Librarian Nancy Pearl interviews one of her favorite authors, Guy Gavriel Kay for Book Lust TV this month.

The pair, who have talked several times before, start by discussing Children of Earth and Sky (PRH/NAL; OverDrive Sample), Kay’s newest book, published in May and,set in the same general world as Sailing to Sarantium (a particular favorite of Nancy’s) and Lord of Emperors. It also falls within the general universe of The Last Light of the Sun and The Lions of Al-Rassan.

Kay explains that he likes to write stand-alones rather than series as endings are very important to him and he wants each book to have its own arc. He also wants readers to enjoy every book for itself, without feeling as if they are missing an insider joke but does offer long-time readers “grace notes, small, glancing allusions to the previous books.”

The two discuss Kay’s particular brand of fantasy, which he calls a “quarter turn to the fantastic” as well as the rise of popularity of the fantasy genre in pop culture. Kay believes the rush of fantasy novels rests in the fact that the “book industry is a copy-cat industry” and much “cloning” takes place. Of his own take on fantasy, he says he likes to compress time so that readers get an immediate sense of what happens over hundreds of years.

The interview concludes with Kay detailing what he is currently reading and recommending to others: Edith Grossman’s translation of Don Quixote, Anne Tyler’s A Spool of Blue Thread, and Helen Macdonald’s H is for Hawk.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 22nd, 2016 at 12:55 pm and is filed under 2016 -- Summer, Fiction, Science Fiction & Fantasy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.