An Interview with Wes Dyson
Tell us about yourself!
I’m about 5’10”, around 170 lbs and I eat Cheerios by the box-load daily. Original. The sugary ones give me a stomach ache.
What does NobleBright fantasy mean to you? Why is it important?
NobleBright fantasy is about redemption in the face of loss. The stories we tell are important because they define what’s possible. Stories about overcoming our darkest hours remind us that we don’t have to submit to them. They give us hope.
How did you start writing?
An important part of any writer’s journey is getting comfortable with their voice and learning how to lean into it. In my case that was a particularly long journey, but I started with poetry because it felt like less of a commitment than a whole story, which lessened the anxiety around it.
What are some of your favorite books/authors? Why?
Stories we read when we’re young leave the biggest impressions I think. Maybe because our imaginations are a bit less restrained then. I remembering diving into The Neverending Story by Michael Ende like it was a portal into another world. I connected very much to the main character Bastian, as a bullied boy with family troubles and a big imagination he could escape into, where the fantastic world made more sense than his real life.
Please tell us about your world and your characters.
Myracles in the Void takes place in a world where the characters’ emotions and tendencies alter their reality as creative or destructive magic. It’s a character-driven magic system. If a character has creative thoughts, they’d likely manifest creative powers like the ability to bring objects together or even create time. And the opposite is true of a self-destructive character; they’d likely be able to destroy things in the blink of an eye as if they never existed.
The story follows a brother and sister who end up representing the extremes of these personalities, and therefore the extremes of the powers. Gai, the older brother, wishes very much to fix things, most of all his broken up family. Lynd, his sister, has a darkness within her caused by the moment their family fell apart.
Do you have any works in progress? Tell us about them!
Of course! I have several stories coming together from this “Myraverse” series. But also a super fun sci-fi adventure in the pipeline. I hope to always have so many ideas that I can’t get to them all.
Where can we find you online?
You can go to WesDyson.com or say hi on Instagram @wes.dyson. I truly cherish talking to readers so don’t be shy!
An Interview with Sarah Delena White
Tell us about yourself!
Hi! I’m Sarah Delena, and I write fantasy inspired by mythology, folklore, and my own life experiences and travels. I’m a baker by morning, a librarian by afternoon, and a writer by night (I don’t sleep much, haha!). I love new experiences and adventures and am always up for traveling to an unfamiliar town or trying a new food. I am on a perpetual quest for the perfect cup of coffee. One of my life goals is to have a magnificent flock of chickens.
What does NobleBright fantasy mean to you? Why is it important?
With the recent trends in storytelling tending toward excessive grittiness and moral ambiguity, I feel it’s more important than ever to provide a counterpoint. In reading stories that focus on true and beautiful things, we can come to see and appreciate these things better in our own world. I want my books to leave people with a sense of hope and refreshment, no matter where the reader’s journey takes them and what perils they meet along the way.
How did you start writing?
I started inventing stories when I was very young, but I rarely wrote them down back then. I didn’t think of myself as a good writer, and I didn’t know how to translate the movie-like scenes in my mind into words on a page. I made my first attempt at writing a novel in my late teens, but I set it aside in order to focus on college, grad school, and other real-life experiences. I thought I was done with it for good, but God led me back to it through a series of experiences and a lot of inspiration I couldn’t ignore. Since the story ideas wouldn’t leave me alone, I finally realized I needed to learn how to write fiction. After a lot of trial and error (and eight or ten unfinished projects), I finished my first novel, Halayda, in 2016.
What are some of your favorite books/authors? Why?
Tolkien is my perennial favorite because of his incredible worldbuilding, memorable characters, and general epic-ness. George MacDonald was a big influence when I first started writing seriously; I love how he tackled existential questions through such whimsical stories. As for more recent authors, I love H. L. Burke, Janeen Ippolito, and W.R. Gingell.
Please tell us about your world and your characters.
Seaspoken tells the story of Evya, a tuath (mer) warrior, and Keliveth, an elven prophet, whose love becomes the catalyst for ending the war between their peoples. These two characters were a blast to write because of their vivid personalities and their deep loyalty to each other. Evya is fierce and angsty, while Keliveth is the noblest of floofs. Their world, Tandith, was once home to a peaceful and glorious civilization build by the combined efforts of the elves and the tuath, but it fell into ruin because of betrayal on both sides. Seaspoken and its planned sequels follow the star-crossed couples who have a hand in restoring their world. The setting and mythos were loosely inspired by Irish mythology.
Do you have any works in progress? Tell us about them!
I’m currently working on the third book of my Star-Fae Trilogy, a fae/steampunk mashup that follows the adventures of a half-fae alchemist, a troubled faerie king, and their quirky allies as they fight to save their world from a monstrous foe. I’m also planning out my next book set in the world of Tandith, which will follow one of the supporting characters in Seaspoken.
Do you want each book to stand on its own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between each book?
Both! All of my books are part of the same multiverse, and they are all connected in some way. There are a few characters that jump between worlds, book series, and even authors (hint: if you’ve read my Star-Fae books or Janeen Ippolito’s Steel City Genie series, you might see a few familiar names in Seaspoken, even though it takes place centuries earlier on a different planet). However, each book or series is also meant to stand on its own so readers can enjoy them even if they haven’t read my other books.
Where can we find you online?
You can find me at sarahdelenawhite.com, and on Instagram at @latte_elf. You can also join my Facebook reader group, Bookish Vagabonds.