An hour-long conversation with Peter V. Brett, the internationally bestselling author of the Demon Cycle series (The Warded Man, The Desert Spear, The Daylight War, The Skull Throne, and The Core), which has sold more than three million copies in 26 languages worldwide.

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The Introduction

Photo by Karsten Moran

Peter V. Brett is the internationally bestselling author of the Demon Cycle series, which has sold more than three million copies in 26 languages worldwide. Novels include The Warded Man, The Desert Spear, The Daylight War, The Skull Throne, and the final novel in the series, The Core. He lives in Brooklyn.

The Lightly Edited Transcript

I seem to start a lot of these by saying, “Oh, we met in Calgary. For some reason I’ve met a lot of authors in Calgary and you’re one of the most recent ones. We met at When Words Collide in Calgary this last summer, which is a convention I like to give a shout out to whenever I can because I think it’s a really good one. Hope you had a good time there.

Yeah, that was a fantastic convention. I didn’t really know what to expect, I’d never been to it before and wasn’t really familiar with it, but it actually ended up being one of the most welcoming and friendly and enjoyable conventions I’ve been to in a while.

I think one of the nice things about it is that it’s so focused on writing, and not just within science fiction fantasy but all sorts of writing. So, I think that’s nice change from just the typical science fiction convention or fantasy convention.

Yeah, I agree. And there were locals there who sort of know the area and are really welcoming and also a lot of guests from all over. So, there’s a good mix and I really had a good time there. And Canadians are just nicer.

Maybe. I’m both Canadian and American so I can’t really speak to that.

We’re going to talk, of course, about the Demon Cycle as we as we go ahead here, but I like to go back into the mists of time with my guests and find out how they got started. First of all, how did you become interested in the fantastical? I understand it’s from an older brother.

Yeah, I mean, some of that I think is from my older brother. Some, I think, it’s just when I reached the age where I was old enough to sort of read a novel on my own, the novel that happened to be hand was The Hobbit. That, I think, was probably the first book without pictures that I ever read of my own accord. And I think that definitely set me on the path.

And then I had an older brother, and you know, in the ’80s I was playing Dungeons & Dragons. We were those kids in Stranger Things playing Dungeons & Dragons. And so, between the two I think that I really get heavily invested in fantasy from an early age. And then when I started prowling the bookstores looking for things to read, I ended up in the fantasy section.

I have two older brothers who both read this stuff and that’s kind of how ...