Risingshadow has the honour of publishing a guest post by fantasy author Courtney Schafer. Courtney Schafer is the author of The Shattered Sigil trilogy (The Whitefire Crossing, The Tainted City and The Labyrinth of Flame).
Courtney Schafer was born in Georgia, raised in Virginia, and spent her childhood dreaming of adventures in the jagged mountains and sweeping deserts of her favorite fantasy novels. She escaped the east coast by attending Caltech for college, where in addition to obtaining a B.S. in electrical engineering, she learned how to rock climb, backpack, ski, scuba dive, and stack her massive book collection so it wouldn't crush anyone in an earthquake. She then moved to the climber's paradise of Boulder, Colorado, and somehow managed to get a masters in EE from C.U. Boulder in between racking up ski days and peak climbs.
After completing her masters, she got a job with a local aerospace company, married an Australian scientist who shared her love for speculative fiction and wilderness adventures, and took up figure skating since her other hobbies weren't challenging enough. She's had to slow down a little on the adrenaline sports since the birth of her son, but only until he's old enough to join in.
A voracious reader, Courtney always wished new fantasy novels were published faster - until she realized she could write her own stories to satisfy her craving for new worlds full of magic and wonder. Now she writes every spare moment she's not working or adventuring with her family.
Click here to visit the author's official website.
Links
Click here to visit the Kickstarter page for The Labyrinth of Flame.
Sample chapters of The Labyrinth of Flame:
- Read the 1st chapter of The Labyrinth of Flame.
- Read the 2nd chapter of The Labyrinth of Flame.
- Read the 3rd chapter of The Labyrinth of Flame.
GUEST POST by fantasy author Courtney Schafer
I’ve talked a lot on my own blog and elsewhere about how my experiences mountaineering and climbing inspired scenes and characters in the Shattered Sigil series. But mountaineering isn’t the only beloved hobby I drew upon in writing the novels; today, I’m here to tell you how my years as a figure skater informed my choice of magic system.
That’s right. Figure skating. No, my characters don’t do double axels or flying camel spins. The only thing my mountain climber protagonist Dev knows how to do with ice is climb it. As for my blood mage, Kiran, who spent most of his life in a desert city where water is a currency of control – he’s still awed and astonished by the mere sight of a frozen lake.
It’s not the physical activity of skating that I used for the novels, but aspects of skating as a competitive sport. In my years at the rink I’ve watched a seemingly endless parade of bright-eyed, talented little girls be devastated when they grow too tall to keep their triple jumps. These are kids that train 20 hours a week on the ice, and that’s not counting all the off-ice conditioning and Pilates and trampoline classes they do in support of their training. Their whole lives are structured around figure skating, and for a while, it pays off. They’re in the top ranks at Junior Nationals, their jumps are solid, they’re dreaming of the Olympics...and then slowly, inexorably, their bodies betray them. They struggle to land the jumps that once came so easily. They slide down the rankings, overtaken by younger competitors. A lucky few have the right combo of grit and genetics to relearn their triples and continue competing at the elite level. But for most, their career as a competitive skater is over, long before they reach adulthood.
This didn’t happen to me. I didn’t start skating competitively until my twenties, way over the hill in skating terms, and I count myself lucky for it. I have the freedom to enjoy the sport without the pressures younger skaters face. But after watching young skaters struggle to navigate the transition from one life to another, I wanted to explore that further in fiction. It’s a terrible thing to feel you’ve lost everything when you reach puberty.
So in the Shattered Sigil world, children born in the city of Ninavel carry a psychic "Taint" that gives them telekinetic powers, which they lose at puberty. Before Dev was a mountain guide, he grew up as one of these Tainted children. He spent his childhood being exploited by a criminal for his abilities - and then was cast aside when his ability vanished and he was no longer of use. That experience colors his whole world view, influencing his decisions and relationships, and is something I explore in various ways throughout the series. When Dev is offered an opportunity to temporarily regain his talent, how far will he go for that chance? How blind will he be to the cost?
In the third book, The Labyrinth of Flame, this exploration takes on a new facet. A child Dev cares for is undergoing the same transition he once endured, with all its loss and heartbreak. Knowing her pain doesn’t mean he knows how to salve it, nor does mentoring come easily to him – especially when he’s desperately trying to outwit blood mages and demons. But aside from the fantastical trappings, I think his struggle to help his young friend is one that anyone in a parental role will recognize. You can’t spare children from loss and pain, so how do you help them through it?
There aren’t any easy answers. There never are. For the little girls I see day in and day out at the rink, all I can do is hope that when they leave the elite ranks of skating, they (like Dev) will move past loss to find new sources of purpose and joy.