By Andrew Warrick

This Saturday afternoon at C2E2, fantasy novelists Rachel Griffin (The Nature of Witches), Scarlett St. Clair (King of Battle and Blood), and Maxym Martineau (Kingdom of Exiles) gathered for the Witches, Gods, and Monsters panel to discuss the writing life. To kick things off, each writer described herself using six words: 

Griffin: “I’m Rachel and I love nature.”
St. Clair: “Daddy’s girl, mythology obsessed, dog lover.”
Martineau: “Anime-lover, video games, coffee, dogs.” 

(L to R) Rachel Griffin, Scarlett St. Clair, Maxym Martineau

Next, conversation shifted to how witches, gods, and monsters functioned in the authors’ novels. 

“I’ve always thought of witches as people first and foremost,” Griffin said, “who have this incredibly deep connection to the earth and to the natural world around them. And so when I was building out the story [of The Nature of Witches, a novel whose fantastical world is centered around the seasons], it became clear to me that it needs to be witches who are able to use this magic.”

St. Clair explained that “all my books are steeped in mythology… I always try to find a way to put the women in the mythology in power… because traditionally, even in Greek mythology, [women have] powers taken away from them. So I always seek to do that… it’s kind of how I play on mythology.” To keep mythology fresh, she looks at how “it’s still relevant today because I don’t think society has changed very much unfortunately… [for example] looking at Apollo… I compare him to Harvey Weinstein, like he pursued women until they begged to be turned into a tree.” 

“Yeah, I write monsters,” Martineau said. “All of my books have a lot of inspiration from… video games and anime and really strange and mythical creatures.” Martineau comes up with her beings by “looking at like the world’s scariest creatures… [and] also before I got my degree in English, I started as an animal behaviorist and I wanted to study big cats…  if you read my series, the 10 legendary beasts are all felines of some sort… I pulled from that a lot, and then obviously like Pokémon.”

The writers turned to characterization next. Martineau described how “I read a …….

Source: https://www.comicsbeat.com/c2e2-21-fantasy-writers-panel/