Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: Witchy Winter
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S): Butler, D. J.
BIRTHDATE: 1973
WEBSITE: http://davidjohnbutler.com/
CITY:
STATE: UT
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
RESEARCHER NOTES: writer use two forms of his name for different audience/genre
LC control no.: no2015111332
Descriptive conventions: rda
LC classification: PS3602.U8667
Personal name heading:
Butler, D. J. (David John), 1973-
Variant(s): Butler, David John, 1973-
See also: Butler, Dave, 1973-
Located: Provo (Utah)
Birth date: 1973-05-10
Fuller form of name David John
Profession or occupation: Authors Lawyers
Found in: Butler, D. J. Crecheling, 2013: title page (D.J. Butler)
cover (also author of City of the Saints and Rock Band
Fights Evil)
Facebook, August 20, 2015 (Dave Butler; born on May 10,
1973; lives in Provo, Utah)
davidjohnbutler.com, August 20, 2015 (Dave Butler; David
John Butler; lawyer and novelist; author of City of the
Saints)
Dave Butler Writes, via WWW, November 13, 2017 (writes
adventure stories for kids as Dave Butler; writes
adventure stories for older readers as D. J. Butler)
Front Page
Associated language:
eng
================================================================================
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS AUTHORITIES
Library of Congress
101 Independence Ave., SE
Washington, DC 20540
Questions? Contact: ils@loc.gov
LC control no.: n 2015057866
Descriptive conventions: rda
Personal name heading: Butler, Dave, 1973-
See also: Butler, D. J. (David John), 1973-
Birth date: 1973-05-10
Profession or occupation: Authors
Found in: The kidnap plot, 2016: ECIP title page (Dave Butler)
The kidnap plot, 2015: email from publisher 09/22/2015
(Full name: David Butler DOB: May 10, 1973)
Dave Butler Writes, via WWW, November 13, 2017 (writes
adventure stories for kids as Dave Butler; writes
adventure stories for older readers as D. J. Butler)
Front Page
Associated language: eng
================================================================================
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS AUTHORITIES
Library of Congress
101 Independence Ave., SE
Washington, DC 20540
Questions? Contact: ils@loc.gov
PERSONAL
Born May 10, 1973; married; wife’s name Emily (a novelist); children: three.
EDUCATION:New York University, law degree, 1999.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer, 2010–. Clifford Chance (law firm), associate, 1999-c. 2005; Micron Technologies (semiconductor manufacturer), former associate general counsel; Numonyx (international semiconductor manufacturer), director of corporate legal services, 2008-10; private practice of law, 2010-13; D.J. Butler Consulting, Provo, UT, co-owner, 2017–. Acumen Learning, former senior consultant and corporate trainer. WordFire, acquisitions editor; Story Monkeys, member of writing group; Space Balrogs, performer of interactive theater at science fiction and fantasy conventions.
AVOCATIONS:Reading, playing guitar.
WRITINGS
Work represented in anthologies, including Space Eldritch, 2012; Space Eldritch II: The Haunted Stars, 2013; Redneck Eldritch, 2016; Shared Nightmares; and Windows into Hell.
SIDELIGHTS
David John Butler worked in the business world for several years, primarily as a lawyer. He has been a corporate trainer, an acquisitions editor for a publishing company, and a director of corporate legal services. Butler has also given rein to his creative side. He is a guitarist and folk musician. He performs interactive theater pieces at science fiction and fantasy conventions with a group called Space Balrogs. In 2010 he also became a fiction writer.
Butler exercises his imagination in an eclectic portfolio of adventures for readers of all ages. City of the Saints is a four-part steampunk adventure set in the wild, wild West. Characters with names like Sam Clemens and Edgar Allan Poe compete for the steampunk weaponry of the Kingdom of Deseret to augment the military supremacy of North (or South) in the American Civil War.
Rock Band Fights Evil is a six-part “action-horror pulp fiction serial,” according to Butler’s website, about a “dogged band of damned rock and rollers” on a quest for redemption, later collected in two print volumes. Shorter adventures include “tales of space opera horror” inspired by the work of H.P. Lovecraft and a story “about telepathic space fungus that wants to have sex.” For young adult readers, The Buza System follows potential magister Dyan as she leaves her birth creche and plunges into a dystopian nightmare of blood ritual and murder.
The Kidnap Plot
Butler then adopted the pen name Dave Butler to launch a three-part series for middle-grade readers. Clockwork Charles Pondicherry is a Punjabi-English boy who lives in London during its steampunk heyday at the turn of the last century. In The Kidnap Plot Charlie helps his father, the genius inventor Bap, by running errands while trying to evade the local bullies who dog his every step. He spends the rest of his time confined to the safety of his humble Whitechapel flat, surrounded by books and fairytales filled with exotic lands he dreams of visiting and adventures he longs to have.
Adventure comes his way when his father is kidnapped. To save Bap, Charlie must brave the streets of London and its forbidding underground. Charlie collects a mismatched band of helpmates: trolls and dragons, pixies, and a diverse population of other unique outcasts of the city, none of whom turns out to be as simple as appearances might suggest. Along the way, Charlie learns that his father, too, may not be the man he believed him to be, and Charlie himself may have an extraordinary secret identity of his own.
Aided by the author’s “astute social commentary” regarding the racial bias prevalent in turn-of-the-century London, a Kirkus Reviews commentator found the message “that kindness is integral to the definition of humanity” in all societies. Booklist contributor Stacey Comfort called The Kidnap Plot an “engrossing story” made more fascinating by the whimsical descriptions of Charlie’s fantasy friends. A population so diverse could be daunting to certain readers, suggested Eliza Langhans in School Library Journal, but she recommended The Kidnap Plot as “a page-turning adventure for ambitious readers who don’t mind a bit of a learning curve.”
The Giant's Seat
Charlie’s adventures continue in The Giant’s Seat, right after his father’s murder, when Charlie must confront his true identity. He escapes from the malignant dwarf who captured him and embarks on the search for his father’s mysterious friend to warn him of mortal danger. Separated from his fantasy support team, Charlie is thrust into the Welsh wilderness alone, where another magical crew comes to his aid.
To Langhans, writing again in School Library Journal, The Giant’s Seat explores “intriguing ideas about what makes people different–and what can connect them.” A commentator in Kirkus Reviews reported: “Charlie learns that true family is oftentimes something that you create for yourself.” The series ends with The Library Machine, which takes Charlie to Germany. His vow to avenge his father’s murder has become a quest to save the world–and himself–from the Iron Cog organization that kidnapped Bap in the first place.
Witchy Eye
As D.J. Butler, the author published Witchy Eye as the first of a projected three-volume series for older teens. The owner of the “bad eye” is fifteen-year-old Sarah Calhoun, who wants nothing more than her privacy. Her bulging eye, which may be connected to her uncanny gift for casting the magical spells known as hexes, ensures that she will never be able to avoid unwanted attention.
Sarah lives in an early American landscape full of magic. Her home is the backwoods of Appalachia, but her heritage stretches back to the founders of the American republic–the Franklins and Penns. Her father is a military hero who will help to choose the next emperor of the New World. When Sarah becomes the target of a kidnap attempt and the Firstborn monk Thalanes comes to her aid, she learns of a heritage even more ancient and more powerful than the magic of her witchy eye.
Thalanes reveals Sarah’s connections to the Moundbuilders of the Ohio and the throne that awaits her if she can evade the roadblocks in her way. Saved from the wizard priest who tried to abduct her, she is then pursued by the emperor’s dragoons and a variety of supernatural creatures from beyond. The ultimate evil awaits.
In California Bookwatch, a reviewer described The Witchy Eye as “a satisfying blend of fantasy and horror.” In an interview at Anaphora Literary Press, Butler told Anna Faktorovich: “Fantasy novels, being the what-if literature of the human spirit, are loaded with opportunities to explore the human psyche” along the nebulous “line between religion and magic.” In the same interview, he advised readers: “When you read anything … that sounds like a cock-eyed joke about history or a sly reference to popular culture … it probably is.”
Witchy Eye
In Witchy Eye, Sarah learns that she is in fact the emperor’s daughter Sarah Elytharias Penn, and she has arrived in Cahokia to claim his Serpent Throne. She is not alone. Sarah has two siblings, including Nathaniel Chapel, whose twisted ear enables him to hear the voices of the unseen, a gift that earns him the label of madman to be feared and confined. Unaware of his own heritage, Nathaniel is aided by an Anishinaabe Loon native in return for healing the warrior’s sick son. Sarah must also triumph over other candidates for the throne: among them a New Orleans shape-shifting priest who would control the mouth of the Mighty Mississippi, a gang of Catalan pirates, and agents of the Heron King who sport dual peaceful-combative personas with dual names to confuse the unwary. Politics and magic will collide while Sarah masters the legacy of her history and her magic.
A Publishers Weekly contributor hinted that the “many scattered threads” of this tale “slowly and cunningly converge on Sarah and [her] approaching battles.” Carolyn Cushman described the series as a “fascinating alternate history of a world where magic is real, and has greatly changed the course of history.” In Booklist, reviewer Dawn Kuczwara recommended it to “readers who love history-based fantasy, steampunk, or urban fantasy.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, May 15, 2016, Stacey Comfort, review of The Kidnap Plot, p. 57; April 1, 2018, Dawn Kuczwara, review of Witchy Winter, p. 60.
California Bookwatch, May, 2017, review of Witchy Eye.
Publishers Weekly, March 5, 2018, review of Witchy Winter, p. 53.
Kirkus Reviews, April 15, 2016, review of The Kidnap Plot; April 15, 2017, review of The Giant’s Seat.
School Library Journal, May, 2016, Eliza Langhans, review of The Kidnap Plot, p. 91; April, 2017, Eliza Langhans, Eliza, review of The Giant’s Seat, p. 137.
ONLINE
Anaphora Literary Press website, https://anaphoraliterary.com/ (July 21, 2018), Anna Faktorovich, author interview.
David John Butler website, http://davidjohnbutler.com (July 21, 2018).
Locus, https://locusmag.com/ (May 15, 2018), Carolyn Cushman, review of Witchy Winter.
Additional books:
D.J. Butler
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Crecheling (The Buza System) (Volume 1) Paperback – February 25, 2015 - WordFire Press
Urbane (The Buza System) (Volume 2) Paperback – July 30, 2016 - WordFire Press
The Road to Hell: Rock Band Fights Evil Vols. 4-6 Paperback – April 26, 2017 - WordFire Press
Contains 3 novels: Devil Sent the Rain; This World Is Not My Home; The Good Son
Band on the Run: Rock Band Fights Evil Vols. 1-3
WordFire Press - March 1, 2016
Contains Hellhound on My Trail; Snake Handlin' Man; Crow Jane
City of the Saints Paperback – November 10, 2015 - WordFire Press
Contains Liahona; Deseret; Timpanogos; Teancum
Anthologized: D.J. Butler
Space Eldritch Paperback – December 14, 2012 - self-published
I’m a novelist living in the Rocky Mountain west. My training is in law, and I worked as a securities lawyer at a major international firm and inhouse at two multinational semiconductor manufacturers before setting up in solo practice. I’m a consultant and corporate trainer, teaching business acumen to employees of world-class companies.
I am a lover of language and languages, a guitarist and self-recorder, and a serious reader. I am married to a powerful and clever woman (also a novelist) and we have three devious children, but they don’t appear much in this blog (they do recur with some frequency in my social media posts). This blog, with all its meandering and changes of pace, is about writing.
I have been writing fiction since 2010. I write speculative fiction (fantasy, science fiction, space opera, steampunk, cyberpunk, superhero, alternate history, dystopian fiction, horror and related genres) for all audiences. I have written and am writing novels for middle grade, young adult and adult readers. I’m published by Knopf (The Kidnap Plot), WordFire Press (City of the Saints, Rock Band Fights Evil, The Buza System), and Baen (Witchy Eye). I am also Acquisitions Editor at WordFire.
I tweet: @DavidJohnButler. I’m also on Google+ and Goodreads (both somewhat passively), and you can reach me at david-dot-john-dot-butler-at-hotmail-dot-com, or via the Contact Me page of this blog.
I am represented by Deborah Warren of East/West Literary.
My writing group is the Story Monkeys: Platte Clark, Michael Dalzen, Erik Holmes and Eric Patten. I perform semi-improvised interactive theater at sci-fi and fantasy conventions with the Space Balrogs: Holli Anderson, James Wymore, Jason King, Craig Nybo, and David J. West.
My wife Emily is also a novelist, and sometimes she and I work on projects together. Learn more about her and her writing at emilyhbutler.com.
All Dave’s Books
Links to purchase all books can be found in the right-hand column of this website.
As Dave Butler
Kidnap Plot final
I write fantastic adventure stories for kids and other readers. My big press debut, out in June 2016, is The Kidnap Plot. Charlie Pondicherry isn’t allowed outside the house, until one day his father is kidnapped by trolls and Charlie has to organize the rescue party.
Kirkus Reviews says “Reminiscent of both Pinocchio and The Great Mouse Detective, this novel is tailor-made for young readers who love adventure narratives and steampunk fiction.”
School Library Journal says “VERDICT A page-turning adventure for ambitious readers who don’t mind a bit of a learning curve.”
The Giant’s Seat, book two, follows Charlie into the wide world of adventure. Look for the third and last book, The Library Machine, in 2018!
As D.J. Butler
Witchy Eye is my epic fantasy, published by Baen. Sarah Calhoun is the fifteen-year-old daughter of the Elector Andrew Calhoun, one of Appalachee’s military heroes and one of the electors who gets to decide who will next ascend as the Emperor of the New World. None of that matters to Sarah. She has a natural talent for hexing and one bad eye, and all she wants is to be left alone—especially by outsiders.
But Sarah’s world gets turned on its head at the Nashville Tobacco Fair when a Yankee wizard-priest tries to kidnap her. Sarah fights back with the aid of a mysterious monk named Thalanes, who is one of the not-quite-human Firstborn, the Moundbuilders of the Ohio. It is Thalanes who reveals to Sarah a secret heritage she never dreamed could be hers.
Now on a desperate quest with Thalanes to claim this heritage, she is hunted by the Emperor’s bodyguard of elite dragoons, as well as by darker things—shapeshifting Mockers and undead Lazars, and behind them a power more sinister still. If Sarah cannot claim her heritage, it may mean the end to her, her family—and to the world where she is just beginning to find her place.
Look for Witchy Winter — in which Sarah enters the strange homeland of her father’s people in pursuit of his history, his throne, and his goddess — in spring 2018!
City of the Saints is a four-part gonzo action steampunk adventure tale. 1859. War among the states looms. Sam Clemens, U.S. Army agent, is tasked with getting Brigham Young’s Kingdom of Deseret, with its air-ships and phlogiston guns, into the war on the side of the Union. Clemens rides west aboard the amphibious steam-truck the Jim Smiley, but his competition is fierce: the explorer Captain Richard Burton for Her Majesty Queen Victoria, and as agent of the clandestine Confederate leadership, Edgar Allan Poe, who travels disguised as an exhibitor of Egyptian antiquities, armed with cunning clockwork weaponry. But will even the hypnotic hypocephalus and the flesh-eating scarabs be enough when the machinating Danites spring their coup?
The four installments are Liahona, Deseret, Timpanogos, and Teancum, all available now as ebooks. City of the Saints is also available as a complete tale in paperback form. City of the Saints was a 2012 Whitney Award finalist in the Speculative Fiction category, and is also available in audiobook form, recorded by Deren Hansen.
Hellhound Front and SpineRock Band Fights Evil is an action-horror pulp fiction serial. Jim is Satan’s son, who keeps a vow of silence and wants to be left alone. Eddie sold his soul but was cheated, and became the world’s greatest tambourine player for his trouble. Adrian is a powerful wizard… when the narcolepsy doesn’t knock him out. Twitch is an outcast, shape-shifting fairy. Mike is a drunk, haunted by the ghost of the brother he accidentally killed. Follow the<< dogged band of damned rock and rollers>> as they struggle to save themselves. Can they get the fragment of Azazel’s hoof, their bargaining chip? Once they get it, can they keep it? And who else might have designs on the hoof… or on the members of the band?
The Rock Band stories are novella-length adventures, and Rock Band #1 is Hellhound on My Trail. Since 2015, Rock Band has been published by WordFire Press, and can be found for sale at all the best conventions from coast to coast. The first three Rock Band stories are collected in an omnibus called Band on the Run.
The first of the Eldritch Anthologies was Space Eldritch, a 2012 anthology of H.P. Lovecraft-inspired <
Space Eldritch was well enough received that in 2013 some of the same writers, plus others — including Steve Peck, Michaelbrent Collings, and Larry Correia — put together a follow-up: Space Eldritch II: The Haunted Stars. My contribution this time was “Seed.” I don’t want to give out any spoilers, but I tried to write something that was less action-adventure and also both more science fiction and more horror. You’ll have to judge whether I succeeded for yourself, but I will tell you this: it was fun to write <
For 2016’s Redneck Eldritch I dug into one of my other areas of interest, folk music, to write “Recording Devices.” Think Alan Lomax meets Cthulhu.
CRECHELING thumbnail
Crecheling is book one of The Buza System, a tale for young adults and other readers. Dyan receives her Lot Letter as she prepares to leave the Creche, identifying her Calling — her future rule in Buza System, the only family Dyan has ever known — as Magister. Gifted with empathy and an understanding of people, Dyan will take her place as a teacher and nurturer of future generations. But before she can do so, she must pass a final test the System puts to her, and that test is murder.
The Buza System is dark science fiction set in the crumbling ruins and blasted deserts of a future in which all people are not created equal and control is exerted by savage rituals of blood.
Book two of The Buza System is Urbane. Jak and Dyan sneak into the System in an attempt to rescue Dyan’s condemned mother. The knowledge they will gather — about the System and about themselves — is precious and bittersweet, and the price they will have to pay is high.
Shared Nightmares is an anthology of horror stories, all touching in some way on dreams, including such greats as Sara Hoyt and Larry Correia. My own 9k=story, “Incubation,” is about judgment, divine or infernal visions, and the ancient practice of sleeping in sacred places as a way of provoking a meeting with the gods.
Other anthologies containing my stories include: Windows into Hell (“Short Rests in Hell” is about a damned high school music teacher, condemned to listen to nearly-identical pieces of music and spot the differences until he learns his lesson), Under a Brass Moon (“Kung Pow Chicken for Pygmalion” is a steampunk-wuxiaish tribute to James Clavell about a secret agent looking for a secret weapon), and States of Deseret (my story is “The Guns of Perdition,” about a necromancer auctioning off a pair of guns made from the flesh and bones of a martyred prophet).
David John Butler
@DavidJohnButler
Fantasy novelist. I write Baen'd books, including WITCHY EYE. Corporate trainer. Gamer. Language lover. Folk musician. Acquisitions editor at WordFire Press.
Utah
Interview with D.J. Butler, Lawyer and Speculative Writer
Interviewer: Anna Faktorovich, PhD
Processed with VSCOcam with g2 preset
D.J. (“Dave”) Butler grew up in swamps, deserts, and mountains. After messing around for years with the practice of law, he finally got serious and turned to his lifelong passion of storytelling. He now writes adventure stories for readers of all ages, plays guitar, and spends as much time as he can with his family. He is the author of City of the Saints, Rock Band Fights Evil, Space Eldritch, and Crecheling from WordFire Press, and Witchy Eye from Baen Books. As Dave Butler, he writes adventure stories for younger readers, including The Kidnap Plot and sequels, from Knopf. Read more about Dave and his writing at http://davidjohnbutler.com, and follow him on Twitter: @davidjohnbutler.
Witchy Winter
Witchy Winter: (Published: 4/3/2018; SKU: 9781481483148; Ebook Price: $9.99): Sequel to Witchy Eye. Butler delivers another brilliant Americana flintlock fantasy novel. Sarah Calhoun paid a hard price for her entry onto the stage of the Empire’s politics, but she survived. Now she rides north into the Ohio and her father’s kingdom, Cahokia. To win the Serpent Throne, she’ll have to defeat seven other candidates, win over the kingdom’s regent, and learn the will of a hidden goddess—while mastering her people’s inscrutable ways and watching her own back. In New Orleans, a new and unorthodox priest arises to plague the chevalier and embody the curse of the murdered Bishop Ukwu. He battles the chevalier’s ordinary forces as well as a troop of Old World mamelukes for control of the city and the mouth of the great Mississippi River. Dodging between these rival titans, a crew of Catalan pirates—whose captain was once a close associate of Mad Hannah Penn—grapples with the chevalier over the fate of one of their mates. Meanwhile, a failed ceremony and a sick infant send the Anishinaabe hunter Ma’iingan on a journey across the Empire to Cavalier Johnsland, to a troubled foster child named Nathaniel. Ma’iingan is promised that Nathaniel is a mighty healer and can save his imperiled baby, but first Nathaniel—a pale young man with a twisted ear who hears the voices of unseen beings—must himself be rescued, from oppression, imprisonment, and madness.
Faktorovich: A year ago you started a new independent venture, DJ Butler Consulting, LLC, in Utah. Why did you decide to incorporate it as opposed to running it as a sole proprietorship or another business structure type? I have been considering creating a corporation to start a non-profit branch of Anaphora, but the cost has always seemed a bit much. So, what’s your legal reasoning behind choosing an LLC? Can’t you just consult people on their businesses without the LLC? Are clients more likely to work with you with this protection? Are there tax benefits?
Butler: Oh, interesting question. In theory, the LLC might provide some protection from liability, but I’m not really worried about that in the consulting business. The LLC gave me and my co-owner, my wife Emily, a vehicle for investing together, with some tax efficiencies.
Faktorovich: For the last couple of years, you have been working as the Acquisitions Editor for WordFire Press, which also employs dozens of editors and proofreaders. On their submission page they say they are not open to new submissions. Are you actively working for them at this time? At what frequency do they close and open for submissions? Is most of the team employed as independent contractors who are paid when the press solicits and accepts submissions? Editing isn’t something that appears on your CV previously, so why did you choose to take on this job? It looks like you published a few books with them before taking on this role. Did you learn that they needed help through this connection? How do you like working in acquisitions so far? Can you describe the worst or the best experience you’ve had so far acquiring books?
Butler: I was picked up by WordFire as an author before anything else. I spent a year traveling to popular culture conventions (comic con-style) to sell my books as well as the books of other WordFire authors before the acquisitions editor opportunity came about. When the owner, Kevin J. Anderson, mentioned to me at a convention in Miami that he was looking for an acquisitions editor, I sent him an email with a list of reasons why that editor should be me.
We haven’t been officially closed for submissions since I’ve been acquisitions editor, but that doesn’t stop writers from querying me—and good for them, frankly. So we have been soft-closed most of that time, which is to say closed generally, but open to exceptions, and the making of those exceptions has been agreed between me and Kevin Anderson. We are at present hard-closed, by which I mean you’d REALLY have to be unusual to be acquired by us right now. Most of our team works either on a volunteer basis or is paid out of royalties on the books they work on, with a modest advance.
The wonderful thing about working in acquisitions is that you get to make people’s dreams come true. Every single novel acquired has given me a heart-warming experience, and most of them have resulted in strangers becoming friends. I do have worst experiences, but to tell you them I’d have to talk a bit out of school, so I will choose discretion. Among my best experiences I’d include acquiring and editing R.M. Meluch’s Blood of Akhilles—she’s a learned classicist (does her own translations out of the Greek) as well as a terrific novelist and a joyous personality.
Faktorovich: Up until a year ago, you worked as a Senior Consultant/ Corporate Trainer for Acumen Learning, which advertise itself as having taught acumen to 500,000 business leaders. Their marketing goes on to say: “How many of your leaders would rather have a root canal than a discussion about financial statements?” They promise to help people understand “business.” Did you seriously believe in what you were selling; did you get disillusioned with it before or since this job ended? It seems like what they’re selling is similar to hypnotism. Instead of giving information about business strategies, or using real-world examples, they talk about the theory of understanding something otherwise incompressible about business. If this isn’t the case, can you give an example of practical advice you gave in this position?
Butler: Business is one of those areas of human endeavor (military strategy is another) into which a great deal of thought has been invested, but that investment has largely happened outside the academy. There is rigorous thinking about business, and it comes down to some fairly obvious fundamentals, but because of the priorities built into our public education system, most people go through an entire career in for-profit businesses with only the most tenuous understanding of what they’re doing. Orders seem arbitrary and selfish and results appear random or pre-determined. Cynicism and disillusionment result.
So if you can communicate those fundamental ideas in engaging stories and a logical progression of ideas, it turns out that most people are able to give themselves good advice about how to increase cash flow, raise profit, or maximize return. So yeah, with a little allowance for sales puffery, I do believe it.
And frankly, I think more writers could benefit from exposure to business knowledge, and especially to start-up theory. Every writer is a small business, and most writers are startups that fail—that don’t reach a large enough group of customers before running out of cash or will.
Faktorovich: Prior to switching to consulting, you ran an independent law firm for three years (2010-3). How could this business have an end date? If you’re still an attorney, why wouldn’t you keep this company open indefinitely in case somebody finds it and asks you to represent them? Even if my publishing company ran out of money and I did not have time to work on it, I can’t imagine fully closing it down.
Butler: Well, it’s not free to keep open any business, and especially a business like a law practice, where you have to pay bar fees and insurance premiums. I enjoyed representing startups and tech companies in Idaho when I did, but I’ve always wanted to be a novelist, and I’m thrilled that’s taking off now.
Faktorovich: What advice do you think start-ups, entrepreneurs and other clients you represented as a lawyer most need to hear? Is there a legal mistake that came up most commonly that you prevented? What’s the main reasons entrepreneurs should hire an attorney when starting or evolving a business? What’s the worst that can happen if an entrepreneur relies on their own legal research?
Butler: It’s easy to over-lawyer, especially if you have the money. Hiring a lawyer is a way to mitigate risk, but being an entrepreneur is a high-risk venture, regardless. I think entrepreneurs are well-advised to consult a lawyer when the stakes are highest—for instance, in negotiating with investors, and in bet-the-company contracts.
Faktorovich: Just before you started your own practice, you worked for Numonyx as the Director of Corporate Legal. You started with them in the year it was founded, 2008, and stayed with them until they sold it to Micron Technologies in 2010. Since this point it has started generating $3.6 billion in annual revenue and had over 6,000 employees. Since you guided this company from infancy to this mega success, why didn’t you stay on to bask in the profits? Was there something about this job that convinced you that you had to work for yourself in your own law firm? Curiously, you had worked as an Associate General Counsel previously for the company that bought Numonyx, Micron. Did you help to make this acquisition happen because of your connection to Micron?
Butler: I’m grateful for my time at Numonyx. I stepped up into more senior corporate leadership, got terrific experience, and made great friends. Helping the company survive through a time of falling chip prices and then transactioning the company to Micron was an adventure. For sure, my being a former Micron lawyer and having relationships with all of Micron’s attorneys made a lot of the communication easier, but I wasn’t the one who arranged the deal. Semiconductor manufacturing is a small world, and the executives all knew each other to begin with. Once we’d sold Numonyx to Micron, I’d gone as far as I ever wanted with my legal career, and that success gave me the opportunity I’d long wanted, to take a stab at getting published.
Faktorovich: Right out of New York University School of Law in 1999, you found a great job as an Associate for Clifford Chance LLP and stayed with them for 6 years. Did it take a lot of effort to find this first job, or did an NYU degree make it pretty simple? Did they scout you rather than the other way around? Did you work with an employment agent that found the job for you? What does “cross-border capital markets”, your field of expertise at Clifford, mean? Was this work interesting? What surprised you the most when you first started? Were you prepared for the realities of the work involved through your law school, or was the reality more mundane in comparison with how this job is advertised in law textbooks, TV series, or mysteries?
Butler: NYU didn’t do the leg work, but the imprimatur of an NYU degree made a job at Clifford Chance a possibility, and Clifford Chance recruited me out of school directly. Cross-border capital markets means that I helped companies raise money from investors in international transactions—helped a Polish cell phone company sell bonds in the US, for instance, and helped an Italian spirits company list on the stock exchange in Italy and sell shares to American investors.
In law school, I had learned to work and think, but most of what you do in law school is geared at case-law analysis, and was therefore not relevant to my new job, which was conducting due diligence, drafting prospectuses, and negotiating contracts. My reality was more like Barbarians at the Gate than like Better Call Saul or Perry Mason, and I’d say the thing that surprised me most up-front was how little of the actual work was legal analysis. I’m grateful I did it, because it was a fantastic education in business, people, and the world.
Map by Bryan G. McWhirter on the back of WITCHY WINTER
Faktorovich: I met you at the Baen Publishing Enterprises booth a few days ago at the Texas Library Association (TLA) convention. Baen has published two of your speculative novels: Witchy Eye and Witchy Winter. You had a gigantic couple of stacks of your book that you were signing and the editor said he covered your hotel stay. Is this type of treatment better than what you have seen from your other publishers? As you are moving into publishing more children’s fiction with Penguin/ Knopf, do you think they will or have they provided even better marketing packages? Do you think a speculative novel could sell well without a massive marketing plan like the one Baen offers? Do you know how the distribution deal with Simon & Schuster works; does Simon or Baen provide the funding for marketing?
Butler: I understand that Baen’s funding is independent, and that Simon & Schuster acts as its sales force, getting books into bookstores, but I could be mistaken. I have been working hard at selling and marketing my writing for six years now, and I continue to invest; I covered my own flights to Texas, for instance, as part of a trip that also took me San Jose’s Silicon Valley Comic Con, to stand on the show floor and sell books for the weekend. I have paid for chibi stickers, tote bags, and hats that I have given away in marketing events. I’ve recorded and given away CDs of music. I leverage my consulting travel to visit bookstores and go to conventions. Wherever Baen’s funding comes from, they have shown great willingness to co-invest in marketing with me, and I think we’re seeing the results. I’m absolutely thrilled to have a partner that seems to be as excited about me as I am about them.
As it happens, I was published by Knopf before I was published by Baen. Books written for middle readers are harder to sell than science fiction and fantasy written for adults, because you can’t sell to the children directly (unless you’re Scholastic), so you end up trying to market to adult decisionmakers like teachers and parents. An indie fantasy writer can use tools like Amazon, Bookbub, Wattpad, and Goodreads—an indie novelist writing middle grade fiction has to physically go to schools to reach his audience.
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Faktorovich: Both of these stories have shocking opening paragraphs. Witchy Eye starts with a description of the witchy eye the title refers to: “her eye bulged in its socket, useless, sealed shut, and glinting with a hint of pus…” Witchy Winter starts thus: “With one last push and a hiss of triumph, Waabigwan gave birth to their child…” Both of these are pretty unusual for the genre. It is very common to see opening paragraphs where somebody is murdered, dies an otherwise tragic death, or suffers some other “ticking-bomb” mechanism disaster that starts the story rolling. Focusing instead of bodily functions like pus in the eye and afterbirth is shocking, but a bit grotesque. Can you explain how you settled on these starts? Did editors convince you to go in this direction, or was this something you insisted on? In fact, in your Knopf children’s book, The Kidnap Plot, you also open the story with a discussion of “toenail fungus” and “smeared” “goop.” So, would you say the grotesque is an element of your signature style?
Witchy Eye final
Butler: That’s funny, I hadn’t made that connection. Maybe some amount of the grotesque is part of my writing, but I would have defined all three of those opening scenes in terms of conflict. Witchy Eye begins with Sarah Calhoun, who is offended by the Englishman Obadiah Dogsbody (he stares at her because of her eye), and who determines to take Obadiah down a peg by humiliating him and his master. Witchy Winter begins with a ritual conflict (with a predetermined outcome), between the doodems of Maa’ingan and his wife Waabigwan, to determine which clan will have their child; when the ritual goes awry, it creates a new level of (real) conflict. The Kidnap Plot begins with Charlie running from bullies in the alley, and by the end of the chapter has him facing an adult with genuinely malign intentions.
Faktorovich: Are children’s books more profitable than speculative fiction for adults in the current publishing market? If not for profit, why did you decide to write books for young readers like The Kidnap Plot? After decades in corporate law, is it difficult for you to write at a reading level that can be understood by kids? Is there a trick you use to enter the mind frame needed for this style of composition?
Butler: The market for middle reader and young adult novels is larger, and therefore those publishers generally pay larger advances than science fiction and fantasy. I write for readers of all ages because I have stories I want to tell to people of all ages. As a business matter, I also want to capture readers when they’re young with complex adventure tales, and then keep them their entire lives.
I’ve found I don’t have any particular challenge writing for younger readers. There are subject matters to be more careful with or avoid, and you have to pull your punches slightly with respect to vocabulary, but that’s all. Children have just as much brain power as adults, and it’s important not to condescend to them with stories that are too simple, or boring, or predictable. I’m looking for smart young readers, just like I’m looking for smart adults.
Faktorovich: In the children’s book version of your bio, you mention that you currently live “in an old house” in Provo, Utah, and work “in a study where one of the biggest bestsellers of the twentieth century was written.” You’re referring to Stephen R. Covey (1932-2012), who wrote The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. The bio adds: “He has kept the room’s original shag carpet and wood-veneer walls.” Why did you keep the carpet and the walls as-is after purchasing Covey’s house? Did you meet him while he was alive? Were you a fan of his writing? What do you admire about him or his work? Do you really believe there’s something effective people do that others don’t? It seems as if guessing what successful people have in common is like reading Tarot cards: generalized guesses are likely to be true but cannot really offer practical advice on how to get there. Have you found any advice in his work helpful to your own effectiveness?
Butler: I never met Covey in life, but I’ve met a number of his family members and people who worked in his business. I think he successfully packaged up some fairly conventional middle-class wisdom and reintroduced it to people who needed a reminder, and that’s a valuable service. Yes, those habits do help a person achieve practical success in life. It’s worth reading the 7 Habits, and of his seven, I would say “Sharpen Your Saw” is the one that resonates most with me. I’m a relentless autodidact—on the cross-trainer, I read novels in French, Dutch, German, and Catalan for practice, and I’m currently teaching myself the banjo.
Mostly, I kept the green shag carpet because it’s cool. But you know, just in case Stephen’s office mojo helped sell those bazillion copies of his books… I’ll keep the décor for now.
Faktorovich: The style you use in Witchy Winter is focused on actions and speedy dialogue, but these are interrupted with some curious backstory and intricate descriptions, such as this: “The myrrh ink Luman had made himself, grinding the chunks of resinous tree sap into powder over the course of days with his stone mortar and pestle, and then bottling it up in a small flask of brandy, as if he were mixing laudanum. The myrrh he’d acquired from a Venetian trader in New Amsterdam, who’d parted with it in exchange for a curse of wakefulness cast on a romantic rival for the affection of a fat meneer’s daughter” (325). You go on to describe that the curse in question did not fully work, but still drove the other suitor mad and to his death. In addition to being a great bit of description, it’s also pretty brutal, or a kind of magical realism, where human follies are personified in this magical realm. Did you do a lot of research into Wicca or other magical potions and beliefs? What were the techniques you used to visualize and describe things that might have no basis in reality?
Butler: In fact, with respect to magic, I try pretty hard to ground it in real world magic, either from the point of view of a practitioner or the point of view of an anthropologist. I am not myself a magician of any kind, and I didn’t study Wicca, but I have read a lot about braucheri, vodun, Greco-Roman magic, rune practice, astrology, and other arcane traditions. It’s a fascinating area of study, and the precise<< line between religion and magic>> is very hard to pinpoint.<< Fantasy novels, being the what-if literature of the human spirit, are loaded with opportunities to explore the human psyche>> with just these symbols and ideas.
Faktorovich: The main character in the Baen series, Sarah Calhoun, enters politics in the first book, and then fights to defeat seven rivals for the Serpent Throne in the second. Did you intend her struggles to be symbols for the political struggles America is currently facing in the Trump presidency, or across previous cutthroat politicians? Did you consciously research assassinations or political assassinations of rival candidates in the modern world’s reality to come up with the plotline for this fantasy? What do you think about the realities of modern American political life? Would you ever want to write a non-fiction book about such realities? If not, why not; if so, how so?
Butler: Actually, I try to avoid politics, because I find that I can more easily lose friends than make them that way. The models for Sarah’s challenge have more to do with the Thirty Years War and Josiah’s Reforms than with contemporary political conflict.
Faktorovich: If you met yourself at eighteen today, what advice would you give him to direct your life in the best possible direction? Feel free to speculate on if you would have taken your own advice. How early should he start writing books? Should he spend any time on the law? How can he go about finding a great literary agent?
Butler: You know, my life hasn’t been easy or stress-free, but it’s been good. I took up writing late, but I hope that means I took it with a greater sense of irony, and maybe more wisdom. I can’t regret my large decisions. In my small decisions, I’d urge myself to be kind, compassionate, and patient. I might tell myself that I’d never stop being shy, but that I’d learn to get out of myself, and discover that I really like people.
Faktorovich: Thank you for participating in this interview. Are there any other comments you would like to make, or any other topics you would like to discuss?
Butler: Thank you very much, it’s been a pleasure. To anyone preparing to read my books for the first time, I would just say this:<< when you read anything>> in them <
Witchy Winter
Publishers Weekly. 265.10 (Mar. 5, 2018): p53.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 PWxyz, LLC
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Full Text:
Witchy Winter
DJ. Butler. Baen, $25 (608p) ISBN 978-1-4814-8314-8
Butler follows Witchy Eye with a satisfying second tale of a magic-filled early America. The first volume introduced 15-year-old Sarah Calhoun, who hails from the Appalachian backwoods. She discovered that she had a claim to the Serpent Throne of Cahokia, which controls the Midwest--and also learned she had two siblings, whom she hopes to meet. Now Sarah and her companions have reached her true homeland, and her family members, who are also vying for the throne, may be the least of her worries. The legendary Heron King, ruler of beastkind, has dispatched messengers warning that Peter Plowshare--his peacetime aspect, or persona--is dead, and his wartime aspect, Simon Sword, will unleash death and madness on any who resist him. Deep and old magic influences both places and characters, and the story is tightly focused on the determined Sarah, who needs the magic but only vaguely grasps its multitude of dangers. Butler spins <
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Witchy Winter." Publishers Weekly, 5 Mar. 2018, p. 53. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A530430279/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=a98e98d5. Accessed 14 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A530430279
Witchy Winter
Dawn Kuczwara
Booklist. 114.15 (Apr. 1, 2018): p60.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
Witchy Winter. By D. J. Butler. Apr. 2018.608p. Baen, $25 (9781481483148).
In the sequel to Witchy Eye (2017), Butler continues the story of a rugged and magical North America, deeply entrenched in courtly politics. As is tradition, after the birth of Anishinaabe Loon warrior Ma'iingan's first child, he performs the initiation ceremony. But when the ritual goes wrong and the child becomes sick, Ma'iingan must set out on a quest to save him. At the same time, Sarah Calhoun, now aware of her birthright as the Emperor's daughter, travels to capture the Serpent Throne in Cahokia. But she isn't the only one looking to seize power over the land. For<< readers who love history-based fantasy, steampunk, or urban fantas>>y, start with the first book in this series that gives the genre a new twist.--Dawn Kuczwara
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Kuczwara, Dawn. "Witchy Winter." Booklist, 1 Apr. 2018, p. 60. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A534956908/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=9a555809. Accessed 14 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A534956908
Butler, Dave: THE GIANT'S SEAT
Kirkus Reviews. (Apr. 15, 2017):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
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Full Text:
Butler, Dave THE GIANT'S SEAT Knopf (Children's Fiction) $16.99 6, 13 ISBN: 978-0-553-51299-1
A new adventure awaits Charlie Pondicherry and his ragtag band of uncanny friends.Picking up two days after the climactic events of The Kidnap Plot (2016), this second series installment follows the Punjabi-English clockwork boy Charlie--who is still reeling from his father's murder--as he races to warn an old associate of his father's that the nefarious Iron Cog organization is coming for him. During a freak storm, Charlie is separated from his companions, Gnat the patrician pixie, Ollie the shape-shifter, and Bob, a girl pilot masquerading as a boy. The novel's events again unreel at a frenetic pace, but readers are still drawn into a magical steampunk world in which pixies exist alongside humans in turn-of-the-century Great Britain. The series' quests are as much about enriching bookworm Charlie's real-world education as they are about high-flying adventure, and this tale expands his life experience even more, taking him from his London home into the wilds of Wales. The author introduces Charlie to another diverse set of characters whom he gradually wins over through selflessness and heroics, including a magical singing Welshman, a host of wood elves, and a dwarf who enslaves clockwork machines and initially denies Charlie's humanity. Along the way,<< Charlie learns that true family is oftentimes something that you create for yourself>>. An entertaining sequel that leaves readers wanting more. (Fantasy. 10-14)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Butler, Dave: THE GIANT'S SEAT." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Apr. 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A489268429/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=ee8861f9. Accessed 14 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A489268429
Witchy Eye
D.J. Butler
California Bookwatch. (May 2017):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Midwest Book Review
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Sarah is fifteen and the daughter of a famous military hero who has a bad eye and a good ability to hex, added into a psyche that just wants to be left one. Unfortunately, fate doesn't leave her be: an attempted kidnapping, a mysterious monk, and a hidden heritage prompt Sarah to embark on a journey that holds wide-reaching consequences, from her introduction to other inhuman realms to her inheritance of family gifts and dangers. The result is<< a satisfying blend of fantasy and horror>> that will delight readers seeking complex crossover titles holding both elements.
D.J. Butler
Baen Books
PO Box 1188, Wake Forest NC 27588
9781476782119, $25.00, www.baen.com
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Butler, D.J. "Witchy Eye." California Bookwatch, May 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A496014817/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=f19fbd7c. Accessed 14 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A496014817
The Extraordinary Journeys of Clockwork Charlie: The Kidnap Plot
Stacey Comfort
Booklist. 112.18 (May 15, 2016): p57.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
The Extraordinary Journeys of Clockwork Charlie: The Kidnap Plot. By Dave Butler. June 2016. 304p. Knopf, $16.99 (9780553512953); lib. ed., $19.99 (9780553512960). Gr. 4-7.
Charlie Pondicherry lives in the back roads of London's Whitechapel area, running errands for Bap, his inventor father, and dealing with bullies. Insults and stones fly, with equal accuracy, from schoolmates like Bruiser and from Fathead Wu, who does Bap's laundry. All Charlie wants is adventure--to meet dragons and trolls and to captain a pirate ship--but even in this alternate London, full of clockwork creatures and devices, true adventures are few and far between. When Bap is kidnapped by a Sinister Man and the creepy Anti-Human League, Charlie takes it upon himself to mount a rescue. With unlikely help from the thieves Heavenbound Bob and The Snake, Charlie uncovers a plot to replace Queen Victoria and blame it on Bap, who, it turns out, has a shocking secret identity. In between chapters are snippets from the Smythson Almanack, detailing the sorts of fantasy creatures (trolls, pixies, kobolds) that Charlie sees on an average day, a nice touch that makes for an interesting addition to an already <
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Comfort, Stacey. "The Extraordinary Journeys of Clockwork Charlie: The Kidnap Plot." Booklist, 15 May 2016, p. 57. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A453913710/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=c0013c67. Accessed 14 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A453913710
Butler, Dave: THE KIDNAP PLOT
Kirkus Reviews. (Apr. 15, 2016):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Butler, Dave THE KIDNAP PLOT Knopf (Children's Fiction) $16.99 6, 14 ISBN: 978-0-553-51295-3
Charlie Pondicherry, a Punjabi-English boy whose life revolves around his father's clock shop, experiences the world entirely through books and stories...but that is about to change.When his brilliant inventor father is kidnapped by a group of sinister men, all they leave behind is a mysterious note signed by the Anti-Human League. Aided by a motley crew of helpmates that includes a troll, an aristocratic pixie, and two chimney sweeps, Charlie races to save his father and foil a plot against Queen Victoria during her Diamond Jubilee. Along the way, Charlie learns that life is far more complicated than the fairy tales he read could have prepared him for. In this first novel of a projected series for children, Butler crafts a multilayered network of societies within and beneath London and a racially diverse cast of characters, none of whom are entirely what they seem. Through the group's exploits in the city, the author makes <
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Butler, Dave: THE KIDNAP PLOT." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Apr. 2016. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A449240891/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=dcf86d17. Accessed 14 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A449240891
Butler, Dave. The Giant's Seat
Eliza Langhans
School Library Journal. 63.4 (Apr. 2017): p137.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/
Full Text:
BUTLER, Dave. The Giant's Seat. 352p. (The Extraordinary Journeys of Clockwork Charlie: Bk. 2). Knopf. Jun. 2017. Tr $16.99. ISBN 9780553512991.
Gr 4-7--The second installment in this series starts with Chadie Pondicherry getting abruptly separated from the ragtag team of friends who helped him through his first adventures. Captured by a cantankerous dwarf who insists on treating him more like an animal than a person, Charlie is forced to confront his identity as a mechanical boy, all while reeling from the death of his beloved father. Charlie escapes from the dwarf but is quickly launched from one escapade to the next as he tries to find a mysterious friend of his father's while evading the evil Iron Cog. Butler fashions a diverse world that reflects his <
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Langhans, Eliza. "Butler, Dave. The Giant's Seat." School Library Journal, Apr. 2017, p. 137. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A488688220/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=009218d5. Accessed 14 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A488688220
Butler, Dave. The Kidnap Plot
Eliza Langhans
School Library Journal. 62.5 (May 2016): p91.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/
Full Text:
BUTLER, Dave. The Kidnap Plot. 304p. (The Extraordinary Journeys of Clockwork Charlie), ebook available. Random. Jun. 2016. Tr $16.99. ISBN 9780553512953; lib. ed. $19.99. ISBN 9780553512960.
Gr 4-7--Charlie Pondicherry, the son of an inventor, lives a cloistered life in a back alley of London until his father is kidnapped and he is thrown headfirst into a series of adventures as he tries to rescue him. As Charlie travels through London, he meets a colorful cast of characters and learns that he might not be quite the boy he thinks he is (hint: the spoiler is in the title). The story is action packed and throws readers right in, but the world-building can feel overly busy, particularly since this version of steampunk London is populated not just by humans but also pixies, trolls, hulders, kobolds, and more, each with their own particular habits, dialect, and political subplots. An open ending promises more to come. VERDICT<< A page-turning adventure for ambitious readers who don't mind a bit of a learning curve>>.--Eliza Langhans, Hatfield Public Library, MA
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Langhans, Eliza. "Butler, Dave. The Kidnap Plot." School Library Journal, May 2016, p. 91. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A451409868/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=7648c477. Accessed 14 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A451409868
Carolyn Cushman Reviews Witchy Winter by D.J. Butler
May 25, 2018 Carolyn Cushman
D.J. Butler, Witchy Winter science fiction book reviewD.J. Butler, Witchy Winter (Baen 978-1-4814-8314-8, $25.00,591pp, hc) April 2018. Cover by Daniel Dos Santos.
War and winter are coming in this second volume in the epic flintlock fantasy series begun in Witchy Eye, which introduced this<< fascinating alternate history of a world where magic is real, and has greatly changed the course of history>>. Religions are fascinatingly altered, and the magic, from various cultures, is intriguing. Despite the changes, the sense of frontier adventure is familiar, and names remain, just tantalizingly changed: America is just the New World, where William Penn and Benjamin Franklin helped build an empire, and now their descendants are fighting for control. Very much a middle book, this sprawling volume follows various characters, spread out from New Orleans to Ohio and Philadelphia. Sarah Calhoun, now going by her rightful name Sarah Elytharias Penn, is heading for the Firstborn Kingdom of Cahokia to take her father’s throne, but of course it won’t be that easy, with the beastkind armies of Simon Sword attacking, the Empire’s agents working on the “Pacification” of the region, and other powerful Firstborn already vying for the throne. Elsewhere, conflict builds: New Orleans is caught in a power struggle, and Sarah’s sister Margaret appears briefly. In contrast, Sarah’s brother Nathaniel Chapel becomes a major character in this volume. He’s unaware of his true identity and thought mad because of the voices he hears, but he gets some unexpected help from an Anisinaabe tribesman. The Emperor, Thomas Penn, finally takes the stage as well, not the fearsome monster he seemed from a distance, but bad enough in his calculatingly ruthless way. There’s a lot going on, with plots on plots and a huge cast, but there are some wonderful characters and plenty of lively adventures to keep things fun and full of wonder.