Spells That Run on Hardware: Technomancy and the Magic System With a Root Password
Most urban fantasy quietly assumes magic and technology dislike each other. Phones die near wizards. Engines stall. It is a […]
Romantasy Books: Where to Start and What Each One Actually Delivers
Romantasy got its name recently and its readership did not wait for permission. The label covers fantasy where the romance
The Best Vampire Books, Sorted by the Kind of Vampire You Want
Every list of vampire books runs into the same problem on the first line, which is that “vampire book” describes
Urban Fantasy Books: A Reader’s Map to the Whole Genre
Urban fantasy is one of those genre labels that has been asked to carry too much. It covers a wizard
Seeing It Coming Is Not the Same as Stopping It: Divination as a Magic System
Foresight is the hardest power to write and the most satisfying when someone gets it right. The trouble is obvious
No Powers, No Backup, No Excuse: Urban Fantasy With an Ordinary Human in the Middle
Give the protagonist a power and you have solved your climax. You have also capped your tension, because the reader
Everybody Already Knows: Urban Fantasy Without the Masquerade
The masquerade is the genre’s default setting, and it is starting to show its age. You know the shape: the
The Power Comes Back at Forty-Five: Urban Fantasy Where the Protagonist Has a Mortgage
Most magic in this genre arrives at nineteen, when the protagonist has nothing to lose but a bad apartment and
From the Other Side of the Stake: Vampire Books Told by the People Hunting Them
Turn the camera around and the whole genre changes. Told from the vampire’s side, the story is about appetite, aristocracy
Long Memory: Vampires Who Actually Feel Their Age
Immortality is usually written as a costume. Better clothes, older accent, a house with a library. What it rarely gets