Here is a little girl who I watched grow up into a beautiful woman. I was there when she graduated high school, college, moved into her first apartment, and got married. But now, she’s turned away from us and I don’t know what to do. Things like this weigh heavy on a parent. What did I do wrong? What could I have done differently? These questions rage within me, night and day, and its affects me more and more as the days wear on.

When my wife breaks down and cries, wishing things could go back to the way they were, it just breaks my heart. As holidays, anniversaries, and birthdays pass us by, it gets even harder. I try to understand her feelings, and even though I don’t agree with her train of thought, she’s a grown woman. She’s free to think and do as she wants. That’s what freedom of choice, freedom of expression, and freedom of speech mean in America.

I served my country in the U.S. Navy for more than 23 years, fighting to defend those freedoms. It’s the same old adage… I disagree with what you’re saying, but I will defend your right to say it with every fiber of my being. I wish it was as simple as that, but its not.

There is more to it than that, I’m sure, but in the end, it has definitely hampered my ability as a writer. I can’t focus on my stories, partly because she is a part of them. You see, in the Forever Avalon series, I channeled my children and their personalities into the children of the protagonist, Lord Bryan MoodDrake. Although this iteration is more of a homage than my actual children, it still represents how I saw them when I wrote my first book over 20 years ago. Unfortunately, there is a difference between then and now, and that is giving me a pause in my writing. It’s hard to put the words down when the person you imagine speaking them isn’t talking to you.

I hope and pray that we can come together again in the near future. The problem is that, the longer this stretches out, the more the heart goes numb to the whole situation. Numb is not a good feeling, even worse being a writer. That feeling stretches across me, body and soul, and I don’t like it one bit. Sylvia Plath said, “The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.” I can honestly attest to that.

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

The best fantasy/scifi movies you never watched, but you should

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There are plenty of inspirations when it comes to fantasy and science fiction. Most people have their favorites, i.e. Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, etc. Me, I’m a little old school. My obsession with the fantasy and sci-fi genre began with movies many people today either haven’t seen, forgot or ignored. In any case, each one of these movies has a unique charm about them (for lack of a better term) making them a must-see for any fan or geek. These are my personal picks, so I would love to hear whether you agree or disagree. Either way, I hope you’ll take some “COVID19 down time” to watch some or all of these classics.

The Final Countdown (1980) — This is a kick-ass, “Red, White, & Blue” Hell-yah,  U-S-A, movie with a simple science fiction twist. The nuclear aircraft carrier USS Nimitz is sent back in time to days before the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. It has an all-star cast ( Kirk Douglas, Martin Sheen, James Farentino, Katharine Ross and Charles Durning) but the real star is the U.S. Navy. As a young man, looking to his future after high school, this movie made me want to sign up.  The filming from the flight deck to the sky above, seeing two F-14 Tomcats take on Japanese Zeroes, was epic. This is not your average science fiction movie, but the whole time travel aspect was so well done and wrapped up nicely at the end.

The Black Cauldron poster.jpgThe Black Cauldron (1985) — This is a Disney film, but its one of the darkest Disney films they ever made. The plot is your basic boy becomes hero by defeating the evil sorcerer, your usual fantasy genre yarn, but the visuals of this film are stunning. Something I didn’t know was that it was loosely based on the first two books in The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander, a series of five novels that are, in turn, based on Welsh mythology. Set in the mythical land of Prydain during the Early Middle Ages, the film centers on the evil Horned King who hopes to secure an ancient magical cauldron that will aid him in his desire to conquer the world. He is opposed by a young pigherder named Taran, the princess Eilonwy, a bard and a wild creature named Gurgi who seek to destroy the cauldron. This was Disney’s 25th animated feature, the first animated film to receive a PG rating, and it doesn’t get the props like Disney’s other animated films because of the dark storyline. No matter what, this is a great fantasy movie to see.

Battle Beyond the Stars (1980) — In the age when every movie wanted to look like and have the success of Star Wars, this movie fits the bill to a “T” and then some. Staring Richard Thomas (John Boy from The Waltons TV series) and produced by the genius Roger Corman, this movie had every science fiction movie trope in it, including the kitchen sink. Corman intended this movie to be a remake of the classic The Magnificent Seven but set in outer space. It had a stellar cast, from the legendary John Saxon and George Peppard to Robert Vaughn, and the effects were as expected for 1980, pre-CGI. The story follows the expected plot… The farming world Akir is threatened by the tyrannical warlord Sador (Saxon). Sador’s huge dreadnaught has a “Stellar Converter”, a weapon that turns planets into small stars. He demands that the peaceful Akira submit to him or he will turn his Stellar Converter on their planet. They want to hire mercenaries to protect their world, but since Akir lacks valuable resources, its people can offer just food and shelter in payment. Shad (Thomas) volunteers for the recruiting mission. It is a strange movie, full of Corman’s classic sci-fi tropes,  including a Space Cowboy, half-dressed Valkyrie warrior, an elite assassin, and a reptilian slaver, but it is well laid out and fun to watch.

The Black Hole.jpgThe Black Hole (1979) — Yet another Disney film that  has been relegated to the void that is the Disney vault due to its dark and violent nature. Another great cast ( Maximilian Schell, Robert Forster, Joseph Bottoms, Yvette Mimieux, Anthony Perkins and Ernest Borgnine) fills the screen with astounding visuals of a black hole in space, before Interstellar. The Palomino, nearing the end of its deep space mission, discovers a black hole in space with a large spaceship nearby, somehow defying the hole’s massive gravitational pull. The ship is identified as the long-lost USS Cygnus. Deciding to investigate, the Palomino encounters a mysterious null gravity field surrounding the Cygnus. What they find on board is far worse… Dr. Hans Reinhardt, a brilliant scientist, and what appears to be a crew of robots. They are not faceless drones, but are in fact the human crew who mutinied when Reinhardt refused to return to Earth and had been lobotomized and “reprogrammed” by Reinhardt to serve him and his floating murder-bot Maximilian. Again, a very dark movie for Disney that was not well received by critics but earned two Academy award nominations for cinematography and visual effects.

Dragonslayer (1981) — This movie is very familiar to anyone who played Dungeons and Dragons in the 80’s, but it is not seen as a top-rated movie like LOTR and others. It should be. Dragonslayer gave us our first look at a dragon, an honest to God dragon and all its power and glory. Before there was CGI, there was GoMotion, created by Industrial, Light and Magic for The Empire Strikes Back, Raiders of the Lost Ark and other classic movies of the 80s. In this movie, we got a dragon named Vermithrax that was everything you expected it to be… Evil, deadly, and downright terrifying. Another great cast (Peter MacNicol, Ralph Richardson, John Hallam and Caitlin Clarke) fills out this epic tale of a young apprentice taking on the beast to prove himself worthy as a sorcerer against a King who for years has placated the dragon with a virgin sacrifice. This is a worthy fantasy epic and a must see movie!

Deathstalker (1983) - Rotten TomatoesDeathstalker (1983) — The last movie on my list is another 80’s Roger Corman classic, filled with your favorite fantasy genre movie tropes just like he did in Battle Beyond the Stars. It’s a very Conan-esque movie, with buff men in leather, scantily-clad women, swords and sorcerers. It spawned four sequels, but this is the one to watch. Against, a basic storyline of sword-wielding mercenary on a quest to retrieve four magical items to stop a sorcerer from destroying his world. Along the way, he meets other warriors entering a tournament to find the greatest warrior and gain control over the kingdom. It’s not Shakespeare but it has all the qualities of a sword/sorcerer movie of the 80’s. It fits right in with The Beastmaster, Conan the Barbarian, and other fantasy movies of that time. Corman is a genius of the screen when it comes to movies like these.

So again, these are far from the Oscar-worthy movies you normally think of in the fantasy/sci-fi genre, but they have all the elements you think of when you watch these movies. I would love to hear about your favorites that I might have missed in my list, please comment and let me know.

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

Building a world, from the ground up, isn’t as easy as you think

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Worldbuilding: How to Create a Believable World for Your Fiction ...

Worldbuilding is defined as “the process of creating a fictional world that can be as complex as designing an entirely new and unique location with exotic creatures, societies, religions, and governments.”

Most people think creating the story is the first step of a writer. Wrong. The first step is creating the world. Sure, the story is the idea, but you can’t have a story with the world it exists in. Whether that be another world like Middle Earth or a dystopian future, version of the United States, you need to create it first so you know the elements you’ll need in your story. We’re talking people and races, type of government, land masses, bodies of water, etc. Your cities will need names, what religion do they worship (if any), even the technology used (medieval, steampunk, cyber-tech, etc.) all need to be considered.

In the Forever Avalon series, I had to create the island of Avalon, from the various races, land masses, creatures, etc. It was a daunting task. I started with the capital, New Camelot, and worked out from there. A lot of my world building included a lot of research on myths and legends. From the Elven city of Alfheimer to the Dwarf mountain of Hursag, these are places within the our world mythology when it comes to Elves and Dwarfs. Since Avalon became a repository for all magic in the world (in my story), I wanted it to accurately portray the legends while adding my own touch.

When writing, you set your characters out on quests and journeys, and to do so, you need to know where they’re going and what lands or obstacles are in their way. Forests, mountain ranges, towns and cities all need to be identified with unique names and their own personality, for lack of a better word. In Avalon, the Fenris Mountains were named because the jagged peaks resembled the teeth of the legendary creature. Blackbriar Forest so named because, in the deep recesses of the woods, no light can pierce the canopy, leaving it a dark and dangerous place to travel. Merlin’s Pinnacle is a lone peak that stands separate from any mountain range, said to be the resting place of the eternal magician. These are just some of the places I created within the world of Forever Avalon, and even now, I’m adding or changing things as the story progresses.

One of the best tools in world building, for me, was Dungeons and Dragons. I played the RPG religiously as a young adult. As a writer, I found it to be a great tool in world building and character development. In fact, I took some of the characters and places I used as a Dungeon Master and player in D&D and used them in my novels. For example, in my latest novel, The Outlander War, there  is a new character named Abdel Ben Faust, a half-demon mercenary. This character is based on a half-orc fighter I played in the game. I had to make some adjustments since Orcs don’t exist in my world, but the basis for the character came from D&D.

A Brief Intro To Worldbuilding – Alexandra Peel

I also took inspiration from other fantasy novels, which I’m sure many authors do. In the Forever Avalon series, the home of my protagonist, Lord Bryan MoonDrake, is the floating dragon island of Emmyr. I took this from my love of Michael Moorcock and the Elric series, in which Melniboné (The Dragon Isle) and only surviving city is Imrryr, known as The Dreaming City. For many of us today, it’s the authors of these series that has inspired us to write our own stories. As they say, imitation is the most since form of flattery.

Another great tool for world building, especially when it comes to names, is Google. Searching through the different names in different cultures, whether its a Surname list or using Google translate to look up words in different languages for a town name, it becomes a helpful tool for writers. For example, when I named taverns and inns in Avalon, I always named them after an animal with an adjective to make it more colorful:  The Grinning Toad, The Weathered Wren, The Green Griffon, The Crooked Goose. This kept my thought process in line as I was writing the stories.

Maps are also useful. I’m no mapmaker, but as I put things together in my novel, I made a makeshift map of the world I was creating. I just marked the major points so I could figure out directions and to ensure consistency as I wrote my novel. I didn’t want to say they went north one time, and the next time they were going to the same place but I said south instead. You need to be consistent in your planning.

So, you need to think long and hard about the world you’re creating. The landscape is as essential as character development.

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

Positive reviews of THE OUTLANDER WAR keep rolling in!

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This has been another stellar week for the Forever Avalon series, in particular for The Outlander War: Book 3 of the Forever Avalon series. I received some great reviews and I wanted to share them with all of you!

First is from Jennie Rosenblum at jenniereads.com. Now, Jennie’s from New Jersey, like me, so we have a lot in common. Her website says it all about her as a book reviewer. “This is to answer all those requests for my opinion on books.  I read, I suggest, I review and I BLOG.  My reviews, as you will read, are a little different.  It really irks me to see reviews that are a page summarizing the entire book and then giving very little comments on the book.  My reviews are more along the line of – well written – great characters that seem like real people – plot made sense.  One thing you will not find on my blog is me trashing a book.  Authors work really hard creating their books and I respect their work.  It’s like telling someone their kid is an awful creation – even if he/she is tearing apart your living room – you just don’t use those words.”

She has reviewed the entire Forever Avalon series, and her review of The Outlander War is no exception.

“From the moment I got this book into my hands, I knew the author had upped his game.  The cover is intense and eye-catching.  And then I started to read—–  I have enjoyed this series from the first book.  I would hand it to anyone over the age of 13 that wanted a great adventure, escape, or to travel to another land.  In this, Book 3 – Avalon has entered the real world.  The conflict and discourse of the two worlds were realistically portrayed.  What happens when your world conflicts with another or totally changes, how would you react?  The reader gets to experience several different reactions as well as processes that the characters go through to deal with their new situations. “ — Jennie Rosenblum, jenniereads.com

Next is a young lady going by the name NewBookReviewer from Mumbai, Maharashtra in India.It’s amazing the people you meet on social media. Her Amazon profile says it all about her. “I’m just like any other girl who is trying to be a bibliophile. I love reading books, as I find myself lost in them and I create a whole new world in my head by reading what the Author has described. I think having a hobby helps you to cope with the work and family pressure. I sometimes read just to escape reality. 🙂 I have read many books and most of them had good reviews and it helped me to choose and read them, but recently I came across a new book without any review, at first I was not sure if I should read it or not, but being a book lover you cant really stop your curious self, so I read it and I found myself amazed. The book was great. So after reading it I saw there were many other new books with interesting stories and covers. So I started this blog so that I could post and review about the new books released and motivate the new Authors to write more, as there are some book lovers like me, who value writing and content.”

She reviewed all three books in the Forever Avalon series and I appreciate her kind words and appreciation of my series. It means a lot coming from someone from a different culture and history who recognizes the story behind the myths and legends.

“The story has an amazing start, which starts with a mysteries and attention-grabbing dream and once you read it you will know that you have picked the right book that’s going to be adventurous. The story is filled with a fascinating adventure to a magical island that is shielded from the outside world for 3,000 years frozen in time and space. The book contains from Kings to knights, from magical creatures like elves to dragons, from wizards to dwarves, from adventure to mystery, from action to drama, from suspense to truth the book is a captivating and addictive storyline.” — NewBookReviewer.com review of FOREVER AVALON

“The story is continuous of the first book, and the way the author has maintained the flow of the storyline it’s commendable. Author Mark Piggott is a talented writer and you can see his hard work and passion for writing through this series. A truly amazing and must-read book. The highlight of the book is, the grasping storyline, as soon as I was done reading the first book I couldn’t wait to continue reading with the next book. The author has done tremendous work in describing characters, from their feeling to their personalities, every bit of their nature is described in detail and expressed beautifully.” — NewBookReviewer.com review of THE DARK TIDES

“The Outlander War is the 3rd book in the Forever Avalon Series written by Mark Piggott and its a series that you will never find anything thing like it. What would you do if you find a magical island that is frozen in time and space for more than 3,000 years and you soon accept it as your new home, but suddenly the real world comes knocking, ready for war; A war is fixed but whose side you will be on? Well, the answer to this is in the book The Outlander War. This is the third book in the Forever Avalon series, that I m reading, and I m just obsessed with the storyline and the expressive writing skills of the author Mark Piggott.” — NewBookReviewer.com review of THE OUTLANDER WAR

This is genuinely humbling for me to receive these wonderful accolades and feedback on my novels. It’s expressions like this that make he happy that I chose to be a writer and share all my stories with people. That’s why I am a writer!

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

Books are now the target of “cancel culture”

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My Turn: What 'I'm not politically correct!' really meansI’ve talked previously about “revisionist history” and the whole changing the world outlook from the “PC” police. It’s not a good sign when everything is wrong in movies, television, and now books. In an article published on July 3 in the Washington Post, While offensive TV shows get pulled, problematic books are still inspiring debate and conversation, book critic Ron Charles said…

“The great reckoning now sweeping across pop culture has been working through the stacks of literature for far longer. The effects of time are twofold: Most books have fallen into dust, along with the racist values they imbibed. And those few texts that survive have been subjected to rigorous — and ongoing — debate.”

So now its books. Books! Are we going to have a good ole book burning, like we saw at Nazi rallies or even in movies like Footloose, where religious zealots burned books like Fahrenheit 451 because of its content. In the article, Charles mentioned books like Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn  and Shakespeare’s Othello as examples of racist language not fit for today’s society. Oh course it’s not, but that’s not the point.

As I’ve said before, I’m all for racial equality across the boards. That’s been my mantra for my entire life, and I lived through the 60’s and 70’s in the South. But I draw the line at banning books. Free speech is free speech. It is an essential part of our life as American citizens. I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend your right to say it with every fiber of my being. That said, I draw the line at book banning or censorship of any kind.

Books are the reflection of our life in this world. The stories of every generation can be found in the books written at that time. Yes, they can be crass, profane, and definitely not politically correct by today’s standards, but they are a reflection of the time they were written in. Books are the chronology of our life written by the authors of the time.  When you read Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Huckleberry Finn, The Invisible Man, and other novels, you see the progression of our country through the racial divides. It speaks to the power of literature.

OUR DEFINITIONS OF UNPOLITICALLY CORRECT & POLITICALLY CORRECT ...

“Under the best circumstances, that’s the enriching conversation that literature can inspire: the alchemy that transmutes authors’ moral and artistic flaws into insight and understanding. I don’t mean to suggest that we’re under any super-sophisticated obligation to tolerate plainly racist books. But if cancel culture has a weakness, it’s that it risks short-circuiting the process of critical engagement that leads to our enlightenment.” ~ Ron Charles, the Washington Post

That’s the rub. If we start going after everything one group of people consider offensive (i.e. Gone with the Wind), then where does it stop? What purpose does it have if we “cancel” these novels and no longer discuss or engage in dialogue along these lines? Silence… Nothing but silence. Books allow us to have these constant discussions on race, culture, and society as a whole. It’s what helps us progress and move forward, not backwards.

Take The Great Gatsby for example. In this one novel, F. Scott Fitzgerald lays out everything from race relations to capitalism, alcoholism and class warfare. It is a model of society in that era, the wrong and the right, and opens the door to discuss what changes we could make in our world. This one novel opens up a wide range of discussion on many different topics. To get rid of it would be a great loss to us all.

Are there offensive books out there? Absolutely. There are many that I find offensive and would never read myself, but I’m just one person. We can’t let one person, or one group, dictate to the rest of us what we can or cannot read. Then, we start treading into fascism and communism, one government  rule, and then the next thing to go is our freedom. I don’t want to live like that, do you?

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

Read some alternative historical fiction to understand our history

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Harry Turtledove Combo [3 TITLES] How Few Remain (1997), The Great War: American Front (1999), & Ruled Britannia (2003): Harry Turtledove: Amazon.com: BooksThere’s been a lot of news lately about protesters and anarchists causing chaos and tearing down statues. Some see these as a progressive move forward in America, while others look at it as rewriting our history. There are good arguments on both sides. When it comes to statues of Confederate Generals and leaders in the Confederacy, I have no problem with removing them. They should not be out in the open, on display, but rather in a museum or national park (Civil War battlefield) to explain the war and why it happened. That’s where history belongs, in the museums and parks that illustrate why we are here.

First, let me say that I support and understand the arguments for black lives matter. I understand because my daughter-in-law is African-American and, listening to the experiences of her and her family, it makes me realize that my experiences are vastly different from theirs. I grew up in the 60’s and 70’s in North Carolina, and I never saw or experienced issues with race. I was raised not to judge people by the color of their skin. Even during my 23 years in the Navy, it was never an issue. In fact, most of the senior enlisted and officers I served under were African American. Like I said, it has never been an issue with me.

However, in my lifetime, I discovered that it’s never a good idea to erase or rewrite history. Remember the famous quote from George Santayana… “Those who do not remember their past are condemned to repeat their mistakes.” I truly believe that. They are using these otherwise peaceful protests to vandalize these statues. First, it was Confederate monuments, now its Washington, Jefferson, Grant, Lincoln, Roosevelt, and others. They even vandalized statues of abolitionists, women suffragettes, Winston Churchill and Gandhi. It’s no longer about police reform or rights of African Americans, but about changing America itself.

I will agree that we are far from perfect as a nation. What country is? There are parts of our history that were long considered brutal, horrific and nothing to be proud of. And yet, it’s what led us to be the people we are today. The best way to understand history is to look at alternate history of what could have been. The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick, as both a novel and TV series, gives us a glimpse of the world if the Nazi’s won World War II, even if you look past the science fiction vibe of the story. For me, the best writer of alternative historical fiction is Harry Turtledove.

Harry Turtledove takes one point in time, one instantaneous moment in history, and changes it, altering the future and changing the history as we know it. The best example of this is his novel, How Few Remain. This is the first book of a series that spans from ten years after the Civil War through World War II, but with different outcomes. In this alternate reality, the South wins the war, Lincoln is ousted as president and becomes a stout Marxist, Lee and Longstreet eventually become Presidents of the Confederacy, Great Britain and France are allies of the South while Germany becomes an ally of the USA, there is no rise to fascism in Germany, and instead of a Jewish Holocaust, the mass killings happen to blacks in the South. This twisted view of history is only a possibility, but it demonstrates the power of our own history and how it could have been.

Harry Turtledove has done other books outside of U.S. history; if the Romans continued to rule Europe in the modern day; if Japan won the war in the Pacific, the Korean War escalates into World War III; and other more fantastic and science fiction based alternative histories (aliens invading at the peak of World War II, magic existing in the world and how that changed history, and a trilogy where the Yellowstone Caldera erupts at some unspecified point in the future.) His writings are immaculate and intensively researched to where you actually believe that these timelines could exist.

I’m not trying to be political here. I am a firm believer that we need to learn from our history, and destroying statues to erase history is what the Nazis did, what the Taliban and Isis did, what every dictator in history did to erase the history they disagreed with and put their own in place. It’s not how we learn. We learn from remembering our history to make the world a better place, because that’s what we do as authors.

The stories of our lives are written down by the authors to keep the knowledge alive.

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

Racism in a medieval fantasy world… An excerpt from THE DARK TIDES

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Today is “Juneteenth” all across this nation, a day to honor the day President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation and freed those still held in slavery in 1865. In honor of this day, I wanted to share something with you. I wrote about this very subject in my second novel, The Dark Tides. When I created the world of Forever Avalon, the concept was based around the Bermuda Triangle and where the ships and aircraft that disappeared ended up. In my world, they traveled through a rift in the magical barrier and found themselves on the island of Avalon. So, with that premise, it was possible that a ship carrying captured slaves from Africa ended up on Avalon.

So now I had to mix a world of medieval magic with people, ripped from their homes, and now in a world unknown to them. To me, they would be quite cautious of people and set themselves apart from the rest of Avalon. So now, the stage was set as the Gil-Gamesh, Bryan MoonDrake, a sailor from the modern world who lived through the civil rights movement, Dr. Martin Luther King, and racial integration, enters into this new land. He hopes to bridge the gap of fear and mistrust with what he’s learned and experienced in the outside world.

Here is an excerpt from The Dark Tides as I use the teachings of Dr. King to make a difference my own medieval, fantasy world.

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As T’Ronga led the Gil-Gamesh through the streets of Togo, Bryan was amazed by the people here. They were very simple folk, dressed in animal furs and cloth woven with colorful designs. The one thing Bryan noticed was how strong and muscular everyone looked, including the women and children. It was as if the entire nation were bred to be warriors.

“I meant to ask this before T’Ronga, but you and others speak English better than I expected. Why is that?”

“One of the first great Chiefs of Togo, Elewa, made our people learn the white man’s language. It is best to know one’s enemy through the language they speak.”

“You really think of us as your enemy? The people of Avalon I mean?” T’Ronga stopped and stared down the Gil-Gamesh.

“It was the white man that captured my ancestors, took them from their homes, their family, and their people and brought them to the white man’s world. Why shouldn’t we consider the people of Avalon our enemies?”

“Avalon is made up of many different races, different cultures and we respect that which makes each of them unique. I’m not your enemy. I hope there comes a day when you will consider me a friend.”

T’Ronga said nothing as he turned and continued on their way. The Togo people stared at the Gil-Gamesh with curiosity and surprise. Most of them had never seen a white man walking freely through the streets without being bound in chains nor allowed to carry weapons. It was completely unheard of on Togo.

As word spread across the city of the arrival of the Gil-Gamesh, people began to line the streets as the crowds fell in behind T’Ronga and his warriors, following them to the Gathering Mount. In the center of Togo was what appeared to be a mound of earth, approximately 500 feet in diameter and over 100 feet tall. In reality, it was a dome of stone, wood, thatch and tar with large crystals embedded in the structure to reflect the light inside. A large opening at the top of the dome circulated air inside through the four entrances at the base, each facing North, South, East and West.

As T’Ronga brought the Gil-Gamesh inside the Gathering Mount, Bryan was again amazed as to how a medieval society could build such an impressive structure with no modern tools or equipment. Stone arches reached up from the floor to hold up the ceiling, connected by wooden beams. There were no chairs or seats for anyone to sit in. At the back of the dome sat a raised dais, made solely of human skulls, with a throne of bones at the top. A shadowy figure sat there, staring out into the darkness. It was a gruesome sight, something made to invoke fear and dominance over people. Bryan wondered if he’d bitten off more than he could chew.

From the throne, the shadowy figure stepped down. He was a heavy-set man but very muscular, adorned with silver and ivory jewelry. He wore a cloak of various animal furs sewn together, clasped around his neck by an ornate broach of gold and rubies. He wore a leather bodice while the rest of his body was painted like the others. Atop his head was a headdress made from the feathers of a variety of birds with a small skull with precious gems in the sockets centered. He held a staff adorned with metal rings, one representing each of the chiefs of Togo, and a human skull at the top of the staff. It was said that the skull was that of the captain of the slave ship that brought them to Avalon.

“That is B’Rrak, Great Chieftain of Togo,” T’Ronga told Bryan. Chief B’Rrak walked down and stood in front of the as he glanced back to see T’Ronga and his men with the Gil-Gamesh. T’Ronga gave an order to the warriors around the Gil-Gamesh and they closed in tight. “You will wait here,” he ordered Bryan as he walked over to Chief B’Rrak.

Bryan stood in the Gathering Mount, awaiting his fate at the hands of these outcasts of Avalon. He watched closely as T’Ronga spoke with Chief B’Rrak; their conversation heated and quite vocal at times. T’Ronga seemed to plead for the Gil-Gamesh to speak. Bryan hoped he found an ally in this Togo warrior. Finally, Chief B’Rrak relented and returned to his throne.

T’Ronga signaled his men to bring the Gil-Gamesh forward. The Togo warriors nudged Bryan toward the throne, still surrounded as he approached the Skull Throne. Chief B’Rrak waved them off as they stepped back behind Bryan. The throngs of people who lined the streets started to file into the Gathering Mount. Their curiosity had brought them inside to see what Chief B’Rrak will do with the stranger.

“Gil-Gamesh, you stand in the presence of B’Rrak, Great Chieftain of Togo,” T’Ronga proclaimed. “Step forward and be heard.”

Bryan bowed to the Chieftain. “I am honored Chief B’Rrak. I am Bryan MoonDrake, the Gil-Gamesh of Avalon. I humbled to be able to speak with you.”

“Do not thank me Gil-Gamesh, thank T’Ronga,” B’Rrak denoted. “The only reason you are still alive is because he says you are a man of honor. You asked for an opportunity to speak, so speak!”

Bryan collected his thoughts, carefully putting together his words so as not to offend B’Rrak or the people of Togo. “I have been overwhelmed by everything I have seen since I arrived on Avalon and Togo is no exception. You have truly built a wonderful life for yourself here.

“I will not pretend to understand the hardships you or your ancestors went through when they arrived on Avalon. I have read stories about the slave trade at that time in our history. It was barbaric and unforgiving; but while you have lived here with the hate and contempt for the white man for hundreds of years, slavery of your people ended in the real world. You see, I am not from Avalon, I am an Outlander.

“So much has changed since your ancestors survived their journey and arrived on the shores of Togo. Africans now live, work and worship side-by-side with the white man. In fact, the barriers between the different races are practically non-existent. It happened in the real world and it can happen here. As the Gil-Gamesh, I can help bridge the gap between Avalon and Togo and build a new and lasting relationship.”

“Togo has prospered without the help of you, Gil-Gamesh, or anyone in Avalon,” B’Rrak shouted from atop his throne. “We will not bow down and pay tribute to the white king.” The large gathering of people cheered loudly, encouraged by the Chief’s words.

“And no one is asking you to Chief B’Rrak,” Bryan continued. “All I have heard since my arrival on Avalon is praise and respect for Togo. You have the fiercest warriors equal to any knight and powerful shaman on par with the great wizards on Avalon. We would love the opportunity to learn more from each other. The potential is unlimited.

“I didn’t have to come to Togo as part of my Grand Tour of Avalon, but I wanted too. I wanted to reach out to you, to all of you. The time to open relations between Avalon and Togo is now. All I ask is that you give us a chance.”

“A chance? A chance for what? To stab us in the back and return my people to a life of slavery? That’s all the white man has ever wanted!” B’Rrak condemned.

“With all due respect Great Chief, you’re wrong!” Bryan interrupted. A hush fell over the audience. No one had ever spoken to the Great Chieftain before. “This is the time for us to prove you wrong about the people of Avalon, to show you that we are not like the people who enslaved your ancestors.

“A wise man once spoke of a world where his children would be judged by the content of their character, not by the color of their skin. He said, ‘Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.’ His name was Martin Luther King, a son of African slaves, who believed that all people of all races could live together in peace. It was a dream he was willing to die for. Don’t let that dream die here too. You cannot live in hate when there is an opportunity for peace.”

T’Ronga was moved by the Gil-Gamesh’s words, as were some of the people in the audience. Never before had they heard anything like this from anyone from Avalon. “Your words touch many here Gil-Gamesh and though your heart may be true, there are many on Avalon who are not as willing as you,” Chief B’Rrak said. “Maybe someday there can be peace with Avalon, but I do not think this is such a time.”

“Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak with you Great Chief. May I have your permission to leave Togo in peace?” Bryan said as he bowed to Chief B’Rak.

Chief B’Rrak sat in silence then motioned to T’Ronga. “You may go Gil-Gamesh. May the Gods smile upon you through the rest of your journey,” B’Rrak blessed as T’Ronga led Bryan out. The crowd parted as they moved through, allowing them to leave the Gathering Mount. Some of the people bowed their heads in respect to the Gil-Gamesh, something never done before on Togo. Chief B’Rrak watched his people as he considered what the Gil-Gamesh said.

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I try my best not to get political in my books or on my own social media. I think that people who enjoy fantasy come from all walks of life, not just one ideology. This, however, is a time when we all have to think about the status quo and how we can talk about it and, hopefully, change it for the future. I don’t know if my books can make a difference, but I hope it does bring a voice of clarity in these dark and tumultuous times.

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.

A great week for THE OUTLANDER WAR with reviews and interviews

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It has been a banner week for myself, for The Outlander War, and the Forever Avalon series in general. I will admit that, as a writer, I love it when people read my books and just get excited about reading it. It’s not about the accolades and awards, but rather the affirmation that I’m doing something that people enjoy. It’s what makes being an author so “kick ass” if you know what I mean. And this past week has been no exception.

I received my first review of the third novel in the Forever Avalon series, The Outlander War, from one of its editors. Michael Stettes is a writer-editor like me, whom I work with in my day job in Washington, D.C. About two years ago, I asked him for his help in editing The Outlander War. To do that, he first asked to read my first two books and then he edited my third before I sent it off to the publisher. Mike was a big help to me and his honesty about my writing and storytelling made me understand the writing process, my often “wordiness” in sentences, and plot holes that I needed to avoid. He recently posted an honest review about The Outlander War.

“The Outlander War is a clever, action-fueled tale of ancient Arthurian magic vs. the modern military, conjured in striking detail through the expertise of veteran Mark Piggott. Every page of this magic vs. machine epic is packed with brilliant details, clever characters, and powerful, heartfelt heroism.”

Those words mean a lot to me. I love hearing from my fans, but coming from someone I consider a peer is a real honor. Thanks Mike!

Lastly, I had the great honor to be interviewed by another peer, author Robert B. Hayek. RB Hayek has been writing for over a decade. A graduate of Cal State Fullerton, Hayek authored two books and a writing credit on two web series. He has written freelance for several websites and also has worked for several prominent companies including Fox Sports and CBS Sports. He invited me to participate in an author interview.

“Piggott went the writer’s route and that enabled him to expand his imagination, and his horizons on the possibilities to what he might do. One of the principal themes in his stories is mixing folklore with fantasy.”

You can check out Robert and his website, providing various services to authors, by clicking here and check out my interview here.

UPDATE: Right after its release, Robert’s interview with yours truly was feature in the online literary magazine, S.H. Literary Times Daily. Congratulations Robert and thanks for the awesome exposure for Forever Avalon!

So, as always, I’d like to put a plug here about helping out those independent authors. Reviews are the life-blood of any authors but it means the most to those of us trying to get by with a big-name publisher or literary agent under our belts. Please, if you read a book, LEAVE A REVIEW. Good or bad, I want to know how I’m doing, just be honest. Thanks again for all your support!

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Mark Piggott is the author of the Forever Avalon book series. Forever Avalon is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon. The Dark Tides is available for purchase as a paperback/ebook at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iUniverse Publishing. The Outlander War, Book Three of the Forever Avalon series is available from Austin Macauley Publishing.