C. William Phillips (https://www.instagram.com/words_with_will) spent 14 years writing his debut, a crime thriller that reads like Breaking Bad and The Sopranos writers got into a fistfight in a parking lot and bleed all over the pages. Then he pivoted to epic fantasy and somehow made that look easy too.

In this episode, Will breaks down the wild journey from What Blood Remembers to The Ash Remains, including how unemployment finally forced him to finish a book he'd been carrying since he was 18, why he's a proud pantser which led to adding his best character (Sen) completely by accident, and how he built a dragon bond system that actually costs something.

We also get into: why Will writes unapologetically even when beta readers tell him he'll lose people, what the Malazan book club and The Crippled Pod(https://open.spotify.com/show/1UDpA2dZNhRY0ay3Md4XVY) did to his TBR, and why epic fantasy always felt like home even when he was writing neo-Western crime fiction.

Pre-order The Ash Remains (ebook $5 before release): https://amzn.to/43aZTHK *

Find Will on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/words_with_will

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0:00 - Introduction

3:18 - Writing What Blood Remembers for 14 Years

6:50 - Why Unemployment Finished the Book

10:05 - Sprayed Edges & Indie Publishing with Mayor Golden Bookshelf

12:30 - Pivoting to Epic Fantasy with The Ash Remains

15:30 - Character Work Across Both Books

16:20 - Pantser vs. Plotter (He Pantsed Sen Entirely)

19:30 - Does He Know How the Series Ends?

21:00 - Book Length & Chapter Structure

27:20 - Chapter Formatting & the Malazan Influence

30:50 - What Makes These Dragons Different

34:10 - The Dragon Bond Training Room (No Spoilers)

36:40 - Working on Book Two

39:00 - Future Projects: Space Opera, Short Stories & a What Blood Remembers Novella

41:10 - The Malazan Book Club Podcast Origin Story

46:00 - What Malazan Did to His TBR

50:00 - Writing Unapologetically (Even When Beta Readers Push Back)

55:00 - Action Scenes & Accessibility in Epic Fantasy

1:08:00 - Sen's Book Two Scoop

1:11:30 - Closing & Where to Find Will

#realmrunners #bookpodcast #epicfantasy #indieauthor #fantasyauthors #dragonriders #writingcommunity

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