Richard K. Lyon is probably best known as Andrew Offutt's sometime partner in sword-and-sorcery writing, most famously for their three Tiana books, but both he and Andy have written other works besides. It was my distinct pleasure when he contacted me in early 2005 with some Offut and Lyon rarities for Flashing Swords 2 and 4 and it has been an honor getting to know him better. Wondering what Richard has been working on lately, and what Andrew Offutt is doing these days? Find out below.

I haven’t seen anything from Andy Offutt lately. Is he still alive? Still writing?

Andy’s very much still alive but he did have a heart attack some years ago. That lead him to quit smoking. And it may be one reason he isn’t writing as much as he used to. The other thing is that he doesn’t need to generate as much income by writing as he once did. His children are out of college and doing well and he’s collecting social security.

How did you and Andrew come to write the Tiana stories?

Shortly before Andy became president of SFWA [Science Fiction Writers of America], I sold a story or two and joined it. This lead to an exchange of letters (no e-mail back then) in which Andy learned I’d written a novel which I couldn’t sell. He asked to see it. When I sent it, he sent back an extremely long letter, listing in great detail all the horribly unprofessional things I’d done in writing this novel. Only at the end of giving this possibly well-deserved beating did Andy say that in spite of all the above, it was a very promising story and would I like him to collaborate with him?

Since half of something is good deal more than all of nothing I said “yes” and we were off and running with the first Tiana novel; Demon in the Mirror was off to the races. For the next two Tiana novels (The Eyes of Sarsis and Web of the Spider) I did the rough draft with complete control of plot and substance of the story and Andy did the final with complete control of language and style.

Are there any other stories related to the Tiana cycle of adventures that you and Andrew Offutt wrote?

Yes, writing is not a tidy process. My collaboration with Andy produced a lot of not-quite-finished stuff and the three novels we did finish produced a number of scraps and leftovers which, just for fun, we made into short stories. Four of these (“Devil on my Stomach,” “The Hungry Apples,” “Inn of the White Cat,” and “Arachnis”) we donated to fan magazines. There were a bunch of other stories (“Day of Wrath,” “Portrait of an Assassin,” “The Iron Mercenary,” “Naked Before Mine Enemies,” “The Disciples of Kha-li,” and “The Star of Elbar”) that we never got around to sending to anybody.

When the collaboration ended, I’d finished a rough draft of to a prequel novel concerning the wizard Pyre. In Demon he was the villain but by the end of Web he becomes a hero. Andy never saw the incomplete Tiana novel but he did work with me on the Pyre novel. We published three novelettes from it, “Druin’s Heritage,” “Inn at the World’s End,” and “The Whispering Mirror.” The rest of the novel, however, just sat in my files in rough draft for a long time. Finally I decided to finish it as best I could. Andy was glad to have me do this and it’s now posted at Pulp and Dagger as "The Long Dark Road to Wizardry".

What are you writing now?

I just finished “The Black Knight’s Gift,” an S&S tale of vengeance and forgiveness. “Open Secrets” has been through several drafts and hopefully is approaching final form. The first draft of not yet titled vampire story is slowly creeping out of my word processor. It will be my second story concerning the romance between a Sunday school teacher and a vampire doctor. I sold the first of these stories to Dragons, Knights, and Angels. It should appear fairly soon.

Were there other tales planned that were never written?

Oh yes, I did a ten thousand-word outline for a S&S novel set in fith-century Ireland, The Banshee, and I planned a fourth Tiana novel and wrote about half of the rough draft. Writing isn’t a tidy process and having leftovers is part of it.

In addition to the three Tiana sword-and-sorcery novels, did you and Andy ever work on other novels? Did you ever try your hand at any sword-and-planet?

Yes, I wrote a rough draft of a swords-and-planets novel, Rails Across the Galaxy. The first section, about twenty-five percent, was a “First Contact” story. Andy proposed that we make this first part of the story into a novelette for Analog. Somehow we lost control of the writing process. The twenty-five percent became a full-length novel which we were able to sell to Analog as a three-part serial. The wonderful part of this was Kelly Freas did a marvelous cover for the first installment and some really neat interiors. That did, however, leave behind the other seventy-five percent which is still sitting in my files.

Sword-and-sorcery virtually disappeared for a while there–what do you think happened?

Well, of course, I don’t know. Popular taste, like the stock market, goes through cycles. In both cases there are people who are glad to explain why past events happened the way they did. Since these explanations don’t allow predicting the future with any confidence I regard them with suspicion.

Who are your favorite fantasy writers, and what do you like about them?

The writers I most enjoy right now are Stephen King, Dean Koontz, and George R. R. Martin. They have the slightly unfair advantage that many of their extremely entertaining stories are available as audiobooks. Like many people my wife and I spend a lot of time in the car and we find listening to audiobooks together to be very enjoyable.

That said, I have to admit that my favorite fantasy writers are not the people I enjoy reading now. They are writers that I’ve read over the years and whose stories I remember reading with extreme pleasure: Doc Smith, Robert Heinlein, Jack Williamson, Edmond Hamilton, Robert E. Howard, A. E. van Vogt, and Gardner Fox. Sometimes I can recapture the old joy, especially with Heinlein and Howard, sometimes not.

I’ve been getting more and more questions from people about how to write sword-and-sorcery tales. Do you have any tips for aspiring writers?

First off, join a writers' workshop. Joining Critters doesn’t cost any money. There is a cost in time and it’s time well spent. One gets thoughtful advice on one’s stories from the other members of the workshop and one pays for that advice by reading their stories and writing thoughtful advice. There’s a benefit to both.

Secondly, I’d suggest critting one’s favorite writers. Go beyond reading for enjoyment to studying how they made their stories work.

What is different about writing sword-and-sorcery than writing other genres, even other kinds of fantasy?

Well, of course, I don’t really know but I can pontificate. Maybe the important thing is that doing really fine stories in different genres requires different world views. A Sherlock Holmes-style detective story requires believing in a sensible rational universe. So does hard science fiction, which is why the science-fiction detective story works. The world view is a box and every genre involves a set of elements that will only fit in a certain kind of box.

In a sword-and-sorcery story the characters sometimes fight each other and sometimes battle magic. The former shows a complete failure of reason to govern human relations while the latter shows the world to be controlled by dark irrational forces. Robert E. Howard’s stories were set in a very dark world and I suspect that’s why they were so successful.