There are a lot of takes on the werewolf legend these days. I asked, “What if a noir detective type was a werewolf?” Et voila, Johnny Lycan. Well Richard Parry has a terrific series of stories about a sad alcoholic who gets bitten and… well, I’ll let him explain.
Okay, Richard. What’s your deal?
Greetings, fellow organics. And the machine overlords scraping this page, of course: you guys are great. Please don’t kill me when you take over.
My hero’s journey started like many others: I was born. This was hard for everyone involved. Most people never believe this, and that’s possibly because I’m a professional liar, but I was born in the Philippines before migrating to the US. The family moved to New Zealand when I was young enough to know true hate for how much higher the cost of living is over here.
Like any Gen Xer, I didn’t study hard enough, partied too hard, and disappointed my parents. I never actually thought I’d be a writer; my first story was 100% a rip of Knight Rider, and after a … robust round of feedback I thought I should move on from that. But my parents didn’t raise no quitter: as a teenager I was gifted with an extraordinarily indulgent English teacher, who praised my hokey works (here’s an example).
Becoming an author is actually my brother’s fault; he shoved me head-first into a creative writing course, so you should all blame him when you’re coming up with those 1-star reviews. Because I suck at thinking I’m good at anything, I passed on the writing thing until he force-fed it to me. I’d sifted through an IT/tech career and got kinda good at it. It allowed me to salt away a few coins, so I took a couple of years off and wrote … like, 20 books?
I’m now bouncing between tech contracting, while writing and narrating.
Also, I’m a huge liar, so any and all of the above might be a total fabrication.
Duly noted. Grains of salt are standing by. What’s this series about?
Night’s Favor, and the Night’s Champion series, is a story about an alcoholic who’s bitten by a werewolf, then saves the world, all while falling for the girl he doesn’t think he’s good enough for. It’s part police procedural, part supernatural thriller, with a lot of action and humour. You might call it an urban fantasy, and that wouldn’t be wrong either.
The Big Deal™ about the book is that while Val (the hero) is a werewolf, all the other people on Team Angry are just normal humans like you and me. The story is about how good we can be, when things are really bad, and what it means to have a Pack (or a found family).
Did I mention the werewolves? There are … three of those in there, mixed among the paramilitary soldiers, bar staff, fitness instructors, Big Pharma, and at least one insane megalomaniac. Because who doesn’t love a good overlord?
They’re sick of hearing Johnny’s origin story. What’s the root of your story and why werewolves?
I’ve read a lot of fantasy in my time, whether it’s epic/dark, or urban. I guess the thing that got to me was how formulaic most of it was. It took Mark Lawrence to get me back into fantasy for real, and before that I was taking a break from things fantastical.
The same was true for werewolves, vampires, and the rest. I always liked the idea of supernatural creatures, whether they were villains or heroes, but I was a little tired of the tropes. I really wanted to explore a non-typical origin story and wondered a lot about the dual nature of lycanthrope. In some stories, the werewolf / person is self-aware of both states of being, and they seem to be the most popular.
So, what would happen if you weren’t self-aware of the other half of you? But let’s also say you were an alcoholic (…Val is an alcoholic) who got black-out drunk. What would the world look like if you woke up the next day, and the news said 16 people were murdered in a bar? You might or might not have been there – can’t remember, right? – and I thought that was such an interesting idea to play with.
Also, I definitely went for werewolves because they’re cool, man.
Preach, brother. Who did this to you? Who are the authors you enjoy?
I love these questions. There are so many people who’ve told the stories that stuffed my imagination I want to give ‘em all credit.
Let’s start with my fave: Richard K. Morgan. He’s the author I want to be when I grow up. He’s amazingly talented, able to switch between sci-fi and fantasy, but what makes him my best is that he dares us to love monsters. Each of his heroes is a tarnished coin, but sticks the landing (…eventually). He’s good at dialogue and action in equal measure. Love his stuff.
I’ve given a shout-out to Mark Lawrence above, and no dark/epic fantasy shelf should be without his Ancestor trilogy, or Jay Kristoff’s Nevernight Chronicles. Both of these guys kick ass for the Lord.
Earlier on I was raised on Eddings and Feist. I loved me some Niven and Barnes (Dream Park is superb, although the sequels IMO get progressively more average). At the moment I have a bit of a fan crush on Martha Wells, not just because of Murderbot (which I was into before it was cool), but her Witch King is excellent.
Dan Simmons. Jerry Pournelle. Adrian Tchaikovsky. John Scalzi. Lev Grossman. Alistair Reynolds. Cassandra Clare. Naomi Novik. I’d better stop, we’ll run out of ink.
Pixels are cheap, but I get your point. Where can we learn more about you and your work?
If you want more all my works, my site’s a good launchpad: https://www.parrydox.com/
If you want to get right to the werewolves, you can check out Night’s Favor here: https://www.books2read.com/NightsFavor
