#WIPJoy Day Eight

If you like X, you’ll like my book.

Very hard to answer this without sounding terribly pompous. In my mind, the strength of the story is in the relationships between the characters, so I would say “if you like Joss Whedon, you’ll like my book.”

I have had reviews that compare The Martyr’s Blade to Tolkien, Martin, and Sanderson, so I will throw that out there, although I would never dare to claim that myself. I don’t really see the Tolkien… I try for a much more relatable, real style of storytelling, much less mythic. Mostly because I find the empathy much stronger, but also because I couldn’t write like Tolkien if I had infinite monkeys to work with. Epic does not necessarily equal mythic. That is likely why readers see a similarity between my work and Martin’s. It’s very gritty.