It's no secret that fantasy is, by definition, one of the most imaginative genres out there. Authors who stake a claim in fantasy often have to create new species, new systems of magic, new worlds, and sometimes even new dimensions. For these reasons, fantasy is a great way to captivate middle grade readers' attention and provide them with meaningful lessons within a context of adventure and escapism.

But despite the growing popularity of "darker" fantasy, like the rape-and-violence-prone Game of Thrones saga by George R.R. Martin, among adults, it remains important that authors who write for children temper these elements to an appropriate level. "It's a fine line of balance," says author Katelyn Honeck, whose recent book, The Dragons of Aleria, is forthcoming release from Greenleaf Publications. "You don't want to pretend that things like prejudice and darkness don't exist. But you also don't want to include something obscene in a book that a ten-year-old might repeat. Many of them get uncomfortable when you put in real curse words anyway."

So what is an adventurer to blurt when, say, a centaur steps on her toe? A "darn" or "golly," Honeck says, can kill the tension faster than a rampaging orc army. 

"Instead of 'damn,' I usually use 'blast,'" Honeck explains. "Its equivalent in Harroken, the fantasy language spoken in Aleria is draflkr, but I thought it best to resort to Harroken as little as possible. So instead of 'God!", characters take the name of the divine in vain by saying "By the Goddess," which is slightly different but removed enough from reality that moms won't object."

As she was planning out these logistics, Honeck was struck by how many fantasy books can include what amounts to English profanity by simply making up a fantasy curse that means the exact same thing and using it instead. Like many of her favorite authors, Honeck quickly devised fantasy equivalents of "shit" (scatflgr!) and "ass" (ashken - as in "I'll plant by boot straight in your ashken", ashkenag plural). 

"But soon I realized," she says, "that this was only shielding children from the mildest curse words." What about even more vulgar words? Were these to go unaddressed? Honeck soon realized she had her work cut out for her if she wanted to make her fantasy world safe for middle grade readers.

For instance, her characters use fairk instead of "fuck," since the two words come from two different lingual systems, our "fuck" from Old German and possibly Latin, fairk from high Dwarvish, which was used by the Old Ones before the founding of Aleria's First Kingdom, Elderharr. Characters make subdued use of the word with phrases like "we've been on the road for fairking ages", "fairk the police", "I'd like to fairk that nice piece of ashken," and "you fairkfaced motherfairker." It's easy to see how both parents and their children can feel instantly comfortable in Honeck's word.

But, sadly, it gets much, much worse in English than the F-bomb. "I believe fantasy authors have an obligation to address the marginalization and discrimination that takes place in our own reality, in order to show how intolerance can be overcome." For this reason, Honeck devised fantasy slurs for different minorities in our own world. 

WWYA: So not for elves and dwarves? For like, actual groups that exist here on Earth?

KH: Yes - different ethnicities, religions, sexual communities, people with dwarfism (not the fantasy race!), of different mental ableness --

WWYA: Oh my God.

KH: You mean By the Goddess! (laughs)

WWYA: This is kind of horrible. Why don't you just omit the slurs?

KH: They're not slurs in English. 

WWYA: Well - if it means the same thing.

KH: Well, then it's a nice way to hint at the darkness of the real world to kids who might want to explore that, but aren't ready to encounter it, like, in their own lives yet.

Katelyn Honeck lives in snowy, quiet Russelton, Pennsylvania with her husband and fellow writer Mark Wilson. They're kept busy by their two cats, Heather and Milo, and their respective novels. While interviewed, Katelyn was writing a scene in which Kalen Lightbringer, her protagonist, wipes out an enemy brigade with magic and feels regretful for a chapter, showing young readers the human consequences of violence before moving on to the climactic epic battle between two armies. She was trying to figure out a Harroken equivalent for the C-word when she realized that her female characters do not even get periods.


Dragon book art from Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight, painted by Matt Stawiki. Swear jar from photosearch.com.

1. Killer inciting incident

What could be better than love at first sight? For agents, it's that magical, first-sight experience or nothing. Think: if your reader was browsing at a bookstore, would they drop yours after the first few pages? 

Ideas to kick-start your story: picking the most exciting moment in your plot outline and starting there, an incident that will allow you to display your narrator's unique voice, leading the Korean People's Army across the 38th parallel.

2. Nonstop Action

By action, we don't necessarily mean physical. There are many types of action that make a story compelling: verbal, sensory, new revelations for the characters. "Action" could be anything, from moving to a new setting, introducing a new problem, or the involvement of UN coalition forces and the Chinese. 

Tip: make an outline that structures your story so that something important happens in every chapter.

3. Consistency

Nothing annoys a careful reader (or a professional reader, like an agent or editor) like imperfections and plot holes. Make sure that you have friends and beta readers check your story for inner contradictions. 

If you have a theme, make sure you hint at it repeatedly and never drop the thread. For example, if you want readers to think that your main character was born on a sacred mountain to the sign of a blessed star, learned to talk at three weeks old, has written 1500 of the world's best books, along with 6 incomparable operas, can see into their minds when they have unpatriotic thoughts, does not defecate, and is immortal, drive the message home with constant daily reminders and total control of the press.

Some of you may recall this picture from our blog post several weeks ago:

But the truth is, since unearthing this cinematic shot of Christopher Paolini, we've gone through a strange and disorienting series of emotions. What began as amused giggling over his pose progressed to admiration of his classical  phisyque, then to imagining what it would be like to be the wind, running its weightless fingers through his silken hair. Pretty soon our wombs declared themselves the property of him and him forever.

Here are the 14 Times Christopher Paolini Could Have Had Our Babies Whenever He Wanted:

1.) This is another still from the aforementioned photoshoot. It's all there: piercing gaze, tight sleeves, strong arms to hold us tight and fight away our problems. And of course there are the mountains - silent, ancient witnesses to kisses given far from eyes of men.

2.) The time he was Mr. July for the 2006 Authors of the Month Calendar.

3.) The time he stood in a Hawaiian shirt in the middle of the snow, baring his sculpted calves to the elements like a true child of the fearsome American West, bearing in his hands a strange wooden slab that says "Eragon" for some reason.

4.) When he sat on his porch in Grover's Corners, smelling Mrs. Gibbs' heliotrope in the morning light just as Howie Newsome came by with the milk. What was he doing, as the interviewer asked?

"I'm going to have a copy of this play put in the cornerstone and the people a thousand years from now'll know a few simple facts about us," he replied. "More than the Treaty of Versailles and the Lind-bergh flight. See what I mean? So people a thousand years from now will see this is the way we were in the provinces of New York at the beginning of the twentieth century. This is the way we were: in our growing up and in our marrying and in our living and our dying."

5.) The face he made when he realized that he was standing in a bush of poison ivy and not wearing any pants.

6.) The time when he presented us phallic images. 

7.) When he told us to come closer and slowly raised his leg. "Closer," he said. We came closer. His fingers brushed against the ridges of the dragon statue supporting the table. "Closer," he said. We did. And then he leaned in our ear and whispered, "Se onr sverdar sitja hvass!"

8.) When he grew a beard and we wept and it dried our tears

9.) When he landed the lead role in Eragon and briefly became America's sweetheart. 

10.) When he saw a car broken down on the side of the Montana highway, he got out to see if the driver needed any help. "Sure, but hey, I know you!" said the driver. "You're that teen author, right? Stefan Bachmann, author of The Peculiar, published when you were just nineteen years old!" 

Christopher laughed  a little and said, "Sure."

"I'm a big fan!" gushed the man.

"Certainly." Christopher got a pair of swords out of his car. "Hey, I called my mom and she should be here with the jumper cables in a bit. Want a photo op? I could show you how to use one too."

"Wow," said the man. Chris handed him the wooden one. They smiled for a picture seconds before Christopher swung, shattering the other's wooden sword. He felt the satisfying crunch of wood under the steel, and splinters flew, some up to ten feet away. He rose his sword for a half-parry, then decided on a feint first to the left, then to the right. The terrified man's eyes followed the sword, and his reflexes, slow even for a mortal, weren't fast enough to catch the punch that flew at him, catching him on the jaw and throwing him to the ground. Christopher drove the sword into the splenic plexus, and a well of blood greeted the blade, dying it a dark coquelicot. Christopher mused over the kill, and knelt to close the man's eyes. Somewhere, he had a family. By just a slight altering of fates, it could be Chris there on the ground, and that man standing over him. What a waste of life, he thought. And all for his mistake. 

11.) When he escorted this beautiful, elusive Monacan countess to the film premier of Eragon. 

12.) That time at the Eragon premier when he stopped for a photo with Jeremy Irons, but upon bumping into him found they had switched bodies. Suddenly he was six inches taller, had a grey beard, and the rough, alluring voice of a silver fox. Likewise, he saw his own youthful, glowing face staring back at him in shock. Before they could say anything, hands pulled him away. "Mr. Irons! John Malkovich just challenged you to jello shots!" Seven jello shots later, Chris was weeping and Malkovich was staring in his eyes and whispering in capital letters:  "I SUFFER WHILE YOU DO NOT TAKE A SHOT. DO NOT....PROLONG...MY SUFFERING....JEREMY." Just then, he saw himself hurtling towards him, and they crashed to the floor. Back in his own body, he staggered to his feet and ran to the door, with Irons shouting after him, "You got me drunk, you little...!"

13.) When he gently grazed this kangaroo's boob.

14.) Recognizing that while the sight of adult Christopher is enough to prompt natural, healthy, and socially acceptable desires in women over 15, his mother noticed that Paolini's tween and child fans may not be ready for fantasizing about holding hands with a grown-up (even though to some extent Paolini will always exist in our minds as the fresh-faced, adorable teen that he was when he wrote Eragon). Thus, she made available many young portraits of Paolini, so that voyeurs of all ages can find the Paolini that's right for them.

Don't mind us, we're just over here casually freaking out.

So unless you've been living under a rock (or in like, District 13) you've probably heard the buzz about this beautiful motion picture baby already. A feature film composed ONLY of author cameos? Pinch us. Please. And if this glorious moment turns out to be real, you might just need to stand by with a defibrillator or something because this much happiness is literally lethal and we'll pass out in actuality.

So the producers haven't said much, but if this cryptic tweet by her is anything to go by, fans of the Mortal Instruments could totally be seeing Cassandra Clare on the big screen yet again. If Cassie's in on the movie, it wouldn't come as a shock - she's already had hella cameo experience in City of Bones the movie: 

But in addition to established faces, word is that the movie probably will welcome several up-and-coming cameo actors. John Green is probably a shoe-in for the male lead. We mean, just look at him: 

ADORBS

And rumor is that for fight choreographer, they've just acquired the badass himself -

That's right 

CHRISTOPHER.....FUCKING....PAOLINI

POWER LEVELS = MAJESTIC AS FUCK

And with Veronica Roth probably playing a super fierce warrior, we can only imagine how action-packed and adrenaline-soaked this orgy of awesome is going to be.

Speaking of authors with serious screen cred, it's already pretty much a given that Stephenie Meyer will be in on the project as well. She made cameos in both Twilight and Breaking Dawn, and to be honest, we can't wait to see the softspoken housewife take voyeuristic pleasure in the union of a teen girl and her stalker in another film. 

Why does Hollywood still make regular movies? Like what I can't even