Rimer's God of Weather and Catastrophe

I had a comment a while back that I found a bit strange; that Kayoss, the Rimarian god of catastrophe, was not 'evil enough.' I guess if you've never read AOH, this might be an easy mistaken assumption to assume. Kayoss isn't evil. In fact, I challenge anyone to point out a truly evil character in my entire series. Yes, it has some world class jerks and some guys who should probably go to hell for their crimes if there is such place as that (such as some drakoon characters I have) but even these guys aren't really evil. In fact, I don't believe in evil-ness in anyone. You might point out a guy like Hitler and Stalin and say that they were evil, but they weren't, not really, because from their point of view, what they were doing was absolutely right. It's impossible to say that their actions were not evil because they were, but the men themselves, were they evil? No. Just misguided.

Kayoss is neither misguided or evil. Sure, he's god of catastrophe so as a hobby he sometimes causes things like earthquakes and tsunamis just because he can but most of the time, the dude is really responsible about his powers. The fact is, Kayoss was not born being a 'god of catastrophe.' He was born a normal falcolf with an ordinary upbringing. Later, he became a military leader and a very good, responsible one. He's got prejudices against certain things and he can be fairly racist but that's rather normal for anyone, because everyone is usually a little racist against something (doesn't matter if it's the same species or not!)

Kayoss is not evil. He dislikes humans because we are interlopers on his planet and if he could, he would reasonably annihilate us to protect it. His first job is protecting Rimer, his home - and he will do anything to do that. The only reason he does not smite the humans off the face of his world is because he made a deal with his daughter and with the other immortals (whose support he needs and since they were largely against murdering all the humans, he must grudgingly cede to what they want - for now. He does not want a mutiny but he has made sure to make clauses in that deal which make him able to act.) What Kayoss really is, more than a controller of the weather (and if you think about it, that job would require quite a responsible and dedicated person) is a guardian of his planet, the most powerful one that it has. He's a hero and an antihero. He's the actual main character of my series, as he is the only character to make an appearance (somehow, even just subtly) in every book.

The character who is closest to being evil is the one who is revered the most.

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AOH - What It Is To Me

When people release a book, they always want to critisize it and critique it. That's fine. People are going to do that whether I like it or not. My own phobia against knowing people have read my work (as ghastly as the pessimist in me thinks it is) keeps me from reading these reviews. So what is AOH from my perspective?

AOH is a good read. Not the best, but it's good. To me it's more of a kid's book than anything; a young adult read. It isn't serious and the writing isn't serious. I wrote it when I was fifteen and spent two years updating the writing style, not to mention five years actually editing the damn thing. It's the book that me and all my editors are sick to tears of, because we've been working on it for too long. Our opinions hardly matter anymore - we've worked too long on it. I'm not working on it anymore. If I ever do again, I will be surprised. The only thing that can get me to is full publication - which is in my plans mind you, just not anytime soon.

As short as AOH is, a lot of stuff is just breezed over. I regret this and the writer in me twitches terribly, but that's just how AOH is. It's streamlined. Future books will be much better written. As my editor Alyssa Windsor said "AOH is where you (me) learned to write plot. Emperor's Blood is where you learned to write story." I did consider completely rewriting AOH, but in the end I decided not to. AOH is the beginning of a story about the world of Rimer, with the characters merely being catalysts. In the future, I want people to read its sequel Born of Fire, realize that there is a book before it and seek out AOH just to find out what happened then. Later books are better written, better plotted and better devised than AOH.

I will say it again - I wrote AOH when I was a kid. I grew up with it and it will always be just that - the book I wrote when I was a kid. A good book but not a great one. That's how I feel about it.