Blake Charlton's Blog

It’s been a minute since I posted.

In fact, it’s been a year.

What a year.

It must be admitted: I’ve been a distracted writer. This was mostly because of the thousand natural shocks of first year cardiology fellowship. A major illness in the family applied an equal push away from personal efforts at creativity and toward caring for others. Happily, everyone in the family is fairing better and we are closer because of it. But, again, it must be admitted: I neglected my third novel, Spellbreaker. The reviews have been wonderful, the sales merely adequate.

This is perhaps because of my lackluster promotion. I grow glum thinking of it until I consider it’s a minor miracle that the book exists at all. I had to write the book as a 4th year medical student, revise it as an intern. Then a political upheaval at my American publisher saw my editor fired and the series orphaned. The manuscript languished on one desk or another for nearly three years. Seen in that light, and after reviewing the praise it did attract, I feel grateful it made it to where it has.

So, now that life has calmed down a bit, I’m picking up the pieces and undertaking needed self reinvention, a process so well known to every creative soul. But first, a little more attention for Spellbreaker. Here’s what’s happened in the past year.

News

Personalized copies for sale! If you’d like signed or personally inscribed copies of any of my available books, you can contact Borderlands Books online here,  toll-free at 888 893-4008, or email office@borderlands-books.com.  They’ll ask you which books you’d like, what (if anything) you’d like the personalizations to say, the address you’d like the books sent to, and get your payment information.  I’ll come sign your books and they’ll ship them out you.  They’re happy to ship internationally, too.  If you already have all of my books, you can also send them books from your collection for me to sign.  They charge a nominal handling fee plus the postage.
Lifetime goal achieved! Locus Magazine interviewed me!
In a sort of modern existential authorial milestone, I’ve come to realize I exist as an author because a Wikipedia page was created about me.
Spellbreaker will be translated into Russian! That’s the good news. The bad news is that there are no other plans for translation into other languages. To my many Dutch friends, many many apologies. You are all wonderful. Thank you so very much for the encouraging emails.
Summer Brooks on her Writers, After Dark blog lead me through one of the more interesting interviews of my life.
The Functional Nerds Podcast had me back on their show despite knowing my proclivity for puns.
The Verge listed Spellbreaker on the “8 stories to read while you wait for the next season of American Gods.” Honored to be listed among such amazing authors.
A Tor.com article explores language in fantasy and lists the Spellwright Series “for advanced users.”

Blog Tour

On the Tor/Forge Blog, I wax philosophical about prophecy in fantasy.
Fantasy Book Critic hosted my post about Overpowering and Balancing Characters in Fantasy.
Unbound Worlds put up a short post in which I identify Le Guin’s A Wizard of Earthsea as the inspiration for the Spellwright Series and had me back for a bookday interview.
Civilian Reader is the home for my post about Fantasy Series and Stand-Alones.

Publication Review Wrap Up

STARRED REVIEW: The worldbuilding and the conflict are expertly delineated, but much of the trilogy’s focus is far more intimate: a richly textured portrait of personal growth, primarily of Nicodemus as he gains self-confidence in himself and his magic, opens his heart to a lover, and then takes on mature responsibilities as a family man, warrior, and politician.  Vivid, intelligent, and painful in an authentically laudable way.

–Kirkus Reviews

STARRED REVIEW: There is significant emotional depth to the story, and ponderings on fate, love, and the purpose of human society give the novel some gravitas. Intricate plotting, strong characters, and a wonderfully imagined world make this a winner.

–Publishers Weekly

Vivid characters, political intrigue, and family drama make this a solid, imaginative work.

–Library Journal

STARRED REVIEW: As [Leandra] defines her own path, and her parents face difficulty accepting her decisions, there is an element of relatability that Charlton has brought to each of his books without succumbing to formulaic series writing. While Spellbreaker can stand on its own, having read its two predecessors adds depth to its undercurrents. It will appeal to readers who enjoy high fantasy, complex worlds, and characters that change and grow throughout the story.

–Book List

Where the first novel was a fun start to the series, Charlton has built upon his world, and by the time we reach Spellbreaker, he’s running with all cylinders firing… Charlton throws in plenty of surprises. It’s easy for authors to follow a rote path for characters caught up in a prophecy, but it’s notable that he manages to find alternatives along the way, making his characters struggle as they fight to save one another, but also to change the world in unexpected ways.

–Lightspeed Magazine

 

It’s my bookday. I am now three books old. At last.

My first book published in 2010, my second in 2011. Writing novels was easier in medical school. It odd thinking back to that first book day. I was like a nervous parent; I set the whole day aside just to promote it and throw it a little party with friends and family at a local bookstore. I was so nervous for the book–that maybe people wouldn’t notice it or like it.

Tomorrow, while Spellbreaker publishes, I will be the on call cardiology fellow at our university hospital. I’ll still worry. I’ll hope people notice it. I’ll hope they like it. But the book will have to fend for itself. I won’t be promoting it or throwing a party. I’ll be trying to help people in the hospital.

I think it’s better this way.

Spellbreaker’s publication is only weeks away now, so it’s particularly gratifying to learn that it has just earned a third pre-publication starred review! As mentioned in my last post my last post, Kirkus and Publisher’s Weekly have given the book a star. Now I’m proud to report that Rebecca Gerber writing for Booklist has given Spellbreaker it’s third starred review!

“As [Leandra] defines her own path, and her parents face difficulty accepting her decisions, there is an element of relatability that Charlton has brought to each of his books without succumbing to formulaic series writing. While Spellbreaker can stand on its own, having read its two predecessors adds depth to its undercurrents. It will appeal to readers who enjoy high fantasy, complex worlds, and characters that change and grow throughout the story.”

Is a fourth star in the works? Unlikely unless there’s someone over at Romantic Times pawing through the pages as I type. Spellbreaker does feature a love triangle between the anti-heroic female protagonist, a very male shark-deity, and a Protean gender-switching deity of wrestling (yeah, that old chestnut). So, it’s possible…just not likely. Besides as gratifying as critical acclaim is, the more important test for Spellbreaker will come when general readers–if they pick up or download the book–decide what they think and feel about the story.

There’s, also, assorted other book launch news:

-The Tor/Forge blog has published a brief piece I wrote about the role that prophecy, predestination, and precognition may play in literature.

-Book tour dates are getting set up! I’ll be at Mysterious Galaxy in San Diego on September 14th, and at Borderlands Books in San Francisco October 1st. A Portland visit has somehow fallen through the cracks despite my best effort. I’m not at all sure why. (Portland friends, if you know of a non-Powell’s bookstore that would be interested in hosting me between September 10th and 13th or 15th and 18th let me know!)

 

 

*Correction. Several booksellers had listed the Library Journal review with a star next to it, leading me to mistakenly believe it was a starred review. Previous editions of this post and associated social media links incorrectly named it a starred review. I’ve attempted to correct the mistake throughout this website.

Spellbreaker’s publication is only weeks away now, so it’s particularly gratifying to learn that it has just earned a fourth pre-publication starred review! As mentioned in my last post my last post, Kirkus, Publisher’s Weekly, and Library Journal  have given the book a star. Now I’m proud to report that Rebecca Gerber writing for Booklist has given Spellbreaker it’s fourth starred review!

“As [Leandra] defines her own path, and her parents face difficulty accepting her decisions, there is an element of relatability that Charlton has brought to each of his books without succumbing to formulaic series writing. While Spellbreaker can stand on its own, having read its two predecessors adds depth to its undercurrents. It will appeal to readers who enjoy high fantasy, complex worlds, and characters that change and grow throughout the story.”

Is a fifth star in the works? Unlikely unless there’s someone over at Romantic Times pawing through the pages as I type. Spellbreaker does feature a love triangle between the anti-heroic female protagonist, a very male shark-deity, and a Protean gender-switching deity of wrestling (yeah, that old chestnut). So, it’s possible…just not likely. Besides as gratifying as critical acclaim is, the more important test for Spellbreaker will come when general readers–if they pick up or download the book–decide what they think and feel about the story.

There’s, also, assorted other book launch news:

-The Tor/Forge blog has published a brief piece I wrote about the role that prophecy, predestination, and precognition may play in literature.

-Book tour dates are getting set up! I’ll be at Mysterious Galaxy in San Diego on September 14th, and at Borderlands Books in San Francisco October 1st. A Portland visit has somehow fallen through the cracks despite my best effort. I’m not at all sure why. (Portland friends, if you know of a non-Powell’s bookstore that would be interested in hosting me between September 10th and 13th or 15th and 18th let me know!)

Last week I reconciled myself to the fact that a book needs not only to be written but also promoted.

Or, at least, I tried to.

It seems to me that in a perfect world, the merits of our work would be their own promotion. But–sad state of the world–to move the needle, art and science must be noticed and judged by others. So it is that I’m humbly beg for 1) your judgement of Spellbreaker when it publishes in the US on the 30th of August, and, should you feel moved to do so, 2) your help spreading the word about the book and the series. If you’re game, please accept my gratitude and consider the following:

So far, the judgement has been gratifying. Spellbreaker has earned three starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, and Library Journal! Bookish.com also rated it in their Summer “Must Reads.” See below for the excerpts.
If you have enjoyed either Spellwright or Spellbound and haven’t yet done so, please consider writing a review on Goodreads.com or Amazon.com or any other review site of your choice. It makes a big difference.
Come hang out with me on book tour! No dates are set yet, but I have time off from the hospital between September 11th and 17th. The tentative plan now is for events in San Francisco, San Diego, and perhaps Portland. I would love to travel farther afield, but my publisher would have to shell out for it. So, if you’d like me to swing by your hometown, chat up your local indie bookseller and suggest hosting me. If the book seller expresses interest, it’s much more likely to be feasible!
Come hang out with me on my blog tour! Apparently all the cool kids are doing these nowadays. I’m trying to be a cool kid.
Please, please forgive my sluggish internet response. I am both excited and anxious about starting as a cardiology fellow July first!

Thank you all! It’s only because of your continued support and patience that I am able to live a balance of medicine and fiction.

And now, the reviews so far…

Publication Reviews

STARRED REVIEW: The worldbuilding and the conflict are expertly delineated, but much of the trilogy’s focus is far more intimate: a richly textured portrait of personal growth, primarily of Nicodemus as he gains self-confidence in himself and his magic, opens his heart to a lover, and then takes on mature responsibilities as a family man, warrior, and politician.  Vivid, intelligent, and painful in an authentically laudable way.

–Kirkus Reviews

STARRED REVIEW: There is significant emotional depth to the story, and ponderings on fate, love, and the purpose of human society give the novel some gravitas. Intricate plotting, strong characters, and a wonderfully imagined world make this a winner.

–Publishers Weekly

STARRED REVIEW: Vivid characters, political intrigue, and family drama make this a solid, imaginative work.

–Library Journal

Online Reviews

[O]ne hell of a wild ride… While there’s plenty of adventure to be had, readers should also know that this is a novel that reaches great emotional depths through character development.

–Bookish.com

 

 

Somehow summer’s melted into fall. I’m not sure where the time went. Seems like I just updated this blog. But when the El Niño rains started falling on San Francisco last week, I realized that it’s been a whole season since I’ve posted. It’s been a busy time. Here are the highlights.

Spellwright and Spellbound are now audiobooks available via audible.com. By a twist of fate, they were read by Kevin T. Collins–an old high school friend of mine. I was in a few plays with Kevin. He was always the star of the show; I always an ensemble member. I’m grateful that we got to work together again, all these years later.

I’ve been lucky enough to spend two months on an in-patient cardiology service and one in my primary care clinic learning as always from my peers, my professors, and of course my patients.

With the end of residency at hand, I’ve applied for fellowship in cardiology and had the good fortune to interview all over the country and meet some amazing people. I’ll find out December 2nd if I’ll be so lucky as to become a cardiologist and where I’ll call home for the next three years.

I’ve just flown back from the American Heart Association’s annual convention, where I was very proud to present my research into anticoagulation (specifically, for the medical nerds out there, into the relative outcomes of warfarin-, dabigatran-, and rivaroxaban-associated bleeding). Together with my co-authors, I’m getting the final manuscript ready for submission and very excited.

Work on my fourth novel continues in fits and starts. It’s both exciting and daunting to strike out into a new world after working on the same series for over a decade.

Spellbreaker is still set for a June 2016 publication in the US.

Spellbreaker now has cover art! It is a bit of a change from the previous, wonderful covers by Todd Lockwood, but I’m thrilled with the result. I think it captures the spirit of book three perfectly.

Spellbreaker also has a blurb! Which I think does a great job of teasing the reader without giving too much away. It’s not really news to announce the blurb or cover art since both were revealed through the excellent book blog, Civilian Reader. But even so, I’d love it if you dropped a comment here about the cover art or the blurb to let me know what you think.

 

 

Leandra Weal has a bad habit of getting herself in dangerous situations. For one thing, she has to solve the mystery behind a very usual murder.

While hunting neodemons in her role as Warden of Ixos, Leandra obtains a prophetic spell that provides a glimpse one day into her future. She discovers that in a day’s time she will either murder someone she loves or die herself. Problem is, she doesn’t know whom she might murder. That’s a pretty big problem for a woman who has a shark god for a lover, a hostile empress for an aunt, a rogue misspelling wizard for a father, and a mother who–especially when arguing with her daughter–can be a real dragon.

Leandra’s quest to unravel the mystery of the murder-she-will-commit becomes more urgent when her chronic disease flares up and the Ixonian Archipelago is plagued by natural disasters, demon worshiping cults, and fierce political infighting. Everywhere she turns, Leandra finds herself amid intrigue and conflict. It seems her bad habit for getting into dangerous situations is turning into a full blown addiction.    

Spellbreaker is the long awaited sequel to Spellbound, which was listed by Kirkus Reviews among the Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of 2011. This final installment of the Spellwright Trilogy stands alone as a complete story; however, fans of the series will find in it answers to the questions raised by the previous books about Leandra’s parents, Nicodemus Weal and Francesca DeVega.

As chaos spreads across Ixos, Leandra and her troubled family must race to uncover the shocking truth about a prophesied demonic invasion, human language, and their own identities–if they don’t kill each other first.

 

As always this blog post is overdue. However, I am happy to report that I have just confirmed with Tor Books that the US publication of Spellbreaker will land either in late spring or early summer 2016. I’m crossing my fingers for a June publication date.

The coming year will also see the publication, at long last, of the audiobook versions of Spellwright and Spellbound–both from Audible Studios. By a twist of chance, the audiobooks will be narrated by Kevin Collins, whom I went to high school with. I was lucky enough to be in a few school plays with Kevin.

I don’t have too many other specifics on offer now. However, I can say that Tor is currently planning to ‘re-brand’ the trilogy with Spellbreaker, meaning that the cover art and package of the book will not be in the style of Todd Lockwood‘s excellent art for the first two US books. While I am sad that we won’t get to see what Todd would have dreamed up for the cover, I am excited to discover what new direction Tor takes the series.

I don’t know when Spellbreaker will come out in Europe or when any particular translation will publish; however, I’ll be sure to post those, and any other, details as soon as I have them.

In the meantime, I’m staying busy during my senior year in internal medicine residency and applying  in cardiology. I’ve had a few more academic publications on topics ranging from how computers can teach doctors, to searching for joy as a doctor in training, to the unethical selling of medical screening tests. And work on my fourth novel continues apace. I’ll hope to have more details about where it is headed about the time Spellbreaker publishes.

One advantage of having a year’s end birthday is the opportunity for reflection: A year of life synchronized with a calendar year. 2014 and my 34th year were immensely busy. At their beginning, I was in the belly of intern year and still struggling to rewrite my third novel. Both tasks seemed endless at the time. Now at year’s end, I find myself a senior resident and halfway through medical training, or at least this phase of it. Spellbreaker has been rewritten and is, ever so slowly, working its way toward publication.

As I write this post, I must fight the urge to resort to numeric metrics for the measure of a year. (Sing the RENT theme song if you’d like.) I’ve always been one for making lists and this year has given me plenty: number of books read, number of patients pronounced dead, number of words written, number of academic articles published, number of patients who’ve recovered. Thinking of any one category brings back a range of emotions ranging from joy to grief, but is always accompanied by a sense of accomplishment. On balance, it makes me look forward to 2015 and 35. However, there is one metric about which I have little positive to write or feel: Number of works of fiction published. Zero is not the hoped for number.

Since last February, Spellbreaker has been revised and all but ready for publication. As before, we wait for my new editor to read through the past two books and revise the third. I’ve been unequivocally promised that I will have an edited manuscript back by January 20th. In March and May I have two month of outpatient (and therefore less demanding) medicine, which will allow me to turn the manuscript around quickly. As for the ultimate publication date, I won’t prognosticate too closely. Ten months from now would be fast but possible. A year is more likely. Any other date, seen on Amazon.com or Goodreads.com or wherever, is pure conjecture. As before, I will be doing little to no blogging or corresponding online as I work toward increasing my competence in writing and medicine. For those who are loyal enough to check in on the blog to see how the trilogy is progressing, know that I am amazingly grateful for your support and just as impatient as you are.

In the meantime, as we wait, I’ll continue to work on my fourth novel. More about that in 2015…

 

 

 

 

 

Few things are stranger than the flow of time for a newly minted physician. Individual hours unspool themselves, encompassing lifetimes of experience. Rare days off become epics of day-trip adventure or fuzzy pajama daysleeping decadence. And yet the months–strangely, paradoxically–are small feathered things; they flit by, almost uncounted.

It’s the sprawling hours I wish I could describe– the long conversations, someone dying quite literally in your arms, the sleep-deprived blurriness, the frustration and humiliation and hope, the small and large victories. But they are too big to describe. My hard drive houses a score of aborted vignettes and reflections. To someone outside medical training they would seem incomprehensible, to someone inside, quotidian.

The months, however, melt away. Somehow I’ve now been a practicing doctor for more than half a year. Somehow come July, I’ll be managing two other doctors and leading a hospital medicine team. It’s all rather mysterious.

My chosen method of dealing with it all is to write. I turned in a finished draft of Spellbreaker last May, and now I’m very happy to report that, after receiving some feedback from beta-readers, I’ve completed another revision.  It’s a sleeker book now, having lost 20,000 words. Still it will be punching away in the heavyweight epic fantasy class with a total of 180,000 words.

It’s a darker book than its predecessors, more focused on endings and difficult choices. It’s also–I believe and hope–better written with deeper character exploration, more intuitive incorporation of the complex magical system, and more consistent plot progression. Of course, I’m counting on the readers to let me know how close to the mark I am on all these counts.

As to why the book is taking so long to get to the shelves…and to when we might expect it to come out… Sadly, like many authors, I have to answer with apologizes about events out of my control. Last year my editor at Tor left the company unexpectedly.  The Spellwright Trilogy was orphaned; something that could have had dire consequences. But I was very fortunate that one of the company’s most senior editors, Patrick Neilson Hayden, was a fan of the series and picked me up. I’m thrilled to work with Patrick. Because he’s coming aboard on book three, he does need time to reread the first two books in the series before editing the third book. Hopefully I’ve made his job easier by landing a more polished manuscript on his desk. Even so, the absolute earliest I’d guess publication would be possible would be late 2014…and that might be too optimistic. When a publication schedule firms up, I’ll be sure to publish it here.

So…what’s next? Difficult to say. There’s a young adult novel idea I’ve been kicking around and a few medicine related stories I’m considering, but after a decade churning out a trilogy, I’m rather enjoying intellectual freedom  for a bit. There are a few things I do know for certain. The next book will not take place in the Spellwright universe. To grow as a writer, I need to try some else for a while. Perhaps I’ll come back to Nicodemus’s world; I think and hope I ended the series in a way that satisfies fans of the trilogy but leaves the door open, as it were. Another thing I know I won’t be doing is blogging all that often. This weekend is my last as an intern, which is to say that I won’t have another two days in a row off until the end of June. I haven’t very good about responding to messages. I’m sorry about that. I’ve continued to get inquires about the next book. Some are an impatient, but most are wonderfully supportive.  For that reason, I’m amazingly grateful. I could not do this without your support and patience.

Dearly Beloved You Guys,

My heart is overwhelmed by the amazing response I’ve been getting from the NYT piece. The stories you all are sending me about people and families succeeding, struggling, and living bravely with disability are both beautiful and truly humbling. I wish I could reply to every single one of these messages with the attention they deserve. I wish I could publish all these stories for the world to see.

Thank you all.