John Brown Answers Questions Five

I presume that John Brown is a pretty happy guy – he recently saw the release of his first novel, Servant of a Dark God (US, UK, Canada, Indiebound). It’s the first book in the Dark Gods trilogy (though it stands on its own well enough) and it’s been fairly well received – I enjoyed it. He lives in the hinterlands of Utah with his family and has been inspired by conversations with livestock (see below). And I’m very pleased that he took the time to answer Questions Five.

Utah seems to have a disproportionately high number of SFF writers when compared to other places in the world. Is there something in the water?

It's the Jell-O, actually. You eat as much green Jell-O as we Utahans and it's bound to start affecting your dreams.

It does seem there are indeed a lot of SFF writers in Utah. You've got big names like Sanderson, Farland, and Modesitt. In YA there's Mull, Dashner, and Hale. But I question if we really do have more per capita.

I'm looking at the SFWA directory with members listed out by state and Utah doesn't seem to have an inordinate number for its size. For example, if you use the electoral college as a rough population guide, New Mexico and Utah (both with 5 electoral votes) have about the same number of listings. Washington, which has double the number of electoral votes of Utah, has a little more than double the number as Utah. New Jersey isn't represented well. Neither is Georgia. Of course, not all SFF writers are members of SFWA. So this could be just another one of those useless datasets.

Having done that super rigorous investigation, I will say that I have enjoyed the relationships I've made with other Utah writers. I don't know what other states are like, but the group here is so dang nice and helpful. Everyone seems to be all "come on in, the water's fine!" And I can tell you it feels very nice in this pool.

Just how many significant events in your life have been inspired by conversations with livestock?

Besides the one that helped me get the idea for this book, I'd say zero. Livestock are just not the best conversationalists. And I've really tried. I've written about it elsewhere (http://whatever.scalzi.com/2009/10/20/the-big-idea-john-brown/ ), but for your readers I'll summarize the one fine beef chat I did have.

I live up in the hinterlands of Utah in Rich County. It's all ranch land for miles and miles. Now, I'm a city boy, so everything up here was new to me. And one day I was hiking up a canyon and came across a small herd of cattle on their summer range. The bull was bellowing.

Being of supreme intelligence, I bellowed back because, hey, isn't it everyone's dream to talk to animals? We went back and forth a few times. I thought we were having a fine conversation until he began to charge through the willows at me.

I suddenly realized I was telling him I was going to take one of his women. He was telling me he was gonna kill me. And I was saying, "Bring it, I'm taking a woman."

He had a slight size advantage on me, and because I've already got a wife and am not attracted to cows all that much anyway, I high-tailed it out of there. But I began to think: humans, cattle, ranching--what if humans were ranched? So it was a bull that gave me the idea for this novel.

If Servant of a Dark God were a fortune cookie, what would its fortune be?

"You will be soon richer than JK Rowling"

In my dreams. Let's see.

"Human, it's what's for dinner."

Naw. How about this.

"After much tribulation cometh the blessings."

How would you interpret this fortune if it were your own?

It IS my own. You can't know sweet until you've tasted bitter. Most of my greatest joys in life were the result of some tribulation. Or perhaps I should say that many could not be had without going through some struggle.

Why should Servant of a Dark God be the next thing that everyone reads?

Because then I'll have a gazillion readers and will be able to exert mind control to pass legislation guaranteeing bunny cakes to everybody every April first. Bunny cakes make the world so much better. The first is my birthday. And so said legislation would make the first an international holiday called John Bunnycake Day. I'm not joking. Really, I'm not.

But if you don't like that reason, then maybe this will make more sense. However much I'd wish it, I can honestly say that this book should NOT be the next thing EVERYONE reads. The world's a big space. A lot of different needs. It might that the next book that needs to be read by Marge in Sandersville, Georgia is Go Dog, Go! And it needs to be read to her daughter. Or maybe it's her husband that needs it, to remind him of the son they've lost. Juan in Blackwell, Oklahoma might need to read Lone Survivor because he's destined to save someone's life as a SEAL. And this will be the book that commits him. And the list goes on.

Still, I do hope that many people read SERVANT. My goal was to plunge the reader into a new world full of danger, to stress them, fill them with cool wonder, make 'em laugh, and leave them with some things to think about—a bit of tribulation before the blessing. From the reports I've been getting from readers, it appears the tale is doing this for most who give it a go. There is a fairly steep learning curve at the front. I might have done that differently, but I think the patient reader will be rewarded.

Review: Servant of a Dark God by John Brown

Debuts are always tricky reads – you may find what will fast become THE next great book, or you may find something that isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on, though the typical debut falls somewhere between those extremes. John Brown’s Servant of a Dark God (US, UK, Canada, Indiebound) is a debut that falls between those extremes, with the good outweighing the not-so-good, leaving me excited to read more.

The world is dominated by clans who are in turn dominated by Divines, magical and long-lived humans who feed off of the lives of their subjects and strictly control access to their magical heritage. Whitecliff is a colony of clans removed from the main civilizations of the world struggling to survive in the face of invasions and divided by the clan wars far abroad. Talen is a boy on the verge of manhood and a member of the oppressed Koramite clan. His family comes under suspicion of ‘slethery’ (soul-eating) – the unauthorized and evil use of magic and Talen finds himself thrust into a world more complicated than he imagined and far more dangerous.

I found Servant of a Dark God to be somewhat uneven – especially in the first two-thirds of the book. The beginning gets overly bogged down by reliance on terminology that’s unfamiliar – it’s always a neat trick to balance clumsy over-description and infodumping with creating an interesting and mysterious world that is slowly revealed to the reader. Brown errs on the side of being overly mysterious and stingy in showing the reader his world. While the slow start isn’t all that surprising since this is a new book in a new world and everything needs to be introduced and set-up, it was slow enough that I considered not continuing with the book.

Compounding the slow start are Brown’s characters. Not only is the central plot yet another obscure young boy-man bound for greatness, but Brown chooses to tell the story through multiple points of view, with Talen getting the lion’s share. This results in the reader to not being invested in any single character and is made worse with Talen being simply unlikable, invoking little sympathy for the majority of the book. The secondary characters proved much more interesting but had their screen time sacrificed for the sake of Talen. The torment developed within these secondary characters as they fight, struggle, make sacrifices, and ultimately yield is at times gut-wrenching.

Balancing these negatives are positives that include the world with its potential and pacing. As I said above, Servant of a Dark God is uneven, but when it’s on, it’s really on. Particularly near the end, the suspense is notched up and the book becomes thoroughly engrossing and near impossible to put down.

The other great positive is the world that Brown creates. The setting feels fresh and the magic of the land is just unique enough. The culture of the people is also quite fascinating – Brown’s take on oppressed peoples feels real enough at times to make me genuinely angry. The significance of the hierarchy of society and the Divines who literally feed on the people they rule grows to a peak at the end. The end result is that I want to keep reading about this land – I want to know what happens. I’ve used the word already, but I’ll use it again – there is great potential.

Servant of a Dark God is the debut novel from John Brown, a new voice in fantasy that I expect I’ll hear more from. As the way of many debuts, Servant of a Dark God is a complete story-arc that can stand on its own, but it screams for the sequels to come. The Dark Gods series is currently planned as a trilogy with Curse of a Dark God expected in late 2010 and Dark God’s Glory in 2011. While uneven, the good dominates in the end I’m left anxiously awaiting what John Brown has for us next. 7/10

Related Posts: John Brown Answers Questions Five