Susan and John Ruff, Fantasy Authors

  • Making an Old Story New

    Back in the early 1990’s, before self-publishing was common, before I even owned a cell phone, I wrote a fantasy novel called Feast of Five Crowns. I dutifully attempted to get my manuscript published in… Read more

  • Travel and Fantasy World Building

    Like all works of fiction, fantasy stories revolve around characters and plot. However, in a fantasy novel, the world itself can also be a major part of the story. A good fantasy book sweeps the… Read more

  • Those Little Formatting Oddities

    I love books. I love libraries. I love bookstores. That beautiful paper fragrance in a second-hand bookstore is a wonderful thing. When I was a kid, in addition to visiting our local library, my family… Read more

  • Critiques During a Lockdown – Part 2

    As I discussed in a prior blog post, writing during this current pandemic should be easy. We’ve all got so much extra time at home now. For someone of my…ahem…mature age, the “shelter-at-home” lifestyle means… Read more

  • The Problem with Prologues

    If you’ve read 60th Hour, you may wonder why the first chapter takes place twenty years before the rest of the story. In a book that focuses on time, why have that outlier right at… Read more

  • Our Next Exclamation Mark Anthology

    When Emerald Cove decided to try its first themed anthology (Kidnapped!), I expected all our stories to be similar. After all, we were writing on the same theme. To my mind, kidnapping stories followed a… Read more

  • To Sequel or Not: One Writer’s Dilemma

    If you want your characters to live happily ever after, you’d better be cautious about writing a sequel. Case in point. The Star Wars movies. The end of the Star Wars trilogy back in the… Read more

  • Zooming Around the Cove

    We did it! We held our first Zoom meeting of the Emerald Cove Press writer’s critique group this week. The meeting lasted much longer than expected (about three hours), but a lot of the discussion… Read more

  • Writing Critiques During a Lockdown

    What do you get when you put five authors and the latest drafts of their fiction works in their local Denny’s restaurant? Nothing. Denny’s is closed for dine-in service in Southern California due to the… Read more

  • A Firm Foothold in Unreality

    Why write fantasy stories? For me, there is an easy answer and a deeper answer. The easy answer: writing them is fun. Ever since I first read the Hobbit when I was 12, I’ve loved… Read more

Welcome to Susan’s Monthly Blog!

On the first Friday of every month, Susan writes a short post about our books, the craft of writing, upcoming projects, travel, writing inspiration, and similar topics that strike her fancy. We hope you enjoy reading them.

Feel free to leave a comment. Susan loves hearing from readers!