Took a long time to do these because I kept heading into other projects.  That and I would stare at the page for too long.  It really was tough to go from War of Nytefall to this project because it’s more daunting.  I can do action scenes and dialogue, but Do I Need to Use a Dragon? (Fantasy Writing Tips) is a different bear to wrestle.  I’m voicing my opinion and almost making myself the main character where I can only talk.  All of my sources have to be from my own works to avoid legal issues, so I have to be careful not to make this sound like it’s solely about promoting my books.  That’s a secondary goal, which I’ll admit to.  Anyway, here is the break down and you’ll see that every chapter is a question.  The things in parentheses are the topics, which won’t be included.

• Who Am I? (Intro)

• The Author
  • Do I Need a Prologue or Epilogue?  (Prologues and Epilogues)
  • What Tense Should I Choose?  (Choosing Tense)
  • Should I Be a Plotter or Pantser? (Plan or Pants)
  • Do I Have to Avoid Cliches? (Cliches)
  • Should I Talk about My Inspirations? (Admit Your Influencers)
  • How Can I Please Everyone?  (Avoiding the Negative)
  • Do I Hide My Quirks? (Author Quirks)
  • What Kind of Author Should I Be? (Author Persona)

• The World
  • How Do I Evolve My World? (Setting as a Character)
  • Do I Have to Go Medieval? (Classic fantasy settings)
  • What Kind of Magic Should I Use? (Magic Systems)
  • Can I Take from the Past? (Using the Classics)
  • Should My Fantasy Races Hate Each Other? (Interspecies Relations a.k.a. Thank A Lot, Tolkien!)
  • Do I Dare to Touch on Religion or Politics? (Religion and Politics)
  • How Do I Paint My World? (Describing the World)
  • Is There a Benefit to Taking Notes?  (Using World Notes)
  • Does My World Need Monsters? (Monsters)
  • What about Time?  (Passage of Time)
  • How Much of the Past Should I Reveal? (History of the World)
  • What is Beyond The Cities?  (Wilderness)
  • Should I Have Magical Items?  (Relics)
  • What about Necromancy?  (Necromancy)
  • How Violent Should I Make My Stories?  (Accepted levels of violence in world)
  • Can I Reuse My World for Another Series?  (Multiple Series in 1 World)
  • What about a Steed? (Riding Beasts)
  • *See Book Title*  (Do I Need to Use a Dragon?)
  • Should I Put My World Through an Upheaval?  (Great Cataclysms)
  • How Deep Can I Make a Short Story’s World?  (Short Story Worlds)

• The Characters
  • Where Should I Start My Heroes?  (Starting Weak or Strong)
  • How Can I Grow My Characters?  (Evolution)
  • Do I Need Supporting Heroes?  (Importance of Supporting Cast)
  • Can I Add Humor to My Story?  (Comic relief and humor)
  • What about Gods?  (Gods!)
  • Should I have Flawed Characters?  (Flawed is Perfect)
  • Is There a Trick to Writing Female Characters?  (Damsels and Princess Generals)
  • How Do I Name a Character?  (Names)
  • Should My Characters Have a Signature? (Signatures of Characters)
  • Can I Use a Monster as a Hero?  (Monsters as Heroes)
  • What Kind of Casters Should I Make?  (Types of Casters)
  • Is the Villain as Important as the Hero?  (Villains)
  • Should I Use Supporting Villains? (Minions)
  • How Do I React to Reactions? (Fan favorites and the Despised)
  • What about Holy Characters?  (Priests, Priestesses, and Paladins)
  • How to Juggle Multiple Heroes?  (Ensemble casts)
  • Should I Design Character Biographies?  (Biographies)
  • Do Rivalries Help Characters Grow?  (Rivals)
  • What’s an Archetype?  (Archetypes)
  • How Do Short Story Characters Evolve?  (Short Story Evolutions)

• The Quest
  • Do My Heroes Need a Clear Purpose?  (Always a Goal)
  • How Do Heroes and Quests Relate?  (Synergy of Heroes and Quests)
  • How Is a Story like a Roller Coaster?  (Roller coaster plots)
  • Should I Have a Good or Bad Ending? (Good or Bad Endings)
  • Is There a Trick to Fight Scenes?  (Fight Scenes)
  • How Do I Write a Big Battle Scene?  (Big Battles)
  • How Big Should the Finale Be?  (Final Battles)
  • What Is a Time to Shine?  (Times to Shine)
  • Why Can’t a Caster Fix It?  (Using Magic as a Crutch)
  • Should I Focus on Adventure or Politics?  (Adventure or Politics)
  • How Dark I Should Go?  (Heavy Topics)
  • Should I Include Destiny?  (Destiny vs Free Will)
  • What about Romance?  (Romance)
  • Is It Time for a Nosh?  (Eating Scenes)
  • Can I Skip Travel Scenes?  (Traveling)
  • Are Distractions, Deviations, and Side Jobs Useful? (Stepping Away from the Main Plot)
  • Do I Have to Kill Characters?  (Killing characters)
  • How Do I Train My Heroes?  (Training Scenes)
  • What about the Children?  (Next Generation of Heroes)
  • How Do I Write a Short Story Quest?  (Short Story Quests)

• Is It Time To Go?  (Outro

And there you have it.  All 70 chapter sections that may seem overlapped and I’m not 100% certain about the order.  I got confused at the end of this post because I had finished writing the list in my notebook 2 minutes before I began this.  So, I hit the last few sections of ‘The Quest’ section and started wondering if I repeated topics.  As far as writing this, I’m going to do all of these in ‘blog style’ writing, so I expect them each to be around 2-3 pages long.  Thinking pictures would be cover art and one for each of four categories.  The category ones would be book characters, so I’d like to hit Legends of Windemere, Ichabod Brooks, and War of Nytefall.  Maybe do Quest of the Broken-Hearted as a fourth one?  Bedlam won’t be included here since it isn’t fantasy.