A Quick interview with Sovwrites

It’s time for the last of our Immersive Ink interviews.

For those who are unaware, Immersive Ink is a massive author Discord server, and I felt it was fitting to interview a few authors from the community. I’ve already interviewed the following 2:

Emrys Ambrosius, author of the Rise of the Infernal Paladin series, among others: Link

Liltwerp, author of The Dark Lord Left For cigarettes: Link

Which means, we’re on to our final interview, Sovwrites, author of Oathbreaker: A Dark Fantasy Web Serial.

Here’s how it works. I sent a series of questions to the author that I came up with myself, just because I wanted to know the answers. The authors have time to respond; it’s all done through email, and I don’t edit their response in the slightest.

Now, off to the finale!

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Starting only a little over a year ago, Sovwrites’ Oathbreaker serial already sits at almost three thousand pages. And more impressive than his hectic writing schedule, after close to 250 ratings, it sits at a total score of over 4.7 out of five stars on Royal Road.

Broken up into three volumes thus far, Oathbreaker is found within the Fantasy, Horror, and Romance genres.

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Author’s About Me:

Hi! I go by Sov online, and I mainly write fantasy and sci-fi fiction. I’m the author of Oathbreaker, which is my first web story. Thanks for checking out my work!

Link to Oathbreaker: Link

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1. What challenges have you faced balancing long-form storytelling with maintaining reader engagement over time?

This was definitely a learning process, and I think having spent a lot of time with serialized fiction prior helped immensely especially as I was starting out and still getting a feel for the story I wanted to tell. I knew I wanted a long narrative from the start, and I had plenty of examples of both the kind of story I wanted to tell and the way I wanted to tell it, from various media. Comic books manga, TV shows, books, web fiction — I mostly just started writing stuff I like.

The specific way I wanted to tell the story helped a lot with this too, because I knew that I wanted to introduce both a large world and complex character with a lot of history, none of which is shared with the reader up front. Slowly pulling the curtain back as I drip fed more information about both the setting and our protagonist, in addition to telling the present plot, helped a lot with stretching that content out. I rarely found that I didn’t have much to say, and it was fun revealing some tidbit or misdirection with the knowledge that I’d be adding even more layers of complication soon.

Basically, I wrote the story in such a way that I was keeping myself engaged week to week, and I think that helped keep readers engaged as well. I usually set short term goals for myself that don’t usually span more than a few chapters at a time, and writing to those moments and revelations keeps me engaged and on track. The hope is that it works for everyone else too.

2. How do you handle writing morally gray protagonists without alienating your audience?

I definitely *did* alienate some of my audience, but not always for the reasons I expected. One of my goals with Alken was to subvert expectations. He is presented as your classic morally gray dark fantasy warrior anti-hero, but even very early on I wanted to subvert that. His journey and motivations are very personal, and him being an assassin, a soldier, a slayer of demons and wicked men, those are things he is, but they are not necessarily the things important to him or his story.

I would often find my most critical comments and even lose readers when Alken refused to do the cruel or practical thing, when he failed, when he expressed vulnerability or doubt, when I presented him as someone who will occasionally eat dirt rather than always being the coolest or most capable person in a room. As a reader, I often enjoy when a protagonist struggles and goes through hell and back before they succeed, I even often enjoy it when they don’t succeed and then have to deal with the consequences of that.

It was both a learning curve and a surprise to me at times, because it definitely felt like a good portion of readers were more interested in the persona the protagonist wears — that of the cold, brutal executioner — even though one of the themes I try to drive in again and again is that this is a story about people who suffer from the very titles they’ve inherited.

I try to think of it as a good thing, because it means those same conflicts inside the narrative are probably doing what I want them to if they’re giving people strong opinions. The worst thing I can make a reader feel is nothing.

3. What part of Oathbreaker has created the strongest connection with your readers, and how did that affect you?

This is a tough one. I think everyone’s getting something different out of the story. Some people like the setting’s lore, some people like the character work, some like the high stakes high fantasy action scenes, some like the romance bits. I think the strongest point of connection I’ve found with my readers, especially those who’ve been following the story for a long while, is that they are invested in Alken’s journey the same as I am, and want to see who and what he becomes across the scope of all the battles he fights, whether they are literal battles against demons and wizards or more personal and interpersonal ones.

It’s been incredibly validating, especially since I’ve spent so much time with these characters by this point.

4. Catrin has a lot of layers to her: lover, spy, dhampir, but a common critique in reader reviews is that her motivations sometimes feel unclear or inconsistent. Have you adjusted your portrayal of Catrin based on specific reader confusion or pushback?

I would say no, I haven’t adjusted based on audience feedback, only my own goals for the narrative. Catrin is meant to seem suspicious and untrustworthy because she’s kind of meant to hone in on one of my themes for the story overall, which is that everyone in this world has to obscure their motives and nature or face harsh and often deeply personal consequences. I wanted a foil to my brooding knight, and having a character with morals and motives just as dubious while also being much more personable and high energy ended up being a fun dynamic to write.

Her motives being unclear and inconsistent were by design, because they often felt that way to our protagonist. He’s learned to trust no one and nothing, so being both suspicious of and perplexed by this chaotic element in his life just ended up being a natural element in the story. Catrin does not care about the motives of gods, angels, and kings, which gives her a unique perspective in a story full of characters defined by their ambitions and intrigues.

5. You’re sitting at a little over a thousand followers right now, that’s quite large. How has your relationship with your audience evolved as your story gained momentum?

The number of followers I gained in a bit over a year as a web fiction writer definitely came as a surprise. Obviously I hoped for a large readership, but I assumed early on that it would take much longer to get there, especially with a more niche story in the space.

I don’t interact with my audience at large all that much honestly, beyond posting regular updates and announcements in my authors notes. I think most people are content to quietly enjoy the story and I’m happy enough with that dynamic, though I definitely appreciate my regular commenters and do my best to respond to them and encourage that extra engagement.

I am stubborn about telling the story I want to tell the way I want to tell it, so I haven’t changed much in response to feedback, but when I get comments that certain things come off as clumsy or unclear I tend to take that feedback seriously. I want the story to be the best it can be, and for the most part everyone is experiencing a first draft — since it’s web fiction that I write and release weekly it’s not always going to be polished — so I’m happy to make changes I agree with, and I appreciate those who care enough to offer suggestions and ask questions.