Questions About Keith Baker's "Gates of Night" - Dreaming Dark Book 3 SPOILERS

Hellcow said:

OK, back!

I do apologize for the end of Gates of Night. As I said before, when I wrote it I fully believed that it was going to be followed by a second trilogy - so things were left hanging to be resolved there. All I can say is that it's not something I will do again - and it wasn't my intention to leave so many questions unanswered indefinitely. As it was, I was able to resolve some of the most egregious unanswered questions in The Son Of Khyber.

Click to expand...

So, we know what happened to Daine. Kind of.
[sblock] And what happened to Daine made me sad. It wasn't really Dained so we don't actually know what happened to him. Or to Xu after the battle. And there was no mention of Lei or Pierce! So especially with Daine's body being dead and shoved into a bag, where's his soul going to go now?[/sblock]
And while the thorn of breland series ended with more closure. There's still a lot more questions on what's going to happen to Thorn now. Is that in another series too? Also, still have no idea what happened to the other members of the party that weren't mentioned in the thorn of breland series.
If it covers even more in another series now it's just sounding like a marketing ploy. While I enjoy reading good books, if the books are good I will continue reading from the author. I don't feel like it's fair that I should spend money on books just because something wasn't explained. And I never really felt the connection with thorn as a character. It honestly wasn't as in depth as the Dreaming Dark Series was. Well, that's my perception anyways.

huskbcake said:

So, we know what happened to Daine. Kind of.

Click to expand...

Like I said, I wanted to sneak Daine and Jode into The Fading Dream, but it just didn't fit the actual story... likewise with Lei. The Son of Khyber was an opportunity to resolve some issues while remaining on track with the actual Thorn story.

huskbcake said:

If it covers even more in another series now it's just sounding like a marketing ploy.

Click to expand...

Which wasn't my intention. A key thing to bear in mind is that with tie-in/licensing series, you're juggling both the author's intent and the desires of the license holder. When I wrote The Dreaming Dark, it was my assumption that the characters would carry on in a second series; as I said, the story intentionally leaves questions unanswered because those would have formed the framework of the next trilogy. It was only after the series was complete that WotC decided not to pursue future stories with those characters, which left me feeling like an enormous jerk.

huskbcake said:

And while the thorn of breland series ended with more closure. There's still a lot more questions on what's going to happen to Thorn now.

Click to expand...

It's a similar situation. The original plan I worked out with WotC was that Thorn would be a five-book series, and I planned her character arc with that in mind. While I was writing Book Three, they decided to end the series there. I did the best I could to give it a solid ending, but it was rushed and there were things I simply couldn't resolve because the answers to the questions didn't lie on Khorvaire, let alone in the scope of Thorn's final mission.

I'm not trying to pass the buck here. Shifts in editorial direction are bound to happen in this sort of collaboration, and it is a danger of working with any sort of licensed property; at the end of the day, the author doesn't have complete control over the situation and needs to be ready for that. As a new writer, I didn't take that into account, and I made mistakes. It certainly wasn't an attempt to get you to buy more books; while I'd like to pursue both storylines, I don't know if WotC has any plans to produce Eberron fiction of any sort in the future. it was simply a combination of my own inexperience as a writer combined with the corporate complexities of writing tie-in fiction.

OK that makes sense, though I was kind of hoping that this quote wouldn't be there.

Hellcow said:

while I'd like to pursue both storylines, I don't know if WotC has any plans to produce Eberron fiction of any sort in the future.

Click to expand...

I did learn a lot about eberron, which was the original goal when I picked up the books way back when.
And despite my unhappiness towards the ending, which you have clearly explained so I can't be all that mad anymore, I did enjoy the dreaming dark series very much and would've gladly invested more into the series to continue reading it.

I felt with the thorn of breland series, which I also enjoyed, that it had too many words. This sounds ridiculous because it's a book, of course it had words. There was a lot more description in it then I thought there would be and it almost seemed overly fantastical. But you also described how it was supposed to be a 5 book series, so that could be part of it.

So I guess in ending I do want to thank you, I honestly didn't think I'd get a response when I first posted here. Were you ever considering to continue writing about them on your own? Like an unofficial transcript or something? Or does licensing prohibit that as well? Or any stories on the unexplored sections of eberron?

I would enjoy more Thorn books. As it is, I do a lot with the Dark lanterns in my stories (John Play especially) and I drop her name here and there to keep her "alive".



Since it seems WoTC is done with her.... what did you have in mind?