Rain & Fire (17 page)

I trust you've found this ramble through the Last Dragon Chronicles and its author's life entertaining and informative, but I really can't finish this book without a last word from Gadzooks — which is, of course,
hrrr
….

 

I usually split this up into two categories — human and dragon. Let's deal with the human first. It's very hard for me not to choose David, as he is based on me when I was a young man. If the series had gone no further than
Fire Star
, I probably would have chosen him. Of course, there are many characters I could opt for. Gwilanna has been fantastic to write — villains always are. And Anders Bergstom intrigues me as much now as he ever did in
Icefire
. But the human I really like is Zanna (and her “alternative” in
Fire World
, Rosa). She has a lot to deal with throughout the series. I love her spirit, particularly the way she copes with David's disappearance
in
The Fire Eternal
. And she's a great mum. I would have loved to have met her when I was David's age!

As for the dragons. I'm in danger of being seriously scorched, here, by the ones I leave out. Seriously, I love them all. They make me laugh and cry in equal measure. Sentiment says I should pick Grace, because she will probably never get over having her ears broken by David. In the end, if I'm forced into a corner, it comes down to two. Gretel is just brilliant. Her feistiness, especially in
Icefire
, is legendary. I like the way you can never be quite sure about her and how she thinks the other Pennykettle dragons are “useless.” But even she would forgive me for choosing the one and only Gadzooks as my favorite. How could a writer not choose the writing dragon? Notice that
The Fire Ascending
is dedicated to him. That just about says it all.

 

 

Again, very, very difficult to choose. For a long time I would have picked
The Fire Within
, because it's not a
book about squirrels and it's not a book about dragons; it's a book about creativity and where ideas come from — a subject close to a writer's heart. When I wrote
Dark Fire
, that took over as my favorite for a while. It has so many lovely twists and turns and it was great to write about Gawaine, the queen dragon, coming out of stasis. Then came
Fire World
, and my feelings changed again. At the end of
Dark Fire
, I knew I had to come up with something spectacular to explain the ending at Scuffenbury Hill. It was a real gamble to dive into the alternative world of Co:pern:ica, but, boy, was it good fun! A small number of readers just didn't get it. But those that did couldn't praise it enough. I absolutely adore
Fire World
. I don't think it's the best book of the series, but it is my favorite — just.

 

 

The Fire Ascending
, without a doubt. It wraps everything up so beautifully. Again, I took risks. I knew I wanted to go back in time and examine the story
of Guinevere and Gawain, but I wasn't expecting to write a 20,000 word chunk of prehistory without any chapter breaks that didn't include any of the known characters (or barely any) and introduced a villain we hadn't met before! That spirit of adventure set the tone for the rest of the book. It was just a question then of how to mix the old with the new and bring everything to a satisfying conclusion. I think
The Fire Ascending
contains some of the best bits of writing I've ever done.

 

 

The only two characters that weren't entirely made up are David and Zanna. David is a name I've always liked and wouldn't have minded being called. Zanna came about after I met a girl at a signing who called herself that. She was a Goth and very striking. I asked her if “Zanna” was an Eastern European name, to which she
replied, “No, it's short for Suzanna, you …” I won't repeat the rest! I thought it was such a cool name and immediately wrote it into
Icefire
. Nearly all the other names, including Gadzooks, just floated into my consciousness when their character was first introduced. It rarely takes me more than a minute to find something I like or that seems appropriate. And the character will soon tell you if the name is wrong; they dig their heels in and refuse to be written. I was really struck with Ingavar (the polar bear), because it conjures up an image of a hugely powerful and courageous bear. It was always good fun making up names for the Inuit characters. Tootega was my favorite. Voss was interesting. I wanted to give the opening section of
The Fire Ascending
a vaguely Scandinavian feel. I typed “Norway” into Google and one of the first words I saw was “Voss” (an area of Norway). I liked it and it stuck. Henry Bacon, I have to confess, is a slight homage to Mr. Curry, the annoying neighbor in the Paddington Bear books. Curry? Bacon? See the connection? Many people have asked if the use of the names Gawain,
Guinevere, and Arthur is some kind of nod to the Arthurian legends. No, not at all. I just liked the sound of them. Gawain, particularly, is a wonderful title for a dragon.

 

 

There's an old saying that goes, “every story is as long as it needs to be.” I don't think anyone quite expected seven books at a time when trilogies were all the rage, but I always felt that if the story was there I would be happy to continue adding to the series. I did consider writing
The Fire Ascending
as two books, where book one would have dealt with the historical stuff (Agawin, Grella, etc.) and book two the Ix inversion. But after a little discussion with my editors we felt that one volume would be enough. I did cut out a long history of Co:pern:ica, and I would have seriously liked to have dedicated more chapters to Gwilanna's illumination
to Gawain. But I'd rather people have a book, not a doorstop. I'm happy with the way things worked out. As for the ending, would you believe I didn't know the exact ending until a few days before I wrote it? I decided from the start (well, from
Icefire
onward) that I would write these books “organically.” In other words, I wouldn't plan them at all but would just let them take me wherever they wanted to go, to keep them “true” to what David does when he writes
Snigger and the Nutbeast
for Lucy. With every book, I always knew what the beginning would be, and I had a
vague
idea of the ending. Everything in between was an adventure! It's a scary way to write, but for me it's the only real way to do it. I placed my faith in the Universe — and let Gadzooks do the rest! Of course, there is a great responsibility on a writer to wrap up a big series in a satisfactory manner. I'm well known for leaving dreadful cliffhangers at the end of my books. I couldn't allow that to happen with
The Fire Ascending
. It had to have a definite end and it had to be good, but more than
that, it had to be different. I came up with the idea of the interview sequence before I started the book, but didn't tell anyone except Jay about it until it was done. I'm absolutely thrilled with the way it came out. It puts the whole series into perspective and is both funny and moving in equal measure. The closing lines didn't really come to me until very near the end. What I like about them is how they address the two main themes of the series, i.e., the power of the mind to create ideas and whether dragons exist — or not.

 

 

It's been a delight to unwrap so much wonderful story. As I said above, when you write the way I do you're never quite sure what's going to happen. So it's really exciting when fantastic scenes pop up out of nowhere. Developing the covers has been another thrill. Angelo (Rinaldi) has done a fabulous job with the artwork, which has become iconic. My favorite cover is
The
Fire Eternal
(love the planet in the eye), closely followed by
Fire World
. Someone jokingly suggested that I couldn't write any more books because we've run out of colors! Pink dragon, anyone? Maybe not. If I had a low at all, it would be the feeling that over a period of years, books like these tend to be taken for granted. People see three, four, five come out and assume they know what they're getting. My answer to that would be, read
Fire World
. How many series take a complete sideways step, six books in, and manage to pull it off? I'm sometimes told as well that the plots are confusing or complicated. Yes, they are, probably because of the way the books are written. And maybe it's partly due to the fact that my two favorite television series were
The X Files
and
Twin Peaks
, which had so many layers of intrigue that it was virtually impossible to finish them conclusively. I learned a lesson there. I think
The Fire Ascending
does have a strong conclusion, one which brings the whole series together.