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Friday, October 10, 2014

Seven Things You Don’t Know About "Moxie’s Problems" by Hank Quense @hanque99 #Fantasy #SciFi

8:00 AM Posted by Quality Reads UK , , , 1 comment
Seven things you don’t know about Moxie’s Problems

The original Moxie story was a short story that I couldn't sell. I loved Moxie’s character and I was determined to put her into her own novel.

I was half-way through Moxie’s Problems when I put it on the side to write a series of non-fiction books called Self-publishing Guides. I did that because I got angry at all the misinformation floating around the internet on self-publishing.

I was able to return to the Moxie novel fairly easily because I always develop a series of mind-maps for my novels before I start to write the first draft. I had maps for the major characters, the plots and subplots and a third which is a graphical synopsis. These mind-maps allowed me to get back into the novel very quickly.

Some of the adventures in the novel, especially for King Artie were originally short stories I wrote a long time ago, but were never published. The Dogs of War and the Isolde adventure are two such short stores. The initial football game between the Knights and the Saxons was a short story I sold four or five times.

Originally, the novel was set in a fantasy land and Moxie was a dwarf. Her three knightly companions were a dwarf, an elf and a human. The fantasy setting conflicted with my plan to use Camelot as a backdrop so I had to change it.

The Camelot background bothered me for a while. The problem was my story bashed against the traditional Camelot legends and not in a small way. My Camelot was radically different and I felt it would annoy reads who hoped for a retelling of the traditional legends. My solution to this problem came with a sprinkling of scifi dust. Once I realized my Camelot took place in a parallel universe, I had my justification and it even encouraged me to develop more non-traditional aspects of Camelot.

One character I really enjoyed writing about was Tristan. In the story he is Camelot’s Bard and the world’s worst poet. I wrote a number of doggerel poems for him. I also made him a schizophrenic. His warrior self and his poet self are in a constant battle for supremacy of his mind. His poet self wants to soothe enemies with words, while his warrior self wants to attack audiences with his sword.

Moxie's Problem

Do you enjoy untypical coming-of-age stories? Well, you won’t find one more untypical that Moxie’s Problem. Moxie is an obnoxious, teen-age princess who has never been outsider her father’s castle. Until now. The real world is quite different and she struggles to come to grips with reality. The story take space against a backdrop of Camelot. But it isn’t the Camelot of legends. It’s Camelot in a parallel universe. So, all bets are off!

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Genre – Fantasy, Sci-fi
Rating – G
More details about the author
Connect with Hank Quense through Facebook & Twitter

1 comment:

  1. Thanks for the interview. I really enjoyed writing Moxie's Problem

    ReplyDelete

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