This article was published in January 2010.

The end of the year means one thing for magazines: lists. Lists of bests. Lists of worsts. Lists of tops. Lists of bottoms. Lists of lists. Publisher’s Weekly caused an uproar when they released their list of Top 100 books for 2009. Only 29 female authors made the cut, and none of them cracked the top ten.

The Washington Post reacted with an article called “The key to literary success? Be a man — or write like one.” Salon.com responded in kind with “If you want to be a great writer, be a man.” Both articles were written by women, recalling advice from former college professors.

As I was reading both (valid) arguments that women get the shaft in publishing circles, I couldn’t help but compare the experiences of those women to the experiences of women in the fantasy genre. Sure, fantasy is full of epic male authors: Tolkien, Lewis, Jordan, Gaimen, Pratchett, Dahl. But fantasy also has its share of celebrated (and well-paid) female writers: Kurtz, Rice, Rowling, Weis, Bradley.

Is the fantasy genre simply more friendly to female writers?

I think so.

But why?

Let’s start by looking at the biggest bang (and bank account): J.K. Rowling.

By now, her personal journey is as well-known as that of of The Boy Who Lived. For example, that “K” in “J.K.” is not even her real name. When Bloomsbury bought Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, they feared that young boys wouldn’t want to read a fantasy tale by Joanne Rowling, so she adopted an androgynous “K.”

By the time Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire hit shelves, Rowling was the highest-profile author in the world, and everyone knew the “K” was for Kathleen. It didn’t matter that J.K. Rowling was a woman; what mattered was that she hurry back to her office and start writing about Hogwarts, Year Five.

Rowling also did another thing for female writers in the fantasy genre: she blurred the lines between children’s fiction and adult fiction. Women have always been trusted with cooking, cleaning and kids; so, the children’s publishing industry has historically been more accessible to females. During Harry Potter’s off-years, many adults went digging around in the children’s sections at their local bookstores, looking for an equally entrancing fantasy fix. And publishers paid attention.

But Rowling wasn’t the first woman to enjoy monetary success and critical praise for her fantasy writing. Before her, there were vampires — and three women who, er, brought them to life.

Marilyn Ross‘ Barnabas Collins series, Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles and Chelsea Quinn Yarbro’s Saint-German series changed the vampire genre. Under their pens, vampires became brooding, tragic, poetic heroes. And unlike the implicit sexual themes in vampire stories before theirs, Ross, Rice and Yarbro made it overt.

What they did for vampires, Marion Zimmer Bradley did for Arthurian Legend. Her Avalon series boldly turned Camelot on its head and examined it from the perspective of female narrators.

And what Bradley did for Arthurian Legend, Katherine Kurtz did for Medieval fantasy lit. And what Kurtz did for Medieval fantasy lit, Tanith Lee did for sorcery.

I think fantasy is more receptive to women writers because it has a long, proud history of financially successful female authors in nearly every subset of the genre. While most writers will tell you they want to bring fresh, engaging concepts to print, they will also tell you that it is much easier to get published if there’s a record of success with what you’re writing. To that end, it would be disingenuous to tell a female fantasy author that men won’t read her books simply because she is a woman.

Of course, financial success and excitement from publishers isn’t synonymous with critical acclaim. Even with the accomplishments of the women I mentioned — and the dozens I didn’t — last year’s Hugo Awards were awfully slim on female nominees. [Editor’s Note: This year was better.) But I’m still not going to cry sexism.

If you want to be a great fantasy writer, they key isn’t writing like a man; the key is writing rich, textured, deeply-imagined stories. As women continue to do just that, it will only be a matter of time before full parity comes to the genre.

Or you could take a shot at writing your main characters sparkly genitalia.

Stephanie Meyer isn’t exactly celebrated, but she certainly hasn’t gone broke writing about vampires.

• Multiple sources are reporting that New Line and MGM are (finally!) very close to greenlighting the two-part movie version of The Hobbit (but that it’s still not a done deal).

• I hate it when someone makes an off-hand comment, and it becomes huge international news, but in this case, I guess it sort of is news: J.K. Rowling doesn’t seem to have completely ruled out eventually writing another Harry Potter novel.

• An interview with “zombie” author Scott Edelman (The Human Race).

• Remember the story about Ridley Scott’s Alien prequel possibly falling apart over budgetary and “gore” issues? A Facebook page has been created to support him.

• The trailer is out for Megamind. I can’t stand Will Farrell, but I confess, it looks fun:

• Bioware is releasing an “ultimate” edition of Dragon Age: Origins at the end of the month. Basically, it’s the original game with the expanded edition and access to all the DLC’s.

• A family finds an actual sorcerer’s mirror (right) — okay, it’s not actually magic — and wonders what it’s worth.

• Looks like Emma Stone may be the new Mary Jane in the Spider-Man reboot.

• Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, the movie (based on the novel), is coming in 2012. And I’m already really sick of this add-monsters-to-the-classics trend.

• Elephants in Bantha costumes.

• Andrew Lloyd Weber is working on a retooled stage version of The Wizard of Oz. I’d be excited if I’d made it all the way through any play of his since Evita.

• The first book in R.A. Salvatore’s Neverwinter trilogy is out this week. Here’s the book-trailer:

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“You’re a wizard Harry.”

What would be better than finding out you are a wizard or witch? What would be better than learning to cast spells and charms (especially if you’re in the cross-hairs of the darkest and most powerful wizard ever born)?

Harry Potter learns many spells and charms at Hogwarts. Here are some of the most memorable — and my favorites.

Is Lumos the most widely-used spell in the books? It’s also perhaps the simplest: the light spell. Needless to say, light is conjured from wands many times during the books’ “darkest hours.”

Nox, meanwhile, turns off the light. It’s the counter spell to Lumos.

In Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban, Harry roams the halls of Hogwarts after dark looking for Peter Pettigrew on the Mauruder’s Map. Lumos let’s him see where’s he’s going (and see the map). He uses Nox when Snape catches him.

Avada Kedavra is one of the three “unforgivable curses.” It is mentioned in all of the books and first used in the sixth book. This spell or curse causes instant death to the victim.

This is a terrible spell to use, but a significant one nonetheless. Voldemort uses it on Harry’s parents and on Harry himself. Snape uses it to kill Dumbledore. And — for those who know Harry Potter through only the movies — expect to see this spell next in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

Expecto Patronum is the Patronus Charm. It is used most in the fifth book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Harry teaches this charm to Dumbledore’s Army. This charm conjures an incarnation, usually an animal, from the wizard’s wand when the caster’s feelings are positive. This charm is usually used against Dementors.

This is my personal, favorite charm. I love the fact that each caster has their own animal-incarnation. I also love that the Dementors, visually scary and almost impossible to “kill,” can be avoided through the use of this beautiful charm.

Not surprisingly, the movies have had a great time depicting it.

Expelliarmus is first seen in the second book, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. This charm is used to disarm another wizard during battle, and Harry uses it to disarm Draco Malfoy.

But of course, the most important time Expelliarmus is used is when it saves Harry’s life in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. During the final stage of the tournament, Harry and Cedric both touch the triwizard cup, which is a portal to the graveyard where Voldemort and his Deatheaters are. Voldemort and Harry duel and, while Voldemort uses Avada Kedavras, Harry use Expelliarmus. But both wands contain the same phoenix feather, which causes the spells to collide (and prove ineffective) creating the Priori Incantatem, thus saving Harry’s life.

Protego shields the caster from his or her enemies’ spell attacks.

I remember Protego (Totalum) the most from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Harry uses it against Snape during their Occlumency lessons. When Harry uses it, the effects of Occlumency are reversed, and Harry sees Snape’s memories instead of Snape seeing more of Harry’s.

There are, of course, many more spells used in the books. Some such as Sectumsempra are only used once, but it’s such a memorable spell that no reader could forget it.

Good writers are good because they make the reader believe that what the author has written is “real.” The incredible magical details that J.K. Rowling has added to her books don’t just make you believe in the stories themselves — at least while you’re reading them, they make you think that magic might be real too.

Have a question about something fantasy-related? Please send an email to thetorchonlineoracle@gmail.com and be sure and include your city and state and/or country.

Q: I know boots of Springing and Striding aren’t real — that they’re a D&D magic item. But it occurs to me that there might be some (non-magical) real-world counterpart. Is there? — Waylon, Portland OR

A: Yes: a brand of exercise equipment called Kangoo Boots (as opposed to “kangaroo boots,” I suppose, which are made from kangaroo fur and leather).

I was both fascinated by how these books work, but also vaguely disappointed that they don’t allow you to jump ten feet in the air:

While looking for a video of Kangoo boots, I also found this, which doesn’t quite correspond to any D&D spell that I can think of, but looks really, really fun nonetheless:

Q: Why remake The Sorcerer’s Apprentice? Seriously. — Urp, Vancouver, Canada

A: The Oracle agrees with you, but if it’s any consolation, the original Sorcerer’s Apprentice (which is, of course, a short film within the animated Disney classic Fantasia) is itself adapted from a 1797 poem, which had previously been turned into an 1897 symphony (this is the music used in Fantasia).

Where did the idea for the movie (which includes a riff on the Fantasia broom-and-flood sequence, which is also part of the poem) come from?

“The idea came to me and my friend Todd Garner,” says the film’s star, Nicolas Cage. “I was making another movie at the time, and I wanted to explore a more magical and fantastic realm where I could play a character who had mystical abilities. I shared these thoughts with Todd, and the next day, we hit on the perfect project: The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.”

So we’re now greenlighting movies based on the egotistical whims of inexplicably “bankable” movie stars like Nic Cage? That explains a lot, doesn’t it?

Considerably richer than God.

Q: Whose worth more: J.K. Rowling or Stephenie Meyer? — ApeGirl, Milwaukee, WI

A: While Stephenie Meyer has been far, far, far more successful than I ever would’ve imagined, and while she made an estimated $50 million dollars last year (for a total estimated wealth of well over $100 million), J.K. Rowling (who, it must be said, has been publishing books for almost a decade longer) is estimated by Forbes to have a fortune of a billion dollars.

Q: They can dress it up all the want, but when Galadriel, Elrond, and the rest of the elves “sailed over the Great Sea” to “Valinor,” that’s a euphemism, and they were really committing suicide, right? — M&M, Fort Wayne, IN

A: That’s, um, an unusual interpretation of things, but if that’s how you read the books, hey, what the hey?

Have a question about something fantasy-related? Please send an email to thetorchonlineoracle@gmail.com and be sure and include your city and state and/or country.

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Have a question about something fantasy-related? Please send an email to thetorchonlineoracle@gmail.com and be sure and include your city and state and/or country.

Myrtle and Shirley (right)

Q: I heard that the actress who plays Moaning Myrtle is far from a teenager — true? — Mom, Jacksonville, FL

A: Very! Shirley Henderson, who plays the teenage ghost in the Harry Potter movies, was 36 when she first played Myrtle in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. She’s 44 now.

But her age actually makes a lot of sense from this franchise’s point-of-view. As a ghost, Myrtle does not age — unlike all the other teen characters in the movie. By casting an older actress, when she reprised the role three years later in The Goblet of Fire, she looked more or less the same. And since the character only ever appears as a ghostly shade, it didn’t matter that even an actress as youthful as Shirley might have difficulty pulling off an actual teenager on-screen.

Q: Has J.K. Rowling ever done a cameo in any of the Harry Potter movies? Why not? — Fiona, Bedford, U.K.

A: J.K. Rowling has said in several interviews that she doesn’t like to see herself on film and isn’t interested in doing a cameo. If she wanted to do it, she absolutely could — unlike most authors who see their books adapted to film, she has had extraordinary influence over the movies.

That said, there are those who swear they see her, in The Sorcerer’s Stone (in the scene in the Leaky Cauldron), in The Chamber of Secrets (either in the train station or as a witch in Knockturn Alley), and in The Goblet of Fire (with Hagrid in the stands at the first dragon task).

The Oracle is unconvinced. In any event, there’s no way she did all these cameos, so at least some people are seeing something that isn’t there.

Q: In Rowling’s world-view, is one “destined” to be evil? It sure seems that way, since every single person that the Sorting Hat puts in Slytherine turns out to be evil. WTF? — Irvin, St. Louis, MO

A: It does seem that the Sorting Hat has a whole “Minority Report” thing going on, doesn’t it? It’s one of the major flaws with the story, at least in this All-Seeing, Fantasy-Questioning-Answering Oracle’s opinion.

It’s true that Harry is allowed to opt out of Slytherin — according to Rowling, the only reason the Sorting Hat wanted to put him there was because of the earlier accidental merging of his soul with Voldemort, so he wasn’t really “destined” to be there anyway.

But every other Slytherin Hogwarts admittee? They don’t get any say: the Sorting Hat looks into their souls and declares them to be fundamentally rotten. From then on, everything about the house — the “snake” mascot, the snotty ‘tude, the encouragement of anti-Muggle bigotry, even the eerie greening lighting in their common house — just seems to reinforce their fundamentally bad natures.

Which begs the question: just what essential element did Salazar Slytherin bring to Hogwarts in the first place? Is the existence of the house simply a way to segregate all the evil kids? If so, why not just not admit them to Hogwarts in the first place? (We know kids can be expelled, so it’s not like everyone with magical potential has to go to Hogwarts.)

In all seriousness, the Oracle can’t remember being more disappointed in an author than when not a single Slytherin joined Dumbledore’s Army.

Not a single one? Seriously? The Sorting Hat is never wrong, Rowling seems to be saying: once a Slytherine, you’re doomed to be an evil coward.

This whole Sorting Hat business seems creepy to me, and downright authoritarian, declaring people to be irredeemably “evil” before they prove it by their own actual, individual behavior.

In Rowling’s defense, at least Severus Snape turns out to be “good,” although he’s still a complete a**hole about it all along the way.

Have a question about something fantasy-related? Please send an email to thetorchonlineoracle@gmail.com and be sure and include your city and state and/or country.

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• I’m super-excited about the HBO series based on George R.R. Martin’s A Game of Thrones. Despite the fact that George R.R. Martin is not my bitch, I anxiously await both the series and the next book. But the news that HBO actually hired a language expert to invent a language for the horse warrior Dothraki people made my day. New languages are world-building at its finest. Hopefully it doesn’t end up sounding “athastokhdeveshizaroon.”

• I’m pleased that the actors did their own stunts in Prince of Persia. I’m not pleased that the movie looks like it could act as a sleep aid – is that just me?

• On a list of 5 Shows That Will Get Me To Watch TV Again, the author has two that fit as genre series: The Walking Dead is the adaptation of the zombie comic, the Untitled Alien Invasion Series is by Steve Spielberg, who only missteps occasionally. Me, I’m holding out for M*A*S*H: Iraq. That’s worth paying for cable to see.

• If you didn’t already love J.K. Rowling for giving the world Harry Potter, her reasons for remaining a British citizen despite her wealth will likely give you a warm fuzzy:

….A second reason, however, was that I am indebted to the British welfare state — the very one that Mr. Cameron would like to replace with charity handouts. When my life hit rock bottom, that safety net, threadbare though it had become under John Major’s Government, was there to break the fall. I cannot help feeling, therefore, that it would have been contemptible to scarper for the West Indies at the first sniff of a seven-figure royalty cheque. This, if you like, is my notion of patriotism.

• In another odd Harry Potter tangent, Daniel Radcliffe is returning to Broadway after he wraps Deathly Hallows and this time he sings! He’ll starring in How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying.

• Aasif Mandvi, who I was completely unaware of, played Commander Zhao in the upcoming Avatar: The Last Airbender, tweeted some reshoots were underway, and a new character was being added. Please let it be the Cabbage Merchant!

• My fellow Palantir-er, Tim O’Leary let you have the news that Joss Whedon was going to direct The Avengers. Now comes the news that he might also be rewriting the screenplays for both The Avengers and Captain America. It makes sense – Joss is a great writer, understands genre work, and the Marvel films need to start having a common feel if they’re to come together in The Avengers.

• If you haven’t read Neal Stephenson’s insanely good Anathem, I highly recommend it. I also recommend you go and check out the Long Now Foundation’s 10,000 Year Clock which featured in the book and is now real. No point in thinking small like the Mayans did, now is there?

• I hate myself for caring about The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, but I’m really excited to see the movie, despite my aversion to Nic Cage. The WonderCon panel did not put me off the film.

• My contempt for reboots of franchises is fairly well known in cyberspace. But even I’m struck by the concept of rebooting a book. Has anyone ever had the guts to do it? I suppose you could argue Wicked was a reboot of The Wizard of Oz. But it was a huge media property – I’ve never heard of Little Fuzzy by H. Beam Piper. But Jon Scalzi is going to reboot the books. And he has the permission of the estate. And it may be science fiction, but that looks more like a demon than an alien on the cover. Who knows if this is a good idea?

• Here’s an odd one. This is the trailer for a short called Hector, Inc. which seems to have some paranormal stuff, magic, and a demonic penguin, all in an office setting. Suitably strange?

• There’s an interesting question brewing at io9.com about which franchise has the most rabid fans. They lump science fiction and fantasy in together, which I think is a little sloppy. So what about fantasy – which fans are craziest? Doctor Who, which has been making time travel possible through a living space ship for so many years? What about Twilight? Their fans are unreasonably supportive, but fairly recent. True Blood? Harry Potter? Can we lump in D&D? What fantasy franchise has the mostly insanely loyal fanbase? What sets it apart – longevity, role playing, merchandising? Tell us in the comments.

• Speaking of Doctor Who, here are some clips from “The Victory of the Daleks” which should be airing this weekend in the U.K. It seems an odd take on an old enemy.

Have a great weekend!

Was Harry Potter really the hero of the Harry Potter series?

On the surface, this sounds like a stupid question. Potter was the main character, and he did do heroic things. Most importantly, Voldemort was defeated because of Potter.

Or was he?

When I recently reread Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, I concluded that Potter was, at best, a weak hero. Too much of Potter’s success with defeating Voldemort hinges on Albus Dumbledore.

Dumbledore was dead, of course. But in the final book in the series, it becomes clear that he set many plans in motion before he died. These plans set things up so that Potter could defeat Voldemort. They clearly went well past merely explaining a Horcrux or showing Harry memories about Voldemort in the Pensieve.

Some plans were small, like arranging for the safekeeping of Gryffindor’s sword (which was useful for destroying Horcruxes).

Some things were bigger, like his handling of Severus Snape. At the start of the book, it appeared that Dumbledore’s trust of Snape had been the biggest mistake of his life. By the end of the book, it’s clear he knew exactly what he was doing. As a result, Snape ended up being an unexpected asset, not liability.

Then, throughout the book, Potter regularly thinks of Dumbledore and what he’d wanted. This influences Potter’s decisions. On page 692 of the 2007 US hard cover edition, it even says: “Dumbledore’s betrayal was almost nothing. Of course there had been a bigger plan; Harry had simply been too foolish to see it; he realized that now.”

All in all, it seems clear to me that Dumbledore had everything planned. All Harry Potter really did was act as Dumbledore’s pawn in helping carry out part of the plan. Harry was critical, of course, since there were certain things that only he could do. (However, he needed to do these things because of events outside of his control. For example, Voldmort’s attempt to murder him when he was a small child.)

I have mixed feelings about my realization. In one way, it’s nice to see “brain” rather than “brawn” win. And Dumbledore does represent “brain” far more than any other character.

Yet, overall, I’m disappointed. All along, I’d been viewing Harry Potter as the hero. Even early on in the series, long before Voldemort made his return, I was betting on two things: Voldemort would return, and Harry would forever beat him.

This would be a classic David and Goliath type story — a classic theme of the ordinary person who is called upon to fight evil, and who wins, despite the odds.

This happened in the earliest books. Dumbledore then appeared to be little more than a source of wizard knowledge. He’d sometimes help, but usually in small ways. Early on, Harry Potter would have to fight mostly his own fight.

Some fights were impressive. For example, take Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. The Chamber’s reopening caused a real problem. It even stumped the best wizards, up to and apparently including Dumbledore. It was Harry Potter who actually solved the problem. Not bad for a second year Hogwart’s student!

As the series went, my view that Harry would vanquish Voldemort was supported more and more. My view met its apex at the end of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, when Dumbledore died. It was a shock, but it made sense for the story line. He needed to go so Harry would be the hero; the young wizard who is forced into greatness.

Except, I was wrong.

While Dumbledore never did return from the dead, he did operate quite effectively from the grave. His plans, made before he died, guaranteed that. Indeed, he worked so effectively, even dead, that I think it feels almost heavy-handed at times. (If nothing else, it’s incredible how infrequently his plan didn’t work as planned!)

In the end, it leaves Dumbledore the real hero of the final book.  And I  think he’s also the real  hero of the series, since the overall series is about vanquishing Voldemort for good.

And I — a loyal reader since 1999 — am left disappointed.

According to The-Leaky-Cauldron.org, Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling has opened a Twitter account.

The first two tweets read as follows:

I am told that people have been twittering on my behalf, so I thought a brief visit was in order just to prevent any more confusion!

However, I should flag up now that although I could twitter endlessly, I’m afraid you won’t be hearing from me very often……….

By the end of Friday, she already had more that 25,000 followers.

I was poking around the internets the other day, and I discovered an amusing list of cliches that aspiring fantasy novelists should avoid — among them were making sure you didn’t have a character who could be described as a “forgetful wizard,” and steering clear of making up races that use the “half-” prefix.

But the one that caught my eye advised writers to avoid writing a book thicker than a New York City phone book.

There was a time when a decent-sized novel was about 400-500 pages. You felt like you were getting your money’s worth. Depending on how fast of a reader you are, it could be a journey that took you some time to complete. But recently it’s almost become the norm to create tomes of 1,000 pages or more, and anything less feels like easy reading.

How did we get here?

Well, the most obvious answer is that The Lord of the Rings, the seminal work of fantasy that basically created the genre, is a weighty 1,008 pages in its entirety, and that’s not including the 100+ pages of appendices. Of course, when it was first published, Rings was famously split into three books, and is often misconstrued as being a trilogy, when it fact it is meant to be read as a single novel.

Why so long? Tolkien was doing more than just writing a simple novel. He was also providing a window into a world no one but him knew, and that required a lot of description. Though touched upon in The Hobbit, light had to be shone more thoroughly on elves, dwarves, ents, and orcs, and while many people criticize the books for its large amount of pages in which characters are traveling to and fro (check out Kevin Smith’s Clerks 2 for a good laugh about the film version), it is that traveling that allows the reader to get to know this foreign terrain. And it’s a testament to Tolkien’s genius that it’s so engaging.

But as for the modern abundance of lengthy novels? I blame Harry Potter.

It’s no secret that J.K. Rowling’s beloved series began modestly with a few slim books aimed at young children, only to balloon into an epic, sprawling masterpiece meant for readers of all ages. (I recall Stephen King a few years ago writing that he was tired of hearing new works heralded as “Harry Potter for grown-ups.” As he pointed out, Harry Potter is Harry Potter for grown-ups.)

The series, which peaked page-wise with the fifth installment, Order of the Phoenix (almost 900 pages!), proved that there was a market for lengthy novels in the teen-to-young adult market, as well as for older readers.

Each one of Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight Saga books, for example, are increasingly long, starting with Twilight at 498 pages, and capping with Breaking Dawn, which came in at 756 pages.

Is this a good thing, this trend towards books heavier than most toddlers? It depends. While it can be a joy to take a long journey with a book, they can’t all be The Lord of the Rings. One of my favorite books of all time is The Mists of Avalon, which can put a small-town phone book to shame with its girth, but that’s not to say I don’t enjoy a book that one can finish on a long train ride, either.

I worry that aspiring fantasy novelists now might feel that they have to make their books long just for the sake of being long, and not in service of their story. To them I give this advice, start small. After all, the original British publication of J.K. Rowling’s first Harry Potter book was a svelte 223 pages, and look where she is now.

Everyone has their favorite fantasy novels — those special books that you read over and over again, hoping each time to find something new that you might have missed in your last reading. It could be the daring swordfights that draw you in. Maybe the cleverly coded symbolism. Or maybe it’s steamy in the way that a hot summer day isn’t.

Whatever the reason, certain books just speak to us. Here are a few of mine.

The Princess Bride

When I was a kid, The Princess Bride was one of my favorite movie for three reasons:

1) The sword fights.

2) It starred Andre the Giant.

3) Mandy Patinkin used the phrase “son of a bitch.” (I was a kid, remember. Swearing automatically equaled awesome.)

When I picked up the book the first time in high school, I was utterly bewildered by the ruse set down by the book’s author, William Goldman, who claimed that the book was actually an abridged version of another author’s work, and then goes on to provide surprisingly intimate details of his life. It was all a trick, I later learned — he was using it as a literary device. But for his sly sense of humor, this book is one I keep dear to my heart.

The Marvelous Land of Oz

Though The Wizard of Oz gets all the attention, I have always been a huge fan of its first sequel, The Marvelous Land of Oz, which features the young lad Tip, the ward of Mombi, and his own crew of misfits: Jack Pumpkinhead, the Saw Horse, the Wogglebug, and the Gump.

Author L. Frank Baum continued his sly brand of feminism (in The Wizard of Oz, all the characters with any real power are female) by having the Emerald City overtaken by an army of militant young women, and what’s more — SPOILER ALERT!! — he includes what might be the first transgender character in children’s literature, as it’s revealed that Tip is really Princess Ozma, who was transformed by Mombi in her infancy into a boy, in order to conceal her identity. At first hesitant to return to his true state, Tip is convinced by his friends and allows the spell to be cast that transforms him back into Ozma. Not something you read every day.

Interview with a Vampire

Long before she found Jesus and stopping writing readable books, Anne Rice emerged from the shadows of literary erotica and wrote this fascinating gothic fantasy, which earned her a legion of fans and an A-list film adaptation. Told from the point of view of Louis, a vampire who is less Bela Lugosi’s Dracula and more the kind of kid that today we’d call “emo,” it is a fun little book, never too wordy or challenging for a high schooler, which is when most people seem to discover it, and for all its pomp and audacity never seems to run that deep beyond the repeating sentiment that being a vampire, well, sucks. (Get it?)

Sexuality was always a prevalent theme in Rice’s works. As the books went on, homosexuality and bisexuality became more prevalent themes, despite her bold choice to render all of her vampires physically impotent. (I suppose this saves us from imagining squirm-inducing undead sexual scenarios.) All in all, Interview remains one of the strongest and, thankfully, least bombastic books in her Vampire Chronicles, and is an enjoyable escapist piece.

The Mists of Avalon

I love, love, love this book. This novel, by Marion Zimmer Bradley, took the utterly complex mythology of King Arthur and turned it on its head by emphasizing the power of the women in these stories instead of the men, and while much of Arthurian tale champions pure Christian values, this story places the Pagan Druids as the protagonists, with the encroaching Christian Church as an oppressive tyrant. But rather than being an anti-Christian piece, the main character, Morgaine, realizes it’s not the teachings of Jesus that are opposed to her, just the men in the Church who are threatened by another religion.

But beyond the basic themes, it’s a fascinating character study of four incredible characters: Morgaine, a woman reared in Avalon and dedicated to keeping the ways of the Old Religion alive; Gwenhyfar, a devoutly Christian woman who is terrified of the world; Arthur, the man whom greatness was thrust upon; and Lancelet, a warrior who is struggling with his forbidden love for his best friend, Arthur.

This novel really has everything you could ask for in a fantasy novel, and it’s an incredibly mature piece. And if you’re worried, no knowledge of Arthurian legend is needed to appreciate it. If you haven’t read it yet, get your ass of the internet and go to a bookstore right now. You’ll thank me. (But then come back to the internet. We need you.)

The Harry Potter Series

I resisted this series for a long time. I was one of those cantankerous twenty-somethings who utterly refused to indulge in a series of books meant for children. I was WAY too highbrow for that sort of thing. But then a friend of mine, one whose opinion I greatly respect, read the first few books and told me they were actually pretty good. I told her that although I value her input, I wasn’t about to cave. But then my late grandfather, a greatly distinguished writer and very literate fellow, told me he read them and they were delightful, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to at least peek at the first one. I did, and was hooked.

I loved how the characters grew over the course of the books, truly maturing and changing as the stories evolved, and how J.K. Rowling carefully crafted Harry to slowly evolve into a true literary hero of the old school. Does the Potter saga borrow liberally from Lord of the Rings? Yes, but what fantasy literature doesn’t?

At the end of the day, there’s some real art to be found in the bajillion pages of text that Rowling puts down, but none more so than in the conclusion to her epic, Harry Potter and the The Deathly Hallows.

The Iliad

I know it sounds like pretentious garbage to put The Iliad as one of my favorite fantasy novels, and perhaps even erroneous, as it isn’t technically a novel. And if I wasn’t such a foaming-at-the-mouth Greek myth nerd, I probably wouldn’t be too interested. But as it happens, I Greek-geek out with the best (or worst) of them, and The Iliad takes place during one of the most exciting and action-packed moments in all of Greek mythology.

One of the reasons that 2004’s Troy, which claimed it was based on The Iliad, felt so weak is that it ignored the best part of the story — the gods. Sure, the mortals in the film talked about the gods, prayed to the gods, worried about offending the gods, but it all came across as religious hooey that had no dramatic stakes, because for all we knew, the gods didn’t really exist, and these were just silly people running around in skirts.

Homer’s epic makes for great reading — if you’re a devoted fan of Greek myths. If not, and if you somehow got through school without having to read it, I’d say don’t bother.

The Lord of the Rings

Like you didn’t see this one coming.

Okay, listen closely, because I’m going to admit something incredibly shameful to you. It’s very embarrassing, and I only ask that you don’t judge me too harshly.

Okay, here we go.

When Peter Jackson’s Fellowship of the Ring came out in 2001, I went in cold.

Because I hadn’t read the book.

I hesitate to admit that, because I feel like it may compromise my integrity as the Associate Editor of a fantasy website. But when that first film came out, I just hadn’t read the books. I can’t give you any reason. I had read The Hobbit and loved it. I had read other fantasy works. I’ve always loved the genre. It just seemed like such a big undertaking, and it was always something I had meant to do, but I had just never got around to.

But then the cinematic version, which is a masterpiece in its own right, washed over me, and I knew I had to read the books before the next film came out. And I did. Twice, actually. And The Silmarillion.

By the time I sat in the theaters to watch The Two Towers, I was a Tolkien expert, and have read the books at least half a dozen times since then.

The Lord of the Rings is, quite frankly, my favorite book of all time. Every sentence is a pleasure. If I could read no other book for the rest of my life, it would be that.

Okay, well, that’s enough out of me. I want to hear what YOUR favorite fantasy novels are. I know you’ve got them. Now it’s your turn.

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I just finished re-reading all the Harry Potter books again. Just like the first time through, I was sucked into J.K. Rowling’s stunning world of magic. I want a wand! I want to play Quidditch! I want to buy everything the Weasley twins sell in their joke shop!

Mostly.

As cool as these things are, I’m not sure the benefits of being a wizard make up for the downsides. There are some very good reasons I’m glad I’m a muggle:

My Teddy Bear Can’t Turn Into A Giant Tarantula

Remember why Ron was afraid of spiders? Because his brothers turned his teddy bear into a giant spider while he was hugging it. I can’t imagine anything more horrific. I think this would scar me a lot more that just making me afraid of spiders. I think I’d pretty much be terrified of stuffed animals in general, every species of bear known to humans — and, uh, especially sadistic brothers.

I Don’t Have A Slave and My School Doesn’t Have Slaves

The magical world seems awfully blase about the idea of having a slave around the house. I’d like to think I’d be in Hermione’s camp! It would be particularly difficult to go to school in a place where the cooking and cleaning is done by slaves — elf or otherwise.

The Imperius Curse

Can you imagine not knowing whether the mind of your best friend, boss, or spouse has been possessed by your mortal enemy? Could you ever trust anyone again? Give that it’s so incredibly horrible — and given that it happens a fair bit in the books! — the wizarding world doesn’t really have a good way of dealing with this problem. (And I’d add on to this the memory charms. It’s remarkably easy to make people forget their memories, which means you can’t trust your own mind either. Great!)

Earwax Flavored Candy

‘Nuff said.

I Can’t Be Thrown Into Azkaban Without A Trial … Let Alone Evidence

Hagrid was suspected — with no proof! — of opening the Chamber of Secrets and letting out the monster. The first time he was suspected, he was expelled from school, which is bad enough. The second time, though, the Minister of Magic threw him into Azkaban for two months just to be sure it wasn’t him!

Really, Minister? Just because he’s suspected of a crime, you’re going to toss him into a soul-sucking prison that drives its inmates crazy? Does that punishment really fit the crime? In what world can that possibly be all right?

I’ll take my Bill of Rights intact, thank you very much.

The Principal Doesn’t Keep A Three-Headed Guard Dog At School

Perhaps wizarding parents are just more accepting of putting their kids in mortal danger. In the first book, Dumbledore puts a three-headed guard dog a school hallway and then just tells students not to go in. Is he kidding? There wasn’t a better place to put it? Like … oh, anywhere that’s not a school?!

This is also a good place to point out that the Forbidden Forest is on school grounds, which means that there are talking killer spiders on school grounds. That’s basically like having a corner of the playground filled with land mines.

There’s also a giant racist killer basilisk in the school basement, just for good measure. I suppose if it weren’t there, though, you’d just be worried about the poltergeist in the hallway, so maybe it’s there for putting things in perspective.

So, yes. Spare me the basilisks and the awful candy and the jinx that makes me dance. I’m happy to stay a Muggle … although I still wouldn’t mind a game of Quidditch now and then.