The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy, Vol. 2: The Opus Magus (Volume 2) [Paperback]

Tee Morris (Editor), Valerie Griswold Ford (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1896944159 | ISBN-13: 978-1896944159 | Publication Date: October 1, 2007 | Edition: 1

Tee Morris and Valerie Griswold team up as editors for the title that picks up where Alchemy With Words leaves off. The Opus Magus takes on the advanced topics of writing, such as incorporating horror, mystery, herbalism and advanced worldbuilding.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A treasure trove at your fingertips—a perfect companion to The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy" -- Sheri L. McGathy, Author of Within the Shadow of Stone

"Jovial and practical, this is a fine 'companion' for any writer of fantasy." -- Michelle M. Welch, Author of Confidence Game

About the Author

Tee Morris (author of DMP's MOREVI and Billibub Baddings and The Case of The Singing Sword) and Valerie Griswold-Ford (author of DMP's upcoming dark fantasy Not Your Father's Horsemen) team up as editors for the title that picks up where The Complete Guide leaves off. The Fantasy Writers' Companion takes on more advanced topics of writing, such as incorporating horror, incorporating mystery, herbalism, developing a story in your favorite RPG universe, and exploring alternative cultures for worldbuilding.

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Dragon Moon Press; 1 edition (October 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1896944159
• ISBN-13: 978-1896944159
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #644,253 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Tee Morris began his writing career with his 2002 historical epic fantasy, MOREVI The Chronicles of Rafe & Askana. Tee then appeared in Dragon Moon Press' 2003 release, The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy. 2004 saw the releases of The Case of The Singing Sword: A Billibub Baddings Mystery and The Fantasy Writer's Companion. It was in 2005 when his idea -- podcasting a novel -- established him as a pioneer in the Social Media movement, becoming the first author to podcast a book in its entirety. That experience led to the founding of Podiobooks.com (with Evo Terra and Chris Miller), the premier site for podcast literature.

Tee took his collaboration with Evo Terra to print in Podcasting for Dummies (featuring Chuck Tomasi in the Second Edition) and its follow-up, Expert Podcasting Practices for Dummies (also with Ryan Williams). Along with those titles, Tee has penned and collaborated on Legacy of MOREVI: Book One of the Arathellean Wars, BenBella Books's Farscape Forever: Sex, Drugs, and Killer Muppets, the podcast anthology VOICES: New Media Fiction (edited by Mur Lafferty), and in BenBella Books' So Say We All: Collected Thoughts and Opinions of BATTLESTAR GALACTICA.

Tee continues to explore podcasting with Bird House Rules, the companion podcast for All a Twitter and Sams Teach Yourself Twitter in Ten Minutes. His other podcasts and blogposts can be found across the Internat and at imaginethatstudios.com and teemorris.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Stands above the rest, but how far?, March 2, 2005

By 

the bookshelver (Roanoke, Virginia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy, Vol. 2: The Opus Magus (Volume 2) (Paperback)

The greatest compliment I can give this book is that I've owned it for less than a week and it's been borrowed four times. The first volume goes over general character and world generation--anyone with access to roleplaying reference materials knows general character and world generation--but this book won my heart because it describes other areas of fantasy fiction. High notes are Tony Ruggerio's chapter on horror fantasy and Tee Morris' chapter on Asian-based fantasy, and a few chapters concern editing and publishing specifically for the fantasy writing market. However, the rest of the book rehashes the same information laid out in the first volume, albeit with a few tweaks (like a full-blown "sex in fantasy" chapter instead of a few hints).

All in all, it's one of the better fantasy resources I've found in print. If you've got the cash to spare and you write offbeat fantasy, it's worth owning.

25 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Better than Volume 1 in series, February 27, 2005

By 

David A. Olson "davidolson22" (WI, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy, Vol. 2: The Opus Magus (Volume 2) (Paperback)

For all that this book rambles on about such "interesting" topics as the discussion on how to this book (not your book, but this book!), I found it better than the original volume in the series. There is once again wasted space, i.e. chapters about writing short stories, that don't fit well and are covered much better in other book on writing. Some somewhat useful sections on combining genres.

What makes this book shine is two of the sections are quite good. There is a detailed section on Asian culture (though I wish it had a reference section) and an intruiging chapter on government.

To summarize my thoughts on these books: I was looking for something that would overview a lot of information (which these do) in enough detail (which these sometimes do) and with good references (the references were spotty at best. Some chapters ended with suggestions on how to do an internet search.) If there were a better set of books that covered this information, I would recommend it, but I have yet to find any such thing.

Unless you want a detailed discussion on Asian culture, I recommend purchasing "The Writer's Complete Fantasy Reference" instead.

5.0 out of 5 stars Good tool for writing, February 27, 2011

By 

JC - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy, Vol. 2: The Opus Magus (Volume 2) (Paperback)

Lots of good incite and details to watch for, for anyone thinking about writing fantasy. The chapters on self-editing and short stories were epically enjoyable and helpful. This book picks up where the Complete Guide Vol. 1 lets off.