Legendary Author Battle: Phil Wade vs. Loren Eaton

People like to fight. How else do you account for heavyweight championships, Monday Night Football, and 24-hour cable news? We writers like to pretend we're a sedate bunch, but in reality a pugnacious pugilist turns lap after lap inside every one of us, just itching to spar. Perhaps that's why Simon Cantan (Shiny New Swindle) created Legendary Author Battles.

The setup is as simple as it is brilliant: Have a pair of authors try to write each other into a corner while composing a collaborative story and turn the whole thing into an audiovisual delight at the end. It starts with the challenging writer picking a defender and taunting him about his inevitable literary demise. The defender counters by selecting a genre and a time period. The challenger follows it up by penning descriptions of the hero and villain. The defender details the hero's special power that will allow him to defeat the villain, and the challenger provides an in media res summary of where there story will start.

Then the real fun begins.

Over the course of nine alternating rounds, the two duel, each trying to stump the other as plot and characters develop. Of course, the ultimate decision comes down to the judges, who happen to be ... you. At least you're the judges when it comes to my battle with Phil Wade of Brandywine Books. Our tale includes an evil fae, a clueless bureaucrat, a stolid solider, a falcon made of metal and magic, burnings, enchantments, poisoned fruit, grammatical humor, epic clashes between fantasy races, and ... you know what? You should really just watch the video below (quite professionally produced by Cantan himself, if you don't mind me saying so). Or there's always plain old text should you prefer.



For more Legendary Author Battles, visit SimonCantan.com.