Andrew Q. Gordon

Publisher: Wilde City Press

Authors:

August Li

Brandon Witt

Scott Coatsworth

Skye Hegyes

Cover Artist: August Li

Q & A With The Authors of Myths Untold: Faery

Introduce us to your main character. How old is he, what does he look like, what does he do for a living—the basic stats.

Gus: My character, Glyn, is eighteen. He has long blond hair that he ties back. He is currently (at the start of the story) homeless in Cardiff after being kicked out of his aunt and uncle’s house.

Brandon:   My Character is Quay. He is the eldest child of the royal family. He was beautiful and strong. My fairies chose their ‘royal family’ based on their physical beauty. Quay’s transition (exiting of the Chrysalis) goes horribly wrong. His face and skin is disfigured and he becomes an outcast. The lowest of the low in fairy culture.

Skye: Tyler, is a teenager

Scott: I have two. Colton is a down-on-his-luck trans gondolier plying his trade and fleecing the tourists in the drowned part of San Francisco, about 50 years from now. Tris is an elf from Faery who has crossed over to our world to hunt down his brother, who left and never returned.

Tell us something unique about your main character.

Gus: Glyn has an eerie beauty. His eyes are violet, though he’s always been told they’re just blue but his blood vessels are near to the surface. Since he’s been a boy, people have always been uncomfortable around him.

Brandon: Quay sees himself as damaged and worthless, yet prides himself in being strong–not letting anything get to him.   There is nothing he won’t sacrifice for his younger brother. During the arc of the story, Quay begins to fall in love with another fairy, one who isn’t very good to him, he struggles with the weakness such emotions show.

Scott: Colton has been running all his life, and he’s never learned how to turn around and face things. And Tris… Tris is naive to the ways of the world, but it’s also kind of his superpower, and lets him do things others would think were impossible.

What is the main conflict your character faces?

Gus: Aside from being homeless and trying to survive, Glyn must solve the mystery of why other street kids are disappearing—his companion among them.

Brandon: Being the exiled outcast from both his royal family and the fairy species, he has made it his life goal to watch over and protect his brother, from afar.

Scott: For Colton, it’s overcoming his own internal demons and finding himself worthy of being loved. And for Tris, it’s finding his brother and bringing him home safely. If he can.

What are your character’s strengths? What traits will help him get through the hardships in the story?

Gus: Hope. Time and again, Glyn resists succumbing to despair over his circumstances. He also has a practical streak and is willing to do what he needs to do. He has a lot of pride and doesn’t let anyone exploit or insult him.

Brandon: Love for his brother. Having been made strong through rejection and abuse.

Scott: For Colton, it’s his loyalty to his friends which keeps him going, even when things look bleak. For Tris, it’s his boundless faith that he will find a way to overcome any obstacle.

What are your character’s weaknesses, and how do they hinder him in achieving his goals?

Gus: Glyn’s hope is both a strength and a weakness. He trusts in luck so much that he often waits for things to come to him instead of actively pursuing them. However, he’s an opportunist—also a double-edged sword sometimes.

Brandon: Honestly, his source of strength is also his biggest weakness. He loves his brother more than anything, more than life itself. However, it’s that love and devotion that keeps him trapped in a nearly unlivable situation.

Skye: Tyler wants to believe he’s normal, even though he’s clearly not—not just in appearances, but in romantic preferences. In doing so, he holds himself back, which only tends to frustrate him even more.

Scott: Colton has always run away from things. From the tragedy that killed his mother and brother, from relationships that might have panned out, and from any real responsibility for his own life. Until he can learn to run toward something, he’s trapped in his own fear.

Does your character’s past influence him? How so?

Gus: From childhood, very few people have been caring or warm towards Glyn. It’s made him self-reliant, but also, understandably, very guarded—and a little bitter.

Brandon:   It influences everything. He was the heir to the throne. He had it all, and now he is the lowest of the fairy society. He is still reeling from loosing everything.

Skye: Yes and no. Part of him wants to know who and what he is as well as where he came from. At the same time, he’s so used to what he’s always known, he’s afraid to change.

Scott: Yes, especially for Colton. He is still haunted by the death of his family, and Is trapped in his own little world until Tris arrives to shake him out of it.

Blurbs

Faeries are part of mythology the world over, past, present, and future. Called elves, brownies, the fae, and more, they evoke a sense of wonder and a little danger. Faery has its own rules, and humans enter at their peril.

In this spirit, we bring you the first book in the Myths Untold anthology series—four stories from the land of the Fae: a homeless man in Cardiff and the luck that could destroy him; the trans man in future San Francisco who falls for an elf; the village boy who has always been a little different; and a faery prince whose birthright was stolen from him.

Welcome to Faery.

The Pwcca and the Persian Boy, by Gus Li

Despite beauty and luck, something about Glyn makes everyone uncomfortable. Homeless on the streets of Cardiff, he has nothing to keep him going but his friendship with Farrokh. Through stealing and fortune’s occasional favor, Glyn keeps them alive. But then homeless youths begin to disappear, and when Farrokh goes missing, Glyn begins to discover the reasons behind both his luck and the way people react to him. Determined to save his friend from a danger he never imagined, he enlists the help of Lleu, who might be an ally, or might be manipulating Glyn to achieve his own goals.

The Other Side of the Chrysalis, by Brandon Witt

In a species that values beauty above all else, Quay looses both his freedom and his birthright as prince of the fairies. Lower than an outcast, he watches over his younger brother, hoping against hope that Xenith’s rebirth will provide safety and positions that has slipped through Quay’s grasp. Though he expected kindness from no one, Quay gradually starts to trust that there is more to life, even for the likes of him, as sexual encounters with Flesser, a fairy barely accepted himself, turn from lust to love. Quay knows having forbidden relationships will be his undoing, but he is powerless to turn away.

Changeling, by Skye Hegyes

With his pointed ears and a tail, Tyler’s always been different than the other children, but until Marsh, a brownie tells him he’s a changeling, he never thought he wasn’t human. Now he will discover what faery life is like, and just how being a changeling could change his life. On the way, his ties with his mother will be pushed and prodded even as his friendships grow and his love life blossoms. However, in a village of God-fearing people, those who are different are spurned and Tyler will discover how much trouble a fledgling changeling can get into.

Through the Veil, by J. Scott Coatsworth

In the not-too-distant future, San Francisco has been swamped by rising sea levels caused by global warming, and has only survived by building a wall to keep the water out of the heart of the City. Colton is a trans man barely getting by on the canals outside the wall. Tris is an elf who has come to the human world on his journey to become a man. Fate brings them together, and everything changes for Colton when he sets out with Tris to find the elf’s missing brother, taking Colton behind the Wall for the first time.

 Buy Link

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 About the Authors

Gus Li

August (Gus) Li is a creator of fantasy worlds. When not writing, he enjoys drawing, illustration, costuming and cosplay, and making things in general. He lives near Philadelphia with two cats and too many ball-jointed dolls.

He loves to travel and is trying to see as much of the world as possible. Other hobbies include reading (of course), tattoos, and playing video games.

Brandon Witt

Brandon Witt’s outlook on life is greatly impacted by his first eighteen years of growing up gay in a small town in the Ozarks, as well as fifteen years as a counselor and special education teacher for students with severe emotional disabilities.

Add to that his obsession with corgis and mermaids, then factor in an unhealthy love affair with cheeseburgers, and you realize that with all those issues, he’s got plenty to write about…

Skye Hegyes

Dragons, wolves, and sharp objects are commonplace in Skye Hegyes’s home in North Carolina. She spends most of her time between writing and working. When not doing either of these things, you may find her making crafts or adventuring with her family, which consists of her husband, two daughters, two birds, and three cats… and a partridge in a pear tree…

Scott Coatsworth

Scott has been writing since elementary school, when he and won a University of Arizona writing contest in 4th grade for his first sci fi story (with illustrations!). He finished his first novel in his mid twenties, but after seeing it rejected by ten publishers, he gave up on writing for a while.

Over the ensuing years, he came back to it periodically, but it never stuck. Then one day, he was complaining to Mark, his husband, early last year about how he had been derailed yet again by the death of a family member, and Mark said to him “the only one stopping you from writing is you.”

Since then, Scott has gone back to writing in a big way, finishing more than a dozen short stories – some new, some that he had started years before – and seeing his first sale. He’s embarking on a new trilogy, and also runs the Queer Sci Fi (http://www.queerscifi.com) site, a support group for writers of gay sci fi, fantasy, and supernatural fiction.