Talking with the Authors

Julie Kagawa and J.T. Nicholas are the authors of A Throne Betrayed, the epic first novel in the new Clan Wars series. Both are long-time L5R fans, so we asked them to tell us a little more about their history with the game, and what it was like translating that passion to their writing.

Where and when did your love for Legend of the Five Rings start? 

For both of us, it started with the roleplaying game. I first picked it up in… maybe 2000? Julie picked it up not too long after (this is before we ever met). We both fell in love with the world and the more intricate and complicated approach to the game. Also, the amazing artwork and characters that really immersed you in the setting. We were both Kurosawa and other samurai-flick fans already, so the idea of a samurai drama game was amazing. We’ve stuck with it through the various editions and dabbled in some of the other properties (I’ve got more cards from the original card game than I’d like to admit alongside a bunch of pewter minis from the Clan Wars wargame). We always come back to the RPG, though.

With so much existing L5R lore, how did the writing process work? How much research was involved in developing the story?

The scope of things was a challenge, for sure. The lore is so big that unless you live and breathe it everyday, it’s hard for one person to know it all.  And that’s before you factor in various changes, retcons, and alterations to the canon made over thirty years of publication.  We did a good amount of our own research (even dusting off our 1st edition books published in the late ’90s) but, honestly, we’d never have been able to keep the lore coherent and in line with the actual “present day” timeline without the help from the folks at Asmodee. Between our editor (Charlotte Llewelyn-Wells), the “loremasters” (our term… I’m sure there are other official titles) that worked directly with us (Katrina Ostrander and Brian Mulachy), and everyone else working behind the scenes to make sure we didn’t accidentally break Rokugan, settling into the Emerald Empire was definitely a group effort.

As for the writing process, Julie and I have the advantage of working within shouting distance of each other. We started with joint brainstorming, taking the guidelines from the folks at Asmodee and building out our versions of the story and characters from there. We do a lot of back and forth on any given day, bouncing ideas off each other and feeding into a creative loop. That’s regardless of what projects we’re working on, independently or together. We’ve always used each other as sounding boards for our novels. There’s also an approval process with Asmodee – after all, they’re trusting us with their babies, so it’s only fair that they have input into what’s going on, and that was another curve in the creative loop.

When it was time for the rubber to meet the road, we generally use a write/rewrite process. One of us writes a scene/chapter/whatever, then the other one reads it and rewrites it. Think of that as really aggressive editing where we both have the chance to put our individual stamp on everything going out the door. Of course, the reality is that we’re pretty in sync and stylistically similar, so the “aggressive” part of that is more in theory than in practice.

Did you have a different approach to writing each viewpoint, if so, how?

You have to try and get inside the character’s head… that’s kind of writing advice 101, but it’s not an easy thing to do.  For us, the easiest way to do that is to give the characters something that is central to them and that can recur without becoming needlessly repetitive. Hotaru struggles with balancing her duty as Clan Champion with what she wants to do and who she wants to love as an individual. She also views the world through a musical lens, particularly when it comes to the “dances” of battle and politics. Yakamo struggles to live up to the image of his father, and with his own perceived inadequacies. He sees the world in a more direct, brutalistic (dare we say “Crab-like”) manner. Toturi is plagued by his own perceived failures, but on a scale and in a scope very different from Yakamo’s. He has to overcome his guilt and understand that the world that he thought was perfect (before the Emperor’s death) was actually rife with problems.  His own sense of duty won’t let him ignore those problems once he’s aware of them.

By giving each character their own “thing” that defines them, it becomes a lot easier to make their voices unique and to understand what drives them.

As a massive fan of the L5R, do you have a favorite clan to write?

For J.T. it’s the Crane, hands down. Urbanely snarky master duelists with a flair for art and sarcasm?  Come on… what’s not to love?

For Julie, it’s the Scorpion. Sneaky, sometimes underhanded, ninja-assassins? Also, willing to sacrifice their own reputation for the greater good… they make the ultimate tragic hero, taking the blame and doing what must be done, but all to keep evil at bay.

What do you hope readers will walk away thinking?

We know that for a lot of fans out there, we’re treading on sacred ground. And that ground is shifting, changing. Rokugan is a living, breathing place, and it’s also a living, breathing intellectual property. We have undoubtedly made changes (and the setting as a whole has gone through other changes) that some folks are going to love and others are going to… let’s say question. We know that. But we have been telling stories and having fun in the Emerald Empire almost since its inception. It remains our favorite setting to play games in. So more than anything, we hope people walk away thinking that this was a book written by people who care about the world and characters and even if some things may have changed, it’s clear that it was a labor of love.

Also, if they walk away thinking, “OMG this book was amazing!” that would be great, too. 

The Clan Wars: A Throne Betrayed is available now in paperback and ebook. Ask for it wherever you buy books, or find a retailer here, and for more information visit the Aconyte Books website.