Tom Pepperdine interviews Tej Turner about his writing process. Tej discusses his approach to world building in his epic fantasy series, Avatars of Ruin; why he benefits from plotting in stages, and how he works around his full time job.

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Hello, and welcome to The Real Writing Process.

I'm your host, Tom Pepperdine.

And this episode, my guest is the writer, Tej Turner.

Tej is a fantastic fantasy author.

His debut novel, the Janus Cycle was published in 2015.

And two years later, he followed it up with Dinnusos Rises, which

I think was the point where people started to take notice and realize

he's actually consistently good.

For the last few years, Tej has been working on a new epic fantasy

series called Avatars of Ruin.

Two books in the series are already published.

Blood Sworn and Blood Legacy.

And this interview took place in February 2022.

Just three weeks before Blood Legacy was released in paperback.

Right, let's play the jingle and get onto the interview.

Hello.

And uh, this week I'm very pleased to say my guest is Tej Turner.

Tej, hello.

Hello, how are you?

I'm very well, thank you.

My first question to you is as always, what are we drinking?

Okay.

So before I answer this, I think I should establish that it is the

evening, so I am drinking red wine.

It's a Tempranillo from Spain, Finca Constancia and it's an

organic moon wine, apparently.

Very nice.

And yourself?

Uh, Yes.

I mispronounced it all the time?

I always say Tempranillo, but how do you pronounce it?

Tempranillo.

When it's two L's it's pronounced like a Y.

It is one of my favorite grape variants.

But you know, just being a heathen with wine, just an Englishman thing to do.

It's like, oh I just see it and pronounce it exactly as I see it, ignoring all

the culture and the language barrier.

Well, I've got a bit of an advantage as I speak spanish as well.

You are very well traveled and we will come onto that.

Yes.

Yeah.

So, um, most times that I've met you, Tej, you have red wine in your hand.

So it is something I associate with you.

But I wonder, is it something that you drink whilst writing or is it more

just a social occasion drink for you?

Uh, no, no.

Um, so I've, I think that my convention friends think that I'm an alcoholic

or something, because I dunno, I have a bit of social anxiety.

And so when I'm in big groups, I just need to drink to take the edge off a bit.

So yeah, so the convention crowd and all the writers and everyone I know, probably

think that I am just a complete mess all the time, but when I'm at home and

I'm writing, I drink lots of green tea.

Oh, okay.

So this is a social juice?

Just gets you through talking to people.

Okay.

That's cool.

That's cool.

And yes, if if you see Tej with a glass of wine, just reassure

him that everything's okay.

And where I'm speaking to you now, is this where you write?

Is this your writing spot?

This is where I write most of the time.

This is my study, which also doubles up as my dining room and library.

And yes, I've got a desk here in the corner.

I'll give you a little tour actually, cause this will probably answer

one of your upcoming questions, but I'll give visual notes as well.

I've got a big white board with lots of notes on it.

And then on the wall in front of me, there's a map of the world, recognize

that writing in and lots of world building notes and stuff, just all over the wall.

Okay.

So for our listeners, I'm going to describe what I see there.

What he says there's a large whiteboard.

It is a huge whiteboard, I would say that's probably at least a

meter wide by meter and a half tall.

Would that be accurate?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And it's in portrait, not landscape.

And there's a lot of A4 printed out notes at the bottom.

And the title of your next book at the top, I believe.

Is that correct?

Are we, Are we allowed?

Blood war.

Yes.

Okay.

That's official.

That's been announced.

I can say that.

Yeah.

And then in front of you are sheets of A4 stuck up on the wall,

which are sort of historical background to the, is it like world building?

I've got the map of the world.

I've got like a family tree of the Pantheon of the gods and

goddesses in their religion.

And then I've got like, um, it's three sheets long, like a glossary.

And that's just like terms that I have in mine.

Cause I have like my own slang in my world.

And then I'm introducing a new culture that the characters venture to that they

haven't been to in the previous two books.

I've got quite a lot of notes concerning that.

The calendar and then some notes about the magic system.

Okay.

So that kind of leads me on to a very easy, first question is

just do you enjoy world-building?

Yes, I definitely do.

Yeah, I guess for a lot of people I've spoken to, they try

and keep a lot of it in their head.

But you find it far more useful to have a very strict code set

out early on, so it's consistent?

Yes.

In terms of the world-building I do, but with the narrative, I don't

always plan it out very thoroughly.

It's yeah, like with the world-building I tend to, I always have a good

sense of the big scope of the world.

The first thing that I always do is draw a map and I write their

history, the different cultures, the way they interact with each other.

And I have always have a good sense of that as in terms of the meta-narrative,

but I'm not one of those authors who will be able to have a list of

dates in chronological order about certain things that have happened.

Like, if I need to create a certain date for something, I will write it

down and make sure that I keep it so that I don't make any consistency

errors later down the line.

And so with the Avatars of Ruin, is the series that you're writing.

So when you first thought of the concept, it was very much the world that's

sort of what came first rather than the characters that lived within it?

I think the way I started with this series, it was my

first venture into epic fantasy.

They weren't my first novels I had published, but they were my first

venture into epic fantasy, which was my favorite genre when I was growing up.

And what I wanted to do was combine elements from other things that

I like with the fantasy as well.

And I grew up watching a lot of anime during the nineties.

You know, and a lot of those, they had heroes and villains who could,

I dunno, like they could summon another form, like an armored being,

or uh, they could pilot a Mecha.

Or another thing a lot of them had were like weird mutant creatures.

And I wanted to find a way to plant those sort of things into

a medieval epic fantasy world.

Yeah.

So it's a, cause it's not explicitly like cross genre.

It's just putting those things of mechanization and experimentation, but

it's experimentation through magic rather than technology, which I really like.

And so was it specifically just anime that was a key influence that you

wanted to introduce to epic fantasy?

Yeah, it was, it was, I created a magic system where people could

be experimented on through ritual and that ended up creating like

weird humanoid mutant beings, but also characters who could transform.

But it wasn't like they were piloting a mecha.

It was like, they were fused to magical artifacts that may help them summon

a God like the avatar we've got.

That's why this series is called The Avatars of Ruin.

But yeah, another genre that I wanted to insert into there was a

lot of the scifi horror crossovers.

Things like the nineties film, The Faculty.

Yeah.

Or more modernly, The Walking Dead.

Where you have an ensemble.

Cause I know like with a lot of zombie things, it's not really the

zombies that interest me as much as people who typically wouldn't choose

to be in each others company are forced to band together to survive.

And they might be people who in our current modern society would have been

part of different tribes who hate each other, but suddenly they realize that

like that just meaningless when their lives are in danger and they've actually

got more in common than they think.

Yeah.

And I wanted to capture that kind of atmosphere as well.

And then I also realized well, I've got ritual experimentation going

on that's allowed me to create you know, some of the characters to be

experimented on and escape these powers.

But I can also use that to have themes of contagion, which I guess is

quite quite relevant at the moment.

And so when you're coming up with these ideas, are you writing

them in a document on your computer?

Are you writing them free hand?

Do you use index cards?

How does it first formulate what you want to include and what you don't?

So I typically...

I have a word document for each aspect about the world.

I'll have a word document about this culture's history, about this culture's

history, and then like a broader document about the combined histories of them all.

And, I have a document about their calendar, their religion, stuff like that.

And I will build up, before I do any writing at all,

I'll build up a base of that.

But as I'm writing, I will often have strokes of inspiration.

Like maybe I will, as I'm writing, I'll foreshadow something that will have

consequences later on down the line, or I will add another detail to the world.

And when that happens, I will grab a post-it note and I will

add it to this whiteboard.

I mean, when I just showed you what it looked like now,

there wasn't any on there.

And that's because what I do is every now and then, sometimes it's just full

of post-it notes, but I'll just take them all off there and I'll go through them all

and I will add them to the correct word documents for each aspect of the world.

So you said earlier that you really start mapping things out before you start

writing the main manuscript of the book.

With Avatars of Ruin, obviously you're working on your third book now, what

was the world-building before book one?

How long was that process?

I honestly couldn't tell you because I had a very primitive

idea of this story and some of the characters when I was 15, I think.

And I wrote a, a very, probably awful like first four chapters of

it back then that I prayed to the gods will never resurface somewhere.

I put it aside for a while and then I approached it from a different

angle and I I was like, I'm an adult now I'm taking this seriously.

I already have the characters in place.

The characters are similar to what it was then, but I focused

a lot more on the world building.

But yeah, one thing that I do with my world-building, which is

it's not completely unheard of.

I'm not going to say that I am the first one, cause I can think

of dozens of others who have.

I do think about my world worlds in an astronomical sense as well as in

terms of the geography and history.

So for example, the Avatars of Ruin series, I know that their world is

a bit smaller than ours, so they're

They have three moons as well.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They have three moons.

Yep.

Yeah.

And that has consequences for the way that they live.

Because uh, when I, I once showed my map to my friend who's a geography teacher.

And the first thing he said was just like, oh, this bit here,

this bit is crucial to everything.

If something happens to that place, everything is fucked.

And I was just like, welcome to book three, my friend.

Th the second thing he said was, why don't you have any settlements on the coast?

And I was like, well, you don't really want to be on the coast

in this world, because it's just yeah, just not a safe place to be.

That's good that you've got that kind of set up.

One of the things that I did want to ask.

I'll ask it now.

I was going to ask it later, but obviously it is a series and it's not a trilogy.

Did you start with book one with a rough idea of how many books it's going to be?

So I do know how many books it's going to be.

But me and Elsewhen Press have made a conscious decision to not disclose that.

And it's because I think that readers form expectations about the way certain

books are going to pan out, depending on how many books the series is going to be.

If, for example, you have a big, massive battle in book three, everyone's going

to be reading it expecting it to all be like tied up with a nice, neat rope

at the end and et cetera, et cetera.

You know, and I don't want that for but no, I did, I'll be honest about

one thing, when I did start it, I did think it was going to be a trilogy.

But then when I was writing the second book, Blood Legacy, I realized that

it was about 140,000 words long, and I was only half way through.

And so I was like, oh, okay.

Maybe it's not a trilogy.

I think it's good that you have got an end point in mind.

And I think it's also a good idea to keep it under wraps, because I think when it's

longer than a trilogy, sometimes you, you will have some readers go, I'll wait

till it's all out and then I'll read it.

And then of course, that has problems because the individual books then aren't

selling well, because the audience is waiting for it to fill back and then

they get annoyed when it gets canceled before the sort of runs finished.

And it's if you bought the books instead of waited then

there would have been continued.

I, I know I mean, I don't know them very well, but I know of

some authors that's happened to.

It seems to be a problem.

I mean, I'm, like I'm published by an independent press and one of the

advantages of that is because they're not as profit driven as the big publishers.

So they, Elsewhen Press, who publish both of my current series.

They've never done that to any of their authors, basically.

Cause they understand that they, they said that to me, um, when I first

start getting published with them.

They said, we know we've had books come out and they haven't had a big

audience originally, but sometimes books find audiences later down the line.

I will say one thing, my series is , I'll just say it's longer than

three, but it's not going to go anywhere near Wheel of Time length.

No, that's great.

I, you know, I think just the individual books and the characters are so compelling

that it's worth reading as you go.

Um, now you sort of said, you know what you'd like.

You know, sort of with the world-building and mapping all of that out.

Are there any bits of the initial development that you find challenging,

that you don't look forward to, that are a real struggle?

Uh, to be honest, no.

Like, as a writer, there's certain things that come very naturally to me.

And to be honest, world building and the plotting all those things.

I think my only weakness in my world building sometimes is what I mentioned

earlier that I have a good sense of the broad history of my world, but

I don't have a massive detailed one.

But I do create details if I need them.

And I, when that happens, I just always make sure that I record it somewhere,

so I don't do any continuity errors.

When it comes to the plot, do you have any form of outline that you have

written down, how do you plot out?

How do you outline the plot?

I, so I am a planner.

So I'm definitely a planner for my epic fantasy.

I am most certainly not a planner when it comes to a couple of the other novels that

I wrote, but I'll talk about them later.

So we don't get too muddled.

So when I first imagined this series, it was very character driven and

I've always had certain moments that I've wanted each character to reach.

I've always had certain interactions that I've wanted all the

characters to have each other.

And certain evolutions to their relationships to explore.

So that's always been there.

And I know that the, the big meta narrative of how each book is going to

go, but I don't plan every bit in detail.

So when I start a novel, I've got an I, a broad idea of the way it's going to go.

And certain beats that it's going to hit.

I know how it's going to end, and I know how the journey that

each character is going to make.

But with the more detailed plotting, I do that in stages.

And it's usually about four to five chapters at a time.

So once I've reached the end of that section, I will then stop, you know,

writing the actual thing for a couple of days and then go into planning mode again.

And when I do this, I do a step-by-step plan for each chapter.

That's what you actually saw on my big whiteboard earlier that I showed you.

So I've got three chapters currently pinned up on there, the

ones I'm working on right now.

And then these plans I have, it'll have in big letters, which characters going to

narrate each part of of each sub chapter.

Cause uh, yeah, I mean, I mean, people read my books, know that I have, I tend

to have a lot of point of view characters.

And then I, I know when it's going to shift between the characters and the

topics of their conversations and the events and, I know what sort of things

that are gonna be said, things that are going to happen that are going

to advance the greater narrative.

And the reason why I do this more detailed planning nearish the

time is because first of all, I want it to be fresh in my mind.

Cause if I do the whole thing, by the time I'm getting to the end, it would be like

months since I'd written down that plan.

And plus, I sometimes like, even if I have a plan I'll just end up

changing things or adding stuff.

And I think that's because particularly with the Avatars of Ruin series, it's

very character driven and sometimes the characters just take over the story.

Like I will have, you know, just I'll have intend for X to happen,

but then when I get to writing it, like the character would do something

else and then I'll be like, oh yeah, actually that does make sense.

That character wouldn't do that.

I was just writing that because it was convenient for the plot.

Or another thing that occasionally happens is I'll start writing a scene

and it will have a different energy to what originally intended for it.

And when this happens, I don't usually fight it.

Sometimes, if it's got a different energy, a certain beat that I wanted to

hit during that scene won't be reached.

So I have to think about a way to have that beat at a later time in the book,

or I'll introduce a beat I hadn't originally intended to do, and that will

have consequences later in the book.

So yeah, that's why I do the more detailed planning in stages.

That makes sense.

That's a good idea.

And so once you've mapped out the beats for the first couple of chapters and

you've got the world, is it difficult to actually start writing the story itself?

Because some people, they love the world building and then the

actual sort of so-and-so said this, and then did that is a chore.

And some people love it.

And it just flows out of them.

Do you find it's an easy flow or do you find it's a bit of a graft?

For me the most grafting part of my writing personally,

cause we're all different.

You have some writers who get their first draft is similar

to what ends up being printed.

And those people dazzle me because my first drafts are usually

a bit of a challenge for me.

Like one of my worst nightmares is the idea of somebody finding my first

drafts and seeing how awful they are and realizing that I am a fraud.

Once I've actually got the first draft down, that's when I actually started

to enjoy it more because for me that's when I start to look at it and think

oh, this is actually quite good.

And the prose starts to sing, and I much prefer editing to getting the

first draft down, if I'm honest.

The first draft is definitely the hardest point for me as a writer.

And with that, do you find word counts helpful, or are they just evil

and just a horrible reminder that you're behind where you want it to be?

Well, so, so, so for me, like I I work at a day job

as well, four days a week.

I mean on a day that I'm working, I get up at half past six.

I do an hour before I go to work and then I try to do an hour in the

evening, if I still got the energy.

Doesn't always work out.

Um, and then if I've got the day off I will do like three hours in the

morning and two hours in the evening.

For me, like having a, a daily word count, just doesn't make sense with that.

Because I've got such a vast difference in different days that I write.

The only rule that I try to impose upon myself is I try to write every day.

Even if I have a really busy one and I'm tired, I'll just try and do a few minutes.

The reason for that isn't necessarily just to get some words down.

But more because like when I'm writing a book, my, my subconscious

is so absorbed by it that I need to go into it at least once a day.

Because I find that if I have a day off it'll take me a day or two

to get back into that world again.

If I, if it is a day that I have off where I'm not working, if I

do 2000 words I'll be like, okay.

Yeah that's fairly decent.

But at the same time, I, if I don't reach that 2000 words, I don't beat

myself up over it because you know, like it's all relative anyway.

Cause you know, if you're writing a dialogue scene, 2000 words, you

can churn that out quite quickly.

If it's between two characters who have quite good chemistry and you

know, but if you're writing a fight scene you know, can take longer.

It certainly does for me.

And I find it interesting that you said there that on days that you're

working and on days off, you'll work both in the morning and the evening.

That you have two set separate writing sessions.

A lot of people I know, or a lot of people I've interviewed, tend to

have have that one section of the day that they dedicate to writing,

either in the morning or the evening.

Do you find that there's a different energy or that you focus on different

things depending on the time of day it is?

I find I personally do my best writing in the morning,

because my day job can sometimes be quite physically demanding.

So I can sometimes come back from it quite tired.

I usually come home and I have a break for like an hour or two and then I do some.

If I'd have had a day where I feel particularly tired and I'm too

tired to write anything that's first draft, I'll do editing.

And on your days off, you, you still like write in the mornings and

the evenings, is that the same as the creative output kind of first draft in the

morning and then revision in the evening?

There's a few hours break?

I guess I'll try to do more first drafts on if it's my days off.

Cause, cause for me, like the first drafts are the most exhausting for me.

So I always that's that last, the main grunt work.

So I make it sound like I hate it when I say grunt work.

I don't hate it.

It is work and I think, you know, that's the thing that I'm always trying

to get the audience to understand is as fun as the world building

can be and the story creation and the privilege of being able to tell

your stories and get them out there.

If it wasn't work, everyone would be doing it.

So a lot of people do abandon it when they realize how much

work you've got to put in.

But no, that's useful to know, just how you want to put those extra hours in.

You might have a bit in the morning, but you can still

like, I can do a bit more today.

And just that extra, that extra bit that you put in on a day, I think is great.

And obviously, like you said, at the start, this sort of dining room,

library, workspace in the corner.

Do you need complete silence?

Do you find you have like theme music, soundtrack music?

Some people work in coffee shops and they're just like

white noise chatter around them.

What kind of environment do you like to work in?

So if I'm in my study, it will sometimes be silence.

But I live in a city, so sometimes it's not, silence is not silence.

I put on music sometimes, but I won't put it on too loud.

And it will be certain kinds of music like classical or ambient or if it has vocals,

it has to be not like vocal, like some musicians singing glossolalia where you

don't know what they're actually singing.

Like Sigur Ros.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Like if it's too much, if it's too vocally, it'd be distracting.

And you mentioned oviously how the first draft is a killer for you.

It's just actually getting that out is the real challenge.

Is that the moment where you feel imposter syndrome the strongest,

or does that come in the edit?

Because obviously you mentioned that you do feel it.

And what stage of the writing process do you find it, it starts kicking in?

I don't really get imposter syndrome that much these days, because

it's so competitive getting published.

So getting published is quite validating in itself.

And then, when you're getting pretty much, mostly good reviews.

You're obviously doing something right.

But I do have that slight like thing of oh, what if

somebody finds my first drafts?

Cause yeah my, my first drafts are really bad.

They are in my head at least.

The only other times I sometimes get imposter syndrome is like, if I'm at like

an event or something, and I don't know, it's a a panel of people and everyone,

else's a bit more established than me.

There'll be like a little voice in my head, that people in the

audience will be thinking like, who's this dude, like it's a small one.

Do you get a point in the writing process where you go, I've

made a mistake, this story is trash.

Because that's something I've found writers sort of get to a moment where

the project that you're working on, you suddenly have this critical self doubt.

Have you ever had that and how did you combat it?

I think I had that early in my stages of being a writer, like

when I was pre-published and when I first started getting published.

But I'm not sure if I remember how I combated it.

I just, I had little slumps, but I think I got, I obviously got over

them cause I'm where I am now.

And I think cause, cause at the moment I'm like three books into

a series, so I already know, I already have a publisher lined up.

So I know that as long as it's not completely awful it's...

(laughs)

I guess so.

Cause I guess you've discussed with them where the story's going and

they kind of have a, they know what's happening book to book roughly.

So you've had that validation that they've signed off on it.

And you know, so going on to rewrites.

Do you, as soon as you finish the first draft, do you need to lock it away

for a while before returning to it?

Or is it like end, go back to page one and start rereading it again?

Or because you edit on the fly, you said you'd write in the mornings in,

sometimes you edit in the evenings.

Is there a lot of rewriting along the way, but once you have got a

finished draft, you know where you need to work and where you don't?

Okay.

So I'll tell you, I have I have a process.

I've told people about this process before, some people are like,

Ooh, some people are like, what?

When I explain it to them.

But this is my process.

So I write the first draft and usually that's the hardest part for me.

And then what I do is when I finished the first draft, I print it off.

And then I get a big red pen and I go through the first draft and I am

very brutal to myself in the stage.

I'll like scribble out whole lines.

I'll rearrange paragraphs and write loads of comments in the

margin about how bad it is.

And then what I do is then I, then I will open up a new word document and I

will write the secondary would be written from scratch, but using that printout

that I've done notes on as a basis.

Yeah.

And then, it doesn't strictly work like this, but you know how I

mentioned earlier that sometimes say if I'm having a busy week at work,

I'll be a bit tired in the evening.

And I find it hard to do first drafts or I'll reach like a stumbling block

in a certain part of the story.

Typically when I'm first drafting chapter two, I'm second drafting chapter one.

Right.

When I'm first chapter drafting, chapter three, I'm second drafting,

chapter two, et cetera, et cetera.

It doesn't always work out exactly that way.

Like if I'm, churning out the first drafts quite well, I might go do

about three or four of them before I start second drafting them.

But it's just, I've always got something that I can go to if I'm at

a point where I'm stumbling a bit.

Not stumbling, but like I'm not quite sure, like how to

do a certain part of the bit.

And I'll be like, okay, I'll just redraft the chapter before.

So once the second draft is done, it goes on to another file, which is where the

whole novel is going to be compiled on.

And then once I've got the whole manuscript together, the first

time it's the whole manuscript together it's all second drafted.

I will usually do a third draft straight away, which is when I just go

through the whole thing as one piece.

And then that's the point where I will then just keep it in the folder and

and I'll start a new book or something.

And then I won't do the fourth draft until at least a few months have passed,

so that I can look at it with fresh eyes.

So the first or second day, you print off and you have this

tangible copy, but the second to third, it's all on the computer.

I think there have been a couple of occasions where I'm going

through the whole novel and there'll be like a scene where it's oh,

actually this seems a bit rough.

Like I'll print that out and I'll do that whole process again where I like,

cause I find like looking at a printout of it and being able to write on it that

helps me like be more thorough in the...

um, to be honest I think I did that when I first started as a writer, but I'm

getting a bit more polished as I go along and I'm I don't think I had to do that

for the last two novels I had published.

There's more confidence in your writing.

I think you learn what mistakes you used to make and you just

avoid them instinctively.

Yeah.

I think also like that, the first novel that you write, you're

learning how to write a novel.

Like whenever I have friends who tell me that they want to get into writing,

one of the first things I say to them is just when you finish your first

book, you're probably going to think it's more ready than actually is,.

Lock it away, redraft it, and then lock it away again and redraft it

and then lock it away like, yeah.

So after four, maybe five or six drafts that you've done that process

with, do you have a beta readers or does it go straight to an editor?

Who's the first person beyond you that gets to read the book

that you'll want feedback from?

There's been a few people I've had beta reader relationships

with like on a occasional basis.

But I do have one beta reader who's been with me since when the very beginning.

We went to university together and everything that I've ever

written, he's read and everything he's written, I've read.

And it's quite interesting actually, because we're very different writers.

He doesn't read much science fiction or fantasy.

He's more into his literary stuff.

So yeah, we um, do help each other out, but cause we're very different

writers, sometimes we both filter through like what is each other's opinion.

Because anything your beta reader tells you, you know, it's all subjective.

It's good to have uh, the opinion of somebody else, you don't have to take

every piece of advice they give you.

And with I guess him being a writer as well, there's certain

crafting techniques that he understands the process, which

I think can be quite beneficial.

Certainly from other authors that I've spoken to, if it's just a reader

that loves reading books, but doesn't understand the technical mechanisms

of you know, how it's crafted.

It can be quite hard for them to articulate what

needs work or how to fix it.

They just go, I got bored or I don't like that character, without understanding

whether that character is a device for something grander during the story.

And with editors.

So you're working on the third book of your series.

Is it the same editor that you've had through the series?

And have you worked with them before, or is this the series that the first

time that you've worked with them?

Elsewhen Press have a team of editors, but they usually assign me

the same one, for the structural edit anyway, which is like the first one or two

rounds, depending on how many book needs.

They usually get one of them to work with and yeah, we, we

worked together quite well.

And in your opinion, what makes a good editor?

What do you like about the editing process?

So the first time I got edited, I actually just remembered, I did have

a different editor for my first book.

And it was a bit daunting that first time that you get that word file

back with all the tracked changes and with all these red lines.

And my publisher basically had to explain to me that I didn't

understand how a comma worked.

But I agree with most, in terms of the grammatical things and stuff like that.

I agree with most of the things they say these days.

I don't challenge things very often

I did it a bit more with my first two novels, because my first two

novels they were a bit more literary.

So the style of the writing was one where I would sometimes go to the editor, okay,

you know, that comma isn't necessary, but it's there because I want to have

the sentence to have a certain rhythm.

But with my epic fantasy, the style of the writing that I adopt for that is,

is more well I wouldn't say transparent, because that makes it sound plain.

But like when I'm writing epic fantasy, I write in a way that I

hope the reader can just mostly get lost in the story rather than be

distracted by the flowery prose of it.

And...

(chuckle).

Yeah, that's cool.

And once it's gone through the editing process, do you have a, well actually,

maybe even before it goes into the editing process, do you have a a set

process for once you've finished a book.

Once the book's, in your opinion, done?

I know that's just before it goes off to the editors or once all

the edits are done, do you have a celebration like process or is it

just like, great, onto the next book?

Great onto the next book now.

I mean that there is still a certain amount of magic when you get to

hold that book that you've worked on so much for the first time.

But sometimes by the time it's actually printed, you've gone

through that manuscript so many times that part of you is like...

Um, uh, I just realized I didn't actually answer the full question that you asked

a minute ago, I think a good editor is somebody who it needs to be somebody who's

into the genre and what you're writing.

Because I think when they are like that they're not just watching out

for grammar and the style of the sentences and stuff, there'll be

actually engaged with the stories.

They'll be more likely to notice if they find like a continuity error

or that you've used the wrong name.

Cause you made a typo or something like that.

And I think that it's also good to have one with patience, because I think quite

a lot of writers are neurotic people.

I know that I am.

Sorry, what was the last question you asked me?

Because I was just answering the one before.

I asked, do you have a process once you've actually finished the book?

You know, is there any kind of like celebration or is

it just going on to that?

What I did want to ask next, which actually feeds into that

really is, how comfortable are you in promoting your own work?

Do you find talking about a past project that in your mind you edited to death

and it's gone, and now you're knee deep.

So for context, with listeners, as we're doing this interview, the ebook

for blood legacy has been released.

Yeah.

The paperback has not, so it's in It's a middle, a liminal

ground of promotion of book two.

But as all your paperwork on the wall and on your whiteboard shows,

you're in the middle of book three.

So how is it revisiting book two, is that easy for you or is that quite a challenge?

It's fairly easy for me because I, of course I've got one advantage,

in that I'm still working in the same world, so it's still the same

characters, the ones I haven't killed.

Yeah, and I think that the timeframe of how things work is a

bit different with Indie presses too.

We were still editing Blood Legacy about, I think it was, I think it

was like a month before it came out.

Like we did the last sort of copy edit.

So So while I've been writing book three, there's been some stops while I've been

going through different edits for it.

the only time I it's ever been a bit confusing, so I wrote the first

book of another series that I've laid the foundations for last year.

And I leapt into finishing off Blood Legacy.

Cause I it's a weird story.

I started Blood Legacy, got about halfway through and then I didn't have a publisher

for it and I went away for a year abroad.

And then I came back and I was like I've got an idea for a new

story, so I'll start writing that.

Um, because I don't have a publisher of a Bloodsworn yet, there's

no point finishing the sequel.

And then I got a publisher for Bloodsworn just as I was finishing the other

book that I started, the fresh one.

And then my publisher found when they were doing the first edits of Blood

Legacy that I'd done some typos where I'd used character names from the

other book that I was working on.

Completely different world.

(laughs)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Like if it's the same world, but it's a different book, I

don't find it jarring at all.

But when I'm going between different worlds, that's something that

takes my brain like several months to get my head around sometimes.

And another thing I want talk about in kind of writing adjacent sort of thing.

And this probably a good time to talk about the fact that you're also a travel

blogger, cause one of the questions I like to ask is what's your opinion

of using social media as a writer.

And obviously you use it in two very different ways, because you have your

blog and you're quite known for your travels through South America and

you're going back to South America and following those stories are great.

So in that regard, social media is quite essential.

In your epic fantasy, how do you find using social media?

Is it a good promotion tool?

Is it good networking tool?

How do you use Twitter and Instagram, like social media for your writing?

So I'm not, I think I could be better at social media if I'm honest.

I do have some presence now and it's growing slowly.

But the first few years I was on Twitter, I didn't use it much because

I wasn't really getting much out of it, but I think I eventually realized

is because my approach to it was wrong.

Because my, my go-to for my social life and for social networking

has been mostly Facebook.

I've made a Twitter account because I felt like, oh, I need to do

that because I'm an author now.

And I'd only go on it to post stuff about books.

And I felt like I was just shouting into the void because

I get very little response.

But then I realized that It's because I was approaching it the wrong way.

Nobody wants to just see you talking about your, or trying to

promote your book all the time.

They want to know about you and that's when they get interested by you.

And so I started to use Twitter a bit more like in the way that I use Facebook and

being, and just being more sociable on it.

And I've actually discovered a mostly very nice book community through that.

And it's, it is a steady progress.

I think Twitter's a bit harder to get into than Facebook.

Cause I don't think the algorithms favor new people as much as Facebook does.

It's harder to start getting enough engagement for it to be encouraging.

But I think when I had Bloodsworn come out, I think, cause that's sold much

better than my previous two books.

That's when I started to have more engagements and I started to feel more

encouraged and I started using it more.

But yeah, I don't have the best social skills in the world and I am getting

better at social media, but it's something that I needed to work on, cause

I do make some money off writing now, but it's not enough to live off yet.

So I have to have a day job and I pretty much do full-time hours

writing now and I work about 30 hours a week for the day job.

So it's sometimes I just don't have enough time for social media as I should do.

Yeah.

But you do socialize it with, like you said, you found the writer community,

but you also go to conventions.

You go to science fiction and fantasy conventions.

And do you find that easier for engaging with the writing community than doing it

online in social media and what's the pros and cons of a face-to-face interaction?

I mean in some ways, yes.

And in some ways, no, because as I mentioned the start I

have a bit of social anxiety.

So I find like big events a bit overwhelming.

And that's why I drink a lot when I'm at conventions and

it's finding that sweet spot.

So you've drunk enough to relax a bit, but not too much to be obnoxious.

I like It's yeah, like a lot of the connections I have

now were through conventions.

It was through conventions that I got my novels published

through Elsewhen Press in a way.

Because I met an author called Douglas Thompson.

Who's a great author that people should read.

And he was the one who recommended Elsewhen Press to me.

Then I've met certain people who have become interested in my work

and they've read my book and then they've given me cover quotes for my

books and that's helped a lot as well.

In terms of how to engage with conventions, I'm not sure if I'm

the best person to ask about that question because I'm not like

a stealthy socializing person.

I'm not somebody who will go into the bar and be like, this person is this editor

and then home in on, on like, you know, I, I just go there, usually a bit nervous.

Then I talk to people that I vibe quite well with and I make friends

gradually and it's all quite organic.

Like I, I sometimes wish that I was a bit more like that, but even

if I try to be like that I don't think I'd be very good at it.

The thing is I think one of the nice things about you is

like one, how authentic you are, and like you say, it's organic.

And I think there's a lot of people that when they first go to a convention

and they do have ambitions with their writing, of getting either

traditionally published or just trying to get more of a readership.

It can sometimes be intimidating when you see oh that's editor of

so-and-so or that's that writer I've been reading since I was six.

And it's just gosh, how do I approach these?

And to hear someone who's gone there and felt exactly the same way.

But then managed to meet a writer who gave them some advice

that led to a publishing deal.

That now they have several books traditionally published, money

coming in, a fan base that's growing, and an audience that's growing.

Because yeah, it wasn't the debut novel that's launched in

massive success, but I think more people are becoming aware of you.

Because like you say, you're getting good reviews.

You write really well.

You wrote really compelling characters and really compelling stories.

And it's a huge industry with lots of writers and sometimes very good

writers can get lost in the noise.

But if you have a belief in your writing, if you go to these events, if you go

to enough of them over time, people finally people will recognize you.

People go, oh yeah, we've met before.

How are you?

And it's just, you can have success without being an overnight success.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I started going to conventions, I think it was like 12 years ago or something.

So I, and there's still quite a lot people I haven't met yet.

Cause it's cause like I said, cause the way that I make friends at them.

I mean I'm not gonna lie and say like I, I do go to conventions to network.

I also go there just to meet like-minded people, make friends.

And I probably haven't introduced myself to as many people as a lot of other

people who have better social skills with me would have done as quickly.

But it's, yeah, it's been a gradual thing.

And like I said, I think because people, when they do actually meet

me can tell that I'm like that, and I'm not talking to them just because

I want something from them or...

And yeah, like I said, you're authentic, you are you.

And you are looking for people who are like minded and like you say, vibes.

You know, just find the people of your tribe.

Which is the terminology I use.

Is to say, you know, find people from your tribe and go, you see

the world in the same way I do.

We should, we shall get drunk together.

Also, you know, for people who haven't been conventions, everyone drinks.

Not that teetotal people are exempt, but you just need to accept you'll

be surrounded by drunk people.

But yes, you want to be confident without being obnoxious.

That's a thing I struggle with when I'm sober so, you know, with

alcohol it's doubly challenging.

But yes, it definitely has been a, a joy to meet you and

through you, discover your work.

So...

um, a phenomenon that I've noticed at the convention hotels, because I mean,

Bristolcon, the one that that me and you have met at, it's always the same

hotel, but, FantasyCon and EasterCon, they move around the country quite a lot.

But whenever it's at a new hotel, there's this thing that happens.

The people who organize the conventions say, have you got

plenty of people on the bar?

Because these people will drink a lot and they're kind of skeptical.

They're just like yeah, whatever.

And then the first night, there's never enough people at the bar.

And yeah, it's like, they just underestimate how much introverts will

drink when they're trying to socialize.

So I've um, this conversation with bar staff before, and it's interesting.

And they say there's a social stereotypes of rugby players that's

oh, they're all big drinkers.

And certainly at university, I remember it actually stopped me joining the

rugby because I used to play rugby at school, went to university,

saw the drinking culture and I was like, you know what, I'm fine.

So there was always this assumed drinking culture with rugby, but when you get to

professional level and they're athletes, they don't actually drink that much.

And their body fat ratio is quite low.

So when they do drink, their tolerance is really low.

So there's all this machismo, but once you get them all the

bar, two pints and they're away.

Writers on the other hand, drink is part of their work.

You know if they're struggling, you know, they will hit the bottle.

When a lot of the uh, social interactions are in the pub.

And like you say, there's a lot of social awkwardness, so they're

drinking to build confidence.

Also, let's be honest, a lot of authors, their body fat ratio is

significantly higher than rugby players.

So they have the ability to absorb a lot.

And they also are actively using their minds, so they're

engaging in conversation.

And they're keeping sharp and because they have this mental acumen that

they can really engage for a long period, no matter how many brain cells

they're killing off at the same time.

They can put away a lot more than other big social groups.

And so yeah, I had this sort of thing.

It's oh, we used to have like extra bar staff when we'd have

like big sports groups in.

And then we found that they were wasted and we didn't need that many staff.

We know have learned with writers, you definitely need more staff.

They usually learn it by the second night.

Yeah, you're absolutely right.

It is something that if a hotel hasn't hosted writers before, it is quite

comical how under-prepared they are.

um, Onto my final two questions, to wrap up.

It's my belief that writers continue to grow and develop their writing

with each story that they write.

From your last book, which I know is Blood Legacy, it's just come out.

Was there anything that you learned through writing Blood Legacy that

you're now applying to Blood Wars?

I think in books two and three, I became a lot more aware of author

expectations and how I might be engaging with different books of the same genre.

Because like we covered earlier, like Blood Sworn was

a very claustrophobic novel.

Um, Even though it was epic fantasy, like the main characters didn't really know

much about their world and suddenly the plot takes this grim turn and they're

just fighting for survival the whole time while being on the run and stuck together.

Blood Legacy, it was where I kind of, it was starting to become more of a

traditional epic fantasy novel because the world opened up more because of the

characters got exposed to more of their world and there's more political intrigue.

So I had to spend quite a lot of time like building up the

world and making it more broad.

And I also started to just realize that there's going to be certain expectations

about how book three is going to go, based on not just like how one or two

were, but how epic fantasy series go.

But I can't really tell you about how I'm going to engage with any of these

things yet, because it would be pointless.

I guess you've sort of, are you then working to go against expectations and

subvert the tropes or is it something?

Yeah.

Yeah.

I I'm always, I mean, I think that's what people expect me to do as a writer now.

But both from my first two books were mostly built around that and yeah, my epic

fantasy is being quite similar as well.

So I guess if we're trying to put it in the abstract

and not put any spoilers in.

If you've learned anything, it's identifying the tropes that might be

seen in the third book of a series.

That your sort of going, that's what people expect, don't do that.

So you go, oh, because I did this in one and this in two,

people expect this in three.

So don't do that.

Is that basically what you've learnt?

Yeah.

I mean, I guess, I guess I've always been doing that, but it

was more subconscious before.

Whereas now, because I think it's also because sometimes you don't realize what

you do as a writer until you get reviewed.

And then the reviewers tell you, and then you're like, oh

yeah, I have been doing that.

Yeah, Yeah, that, that was what I was doing.

I just didn't realize that was what I was doing, all this time.

Sometimes it's, it can be subconscious.

Like with my first two novels, which I didn't plan at all, they were like

just almost streams of consciousness.

And sometimes you know, I get struck by something then I'd write it.

Didn't even realize they were novels at first, they started off as short stories.

And I'd put these weird details in there and I'd be like, why is that a person

carrying that thing around with them?

Why did I put that in there?

And then nobody was more surprised than me when the books came together

at the end and like it all worked out.

And I was like, oh, so that's why I put that there.

Those novels were just weird.

I'm going to sound pretentious now, but I felt like I was channeling

something when I was writing.

Yeah, odd experience.

I think that, that is definitely a shared experience amongst a certain

number of writers, where it's the ideas are coming from somewhere.

And it feels external.

Um, That's definitely something that, some people find.

And, but yeah, the hidden symbolism, that you're like, oh yeah, that was symbolic.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

With my first, cause like I say, with my epic fantasy novels I sometimes

change bits as I go on, but my first two, I, I kept surprising myself.

But they were a bit of an anomaly for me.

So yeah, strange experience.

And my final question.

Is there one piece of advice you've received or read or come across that

you find you return to when you're writing, that you apply to your writing,

that you felt has always helped?

So one thing that I've definitely learned early on, and I

say to friends who wants to get into writing, it's all about rewriting.

uh, I spend more time editing than I do writing my first draft.

The first draft is usually for you.

Yeah.

The edit, the editing is for other people.

And some more specific advice that I would give to people who are particularly

watching epic fantasy is to study history.

History is so important when you're writing epic fantasy.

Cause even if you're not basing your society that you're creating off like

a certain civilization for inspiration.

A passive knowledge about history makes you understand like how societies

evolve, how they interact with each other and how interconnected everything is.

There's lots of free and accessible ways to get an education about history now.

A lot of independent creators who make podcasts and YouTube videos.

I mean, people are probably on their treadmills right now nodding their

heads, cause they're listening to this.

You can educate yourself while you're walking while you're

exercising with podcasts, that's the brilliant thing about it.

And I know one other piece of advice, I also give to people who write epic

fantasy it's you can draw a map and if you've got enough knowledge about

history and geography, the map could almost write the story for you.

Because there's certain sort of patterns that always happen.

Like, you know, civilizations always start in river valleys,

uh, rivers and mountain ranges are natural borders that divide people.

If the resources aren't evenly distributed, there's going

to be conflict and warfare.

Strategic points are going to be by a strategic resources, et cetera, et cetera.

But yeah, learning about history is one of the best things you can do

if you want to write epic fantasy.

That's great.

I think that's a perfect place to end and Tej, I just like to thank you very

much for being my guest this week.

Thank you.

And that was the real writing process of Tej Turner.

I hope you liked it.

I think you really get a sense of how internally consistent his

worlds are with that last bit.

His books are very good.

However, one thing I noticed when editing this interview was that I didn't

push him on how he develops such a well-rounded and believable characters.

Now, that's my failing, but I do want to tell you that his

characterization is brilliant.

If you get frustrated at characters doing illogical things or suddenly having a

personality swap just for the sake of a contrived plot twist, then rest assured

you don't get that in a Tej Turner novel.

His characters are smart, distinctive and logical.

And how he does that, I'll ask him next time.

Now I've left a link to his author profile in the show notes.

Elsewhere.

Impressed has a lovely little bio about him and links to all his novels

in ebook and standard publishing formats, as well as links to his

social media and his travel blog.

Now am I posting one link of laziness and convenience?

Yes.

But it's also easier for you, as it's nicely laid out all on one page.

So just before I sign off.

I'd also like to thank my newest Ko-fi supporters.

Artur Bialek and Becky Pepperdine.

You are beautiful, wonderful humans and your support in kind words and cold,

hard cash are really helping me do this.

All Ko-fi supporters get early access to all episodes and they'll hopefully be

some exclusive bonus content after Easter.

So keep an eye out for that.

If you'd like to support the show, you can do either a one-off or

monthly donation of one pound or more to become an official supporter.

The link is also in the show notes.

And that's everything from me this week.

Thanks for listening.

And may you always keep writing.