In We Are Not Good People, I created a magic system that requires blood sacrifice: the more blood, the more powerful the spell. Magic in your book is an excellent opportunity for world-building and characterization: What does magic cost? How does it work? Power and its use should cost your characters something. I hate The One because there are no damn rules. Or, Never explain how he manages to go from country bumpkin to Amazing Super Wizard Version 5.1 in just under forty thousand words. Or, Give your hero amazing magical powers for no reason whatsoever. Like, Make your hero The One because he fits the details of a prophecy. You know The One - he’s the guy or girl in a story who is fated to save the universe by dint of prophecy or lineage or genetics, or a giant plot-generating box the author hooked up to the electrical grid in his neighborhood which demands a fresh sacrifice every few minutes before disgorging awful storytelling advice.
We dared to ask him his thoughts about the use of magic in the fantasy genre, and this is what he told us. As Off The Shelf recently learned, he’s also wonderfully and hilariously opinionated. He’s written prolifically since then, and his next book is We Are Not Good People, due out October 2014. His story “Ringing the Changes” was selected for Best American Mystery Stories 2006, and his story “Sift, Almost Invisible, Through” appeared in the anthology Crimes by Moonlight. Jeff Somers sold his first novel at age 16.
