Most of the people I know and love don’t read fantasy. Some even won’t read it, the way I won’t eat a snail. Some will only read it if you sneak it into something else and mash it up so it’s unrecognizable, the way I’ll eat mushrooms. That’s alright. The hard part is people who might read fantasy but think that it is only for kids, or only an escape, or a waste of otherwise reasonable skill. I run into that a lot at the bookstore I volunteer for.

So, for once and for all, I’m setting down the reasons that I love fantasy.

1. Dragons

But not actual dragons. Reason #1 is actually this quote:

Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us dragons are real, but because they tell us dragons can be beaten.

Neil Gaiman

At their very core, most fantasy stories aren’t about the magic or the amazingly talented hero or the strange world and different culture. They’re about a very scary goal and how, in the end, it is faced down. I can’t say it any better than Neil Gaiman!

2. Mirror, Mirror

Fantasy is an escape. But for me as a writer, it’s an escape into a world with better perspective. Fantasy, for all its magic and metaphor, can be so much more direct when dealing with character struggles. Real life is messy and unclear, and a million things are going on at once. Synthesizing a problem into fairy tale form can reveal new solutions and old assumptions.

For example: several years ago, when I was at a very low point, I wrote a series of stories about an adorably kind king and some resourceful knights facing religious upheaval caused by a demon destroying most holy relics she came across. My favorite character? The demon. By writing her, I was able to identify and name a lot of the frustration I was feeling at the time. And if instead of fantasy I had written, say, an autobiographical tell-all, I wouldn’t have had that clarity, nor the resolution. All the real life details and squabbles and habits would have gotten in the way.

3. Snow White, Ruby Red

The world around us is colorful and wonderful, but people get suspicious if you rhapsodize about that for too long. 🙂 In fantasy, that color is writ large. In a lot of modern fantasy that means that the worlds are horribly violent and cruel, as we as a society grapple with huge, scary issues like racism and prejudice and an apparently endless fascination with Game of Thrones. (Kidding, but the trend in adult lit these days does seem to be for dark and dramatic fantasy.) I prefer to go toward the other end of the spectrum. I try to create worlds that are bright and fun and welcoming. A safe haven from which readers can enjoy an adventure, or, if they’re so inclined, maybe reflect on their own lives or think about impossible goals.

Concluding Thought

Each of my three reasons is important to me, but I’m still working on my skill at weaving them into my stories. And truthfully, they’re always subtext — secondary to the actual narrative, of course. Each story has to be, first and foremost, a good story. The other fun uses of fantasy come afterward! 🙂