Ry Herman's Blog

15 copies of This Knight Topples Empires are available!

“Herman follows up This Princess Kills Monsters with a droll, queer retelling of the Romanian fairy tale ‘The Girl Who Pretended to Be a Boy.’…Herman’s deadpan tone, humorous magic system, and playful fairy tale logic keep the episodic quest buoyant, and the affectionate sibling dynamic and heartfelt handling of Jules’s queerness anchor the mayhem. This irreverent, inclusive fantasy is sure to charm.”

My next book comes out in two months!

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/798143/this-knight-topples-empires-by-ry-herman

Edinburgh Fringe is over and done with, and that means it’s time for THE RY FRINGE AWARDS for the best shows seen by Ry. I decided this year that I would have some rules why not. So: 1) Any show I saw in Edinburgh during Fringe is eligible, even if it was technically in the International Festival or the Book Festival or whatever. 2) No show can win more than one award, with the exception of the Best Show award, so any show that wins an award will be crossed out for any later awards. 3) Because of this, awards will be given out from those with the least number of nominees to the those with the most.

I saw 27 shows in all (a light year.) Here we go!

EMERITUS AWARD

Fringe shows I’d already seen in previous years that were so good I wanted to see them again

Nominees:

Circa: Wolf

Winner:

Circa: Wolf

The Reason – Circa makes the impossible look easy. Over and over and over again.

BEST MAGIC SHOW

Feats of illusion and/or card tricks

Nominees:

Fake

Winner:

Fake

The Reason – Some pretty good magic in the service of a very interesting show about art forgery.

BEST CAT

Shows with a cat, or a person pretending to be one

Nominees:

PUSS PUSS

Winner:

PUSS PUSS

The Reason – Kitty!

BEST NUDITY

Shows where performers bare it all

Nominees:

Good Girl

Tell Me

Winner:

Tell Me

The Reason – Used non-gratuitously as part of what was overall a very good dance piece about HIV.

BEST DANCE

Shows that delight in all manifestations of the Terpsichorean muse

Nominees:

Mere Mortals

Poles

Tell Me

Winner:

Poles

The Reason – I don’t think humans are supposed to be able to do what Yvonne Smink can do.

BEST QUEER SHOW

LGBTQ+ characters or themes

Nominees:

Angels in America

Crocodile Rock

Remember, Remember!

Tell Me

Winner:

Angels in America

The Reason – I mean… It’s Angels in America.

BEST WTF

Something weird happened and I’m not sure what

Nominees:

Elf Lyons is the Woman on the Edge

Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities

PUSS PUSS

Suitcase Show

Winner:

Elf Lyons is the Woman on the Edge

The Reason – Elf Lyons’ winning combination of surrealist humor and searing self-examination is simply incredible.

BEST PHYSICAL THEATER

It’s not exactly dance, it’s not exactly circus, but it tells a story with movement

Nominees:

PUSS PUSS

Soft Spot

Tale of the Firebird

Tell Me

Winner:

Soft Spot

The Reason – Everything you can do with empty wine glasses turns out to be a lot.

BEST STAND-UP COMEDY

One person with a microphone, telling jokes

Nominees:

Amelia Hamilton: Moral Support

Ania Magliano: Peach Fuzz

Eleanor Morton: The Mermaid

How Now Brown Rao

Winner:

Eleanor Morton: The Mermaid

The Reason – Because Eleanor Morton is extremely funny. Enough said.

BEST CIRCUS

Feats of acrobatics and aerial performance

Nominees:

Circa: Wolf

The Pieces

YOAH

YUCK Circus: Naughties

Winner:

The Pieces

The Reason – Everything you can do with a bunch of ladders turns out to be a lot.

BEST THEATER

More than one person acting out a play, with no singing – you know, theater

Nominees:

Angels in America

Big Dog

Suitcase Show

Waiting for Wonka

Winner:

Suitcase Show

The Reason – The sheer technical virtuosity of this show made it very much worth watching.

BEST SOLO THEATER

One person on stage, telling a story.

Nominees:

Elf Lyons is the Woman on the Edge

Fake

Good Girl

PUSS PUSS

The Wolf of Poyais

Winner:

Good Girl

The Reason – A powerful show about the healing power of BDSM that for once portrays it accurately.

BEST MUSICAL

Like theater, but they sing

Nominees:

Amelia Hamilton: Moral Support

Bliss

Crocodile Rock

The Shocking Truth About Flat Earth

Remember, Remember!

Winner:

Remember, Remember!

The Reason – This was a tough call. If I went with ambition, it would have been Bliss. But instead I went with the show that successfully accomplished what it set out to do, and was very funny in the bargain.

BEST LIVE MUSIC

Musicians on the stage playing music right there in front of you

Nominees:

Bliss

Crocodile Rock

Poles

Remember, Remember!

The Shocking Truth About Flat Earth

Tales of the Firebird

Winner:

Tale of the Firebird

The Reason – The music was difficult, they were fabulous at playing it, and they did it while performing aerial and acrobatic stunts.

BEST COMEDY (NON-STAND-UP)

Anything funny that isn’t one person with a microphone telling jokes

Nominees:

Big Dog

Bliss

Elf Lyons is the Woman on the Edge

PUSS PUSS

Remember, Remember!

The Shocking Truth About Flat Earth

Waiting for Wonka

The Wolf of Poyais

YUCK Circus: Naughties

Winner:

YUCK Circus: Naughties

The Reason – This is the show to see if your memories of the early 2000s included longing for a toy that would slash your face up. I learned a lot.

BEST SHOW

The best show

Nominees:

All

Winner:

Elf Lyons is the Woman on the Edge

The Reason – Because Elf Lyons is a treasure and this show was incredible.

Two extremely different fantasy books topped my list this month:

DEALING WITH DRAGONS by Patricia C. Wrede

Cimorene is everything a princess is not supposed to be: headstrong, tomboyish, smart — and bored. So bored that she runs away to live with a dragon – and finds the family and excitement she’s been looking for.

This was charming. Just absolutely charming and delightful in every respect. I can certainly see why it’s considered a classic!

THE WORKS OF VERMIN by Hiron Ennes

Guy Moulène hunts the uncanny creatures that crawl up from the river. These vermin are all strange, and often dangerous. His latest quarry is different: a centipede the size of a dragon with a deadly venom and a ravenous taste for artwork. No sane person would hunt it, if they had the choice. Guy doesn’t have a choice.

Art, revolution, and the corruption that inevitably follows power, all set in a decaying treestump city powered by toxic effluent and transmutative bug venom. If that sounds fantastic to you, read this at once. If it doesn’t, read this at once anyway. It’s amazing.

Other books I very much enjoyed in August included DAGGERBOUND by T. Kingfisher, THE GIRLS by John Bower, MIRRORWOVEN by Bori Cser, PRATER VIOLET by Christopher Isherwood, A TRADE OF BLOOD by Robert Jackson Bennett, THE IDIOT by Elif Batuman, DECOMPOSITION BOOK by Sara van Os, and IDOLFIRE by Grace Curtis.

The first draft of This Fairy Stabs Everyone is DONE!

How long is it?

About 75,000 words. That’s shorter than it needs to be, but my first drafts always come in short and grow in the rewrites. My previous first drafts have been 44,000 words (although I was kind of learning how to write a book with that one), 74,000 words, 85,000 words, and 80,000 words. So this one’s shorter than the most recent ones, but still firmly in the middle of the pack.

How long did it take?

About five months, which is very quick for me. Weirdly, the first half took me four months, and the second half took me one month. That hasn’t been the case with any previous book, and I do not understand what happened. I don’t really understand my own process.

What comes next?

I take a break from it, then straight into draft 2 revisions. This is actually a good time to take the break, because I’ve got a lot going on in August this year. I won’t send it out to any beta readers until after draft 2; it’s still pretty rough right now.

There was a definite standout this month, by one of my favorite authors:

THE HUSTLER by Walter Tevis

Eddie Felson is a poolroom hustler who travels from town to town conning strangers into thinking they could beat him when in fact, he is a skillful player who has never lost a game. Until he meets his match in Minnesota Fats, the true king of the poolroom, causing his life to change drastically.

It’s hard to believe this was a debut novel. Fast Eddie Felson is an unreliable narrator (he’s no alcoholic, nope…) and often an unlikeable one (he barely thinks of his girlfriend as a person and certainly has no interest in understanding her) whose sole interest and talent is playing pool. And yet somehow, the book is absolutely riveting.

Other books I thought were great this month were CHAIN-GANG ALL-STARS by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, THE EVERLASTING by Alix E. Harrow, SHE MADE HERSELF A MONSTER by Anna Kovatcheva, NATIVE TONGUE by Suzette Haden Elgin, THERE IS NO ANTIMEMETICS DIVISION by qntm, A FAMILY MATTER by Claire Lynch, THE WILD ROBOT by Peter Brown, LOVE GALAXY by Sierra Branham, and THE UNICORN HUNTERS by Katherine Arden.

My fifth book, This Fairy Stabs Everyone, is ON THE WAY! (… eventually. My fourth book, This Knight Topples Empires, isn’t even out yet and won’t be until this November, but still. ON THE WAY!)

I’ve got no idea why, but this has been my most productive writing week ever. 9000 words. (And yeah, I know there are people who do that regularly, but I do *not*. 3500 is closer to my usual weekly count at the moment, and that was an increase over a couple of years ago.)

Maybe I should be trapped at home with a horrible racking cough more often!

The standout book in June was:

THE LAST CONTRACT OF ISAKO by Fonda Lee

Isako is a legendary swordswoman, but every legend has to come to an end. When her long-time client unexpectedly retires, she plans to follow–to walk out into the frozen wasteland of their planet with her head held high and her family enriched by her legacy. But when a competitor offers her a final mission, it’s one she can’t refuse.

This was a twisty, thrilling, stay-up-late-to-finish-it sci fi samurai story with a heroine in her 50’s and feeling it. The kind of book where you go, “Wait, I’m only halfway through?” in the best possible way.

Other fantastic books this month included IGNORE ALL PREVIOUS INSTRUCTIONS by Ada Hoffman, ONE KNIGHT STAND by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner, UNDER THE SAME STARS by Libba Bray, ALL HAIL CHAOS by Sarah Rees Brennan, PIPER AT THE GATES OF DUSK by Patrick Ness, GIRL’S GIRL by Sonia Feldman, THE FOX AND THE DEVIL by Kiersten White, I WHO HAVE NEVER KNOWN MEN by Jacqueline Harpman, THE TAPESTRY OF FATE by Shanna Chakraborty, and SHUGGIE BAIN by Douglas Stuart.