Featured Author
Nick Eve
Nick Eve was inspired by his son to write a different kind of epic fantasy in Beyond Sunlight, the first book of his new series A Pebble Dragon’s Tale
A Life of Fantasy - author's statement by Nick Eve
I feel very lucky to have lived a life where the lines between fantasy and reality have often been thin and difficult to distinguish.
In many ways, I attribute this to my family. My father was a dreamer, trapped in the body of a workaholic. He would always say that the most important thing in life was to do what made you happy, and that if you did that, the practical details would work themselves out somehow. His own life had proved this to him many times. One of my favorite stories is how he just showed up to medical school in Scotland and asked to join. He didn’t apply or anything, he just showed up. And it worked! It was sometimes hard to believe that a hard working Ophthalmologist who spent hour after hour reading medical journals was the same man who once escaped a tyrannical farm boss on a horse. His stories made me believe quite young that there was likely magic hidden inside most people, even if it wasn’t always easy to find.
My mother is a witch. I mean that in the kindest way possible. Witches are great. They are always laughing, aren’t they? They go their own way and use their magic to make life bend around them. My mum was like that, always up for a joke with a twinkle in her eye and the wonders of the wide world always calling to her. I don’t know many people who have traveled as widely or as boldly as she has her whole life.
I was also blessed to grow up during a time when the imagination was celebrated and unleashed. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, my mind was blossoming in a popular culture where the greatest hits of the days were science fiction and fantasy stories. Mutants. Barbarians. Space Voyagers. Androids. The future looked bright, and the inventors and mad scientists would get us there.
So, early on, not even at double digits in terms of age, I found Dungeons and Dragons and was entranced. You could be a Wizard. A warrior. A traveler through rich worlds of adventure. Most importantly, you could imagine your own world. You could set the rules, and fill the land with whatever your dreams could produce. I was hooked. Role-playing games are something I still enjoy as an adult, playing with several local groups on a weekly basis.
In those games though, the stories are usually quite similar. You get a group together, go raid a dungeon, fight the monsters, and collect the loot. When my son became old enough to join me in these games, he didn’t really buy into this typical narrative. My son never wanted to hurt the “monsters”. He wanted to befriend them. To bring them along on the adventure. Clearly our games needed to change.
So, instead of robbing a dungeon, we might find ourselves in a dance party full of magical jelly-fish creatures, having a best moves competition. It became incredibly silly and fun.
I learn as much from my son, at least, as he does from me. And in a world seemingly so full of anger, I really wanted to get down on the page this incredible sense of his that even your enemies can become friends with the right attitude. So I began to write the novels, and would read them at night to my son to see if he enjoyed them. He encouraged me to keep going, to keep weaving the tale, and as a result the Pebble Dragon series was born. It has been a great joy to write and enjoy with my family, and I look forward with great excitement to see how other readers will respond to this unique worldview.