Del Rey Spectra 50 Page Fridays: Mark Charan Newton

Every Friday, we here @ Del Rey Spectra will place a 50 page excerpt of a selected title on Suvudu. Whether it is science fiction, epic fantasy, alternate history, horror, urban fantasy, paranormal, the possibilities are endless.

This week’s excerpt features City Of Ruin by Mark Charan Newton. The book is the follow up to exceptionally vivid fantasy noir tale Nights Of Villjamur, which was actually a 50 PF selection only a short time ago (which can be found here). And just like the last time we featured one of Mark’s books, he has again agreed to write a little something on the genesis of this next book in the Legends of the Red Sun series. So without further ado, here is Mark:

“City of Ruin is a standalone novel within the Legends of the Red Sun world – so it can be read with or without Nights of Villjamur. That gave me some creative freedom, too – I wasn’t restricted by the constraints of a linear series. So, while of course continuing the overarching plot, I felt the need for reinvention of myself as a writer, as well as to build up a different region of the world I’d created.  I like new things; I like exploring different places. So I developed another city.

While in many fantasy novels (including my first) tend to draw on baroque influences, I tried to draw on contemporary influences instead for this novel. I wanted it to be different, to be very much my own territory. Villiren is made up of structures you’d find in many modern cities today – featureless constructions, things built for speed and cost-saving rather than grand ornamentation or aesthetics. When I was creating this, I was thinking of a modern Western city such as Los Angeles, or those Mediterranean holiday regions, compared to, say, something with a sense of history, like Prague. From that, I built up layers of corruption, gang violence, things like suppression of workers’ rights, and politicking. I tried to fit that into why this was a modern fantasy city, and how the corruption informed the history of this place.

This is the setting, of course – the novel is about a siege. It’s a war story. Villiren is a city under threat from an outside force, a race not natural to the world in which the book is set. I invested a lot of the narrative in building up to the war, because to make this war story more powerful, I added in some personal stories. The reasoning was that if the reader was invested in characters beforehand, then they would care when the invasion begun and their lives are at threat. So there are love affairs, a crime plot (with a serial killer), a gang leader whose marriage is breaking down uncontrollably.

But, again, Villiren is pretty despicable. People are treated so poorly. Gangs control so much of the place, corporate greed is everywhere, there are high levels of unemployment, the ice is coming… It doesn’t seem like the city is really worth saving at all. It might be better cleansed from the map – but that’s inhumane. There are hundreds of thousands of lives that need saving and it’s up to the commander, whose own personal life is starting to affect his narrative, to save them and form a defence. The pressure is on him. There are some very sinister characters, too – and if readers can sympathise with the sinister and the weird, then I’ll be happy enough. Hopefully I can make people question their own beliefs of right and wrong at the same time. Hopefully I can use the war and the strangeness to move people.

Oh, and it’s got a massive spider in it, who’s a pretty key character. What’s not to like about big monsters?”

As always, feel free to give us feedback in the comments. Or let us know on Twitter via a direct message to our esteemed Twitter maven, editor David Pomerico: www.twitter.com/delreyspectra . Or write on the wall of our Facebook page: Like us at www.facebook.com/delreyspectra .

Please enjoy this extensive excerpt of City of Ruin, available in paperback and eBook on 6/28.

CITY OF RUIN by Mark Charan Newton, Excerpt