Release The Dragons! The American Obsession With Fantasy Fiction Proves Profitable For Indie Authors, Virginia Chandler And Tony Chandler
When Tony and Virginia Chandler decided to release their 15 year-old novel, The Last Dragon of the North, to indie publisher, Double Dragon, they hadn't given a thought to strategic marketing. However, sometimes things just go right. In the past 3 years, America has had a love affair with all things fantasy and it isn't going to stop in 2012, coincidentally, the year of the Dragon.
- Atlanta, GA (1888PressRelease) January 24, 2012 - Sometimes we carefully plan the release of creative work around other similar events hoping for the best. And, there are other times that we make no strategic effort and the proverbial "planets" just align. In the case of Tony Chandler and Virginia Chandler, a brother-sister team of indie authors from Georgia, the latter appears to be happening. After over ten years of lingering as a nothing more than a computer file, The Last Dragon of the North, their co-written e-book, was finally released in November of 2011 by indie publisher Double Dragon. Little did the authors realize that, at the same time, America's love-affair with all things fantasy had reached an all-time high.
According to speculation, this love-affair began unexpectedly after the successful release of Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland in 2010. Ever since both movie and television producers have been clamoring to satisfy the American audience's seemingly insatiable thirst for all-things fantasy; including, wizards, knights, magic and, of course, dragons. The genre seems to be coming from everywhere. HBO has "Game of Thrones." ABC has "Once Upon a Time." And, NBC has "Grimm."
And, fortunately for the Chandlers, the public's interest isn't limited to just visual media. The same phenomenon is happening with books. Consider the unending success of the J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, Stephanie Meyer's Twilight, and Christopher Paolini's Inheritance Series Whether the subject matter is witches, vampires, or dragons, Americans can't seem to get enough.
"Fantasy has always been around through folklore, mythology and fairytales. It's inherently creative. It asks the question: What would happen if? And, then it answers it," notes Tony Chandler, who began his writing career in the Science Fiction genre.
And that is exactly the question that Virginia and Tony asked when they first created, The Last Dragon of the North back in the 1993. As the story goes, one evening, they were watching Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park (1993) and, almost simultaneously, contemplated, "What if the dinosaurs were dragons?" Not magical talking dragons. Not vindictive, humanized beasts. No. What if these dragons were real creatures, cold-blooded predators like the T-Rex or that velociraptor of Jurassic Park?
"We didn't want to create a fluffy dragon that turns good or an evil dragon that hunts our hero. It's not even a dragon that puts damsels in towers. We did not want a fairy tale. We wanted our dragons to be real with the temperament of a great white shark," adds Virginia Chandler, a former English teacher and Arthurian scholar.
And that is what you'll get with The Last Dragon of the North. It is set in the gritty darkness of the 9th century - a time when dragons were hunted-beasts and heroes were made of steel. It recounts the story of a man's personal journey to find and kill the last dragon on earth. With careful attention to historical detail, the Chandler's set their epic novel in a world that one might find in classic tales like Beowulf or Sigurd. But, unlike these stories of old, the The Last Dragon of the North moves fast with the thrills of any modern fantasy big-screen adventure.
With the continued growth in the popularity of fantasy entertainment, the Chandlers are optimistic about the success of their book. They have already garnered positive attention from multiple New York Times Best Selling authors; including, Piers Anthony who called the book, "One rousing dragon-fighting story..."
"Our timing was an accident but it's been amazing. And, every time I turn around another company seems to be getting on-board. Shortly after we released our book, Elder Scrolls "Skyrim" which is, like our book, all about Dragon hunting," adds Virginia Chandler.
Even Hasbro's subsidiary, Wizards of the Coast, has decided to update and re-release the epic game "Dungeons and Dragons" after a very long hiatus of poor sales. And, Hollywood is set to release almost 50 fantasy genre films in 2012; including, New Line Cinema's The Hobbit and Universal's Snow White and the Huntsman. With all this hype seeping into every level of entertainment, it appears that dragons, wizards and epic sword play will continue to seize the imaginations of Americans at least into 2012; ironically, itself, the Chinese year of the dragon.
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