Read Vampire Warlords: The Clockwork Vampire Chronicles Online
Authors: Andy Remic
Tags: #Fantasy, #Epic, #General, #Fiction
Vampire Warlords: The Clockwork Vampire Chronicles (49 page)
Angry Robot)
You've always acknowledged a debt to Gemmell, and have described Kell's adventures as a tribute to your hero. Did you accomplish everything you set out to do with the series?
Andy Remic)
Kell was indeed a tribute to David, but an idea I actually had – oooh, gods, about 15 years ago now – when I was cycling on the Pennine Moors in the ice and snow. And of course, this was also when David was alive. It was intended that Kell was always going to be my "Druss", a no-nonsense axe man who took the world by the balls and gave it a good kicking, whilst "doing the right thing" in an ultimately moralistic sense. In my original mental planning, Druss was a retired warrior living in an abandoned lighthouse on a rugged coast, and when the albino soldiers invaded (I was reading
Elric
at the time, so hats off to Moorcock) Druss would have to take up his mighty axe. However, I never wrote the book at the time – I didn't feel I had enough original elements, and indeed, back then I was still a fledgling unpublished author. The original elements for
Kell's Legend
only came with the introduction of the Clockwork Vampires, a completely different and deviant mental direction. And then, when all the ideas gelled… whoosh! Yes. Those long winter bike rides through the ice on The Viking Route were superb planning time for what would transmogrify into
Kell's Legend
,
Soul Stealers
and
Vampire Warlords
. However, in terms of accomplishing everything… no no no. Oh no. Kell and Saark are not being let off the hook that easily! I have so much pain waiting for them, it's going to make
Evil Dead
look like a silly little film about puppies.
Angry Robot)
The parallels between Kell and Gemmell's Druss have been discussed elsewhere. Why pay homage to Druss, in particular? What was it about this character that inspired your series?
Andy Remic)
Legend
by David Gemmell was the first fantasy novel which really made me sit up and think, Holy crap! This is GENIUS! when I was about 15 years old. Obviously, Druss was the driving force in
Legend
and you could completely identify and comprehend how much love Gemmell put into the old man. Druss became an icon of Gemmell's heroic fantasy worlds (for me and many, many others), and as such, I wanted to pay tribute – not just to the character whom I so admired, but to the author I so admired as well – and had sadly passed away. When David died, me and Ian Graham built a fire and toasted him to the Hall of Heroes with lots of whiskey. I hope his shade finds my story a worthy homage. If not, I'm sure Snaga will be teaching me a lesson in the Afterlife! *checks over his shoulder in the dark shadows of the room*…
Angry Robot)
Will we see Kell and Saark again?
Andy Remic)
I have another six books of pain, agony and torment planned (in my head) for Kell and Saark, so yes, I definitely want to work with them again. They truly were a joy to write, and by the end of
Vampire Warlords
they didn't so much feel like characters I created, more like old friends and comrades I had been to Hell and back alongside. I lived through their squabblings and their battles, and enjoyed every damn second of it! First, however, I have another series to attend… but trust me, I will be back to Kell and Saark in the near future. There are plans, my friends, PLANS!
Angry Robot)
You're an established SF author, and now fantasy. What's next – Andy Remic's paranormal romance series?
Andy Remic)
It's funny you should mention that, I have plans for a series of romantic novels called, "Love's Loving Kissing Flame", "The Pink Rose of the Virgin's Nun" and "The Throbbing Clitoris of Ecstasy"… Or maybe I just dreamed that ;-).
On the fantasy front, I have a new series planned called the Machine Dragon Chronicles –
The Dragon En>gine
,
Dragon's Ice
and
Twilight of the Dragons
, where the upper world of man has become a prison of vicious ice, thus men have been forced underground, slaves to the dwarves and their "dragon engine" used in the smelting of ore. The novels follows the machinations of religious maniac, poet and torturer Cardinald Skalg, and his plot to use three dark adventurers to free the dragon engine of its world chains. This is still in the planning stages, but it's going to be fast-paced, dark and dirty, a bastard deviation of everything Tolkien did.
That's the plan!
ANGRY ROBOT
A member of the Osprey Group
Midland House, West Way
Botley, Oxford
OX2 0PH
UK
Gears of war
An Angry Robot paperback original 2011
1
Copyright © Andy Remic 2011
Andy Remic asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-0-85766-105-0
EBook ISBN: 978-0-85766-107-4
Set in Meridien by THL Design.
Printed in the UK by CPI Mackays, Chatham, ME5 8TD.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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