Writers Read: Karen Miller

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Karen Miller

Karen Miller writes speculative fiction. Mostly of the epic historical kind, but she’s also written Star Wars and Stargate novels and under the pen-name K.E. Mills writes the Rogue Agent series, about a wizard with special skills who works for his government under unusual circumstances.

Miller's latest novel is The Falcon Throne, book 1 of The Tarnished Crown series.

Recently I asked the author about what she was reading. Her reply:

As I dive back into work, after a trip for research and book launching in the UK and France, I am forced to adjust myself to the regimen of hardly ever reading for pleasure. Of course, research reading is always wonderful - right now I'm working my way through English Society in the Later Middle Ages 1348-1500 by Maurice Keen - but it is 'work'. Sadly, for me, once I'm in the throes of writing my own work, reading new work by other people becomes problematical. Which isn't to say that I don't read any fiction, I do, but it's what I call 'comfy slipper reading', works I know well by authors not writing in spec fic, that pretty much help me turn off my brain before going to sleep. Right now the book doing that job is Angels Fall, by Nora Roberts. She's one of my favourite writers and someone I re-read on a regular basis with never-diminishing enjoyment.

When it comes to new fiction (or at least fiction that's new to me!), the recent trip gave me a chance to enjoy books I've not read before. One of them was Joe Abercrombie's new novel, Half a King, which I enjoyed enormously. Abercrombie's work is always good, vivid and engaging, but I was particularly taken with this adventure. I was especially impressed with how he used our world's Viking history to inform his imaginary world. I believe there are more books to come in this tale, and I'm really looking forward to them.

The other wonderful discovery I made while in the UK, in the Waterstones bookshop in York, was an historical crime series by Ariana Franklin. I was in a hurry, scanning the crime shelves for something new to read, and one book caught my eye. I grabbed it, opened it to the first page, and read the first sentence:
Between the parishes of Shepfold and Martlake in Somerset existed an area of no man's land and a lot of ill feeling.
I laughed out loud, and that was it. Ka ching! And after reading The Assassin's Prayer, and realising it was book 3 in a series, I immediately rushed out and bought the rest. And read them. And carted them back home to Sydney. I adore these books for so many reasons. Brilliant writing. Brilliant characters. An immaculate weaving of history and fiction. I cannot recommend them highly enough.