Archives: Aurealis Interviews

    Sara Douglass has held court as Queen of Australian, if not World, fantasy since publication of BattleAxe in 1995. Her sweeping epic fantasies have enthralled readers to the extent that some think her their messiah. She has just finished a complex four book series centred on the city of London, called The Troy Game. This Earth-based fantasy begins in Bronze Age Greece and ends 5000 years later in Blitz ravaged London of the 1940s. Each book in The Troy Game is over 600 pages long, giving her fans plenty of action and excitement. And now Sara Douglass is returning to series past and writing Darkglass Mountain - the first installment is due out in June 2007. I had a quick chat with Sara in a gap between her writing and gardening:

Q1. 20 pages a day. 16 novels in less than 10 years. A massive series (over 2500 pages) like The Troy Game must have taken it out of you physically and emotionally. How do you keep up such an astounding output?

SARA: With vast difficulty. I'm now lucky if I do 12-15 pages a day.

Q2. You mention in your FAQ page that you are thinking of having a rest. I'm wondering why you changed your mind about taking a break from writing. Has your new environment invigorated your writing?

SARA: I'm always thinking of taking a rest, and I never do for the same reason - I need the income! New house, massive repairs, bills ... I am, however, in a kind of a break at the moment. I try to take 4-5 months off each year from writing, when I catch up on everything else. At the moment it is gardening.

Q3. Are you enjoying Hobart? Have you had the opportunity to explore the area, wander around the marvelous tracks of Mt Wellington?

SARA: I adore Tasmania! I am so glad I moved down here - love the weather, the landscape, the 'old' feel of Hobart. Strangely, though, since I've been down here I've never been back to Mt Wellington. I did do a tour around the state with my sister earlier this year - the wilderness is breath-taking.

Q4. Heroic fantasy in the twentieth century is an unusual climax to a series. Are you happy with The Troy Game?

SARA: I'm never happy with any of my books or series. It was, however, both challenging and fun to write a fantasy in the twentieth century - I really enjoyed that.

Q5. You have taken your fantasy away from Heroic Fantasy to new areas (alternative medieval history) and expanded the legend of Brutus' founding of London into The Troy Game series. Do you like pushing boundaries, or was the writing of The Troy Game an extension of your academic background and personal interests?

SARA: Both, If I can't push some boundaries, then writing isn't challenging enough. Plus, I am fascinated with the history of London ... so I combined the two in the Troy Game (still not happy with it, though).

Q6. Did you find it difficult to separate your love of things London with the needs of the story while writing parts of The Troy Game? Was it difficult to keep interesting facts/places out of the novels that didn't quite fit the story? (Something like: "I wish I could get John Soame's house into this somehow?" or some such interesting part of London.)

SARA: I don't think I found that a problem. If I wanted to include it ... then I included it. I have no self-restraint at all. :)

Q7. Now you are weaving two earlier series into one with the Darkglass Mountain series. Is it exciting for you to go back to material you have written previously and develop it more?


SARA: It has been fun to go back to characters and take them further having learned what I have about the art and craft of writing over the past 10 years. It has been particularly rewarding lifting characters from Beyond the Hanging Wall, which was a YA book, and taking them much further, and into darker territory.

In Darkglass Mountain I am actually combining three series/standalone books - the Tencendor books, Beyond the Hanging Wall, and Threshold.