I’ve read scores of books up to date and there’s only thing I want to state: I love books. You can’t read enough because you never know what infor­ma­tion might come in handy. Ok, I con­fess, I’m not down with tech books or lex­ica. I read to enjoy, to relax. Got to admit there are quite some books I read for edu­ca­tional pur­poses. Well, one can’t read for plea­sure alone.

I’ve roamed the pub­lic libraries of the city I live in and I spend about one hour a week look­ing for new books, online or in local stores. I’m always on the hunt for a good read, be it in the sci-fi, the fan­tasy or the (high-tech) thriller genre. I like hor­ror sto­ries too, but Stephen King sim­ply sucks. The only one to ever make me look over my shoul­der was Howard Phillips Love­craft he wrote very admirable, sub­tle stuff. Over the last few years I’ve bought a whole lot of fan­tasy books and that’s the genre most of my favorite authors work in. Coin­ci­dence? I’m not so sure … I read Mem­ory, Sor­row and Thorn when I was a teen and I quickly came to love Tad Williams.

From this moment on my path has been pre­des­tined, I sup­pose. I read many books – some good, some bad and most of ‘em aver­age – and there they were. A few names who stand for qual­ity and inno­va­tion. A few authors capa­ble of cre­at­ing believ­able worlds unsur­passed in con­ti­nu­ity, appear­ance and cred­i­bil­ity. Ian Irvine stands out most. His Three Worlds cycle is really note­wor­thy, one of the most excit­ing reads I’ve ever had. Since I don’t want to plas­ter this piece of text with the names of my all-time favorites, I should stop now. You can always take a closer look at my pro­file to see the bunch of ‘em.

Ah, what am I try­ing to achive with this text? Very good ques­tion. I don’t know. I’ve had this nag­ging feel­ing for quite some time now. There’s … hmm … noth­ing new in town. Most of the sto­ries are uniques if you take a closer look but if you strip down the tales to their bare essen­tials there’s always a very sim­i­lar plot inside. Even the con­cept of the anti­hero isn’t new any­more, too many writ­ers have already adapted this idea. Is there noth­ing new to be writ­ten? Aren’t there some untold sto­ries left? Plots evolv­ing around some unique, inno­v­a­tive ideas?

I’m sure, there is more than enough stuff only wait­ing to be addressed by some nifty writer. It surely isn’t easy. We all know why even some well-established authors avoid some top­ics. If it’s too weird, too many peo­ple won’t like it and, thus, aren’t going to read it. Ah, the very pit­fall of writ­ing. A story is either too lame and unimag­i­na­tive or it’s too sick. To cut it short, you need some seri­ous writ­ing skills to get it right. I sin­cerely hope the deliv­ery from Ama­zon is com­ing soon …