Blog post by Bill McCormick
What is The Brittle
Riders?
The obvious answer, a trilogy written by me, doesn’t really
do anyone justice. It would be more
accurate to say it’s a trilogy written by me with the specific intent to bend
things. Badly and whenever possible. From the cover art to the prose nothing is
as it should be. And that’s purposeful.
The cover, designed by Bhri Stokes based on characters
designed by Brian “Bigger Lion” Daniels, is your first clue this trilogy is a
different animal. Printed sideways, with no author name included, you have to
manually turn the book to find out which episode you’re about to read.
If an understanding of Roman numerals eludes the reader the
books are also color coded; red, blue, and green, in order. Of course, if an
understanding of Roman numerals eludes the reader then maybe books aren’t their
thing.
When our, hypothetical, reader flips open the book they are
greeted with a cheery missive from me and then the appendix. Yes, everyone
involved knows that appendixes are meant to be placed at the end of the book. Otherwise
it would be called a prependix. Duh!
But, in this rare case, the appendix is actually a part of
the story. A dry recitation of facts that belie the weirdness readers are about
to encounter. Think of it as a linguistic map for the universe of The Brittle
Riders.
Once they slog through that they are welcomed into the
preamble. In just a few, short, pages every man, woman, and child on the planet
Earth is killed and almost all monuments to humanity are razed. As readers will
discover this horrific turn of events stems from a party.
However, to be fair, it was a very nice party.
There was food, booze, nude wait-staff, mutant seals, pretty
much everything any reasonable person could want.
The fact that it kickstarted the apocalypse was just one of
those things. Like losing your car keys, missing that important job interview,
and ending up homeless. But with more bloodshed, death, and stuff.
Once the reader has gotten this far the actual story begins.
Look, like I said, this thing is bent.
The first book is written in present perfect; i.e.,
character is running across the room versus character ran across the room. It was
done this way to reflect the point of view of the titular characters. They have
no past worth remembering nor any future worth believing in. Everything in
their world is in the now.
In fact, it’s not until readers are almost a hundred and
fifty pages into the first book that Geldish, R’Yune, N’leah, Braarb, and Sland
(a/k/a The Brittle Riders), begin to acknowledge anything outside of their
truncated world view. Don’t worry, it’s worth the reader’s time, I threw in a
really fun sex scene there to keep things interesting.
Over the course of the next two books the writing style
opens up to more traditional modes as the characters develop. By the end of it
all it reads just like a book normal people would write. With minor plot lines
others might not include. For example,
when you’re done with the trilogy, you may never look at taking a dump in the
woods the same way again.
The fact this is an important plot point merely reinforces my
earlier statement that this trilogy is well and truly bent.
I could go on, and often do after a few drinks, but you get
the idea. Nevertheless, just in case I’m wrong, read what some pre-readers had
to say about The Brittle Riders.
1)
If David Brin came off a three day tequila
bender and dropped acid, he would have written The Brittle Riders.
2)
McCormick packs more in twelve words than other
writers pack in twelve paragraphs
3)
Fuck him for making me horny and sad in the same
book.
4)
It’s like everything and nothing I’ve ever read
before. He uses language like a weapon.
5)
Everything I know is wrong, everything I believe
is stupid, and everything else is terrifying.
The Brittle Riders, courtesy of Azoth Khem Publishing,
Apocalypses Are Funny That Way.
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