Ask the Author: E. Kaiser Writes
Answered Questions (13)
E. Kaiser Writes
I'd say that Girta isn't the "special answer to prayer" child, the way that Ilise is. But, once Ilise is born, that their mother is able to carry another child... but this time the baby is kind of "opposite" their first born in almost every way.
So Girta's strong gifts, or determination and enthusiasm, may seem more "every day", but can also get her into plenty of trouble, as we shall see by the time we get to "Princess Of Noren", (book 5?-ish? :-) I haven't finished up to there yet! :-) )
Thanks so much for asking, and for reading their tale! <3 We Heart you!
So Girta's strong gifts, or determination and enthusiasm, may seem more "every day", but can also get her into plenty of trouble, as we shall see by the time we get to "Princess Of Noren", (book 5?-ish? :-) I haven't finished up to there yet! :-) )
Thanks so much for asking, and for reading their tale! <3 We Heart you!
E. Kaiser Writes
Ah... that is a question, isn't it? ;-)
I do assure you, that as a determined queen of her kingdom and well aware of her duty, Ilise does indeed find and marry a consort before her tale is done.
WHO that consort is... well, I can't reveal that till that book comes out!!
So you have a vote for who you would like it to be? :-)
I do assure you, that as a determined queen of her kingdom and well aware of her duty, Ilise does indeed find and marry a consort before her tale is done.
WHO that consort is... well, I can't reveal that till that book comes out!!
So you have a vote for who you would like it to be? :-)
E. Kaiser Writes
Thanks, Lesa!
Yes, the fairytales have been around for a long time for a reason, they really stick with people well!
The original novels are somewhat different, set in a different world with a lot less "fairytale-ness" to it, more closer to a historical tale that isn't actually... but they are also a lot of fun to work with!
The characters in each set are really fun to be around, creative-wise!
Yes, the fairytales have been around for a long time for a reason, they really stick with people well!
The original novels are somewhat different, set in a different world with a lot less "fairytale-ness" to it, more closer to a historical tale that isn't actually... but they are also a lot of fun to work with!
The characters in each set are really fun to be around, creative-wise!
E. Kaiser Writes
Wow, thanks so much for your enthisastic feedback, Heidi!!! I'm so thrilled that you loved them, and that you're excited for more!!
Yes, I (/we) ARE going to release White Castle!! But first, I have to finish writing it... and I'm working on that!!
I was thinking possibly next year would be a good time, to plan on having it finished by and then also all the other stuff that goes into a release... It's a big effort to take it from words to book!!! :-)
But with encouragement like this, I keep being reminded that readers are waiting, so thanks for reaching out. We authors can get sidetracked and distracted, depressed and a hundred other things... so reader appreciation is the Gold that an author needs!!!
So glad you enjoyed the books... and what did you think of the ending to King's Ward? :-)
Yes, I (/we) ARE going to release White Castle!! But first, I have to finish writing it... and I'm working on that!!
I was thinking possibly next year would be a good time, to plan on having it finished by and then also all the other stuff that goes into a release... It's a big effort to take it from words to book!!! :-)
But with encouragement like this, I keep being reminded that readers are waiting, so thanks for reaching out. We authors can get sidetracked and distracted, depressed and a hundred other things... so reader appreciation is the Gold that an author needs!!!
So glad you enjoyed the books... and what did you think of the ending to King's Ward? :-)
E. Kaiser Writes
I truly have to say it is Ilise and her man from the Thaw books, (even though I wrote them! ;-) I'm not a "romance" writer, but this JUST CAME OUT) Their romance is heart breaking, breathtaking and life affirming in a way that gives me chills. (And I am NOT a romance-buff... it's just, this relationship is so DEEP that I can't help but *flail* whenever I think about it.)
Half way through the books I still didn't know who she was going to end up with, but the story grabbed it and bent the plot to it's will, and I still have unresolved feelings about that whole arc. (Good, unresolved, feelings. :-) )
Second to this the 11th Dr. and River Song, very poignant romance there. <3
Half way through the books I still didn't know who she was going to end up with, but the story grabbed it and bent the plot to it's will, and I still have unresolved feelings about that whole arc. (Good, unresolved, feelings. :-) )
Second to this the 11th Dr. and River Song, very poignant romance there. <3
E. Kaiser Writes
Thanks for asking, Lesa McKee! :-) Actually, I already have created "from scratch" fantasy adventures, Jeweler's Apprentice and Traitor's Knife (Five Gems books). They were "anti-cliche" books, and so every plot point is a surprise to readers, and they have garnered some very devoted fans.
Sadly, original works don't have the "ease of access" as I've found with the fairy-tale retellings, so it's been harder for them to gain traction & a wider audience.
I will continue to work on both series for some time to come! (Projected 5 in the Five Gems, and possible 20 in the Fairy-tale Collection.)
Thanks for asking! :-)
Sadly, original works don't have the "ease of access" as I've found with the fairy-tale retellings, so it's been harder for them to gain traction & a wider audience.
I will continue to work on both series for some time to come! (Projected 5 in the Five Gems, and possible 20 in the Fairy-tale Collection.)
Thanks for asking! :-)
E. Kaiser Writes
Hi Elsa Frost! (Love your user name, by the way! :-) )
Thanks for asking! That is a great question...!!! ;-)
...And it gets a little complicated in answering, but we're all clever folks here, right? We can take multiple choice solutions!
Okay, in the Thaw series proper, there is scheduled to be 4 (or 5) books, depending on how you count them.
#1 is Winter's Child, #2 Winter Queen, #3 Prince of Demargen, #4 Reindeer King. These four are all very closely knit, and about mainly the same four main characters. At the end of Reindeer King a whole lot of the plot threads are all tied up and most of the angst and mysteries are resolved.
Then there is #5 Princess of Noran. This could be considered part of Thaw along with the first four, but it takes a slight change in setting and MCs. Girta (of course! She's our Princess of Noran!) gets an adventure on her own, into a land that is quite a lot different than the snowy/northern/high mountain/type setting we've been mainly in with the first four books.
So although it is still (in my mind) part of the Thaw Quintet, I can see how some folks might say that the first four are actually the Thaw Quartet, and that Princess of Noran belongs in more of a "spin-off/stand alone" type category.
But it still carries through the same story, and keeps relecting back on what has already happened in the earlier books to find its drama, conflict, and riveting resolution!
And... here's where it gets really interesting, and when I say interesting, I mean tangled and twisted like a knot gone wrong. :-)
What started as "Thaw" has grown to include a whole slew of stories; back-stories, and side-stories, and 'after-Thaw' stories... which are all superbly fun takes on an ever-multiplying collection of other fairy tales.
So the timeline of THOSE books starts right about the time that Hess is born, (concurrent with the beginning of Winter's Child, when Ilise is about 2 yrs old up in Noran)
...but will center around his older Demargen brothers and their adventures.
(Up until just about when the Thaw: Winter Queen, etc. books start, and then even beyond when Princess of Noran ends.)
I am currently working on (in chronological order)
The Beaded Slipper (Asgar @ 18 years old- Cinderella retelling)
Twelve Dark Knights (Albrecht @ 20-something- 12 Dancing Princesses retelling, but with 12 princes instead! ;-) )
... as well as bringing Reindeer King along as fast as it will oblige me! (RK is at nearing that tricky "mostly done but not quite" spot, where the story will sometimes just bulk on me, so I hop over and give some attention to another of it's siblings until it decides to co-operate.)
Not to worry though, this is how I usually work... I'm not a plotter 'per se', so having multiple projects in play actually helps keep me and my creative muscle from burn-out! I wrote WC, WQ & PrD pretty much simultaneously... so have no fear as to Reindeer King's arrival! It will certainly come, though I'm not close enough to "the end" to safely predict a date for it's release... after all, we just came off the first 3's release in January, 2015!
So... here's my question for you!
Should Princess of Noran be a "original Thaw" book, or in the "spin-offs"?
And should the other books, (all dealing with Hess's family, and some with the Noran's relatives!) be considered "Thaw spin-offs" or have their own name, or be "Thaw books" too?
Please tell me!!! As the author, I feel like I'm to close to them to have an objective opinion. I'd love, Love, LOVE a reader's input on this!!! :-)
Again, thanks for asking, and I really hope you can help me out with how things look from your perspective! :-)
Thanks for asking! That is a great question...!!! ;-)
...And it gets a little complicated in answering, but we're all clever folks here, right? We can take multiple choice solutions!
Okay, in the Thaw series proper, there is scheduled to be 4 (or 5) books, depending on how you count them.
#1 is Winter's Child, #2 Winter Queen, #3 Prince of Demargen, #4 Reindeer King. These four are all very closely knit, and about mainly the same four main characters. At the end of Reindeer King a whole lot of the plot threads are all tied up and most of the angst and mysteries are resolved.
Then there is #5 Princess of Noran. This could be considered part of Thaw along with the first four, but it takes a slight change in setting and MCs. Girta (of course! She's our Princess of Noran!) gets an adventure on her own, into a land that is quite a lot different than the snowy/northern/high mountain/type setting we've been mainly in with the first four books.
So although it is still (in my mind) part of the Thaw Quintet, I can see how some folks might say that the first four are actually the Thaw Quartet, and that Princess of Noran belongs in more of a "spin-off/stand alone" type category.
But it still carries through the same story, and keeps relecting back on what has already happened in the earlier books to find its drama, conflict, and riveting resolution!
And... here's where it gets really interesting, and when I say interesting, I mean tangled and twisted like a knot gone wrong. :-)
What started as "Thaw" has grown to include a whole slew of stories; back-stories, and side-stories, and 'after-Thaw' stories... which are all superbly fun takes on an ever-multiplying collection of other fairy tales.
So the timeline of THOSE books starts right about the time that Hess is born, (concurrent with the beginning of Winter's Child, when Ilise is about 2 yrs old up in Noran)
...but will center around his older Demargen brothers and their adventures.
(Up until just about when the Thaw: Winter Queen, etc. books start, and then even beyond when Princess of Noran ends.)
I am currently working on (in chronological order)
The Beaded Slipper (Asgar @ 18 years old- Cinderella retelling)
Twelve Dark Knights (Albrecht @ 20-something- 12 Dancing Princesses retelling, but with 12 princes instead! ;-) )
... as well as bringing Reindeer King along as fast as it will oblige me! (RK is at nearing that tricky "mostly done but not quite" spot, where the story will sometimes just bulk on me, so I hop over and give some attention to another of it's siblings until it decides to co-operate.)
Not to worry though, this is how I usually work... I'm not a plotter 'per se', so having multiple projects in play actually helps keep me and my creative muscle from burn-out! I wrote WC, WQ & PrD pretty much simultaneously... so have no fear as to Reindeer King's arrival! It will certainly come, though I'm not close enough to "the end" to safely predict a date for it's release... after all, we just came off the first 3's release in January, 2015!
So... here's my question for you!
Should Princess of Noran be a "original Thaw" book, or in the "spin-offs"?
And should the other books, (all dealing with Hess's family, and some with the Noran's relatives!) be considered "Thaw spin-offs" or have their own name, or be "Thaw books" too?
Please tell me!!! As the author, I feel like I'm to close to them to have an objective opinion. I'd love, Love, LOVE a reader's input on this!!! :-)
Again, thanks for asking, and I really hope you can help me out with how things look from your perspective! :-)
E. Kaiser Writes
I've long wanted to write something titled the "Winter Queen"... but had a hard time coming up with a "new angle" that could make it exciting enough to get all written up. (The writing part takes a long time, and excitement has to be high enough to carry through!!!)
After Frozen came out, my sister and I researched on the original Snow Queen tale, (we love pinpointing what a movie does correct to the original, and where they vary) I had read the Snow Queen before, and found it too unwieldy to be memorable.
However, as our research went further and further afield, we found more and more other winter fairy-tales, and the elements from each began to align into a combined tale that intrigued me deeply.
I tried to shake it off, because I already have projects to work on; but when I "talked them out" in an attempt to be rid of the idea, my sister got super excited and insisted I write them down.
Relenting, I began to whip out a quick novella... which had so many new things happening in it that we soon realized the story was way bigger than a novella could fit. We decided to go let the story go where it wanted, and it is now set to span 5 novels... 3 of which are readying to release in January. "Winter Queen" (#2) birthed an origins novella "Winter's Child" (#1), and "Prince of Demarken" (#3) left a lot of adventure for all the characters still... so "Reindeer King" (#4) will bring most of the leftover arcs to a satisfying conclusion. Only one character has troubles yet to come, which will be explored and resolved in (#5) "Princess of Noran".
As a quintet series these five books will be a fun world to immerse into, and I think readers will be thrilled to share the lives of Girta, Kai, Hess, Halvor, Tompte, and "the blessed one" Elise, (who feels she has been much wrongly named!) But they will each learn that their lives are only threads in the hands of the Master Weaver, and each sorrow is meant as a path to a brighter tomorrow.
For those not acquainted with the original tales (the Germanic The Snow Child & Snegurken; Russia's Snegurochka; & Anderson's the Snow Queen from Denmark) you can think "Frozen retelling" and be in the ballpark.
With the current excitement over Disney's version of the Snow Queen, I think readers will enjoy delving much deeper into the snowy north and the imaginative world of ancient Europe's fairy-tales.
(There are plans for a follow-up series of spin-offs that will wander all over the quasi-Victorian set kingdoms; from the "Isle-ish" High Isle of Mona in the west, to the Russo/Polish inspired kingdom of Helsk in the north-east, to the sunny, verdant kingdom of Lucia basking on the Southern Sea. 12 tales in all... and each a tribute to a beloved fairytale.)
After Frozen came out, my sister and I researched on the original Snow Queen tale, (we love pinpointing what a movie does correct to the original, and where they vary) I had read the Snow Queen before, and found it too unwieldy to be memorable.
However, as our research went further and further afield, we found more and more other winter fairy-tales, and the elements from each began to align into a combined tale that intrigued me deeply.
I tried to shake it off, because I already have projects to work on; but when I "talked them out" in an attempt to be rid of the idea, my sister got super excited and insisted I write them down.
Relenting, I began to whip out a quick novella... which had so many new things happening in it that we soon realized the story was way bigger than a novella could fit. We decided to go let the story go where it wanted, and it is now set to span 5 novels... 3 of which are readying to release in January. "Winter Queen" (#2) birthed an origins novella "Winter's Child" (#1), and "Prince of Demarken" (#3) left a lot of adventure for all the characters still... so "Reindeer King" (#4) will bring most of the leftover arcs to a satisfying conclusion. Only one character has troubles yet to come, which will be explored and resolved in (#5) "Princess of Noran".
As a quintet series these five books will be a fun world to immerse into, and I think readers will be thrilled to share the lives of Girta, Kai, Hess, Halvor, Tompte, and "the blessed one" Elise, (who feels she has been much wrongly named!) But they will each learn that their lives are only threads in the hands of the Master Weaver, and each sorrow is meant as a path to a brighter tomorrow.
For those not acquainted with the original tales (the Germanic The Snow Child & Snegurken; Russia's Snegurochka; & Anderson's the Snow Queen from Denmark) you can think "Frozen retelling" and be in the ballpark.
With the current excitement over Disney's version of the Snow Queen, I think readers will enjoy delving much deeper into the snowy north and the imaginative world of ancient Europe's fairy-tales.
(There are plans for a follow-up series of spin-offs that will wander all over the quasi-Victorian set kingdoms; from the "Isle-ish" High Isle of Mona in the west, to the Russo/Polish inspired kingdom of Helsk in the north-east, to the sunny, verdant kingdom of Lucia basking on the Southern Sea. 12 tales in all... and each a tribute to a beloved fairytale.)
E. Kaiser Writes
I am currently working on books 3 and 4 of my new THAW: series. At this point we're really pretty far removed from the fairy-tales we're retelling, (starting by combining the Germanic tales The Snow Child, Snegurken, Russia's Snegurochka, & Anderson's the Snow Queen from Denmark) By now we've spooled out into the complicated ramifications of the original tale-with-twists, and have a lot of resolutions to bring to happy endings! Also, a lot to explain from earlier mysteries.
It's a ton of fun, even though it is equally challenging!
My prelim editors are responding with a lot of excitement about where the story is going, so that's super inspiring to keep charging forward!
It's a ton of fun, even though it is equally challenging!
My prelim editors are responding with a lot of excitement about where the story is going, so that's super inspiring to keep charging forward!
E. Kaiser Writes
I have a head full of stories from every sort of source, but my close fans are what get, (and keep!) me inspired to write. It’s a long haul, and gets very dark and lonely feeling in the middle of that tunnel, but having friendly voices cheering me on is what pulls me through to the other side!
E. Kaiser Writes
Doing the stuff you intend to make your characters do. Seriously, people, please do all the impressionable minds out there a favor and actually do your homework on this.
(Can't experiment with time travel? Okay, I'll give you that one.)
But have you ever walked anywhere in your life? If you're planning on writing a book with any amount of walking, (and I'm looking at you, fantasy authors) pick a destination and walk to it. Take notes: speed, feels, actually arriving somewhere.
Then walk BACK: yeah, that return trip can be a killer. Now you know how walking feels, and can write appropriately.
This should be "required doing" for all books that involve characters walking places. I'm in a book right now, where the characters walk and walk, bypassing domesticated animals wandering around after a tragedy. WHAT???
Grab those critters and ride, folks! Come on! I call foul. (Oh, and most of the characters are wounded.) That sound you heard? Yep. Me internally screaming.
(Can't experiment with time travel? Okay, I'll give you that one.)
But have you ever walked anywhere in your life? If you're planning on writing a book with any amount of walking, (and I'm looking at you, fantasy authors) pick a destination and walk to it. Take notes: speed, feels, actually arriving somewhere.
Then walk BACK: yeah, that return trip can be a killer. Now you know how walking feels, and can write appropriately.
This should be "required doing" for all books that involve characters walking places. I'm in a book right now, where the characters walk and walk, bypassing domesticated animals wandering around after a tragedy. WHAT???
Grab those critters and ride, folks! Come on! I call foul. (Oh, and most of the characters are wounded.) That sound you heard? Yep. Me internally screaming.
E. Kaiser Writes
The best thing about being a writer is honing the ability to create experiences that can affect people as if they were real. That's the very best thing.
The worst thing? Getting that ability honed... it's a long, drawn out battle; and there are always a few more orcs leaping at you from the cliffs above, when you're just trying to climb this Lonely Mountain.
The worst thing? Getting that ability honed... it's a long, drawn out battle; and there are always a few more orcs leaping at you from the cliffs above, when you're just trying to climb this Lonely Mountain.
E. Kaiser Writes
Get more sleep! Also, read a lot.
Those two things are really the only keys I have for crushing writer's block... if I'm sleep deprived, (usually due to stress) then I can't create well. If I "slog through" and create anyway, I find that the results do not "sing", inspiration is lacking.
On the other hand, words need to go in for words to come back out, so reading is a good way to get those tanks stocked back up.
It's what works for me!
Those two things are really the only keys I have for crushing writer's block... if I'm sleep deprived, (usually due to stress) then I can't create well. If I "slog through" and create anyway, I find that the results do not "sing", inspiration is lacking.
On the other hand, words need to go in for words to come back out, so reading is a good way to get those tanks stocked back up.
It's what works for me!
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