A. The story needed to be told from other perspectives than just Robert’s. Each of the POV characters also go through an emotional transformation—they change—in KIR, and we need to know them better for those changes to feel meaningful.
Q. Why wait until now to let us see inside the heads of Koria and Eloise?
A. Timing. Both of these strong women served the stories of Dynamicist and Herald best by remaining opaque to Robert. They had secrets that needed to be revealed at the right time. Their character arcs are more fully developed and eventually resolved in KIR.
Q. Who was the easiest character to write? Who was the most difficult?
A. Eloise and Heylor were very easy and enjoyable to write. But focusing on the ladies, Eloise. She has a secret, and her own internal journey to make, and her words flowed easily. Her passions, concerns and ideals were all very straight forward and easy to explain or examine, though never boring.
And Koria was the most difficult character to write. By far.
Q. Why was Koria so difficult?
A. Because she is so intelligent and emotionally balanced. She never loses control, rarely lets anyone know anything she does not want them to know, especially the reader. Koria is an unusual human being. On the flip side, she does tend to keep her pain hidden. And this tendency to secrecy is useful and interesting. She is also capable of dramatic action with very little discernable warning. She is not angry drunk that yells and screams for ten minutes before acting.
Q. Koria has a tragedy occur to her early in KIR. Some readers have felt that she does not show enough emotion and find her lack of response to the incident unbelievable. Does this make you regret how you wrote her?
A. No. Koria was wrote as she truly exists. I have known a few women as strong, confident and opaque as her. She does react to her tragedy, just not in the way that people might expect, unless they know what she is truly like. The clues to Koria’s pain are very subtle. She never throws a book across a table or kicks a door. Koria would consider that stupid. Her eyes water and turn red, but she does not cry. That is also not her. What Koria does, is react. Her tragedy galvanizes her to make several decisions early in the book. And she goes to work.
Q. What is the role of Bethyn in this?
A. Bethyn is not a POV character, but she acts as foil to Koria. She points out that Koria is holding an enormous pain inside. Bethyn asks why her friend is acting as if nothing has happened. Bethyn’s reactions are one of the clues that tell the reader that something else is going on with Koria. Bethyn keeps it real and is much easier for the reader to understand.
Q. Do you think readers will be surprised by the resolution of Eloise’s story?
A. I hope so. Her connection to another character in the story takes on a new meaning, which I hope adds depth to her actions throughout the trilogy.
Q. Eloise says at several points in the story that she is “Her own woman.” What is that about?
A. Eloise has a mind of her own, and she uses it. She refuses to be bound by expectation.
Q. Is Eloise a feminist?
A. I can’t answer for her. That would make her angry. She is her own woman and does not appreciate it when others call her names, regardless of their good intent.
Q. Is the new character, Luciena, gay?
A. Luciena would likely find the question unenlightened. She is attracted to who she is attracted to. I might suggest that she has a pansexual attitude, though she strongly views herself as a woman. There is some suggestion that pansexuality is common amongst the Methueyn Knights.
Q. What was the most enjoyable thing about writing the female characters in KIR?
A. They provided a new dimension for the story. But more importantly, we get to see these amazing people Rise.
Would you trade uncertainty for stagnation, chance for god, invention for inertia, thought for dogma?
Four years have passed since the events of Dynamicist and war is on the horizon.
Robert, Koria, Eloise and Gregory went to the New School, hoping to change the world. They thought that mathematically based dynamics, the enlightened age’s answer to wizardry, would give them the power to make everything better. Their hopes were naïve.
Protestors are condemning the creation of a new vaccine. The city is seeing a series of hangings; is it murder or sacrament? The cloaked man is back stalking students. The long-absent demons Skoll and Hati reappear and begin slaughtering whoever they meet. But the real question is, will Nimrheal return? If he does, who will die first?
Uncertainty is inspiring fear, and inventions are not making the world better, only more complicated. The terrified civilians don’t want dynamics and reason. They want the word of Elysium and the return of the Methueyn Knights.
Koria fears the world faces an awful conundrum: that if the Knights return, Nimrheal will stay.
Will Robert, Koria, Eloise and Gregory choose to transform into angelic knights or, at the cost of such heavenly communion, instead banish Nimrheal? What price will be paid? If a new Methueyn Knight rises, will the age of invention disappear forever?
About the Series:
The Dynamicist Trilogy examines the difficulties of change in a fantasy setting. This challenge manifests itself through a rigorous magic system where thermodynamic cost is accounted for, and an inventor killing god. Most realistically, the challenge of creating a better world is illustrated by the many mistakes and miss-steps of the well-meaning and intelligent characters. The power and importance of memory, love and hope are ever present.
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This again.
“It looks like he got trampled across the gizzard by a team of oxen,” said Herevor in a deadpan voice, rubbing his long narrow jaw with his right hand. His fingernails were black with dirt.
“He wouldn’t tell me what happened!” Shelley yelled from the kitchen table.
I don’t want to talk about it.
“Who’s there?” came a new voice from the couch. It was grandma’s broken, warbly twitter. Heylor peered into the den again and saw her slouched low on the half-collapsed couch. Beside her, perched primly with a straight back, sat Constable Lynwen, hands on lap. Heylor had not seen the young woman cross the room and sit down. He had forgotten about her completely, and now there she was beside his grandma.
“It’s me, Grandma. Heylor.”
The old lady squinted at him. She seemed little more than a bundle of thin, wrinkled skin, looking as if she had lost another two inches of height in the months since Heylor last saw her. Looking at her, spine hunched like a question mark and eyes rheumy and clouded with cataracts, felt like a stab in the gut.
“I thought you were out there across the line.”
“I was.” Heylor looked at Lynwen again, sitting beside his grandma. What is she thinking? “I’m back. Where are Heyden, Scrandeyn, and Helloise?”
Jesteyn crossed her arms. “They’re out farm-handing, Heylor. We told you that at the beginning of the season.”
“Sorry, I forgot about the farm work,” Heylor mumbled. “It’s probably a good thing they’re not here.”
“Why’s that?” Jesteyn asked, eyes narrowing. “They’d love to see you. You know that.”
“Why would they?” Heylor spread his arms wide in a surge of frustration. “They must be glad to be away from here. I can’t believe all the junk you have here.”
Herevor flinched for a microsecond before breaking into a mad grin that exposed every one of his missing teeth. “One knight’s junk is another knight’s armor.”
“Oh, for knights’ sake,” Heylor exclaimed, “why is there a wheelbarrow full of cats in the fireplace? What knight is going to make plate out of that? The cat would be better armor! And isn’t that Shelley’s sextant on the bookshelf? She lives in the orchid now. I do remember that. And isn’t that my old cooper’s kit spread out on the shelf yonder? And why do we have three busted telescopes? I’m sure I threw away the bronze one after second year. What isall this stuff doing here?”
“I needed a place to store my spare things,” Shelley replied evenly. “My room in the Orchid isn’t big enough.”
“Those rooms are huge!”
“Nope.” Shelley was not flustered in the least.
Heylor clenched both fists so hard his face hurt where Skoll had gripped it. “What about the cooper’s kit?”
“Heygard thought we should hold on to it for him until harvest is done,” his father answered nonchalantly
“Oh, of course,” Heylor whispered. “What about the telescope I know I threw away?”
“I think I can fix that,” Grandma piped up.
You? You can barely stand up!
“Well, that accounts for one telescope. How about the other two?”
“That’s me,” jumped in Herevor. “I thought I would see if I could make a small version of an Eindarch Eye.”
Heylor blinked. “Did you succeed?”
“Nope.”
Heylor shook his head. Of course you didn’t. “How about the old wheelbarrow?”
Herevor rubbed his jaw again. “Scrandeyn didn’t want it anymore. I figured it could come in handy. Someday.”
“Of course! Of course it could. Someday,” Heylor almost shouted, angrier than ever. Everything about his family reminded him of himself, of his own failings, of killing his friends. In that moment, he despised them like he despised himself. “It’s come in handy for the cat at least. Whose cat is that anyway? No, don’t answer, I know it came from a cousin or was thrown away by someone somewhere. Everything is useful, everything comes back. From everyone. Nothing is trash. It’s all worth something. My hand-me-down clothes probably got handed back and used for another cat’s nest.” He whirled around. “You know what this family is? Sick, crazy hoarders. It’s an illness. You’re so bad that, even when one of you finally throws something out, it gets thrown back by some other member of the family. When they throw something out, you take it. It’s a circle, a circle of junk, a knights-damned hoarding circle! We should study it in the New School. It’s a mathematical singularity for trash. Nothing ever leaves that doesn’t re-enter. There’s no escape from the entropic pull of the Style family’s hoarding circle vortex! No junk is abandoned, no mistakes are left behind, nothing is forgotten or moved on from.” Heylor held his hands up and whirled slowly around. “This might be a big new house, but we’re still just the same old peasants.”
Smack!
Heylor’s jaw rung for the second time that day, this time from the big hand of his own mother.
“My face already hurts, Mom! Don’t hit me.”
“I love you, boy, but I know that hurts less than what you’re carrying.” Jesteyn had hit him, but she did not look angry. Her liquid eyes betrayed a different emotion. “What mistakes aren’t you leaving behind? What pain are youhoarding? What happened to your face? It’s your family here. The only way yer gonna get rid of whatever it is, is to share it.”
Heylor started laughing. “That’s so clever, Mom.” He kept laughing and didn’t stop until his nose started running because he was actually crying. Through blurry eyes, he looked over at Lynwen, sitting silently, watching. “I’m sure you want to leave now, Constable.”
“Nope.” Lynwen smiled.
His marginal ability to breathe is of no use whatsoever in explaining his career as a geophysicist. He was good at that. Lee published close to fifty journal papers, articles or expanded abstracts, has been awarded numerous best paper awards, and was even sent on a national speaking tour to Canadian universities by the Canadian Society of Exploration Geophysicists. He was born on a farm but grew up near the giant oil sand mines of Fort McMurray and is interested in discussing the environment and the amorality of science. He is also useful at parties in explaining the physics around why, or why not, fracture stimulation might be a risk to manmade structures and the fuzzy cuddly things of nature. Lee’s career helped him appreciate the difficulty in predicting outcomes, the dangers of arrogance—such as thinking you can predict even the smallest thing—and the exigent need to try anyway. He was comfortable and happy being a geophysicist, so after twenty-eight years, he quit to go do the things he was less well suited to.
If you want to hang out with Lee, look for him hiking, cycling, floundering in a lake, clinging desperately to a wall, or at his desk trying to write an entertaining story.
Author Website: https://www.leehunt.org/
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