“Witch King” Is Martha Wells’ Triumphant Return to Fantasy | Audible.com
“Witch King” Is Martha Wells’ Triumphant Return to Fantasy
The award-winning writer of the Murderbot Diaries talks about her new listen, how her childhood inspired her characters, and the importance of injecting humor into the rich, complex worlds she creates.
Note: Text has been edited and does not match audio exactly.
Sam Danis: Hi, this is Sam Danis. I am Audible’s sci-fi and fantasy editor, and I am just elated to be chatting today with the amazing Martha Wells. Martha is, of course, the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author of the ongoing series the . She is also the author of many works of fantasy, including the , and her latest, the title I'm looking forward to talking about today, . Thanks so much for being here, Martha.
Martha Wells: Well, thank you for having me.
SD: So, I want to dive right in. It's been 10-plus years since your last fantasy publication, and as well as you’re known for the Murderbot Series, fantasy is really sort of where you began as a published writer. What brings you back to the genre now with Witch King?
MW: Well, when the pandemic first started, I was actually trying to work on another Murderbot novel, but with all the stress of everything going on, it just wasn't developing for me and I wasn't really making any progress on it. I was just re-editing the same 10,000 words over and over again. But I was, unlike a lot of people who really didn't have the concentration to even read anymore, I was still able to read. And there was a lot of really cool fantasy novels coming out that year. And I also kind of got into Chinese fantasy drama on Netflix and Viki and sites like that. And so did a lot of my friends and a lot of the authors I talked to online.
I'd always been interested in fantasy, but it was really making me want to get back into it again. There was an idea for a scene I had that ended up being the first scene for Witch King. I'd had it for a long time, in different ways, and had never been able to really develop it and do anything with it. And I kind of just started with that and started trying to write, and this book started coming out. And that was a huge relief, because I really hadn't been able to get any writing done except for the revision and copy edit on . It was really, really helpful for me at the time just to have something to work on and something to really concentrate on and feel like I was doing something.
SD: Yeah, I can see how being in Murderbot's head a bit during the pandemic could be a little anxiety-provoking. And that opening scene, of course, is so iconic. Diving right into your main character, his name is Kaiisteron,a.k.a., Kai, a.k.a., the titular Witch King. He is a demon who possesses mortal bodies, but not quite in the way that you might immediately imagine. He actually has quite a significant attachment to his first mortal body, that of a young woman named Enna.I'm so curious, what was the inspiration for this character? Why write a demon? Where did that come from?
MW: Well, I really like writing nonhuman characters, and that's just a viewpoint that I started doing in the Books of the Raksura, and it just still really engages me, as trying to see things from the point of view of someone who has just a completely different physicality and different abilities and is really kind of separate from humanity in some ways. With Kai, what I wanted to do is, you know, the idea of the evil demon possessing bodies is really what people expect. And so the Saredi having it basically be a religious experience, a way of honoring people who die before their time, kind of came together. So, it's really much more of a consensual process. The person knows it's going to happen and it's something for the family to basically retain some of that person who was taken early.
"I've always been interested in characters who were in the same situation of being involuntarily isolated in a lot of different ways. And so when they do form friendships or bonds, it's very strong because they need that connection. And I think a lot of the best science fiction I've read revolves around characters like that."
And also, I kind of wanted the Saredi to be separated from the rest of the cultures in the continent, not just because of distance, but also because they have these practices, which to them are very basically wonderful and loving, and to the outsiders, it's so easily misinterpreted. It's like you're sacrificing your children to demons. And like one of the characters says at one point, actually, it's the other way around. So that was the basis for that. When I developed that, figured all that out, that really kind of set the tone for Kai's relationship with humanity, which is actually very close. His human family has a much closer relationship than his demon family did.
SD: And I think it's so interesting, once he kind of leaves that security of the Saredi clan where he started, suddenly you get all these kind of typical thoughts of what a demon is. And he is very powerful. He can be fearsome in his own right. But within his first mortal body, he's kind of at home and comfortable. And I found that approach to the demon so interesting. I haven't read anything like that before, or listened.
So, you mentioned nonhuman characters. Between this novel and your past work, there is sort of a running theme of main characters, often nonhuman, who are being othered. Murderbot struggles with relating to humans, while Kai develops the strong connection to mortals, particularly the Saredi people. What draws you to this theme?
MW: I don't know. It's always been something—I was a lonely kid. I was not neurotypical, and at the time when I was growing up in the '70s, there was no diagnosis for girls, for young girls, of ADHD or anything like that. You were just badly behaved and couldn't pay attention and all those kinds of things. They never did think that maybe there was a condition that was causing this. I've always kind of felt isolated a lot. My sister was nine years older than me, so I was alone at home. Our house was isolated by a really busy street from other kids, so I didn't have anybody to play with except at school, and I wasn't getting along there.
So, yeah, it's always just been me and books, basically. Books were my friend. So I think I've always been interested in characters who were in the same situation of being involuntarily isolated in a lot of different ways. And so when they do form friendships or bonds, it's very strong because they need that connection. And I think a lot of the best science fiction I've read revolves around characters like that, the best science fiction and fantasy.
SD: Yeah, and I think a lot of sci-fi and fantasy listeners can really relate to that feeling. These worlds kind of provide us with very interesting angles to approach that theme. I appreciated that in this novel in particular. Your characters defy gender norms as well. Kai inhabits bodies irrespective of their assigned sex or gender identity during life. We also see a lot of gender norms kind of turned on their head in Witch King. A lot of nonbinary characters in your work as well. Why is that kind of representation important to you?
MW: I think it's really important now because, again, that was something growing up in the '70s, those binary gender norms were very much enforced. And even the sort of mildest—especially when you were a kid—even the sort of mildest step outside that just really set you apart. So I really love the fact now that people are more accepting of the fact that gender isn't binary. It's a spectrum, just like sexuality is a spectrum. I want to explore it in a way I didn't get to explore it when I was younger. And doing that through different characters is just really helpful for me.
SD: Yeah. I love how, throughout the novel, Kai is Kai. No matter what body he happens to be inhabiting at that particular moment, he's recognizable as Kai through his personality.
So, getting a bit into voice, I think you have such a knack for inserting moments of snark and humor into otherwise tense situations. We encounter a bit of it in this novel. There's a moment involving some borrowed eyeballs that I'll let listeners kind of discover for themselves, but for me, these moments really help me relate to these larger-than-life and nonhuman characters and this completely different world that we're in. How would you describe your approach to humor and levity in your characters?
MW: It's always something I've really gravitated toward in the books I’ve read, even from very early on. My mother had books by Erma Bombeck, who was a humor columnist, newspaper columnist, and wrote all kinds of really funny stuff about her family and her life and everything. And I always just kind of loved that. I always loved books where there was a sense of humor. That's how I identified more with characters. And it's, to me, it's really hard to characterize someone who doesn't have a sense of humor because I think it's such an integral part of your personality, is what you find funny and what you don't find funny. I've always kind of had a bitter sense of humor that gets more and more bitter as things get worse. So that tends to drift over into my characters.
SD: We love a demon with a sense of humor.
MW: Yeah, I think everybody's been in situations where things were so bad you just had to laugh because there was nothing else to do except panic.
SD: Right. And I think sometimes that tension and anxiety even heighten the humor. So, getting into narration a bit, Witch King is actually the first title that we have narrated by Eric Mok, who does such a fantastic job. Always exciting to have a debut narrator. And I see there's more coming from him, which is great. I'm curious what you were looking for, hoping for, in the casting of this novel, considering that your main character inhabits different bodies and thus different voices and perspectives, and we’re introduced to so many different new cultures and societies.
MW: Yeah, it was probably the most audio samples of the most-different people I'd ever had to try to narrow down and pick one person. Usually, it's only a few people for you to listen to and choose from. But this was, I think it was like 10 people. So that was really cool to have that much choice, and also really hard because I had it narrowed down to three at one point and I was just, "But they're all so good!" I was just looking for someone who, to me, kind of evoked the world. You have to just kind of use your instinct. You just pick the person that you think really evokes the book. The only time it was an easy decision was Kevin R. Free, when he was cast for the Murderbot Diaries. And the casting director just basically suggested him and I listened to him and was like, "Yep, that's it. Perfect." But going through 10 people and trying to pick one out of a lot of really good actors was really difficult.
SD: I'm sure. And I think he does a great job not only with the characterizations but kind of those more action-oriented scenes, really bringing up the intensity and the excitement and the anticipation during those scenes. I really enjoyed listening to him. I hope he does a lot more. Always great when you find that perfect fit, especially if you're going to have an ongoing series and ongoing characters. And I know our listeners appreciate that continuity.
So, getting a bit into the lore here, there's so much. Witch King presents such a complex and richly drawn political and social landscape. We jump back and forth between the past and the present, meeting demons and witches and immortals, but also princes and prince-heirs and, of course, the ruthless enemy that presents the main conflict in the story of the Hierarchsand the Expositors. I'd love to hear a little bit about this world and what inspired it. You also have a background in anthropology, so I'm curious how that influenced your approach to this novel.
MW: It's a big influence. Just learning how cultures work and fit together and all the different elements that you have to take into account has really helped me in world-building. How much material culture, the things people use every day and their tools and that kind of thing, really can inform the reader of what the world is like. That's just all been really helpful.
"To me, it's really hard to characterize someone who doesn't have a sense of humor because I think it's such an integral part of your personality."
And kind of the inspiration of this book was looking at a map of the world and seeing how much colonization there had been and just trying to think about the ancient world before that and what our world would look like now if the colonization hadn't happened. And thinking about how terrifying that would be, to have these people come out of nowhere and these things to happen and just this invasion for no reason out of nowhere by people you'd never heard of before. That was really the inspiration for it. And also looking at how different countries have been taken over by others and what that process was like. Because in the book, theAriki are basically infiltrated first. They were a fairly powerful culture and they were infiltrated first, where others that were not as well armed, not as well organized, were just swept over and destroyed. So yeah, just looking at all that stuff and just thinking about how that would affect the world I wanted to create.
SD: There's a particularly—without giving anything away—there's a particularly terrifying scene with the Saredi clan that kind of kicks off Kai's whole motivation throughout the story, and how the hierarchs basically come in and treat them. And throughout the novel we're seeing a lot of trying to figure out what that power structure is going to be going forward, in both the past and the present. And I think it's so complex, and I feel like your background clearly has informed that a bit, and just your knowledge of history.
MW: You want to try to make it feel for the reader as complex as the real world is, without overwhelming them. And that's kind of the balance you have to strike.
SD: Right. And add in magic systems.
MW: And then add in magic. Yeah. [laughs].
SD: Right. So, you mentioned world-building. One thing I admire about your world-building is how you allow the listener or reader to discover it sort of organically, via the characters. Tell me a little bit about how you approach world-building in your writing practice. Are you one of those people who lays it all out before you start, or does the evolution kind of happen as you go?
MW: I don't really lay it all out because I think I’d get overwhelmed. What I usually do is kind of start the story like I did, you know, it's in that tomb, is where it starts. And then I have usually a feel I want to get, whether I'm basing it on a real historical place or just kind of an amalgam of historical places, which is usually what I do. And just kind of build it bit by bit, by what the characters are seeing and what's important in that moment. In the description, try to stick to things that have an emotional resonance for the character, because the reader's going to remember things that are important to the story and that the characters feel an emotion about. And really stick with that and try not to—even though I know a lot about the world, usually especially by the point when I'm doing revision—I try not to overwhelm the reader with all this stuff. And it means I come up with stuff that I think is really cool that I can't put in the book. And so you kind of try to hope you can save it for later.
But yeah, just trying to stick to the character's point of view and just really focus on what they're seeing and what they're hearing and what they need to know at that moment. And then the reader can take it in and start building a picture of the world themselves. They don't need to know everything at the beginning, just as you go along, and then that way they can focus on the story and what's going on, but they're getting all these little hints and drops of what the larger world is really like.
SD: Right. I love that. I think one thing that comes to mind is these wind devils that one of the characters creates. They just kind of come up organically. And I can imagine what that magic system looks like and how it works without having to go into every little detail. And I think that has a big impact on relating to your characters as well. We're not experiencing the world abstractly, but rather through their feelings about it.
MW: Yeah. That's because just a cool description of a lot of stuff that you're not emotionally involved with doesn't have any kind of impact, as opposed to watching someone move through that world and being very much affected by it does.
SD: Right. I love how more of that world exists in your head than ends up on the page. I'm sure there's a temptation to just throw it all in. This kind of brings me to my last couple of questions. Without giving away the ending or too much of the story, because I really do think it's one of those stories that's so interesting and fun to discover on your own—it's a deeply emotional story. At times, it feels almost like a heist-type story. There's just so much going on and so much to discover. It seems possible that this could be a series maybe? What are your long-term plans for this story and these characters?
MW: I'm definitely writing a sequel. There’s some stuff I set up in the book. I guess to avoid spoilers, I won't tell you what it is. When you read it, I think it's a little bit more obvious what I wanted to enlarge on. I kind of have a habit from when it was very difficult for me to sell books; I don't tend to start a series, I tend to do a standalone book that has the potential to have a sequel so that I don't end up putting out a book with a cliffhanger or there's an unfinished story and then I'm not able to finish it. And so I am writing a sequel now, so hopefully that'll come together as I write. I'm hoping it will. And after that we'll see where it goes next.
SD: Great. I was hoping to hear that. Because there's just so much in this novel that I think you could delve into even further. There are moments throughout where I was like, "Ooh, I want to laser in on that a little bit." And like you said, I think it stands alone as a great fantasy story, but there's definitely plenty more to be explored.
MW: Part of my thing for it is I almost want to do like an epic fantasy series, the good parts version, where you feel all these things have happened, but you're really only seeing a slice of it.
SD: I love that. The good parts version. There're definitely a lot of good parts in this story, a lot of action. And I think listeners are really going to love meeting these characters. It kind of brings me to my last question. You've got this epic fantasy series in the works now. You've got Murderbot. How do you plan to balance all of these stories you have going on, all these projects you have going on, and what is in the pipeline for you?
MW: It's not easy actually. Witch King was actually supposed to come out last year, which would've been a little easier, because right now Tor.com is putting out some of my backlist that had been out of print for a long time, so I'm revising. I had to revise those books and I'm still working on that. And then I'm working on the sequel to Witch King. And also after the sequel, after I'm finished with that, I'll do another Murderbot book. So that's kind of my plan right now.
"I almost want to do like an epic fantasy series, the good parts version, where you feel all these things have happened, but you're really only seeing a slice of it."
And what I'm really having to do is learn how to say no to stuff, even if it's stuff I really want to do, just because I don't have time and I know I’ll just be stressed out and have anxiety issues about all these things I have to do. It comes from having a really long career, 30 years, where a lot of times you were not getting any offers to do anything. No anthology offers, nothing like that. And so you get used to, when you do get something, an offer, you jump on it and say yes. And I'm having to really kind of dial myself back and say, "I don't have time. I have to do the stuff I've already committed to."
SD: Right. You're inhabiting so many worlds and so many characters at the same time. I think it's fair to say no to a few things. Although we're really looking forward to listening to the things you say yes to.
MW: Thank you.
SD: Well, thank you so much again for your time, Martha. I can't wait to hear what our listeners think of this new adventure, of Eric Mok, of everything that you've set up here. Thank you so much for being with me today.
MW: Oh, thank you for inviting me and I really enjoyed it. It was interesting to talk about the book. I wrote it two years ago basically, in 2020 and 2021. I've been really waiting for a long time for people to read it and talk about it and everything.
SD: Right. And it's finally going to see the light of day, or the dark of the underworld. Both. And listeners, you can pick up Witch King by Martha Wells right here on Audible.
