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It is very rare for Charlotte and I to agree. When we do, there’s great celebration over at BtGS headquarters. David Tallerman’s trope-inverting, Dungeons and Dragons inspired series The Black River Chronicles, is one of these rare gems (you can read my review here). So we wanted to get him on the show!
Charlotte asks David about the genesis of the series, including his exposure to and interest in roleplaying games. The series had a more unusual early life than many of David’s projects, being approached by an editor who already had the idea, he began the project as a writer-for-hire. But in all things, to make such a project work, you have to find what excites you about that project, and for David, was playing with such well-established tropes.
Within popular culture, the current trend is for all things nostalgia. Be that reboots of old franchises or simply nods to the popular stories from our childhood. The Black River Chronicles also fall into this category. Charlotte and David discuss the merits of nostalgia and endless reboots, along with when, if ever, it works.
Texts mentioned in this episode include:
- Of Dice and Men: The Story of Dungeons and Dragons and the People Who Play It by David M. Ewalt
- Dark Souls
- The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett
- Mulan
- Lilo and Stitch
- Stranger Things
- Midnight Special
- Starman
- La Belle et la Bête
- Dogtooth
David Tallerman is the author of the Digital Fiction Publishingfantasy adventure series The Black River Chronicles, so far comprised of Level One and The Ursvaal Exchange, as well as the novel Giant Thief (described by Fantasy Faction as “one of the finest débuts of 2012”) and its sequels Crown Thief and Prince Thief, all published through Angry Robot. His crime debut The Bad Neighbour is forthcoming fromFlame Tree Publishing in late 2018.
David has also written the Markosia graphic novel Endangered Weapon B: Mechanimal Science and the Tor.com novella Patchwerk, as well as around a hundred short stories, which have appeared in markets such as Clarkesworld, Lightspeed, Beneath Ceaseless Skies and his debut collection The Sign in the Moonlight and Other Stories. The first issue of comic book mini-series C21st Gods is out now from Rosarium.
In his spare time, David watches inordinate numbers of movies, plays board games and helps in the ethical submission, capture and resettlement of troveless dragons.
