Building Fantastical Worlds with J.V. Hilliard

We dive into the epic world of fantasy with bestselling author J.V. Hilliard! From Dungeons & Dragons roots to crafting the immersive Warminster series, J.V. shares his journey from defense lobbyist to full-time storyteller. They talk world-building, gaming, Star Wars, and what it takes to create a fantasy saga that keeps readers hooked. Plus, hear about his upcoming AR/VR video game adaptation and what’s next in his literary universe! You can find his content on his website jvhilliard.com.

Transcript

Intro Song

Rob Valincius: And we are live, uh, barring the technical issues that, uh, is a, is hit or miss on, you know, when you're doing a podcast, uh, virtually, uh, this is the drink o'clock podcast. I'm your host, Rob Valincius. I have the pleasure of having with me a fantastic author, Rob Valincius, By the name of J. V. Hilliard.

Welcome to the show, brother.

J.V. Hilliard: Thank you, sir, for having me. I appreciate that. And sorry about my bad technical karma. Uh, it's just, it follows me everywhere.

Rob Valincius: You know what, dude? It happens, and, um, I've almost built it into my mind, um, at this point. So, uh, it's, it's, seriously, it's either hit or miss. It's either a flawless thing, which when it happens, I'm I'm like, Oh my God, this is great. But in most cases, there's always something. And sometimes it's on my end.

Like for some reason, I couldn't share the link with you because it would not pull from Squadcast, which is weird. It never does that ever. Normally, I just pull the link, send it over. It just would not load. So I had to pull the link from Podmatch, which also it's like, I'm shocked that it was still there and working perfectly there.

But we made it through, man.

J.V. Hilliard: We're here. We're here. And now we're ready to go rock and rolling.

Rob Valincius: Yeah, I don't know if you're drinking. Um, I,

J.V. Hilliard: I have some, uh, lemon lime sparkling water this evening because I have several of these tonight and, uh, it would probably lead to poor consequences if I, uh, partook in part had partaken in a way that you would have wanted me to. So I apologize for that.

Rob Valincius: No, no, no, no. It's not a requirement on the show. I actually haven't been drinking in a while. Um, normally I don't drink during the week. Um, we just decided to say, Hey, fuck it. We're going to have some drinks today, which is the nice thing, right? Instead of drinking, you know, a couple every day, you could just say, now I'm not going to drink, and then when you decide you want to drink, it's cool.

You know, whatever. Well, try to be healthier. I'm going to be 40 in a couple of years. So,

J.V. Hilliard: you go. Closing in, closing in my brother.

Rob Valincius: It's all downhill. It's all downhill. The moment you hit 30, it's all downhill, dude.

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. I mean you get to 35 and all of a sudden you're like, Hmm, you know, you're either at the top of the hill or you're just kind of cresting it and you're like, Oh, and it's just going to go down from there. Trust me. I've been there, done that.

Rob Valincius: Yeah, I'm, uh, I'll be 39 in July. So then I have the one year left of the 30s. And, um I'm not looking forward to it, man. But you know what? What are you gonna do? Time is the enemy. Yeah, there's nothing you can do

J.V. Hilliard: It is,

Rob Valincius: just moves. Um, Now, now, you have, uh, two series, right? So you have the Warmister series, you have the Tide, uh, Time and Tide series.

Um, I saw that for the Warminster series, you have four books. Starts with The Last Keeper, uh, Vorden's Lair, um, The Trillius Gambit, and Echoes of Ghostwood, and then for Time and Tide, you have The Element of Time. Now, um, Time and Tide, I saw that you don't have any other, um, books for that. Is that a one hitter, or do you have a series planned for

J.V. Hilliard: it's a, it's a young adult three part series and part one is the next it's, it's not out yet, but it's coming out by the end of the year. And I also have a couple of standalone novels for my first series, the warmest or saga. That are going to be based on some of the more popular characters in them, and then that'll tie into a 2026 launch of the next series.

So they're all based in the same world. So, you know, like Middle Earth equals token and Westeros. Equals George Martin and Game of Thrones. Well, I have the realm of Warminster. So all of my books are based within the realm there. And, um, so whether or not you're following one timeline and one set of characters, or you're reading, you know, the element of time, which is a different timeline and a different set of characters, it's all based in the same world so that once you learn it, you kind of get it.

Rob Valincius: That's cool. I It's funny, um, because, uh, I The town I work in is Warminster. It's in Pennsylvania,

J.V. Hilliard: I'm in Pittsburgh. So you must be outside of Philly, huh? Yeah, yeah,

Rob Valincius: Yeah, right outside Philly, man.

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. I got you. I got you. Not far from here.

Rob Valincius: that's funny, I saw it, I'm like, I'm like, ah, I work at fuckin Warminster, this'll be a fun convo.

J.V. Hilliard: I took the name because it's a pretty badass name. I thought it was a pretty cool thing for sort of a medieval, uh, you know, city. It had that sort of like British kind of spin to it. And then one day I was in Philly and I saw that Warminster actually existed and I was like, Oh, that's pretty cool.

Rob Valincius: that, so you pulled it right from where I work, baby, let's go,

J.V. Hilliard: It was accidental or maybe serendipitous. I don't know which one it would be, but it's, it's stock and people like it. So I'll leave it

Rob Valincius: The world is circular, right? Everything fuckin comes back to ground zero, that's how I look at it.

J.V. Hilliard: Philadelphia is definitely ground zero.

Rob Valincius: Um, look, talk to me a little bit about growing up, man. What, uh, you know, what was, what was it like growing up and what made you want to be an author? Because I know everyone grows up thinking, you know what, I'm going to be an author.

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. Well, you know, for me it was, it was a little, little different. I, uh, I grew up, uh, with my uncle as a, as my second dad and he was a Marine that was, was paralyzed in combat. And so my mom. Yeah. My mom was a, uh, his nurse. Uh, and it was like Willy Wonka, the original Willy Wonka. It's like we lived with my brother and I, my mom with my uncle and my grandmother and grandfather.

So it was like all of these relatives, one of which, you know, was disabled. And my mom was kind of like the nurse for everybody. So like my brother and I would go to school and things like that. But I say that. Because he was very limited in what he could do as a quadriplegic, and some of the things he could do were things like writing, and he was able to play Dungeons and Dragons with us, and anything that would involve some level of escapism.

So for him, you know, his level of escapism was writing horror novels and pulp fiction that would be You know, cast into magazines of the day, you know, and I grew up idolizing that. So of course, he was a writer. I wanted to be one too. Um, and, um, I got away from that, you know, in high school and college. And it turned out that I spent a bunch of time in DC as a defense lobbyist prior to COVID.

And, um, you know, always wanted to get back to it, uh, as a, you know, a deep down, you know, blood in a stone nerd, you know, I knew I'd come back to it eventually. Um, you know, so I always wanted to, I guess I was emulating him and idolizing him in a way. And for me. You know, being able to, you know, publish that first novel and now the series and things like that's a way for me to, to honor, you know, his, uh, what he, what he meant to me, uh, while also, you know, taking a little bit of a digression from his, he wrote a lot of short stories and a lot of weird, almost Cthulhu like stuff.

You know, I'm on the other side. I'm much more like Tolkien ish and traditional classical fantasy. But I take his that little gothic, that little dark stuff that he had and I spin it into mind to give it its own little flavor. So that's where I wanted. That's where I came from and where I wanted to be an author.

And I came back to it when Kobe provided the opportunity for me to actually write something. Yeah,

Rob Valincius: COVID was a weird time, man. I feel like, um, it opened a lot of opportunities for people. Um, it also made you kind of like really realize. How much like did I've been working since I was 15 and um, you know, I work in an office So I had an opportunity to work from home for like three and a half months and Uh, dude, it was, it was a lot of fun to be able to spend time with my family, my, my fiance, my dogs, and just, you know, I didn't have to fight traffic.

I drive 40 minutes to work every day, you know, so, you know, I didn't have to fight traffic. So the stress level was just gone. You know, and I got to spend a lot of time and, um, yeah, I value, I mean, I know it was a pandemic and there was a lot of shit happening, but I valued those three months. It was just, it was a unique period for us.

And like, you know, we got to play, like we play the switch and we'll, we'll play, you know, Mario party and Mario card. And, you know, we got to just like game out and, and hang out. And it was, um, it was a unique time in this country, honestly.

J.V. Hilliard: I think that there was a silver lining. A lot of people had a chance to do the thing that they've never had a chance to do. And I'm one of them, right? There's an entire Block of COVID authors. And if you ask people during the time previous to COVID, Hey, Joe's writing a book, what is he writing a book about?

They would have never said fantasy adventure. No one knew me as the nerd that I truly am. You know, I'm a defense lobbyist. So, you know, this hardcore thick skinned, blah, blah, blah, you know, you know, dealing with Congress, dealing with the Pentagon. And here I am writing this, these novels that are true escapism at their core and they're made for entertainment, right?

And I had a chance to, you know, and for me, my downtime was more like a year, like DC shut down. The politics of it was that no matter what you were not coming back the way you did. And so a lot of my job became virtual. Anyway, I was able to do some of it through zoom and at the time, Skype and other, you know, uh, you know, yeah, exactly.

Yeah. Like, you know, all that stuff, like those kinds of things, uh, you know, were available to us. But my job was networking with people. My job was whining and dining. My job was being on the Hill and meeting with people and convincing them. And that was all dead. You know, I couldn't do any of that. Uh, and it's changed dramatically since then.

And just the way that you had access to legislators then just doesn't exist. And so for me, this was something I got a chance, like you said, recalibrate, do something that was on my bucket list. And I thought, Hey, you know, I'm gonna write this one book and it's gonna be one and done and I'm gonna be over with and then, you know, my friend got ahold of it and she said, Hey, you know, this is really good.

I'm gonna send you over to development editor and he read it and edited it for me and said, you know what? This is publishable. Let me send you onto a publisher. Uh, and then one book became four books now, two series and a bunch of other things that are coming forthcoming from that. So like a graphic novel series and maybe a video game.

I mean, it's like, it's, it's become a second career. It's the back nine for me, speaking of getting old, you know, you're looking down the barrel of that and I don't want to go back doing what I was doing. This is a lot of fun. It's the, the, the stress, like you said, is just off of you. And if there was a silver lining in a very horrible time, it might be this.

Rob Valincius: Yeah, I mean, um, So, so, um, Why fantasy novels? You know, um, I'll tell you this, I'm an avid reader, and I don't get to read. I do a lot of audiobooks. I talk about this a lot on my podcast, but, um, because of that drive, you know, it's either podcasts or audiobooks, and it depends on my mood. So if I'm in an angry mood where I can't visualize things, it's podcast because I don't need to pay, pay a whole lot of attention, you know, um, but if I'm in, um, an inspired mood or I'm, I'm like very focused, I will do.

Novels and I lean towards fantasy and I love sci fi That's my thing sci fi is really my first love obviously, you know Star Wars like that's I'm a Star Wars nerd That's what I grew up on But I love fantasy too. So Why did you start with fantasy? You know, did you did you think about other genres or is that what you really honed in on originally?

J.V. Hilliard: It's something I've always wanted to do. I like you, I'm a Star Wars and a Star Trek. And an Indiana Jones and a, uh, Lord of the Rings and a Game of Thrones and a Shannara and you just go through and that's what I read. And part of it, I think is because I started in my geekdom at a young age, you know, like 10 years old, I was into it and I loved it and it was creative and it was different.

Um, and I had a chance to immerse myself in it as a writer and I understood the genre very well. Like I've played Dungeons and Dragons my entire life. Um, you know, I've gone and seen. Every movie you can see, uh, that's related to that. I've read all of the major series, uh, that are part of it, you know, and so I've, I've really enjoyed that.

Um, but I've always, there's part of me that also wants to write a horror novel. I've got a great idea for like a vampire novel that I didn't want to screw up. Until I became a good enough writer that I could write that. So I kind of put that aside for now. Uh, and you know, it's really started hammering away and, you know, growing my authorship within, you know, fantasy, um, and sci fi realms.

And so a little bit of dystopian stuff in there too, but like for the most part. It's always been, I've always been attracted to it. It's always come natural to me. Uh, I get it. I think I understand what my readership is looking for, uh, in there. And you're right. I mean, a lot of people these days do exactly what you do.

Audiobooks is the fastest growing part of our market, and it's because people are in different stages of their lives. They've got kids, they've got commutes, they're on a train, they're doing something, and they don't have time and they want a distraction. And so for us, I've made sure that every one of my books are in E format and audio book format so that people can download them and enjoy them while they're in the car, in the doing laundry at the kids soccer game, whatever it is that they want to do.

But that's really why I got into it. It was just something that has always appealed to me. I've loved the genre. Um, I might migrate over and do a sci fi thing one day. I may do something in horror one day, but I'm I'm really You know, set in stone when it comes to fantasy. It's just, it feels very comfortable to me.

Rob Valincius: What, um, so, so are you, do you like gaming at all?

J.V. Hilliard: Oh yeah. I've, I've been a gamer and a role playing gamer, you know? So I, I I'll do the video stuff and I haven't done as much video stuff in the last 10 years as I used to. I used to do it every day. Uh, and then, you know, I would say the, the, uh, RPG stuff I've been playing since I was 10, you know, so 30 plus years of gaming, uh, in, in a variety of different ways.

And you find a lot of inspiration from that. You see what people like and don't like. You get a sense of timing for things. You get a sense for the final boss. Um, you know, the big bad evil guy and what you have to defeat, you get a sense of, of irony and pacing that comes from gaming that you, and it, you know, and a lot of it, if you're playing a role playing game, it's all, you know, it's all, you know, your audio, right?

You're literally telling a story as opposed to writing a story. So you tell it in a different way. Or if you're playing a video game, it's very visual and you get sound effects around you and stuff like that, that immerse you into it. You have to create that atmosphere when you write. And so I think as I became a better storyteller as a dungeon master, or I became a better gamer, whether it was role playing games or video games, it allowed me to feel that sense of pace and that feel that sense of direction.

And, you know, in my realm, that really, really helps. Uh, when you're trying to get something published, they want to know that you understand inflection of stories and where those, those points are, um, you know, to hit stuff home. And I think it helps you with timing.

Rob Valincius: I am entrenched in Baldur's Gate 3.

J.V. Hilliard: there you go.

Rob Valincius: and it's, I haven't, I'm an RPG, RPG guy, I've always been an RPG guy. Uh, up until, well, that's not necessarily true. So I started, I was really heavily put into sports. My dad was like big into Madden and stuff, so it got me into it. But I've been playing games since I was three. I would beat my dad's drunken buddies at Tech Mobile on Nintendo when I was five.

J.V. Hilliard: Blades of steel, man. Blades of steel. Oh,

Rob Valincius: NBA jam.

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah.

Rob Valincius: My, my dad's buddies would be at, over the house would be, he'd be like three or four deep. They'd all be drinking beers and I would whoop their ass and they would get mad.

And my dad has physically had to like tell him, if you don't like chill, I'm gonna beat the shit outta you because you're losing to a 5-year-old. Um. But, but dude, just, there's nothing like, like roleplaying games that are built, I love the story, right, um, the gameplay doesn't have to be perfect, um, and uh, recently got into Baldur's Gate 3, I kind of um, it's been out for I think two years now, and um, I put it off for the longest time because I don't, like turn based combat's a little weird for me, like, I'm indifferent to it, I don't hate it, I don't love it, it's just there, um,

J.V. Hilliard: It's the Dungeons and Dragons thing. It's like that too. It's like rolling for initiative. Right. So you have to, everybody has to take their turns. I get it.

Rob Valincius: yeah, and after you play it, you get it.

But the story, have you played it?

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. I've played, you know, going back, starting with Diablo and all those, those games, that's where I got immersed in that. But the Baldur's Gate three is the latest and greatest, right?

Rob Valincius: Dude, the story for Baldur's Gate is just, it is entrenching. Like you just get so Uh, like, and I'm mad because today I was playing it, and uh, and it's funny because it's a, it's a, it's a, uh, that's how roleplaying games are, but I'm playing through, I do this, this difficult boss fight. I get through the boss fight, I get out of it, I save it, and I'm like, alright.

I'm towards the, there's three acts in Boulder Skate, and um, I'm at the end of act two. So I'm like, alright, let me look up a checklist, let me make sure I didn't miss anything. Because, you know, once you skip ahead, and get into, like, there's, there's points in the game that once you go past, you can't go back.

And I'm like, alright, I don't wanna miss anything. And you can miss companions, you can miss whole quest lines. And I realized, I'd missed an entire zone, where I would've missed two companions, a whole bunch of fucking quests. I'm like, DAMMIT! So now I know that I have to go back to that boss fight at some point, which was a pain in the ass.

Um, but the, the story is just, it's so good. Um, I like to play, I, I guess in, in D& D world, I like to kind of play chaotic good. Like I like to play that line of, all right, I'm not quite good. I'm not quite bad. The decisions I make are really for myself and where I see. This going is kind of how I play and I played D& D a couple times Hasn't panned out what's because yet to get a good D& D group.

You have to have people that are gonna play Seriously, you're gonna have to have people that play for a long time, you know for at least the campaign so but for me Like just, I, I play it probably every week. Weekends in the morning are like my game playing time. I'll play for like four hours straight.

And you just get lost and it's, there's just something that, it releases your stress. You just get lost in this world that's just, and that's the beauty of fantasy, right? You can just get lost in a world that obviously doesn't exist, but in your mind really does

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah, I think that that's the value of escapism. That's why people like this stuff. And Baldur's Gate goes back to an original Forgotten Realms module. You know, the concept of it comes from that. It's a D& D game at its role playing game core, right? And what you've described in terms of escapism is exactly why I still play Sunday nights, six to 10.

I wish I could play more, but you know, it's exactly right. It's almost like a reset button. It's the very, very end of the week. You know, all your familial tasks are put aside. People are going to bed. Kids are going to bed. You know, there's nothing going on for 6 and 10 unless there's a football game on and then we'll skip it.

Rob Valincius: yeah,

J.V. Hilliard: game on, but for the most part, you know, that's kind of like the, you know, the, you know, the value that it has. It clears, you know, it clears your mind. You know, it opens up. You know, your creative juices and then, you know, you end up, you know, going to bed and you start your week and you're craving that Sunday night game again or something like that.

So while you're playing Sunday or weekend mornings, I'm playing the very end of the weekend. Uh, but you know, it's, you know, it's after dinner and people are getting together and it's just, it's, it's just enough time as an adult to escape. But leave you wanting for more. I would love to play for longer.

I'd like, and we, during holidays and stuff like that, we'll play back to back sessions and things like that, but you're right. And for folks like you that like the game and have never been able to do it nowadays, being able to find players online and doing it, what we do, I mean, we used to play always together, always in the same place.

And if you were out of the city, you couldn't play, but zoom and Skype and all these other, now these tools that, you know, Dungeons and Dragons slash. You know, any of the Hasbro stuff, any of those companies have put together that you can now play online. There's not, I mean, even here, you could see a map.

Like if we were playing, you could see a map online. You can enroll online, all these things that, you know, you weren't able to do five years ago, you can now do, and the game has been repopularized. Through COVID, you know, and there's a lot of people have tried it for the first time and it's become even more popular because actors and actresses are doing it too.

And they're, they're adding something to it. So for, you know, as you know, as his popularity has regrown and it's shed, it's like nerdy kind of history. It's still there. You know, people were all geeks play it, but ultimately in the end, they've made it cool, you know, and, um, You know, I, I agree with you. It's just a lot of fun and it gets you that chance to just kind of step away from your life and no matter what struggle you're going through at that time, the day before, the day after, you know, you've got that time to kind of disappear into your world and then, you know, enjoy it without, uh, the stress of everything else around you.

Rob Valincius: And rolling the dice, like even in Baldur's Gate, man. I mean, you know, depending on what character you're playing. It's a roll of the dice. You know, you never know what you're going to get. You know, you roll a one and get a critical one. You're fucked. You know, so, uh, you roll a 20 and it's a crit 20. Then, you know, it's great.

But you don't roll either of those all the time. So, um, I think it's, it's cool how, um, It's a, uh, Larian, I think, games, how they, how they did it, and I wish, um, you know, and we're gonna, we're gonna get more into, to books, uh, but I wish more studios that create content would do what they did, because they came out and said, hey, we're not going to chart, we're not doing any, um, our game is being released as a full game, there's no add on content, there's no micro transactions, you're getting a full game, And enjoy it.

And I, I, I want studios to go back to that because it's, it's like, you know, you're, you're paying 70, you know, they're talking Grand Theft Auto, the new one, six is going to be 100, you know, and it's, and it's caked with micro transactions and all this other shit. And it's just a way for them to rake in as much money as possible.

I mean, this company still made a billion dollars. Because the game was a good game. Like, that's all you need to do, is go back to great storytelling, get people that, that write well, right? Someone like you, that's a fantasy writer. Get someone to come in that writes well, make a great, make great content, and everything else will follow.

But if you're just trying to do a money grab, yeah, you can do the same thing like Madden and Call of Duty does every year, where they create the same fucking game in a different atmosphere or whatever, but it's the same thing. Every time, there's no innovations, there's nothing new to it. Um, I've just really enjoyed, like, it brings me back to the days of, um, like, my all time favorite role playing game is Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 1. Um, I'll never forget playing it, I went in a GameStop, I was a kid, this guy's like, I said to him, I'm like, look, I'm tired of playing sports games, I need something new. And he's like, listen, this is for the original Xbox. I was like, Star Wars? I don't really like Star Wars. This is, I was like, how old was I?

I was maybe 13? 14? And he's like, listen, if you don't like this game, Come back, I'll buy it off you. I already own a copy of it. I'll buy it off of you. Like myself. That's how confident that this guy was. Uh, turns out, by the way, I ended up working for that GameStop.

J.V. Hilliard: Oh, that's cool.

Rob Valincius: and that guy, I ended up being that guy's boss at some point, by the way.

Because I, I, it got, like, that game, like, just took me to a different trajectory. Like, I was, I had just graduated high school, um, So maybe I was a little bit older. Maybe I was, I was 17, I think, or 18. I just graduated high school. Um, I would get home. Uh, I worked at CVS at the time I'd get home from CVS. I'd play Star Wars, Knights of the Republic for eight, nine, 10 hours.

Go to bed, go to work. Come home play like I had no responsibility at all. That was my thing and I did it first like three weeks That game like I think Created the nerd like I was always a nerd that game like projected me It just projected me into a whole new nerdism. You know what I mean? Like Do you have anything that happened to you like that?

Like it like something that just kind of like propelled you into just embracing your nerdiness

J.V. Hilliard: so for me it happened a little earlier. So I, my, uh, fourth grade English teacher, uh, went out on a medical sabbatical and this, you know, happened maybe mid year, right around, um, Uh, you know, the, you know, the semester break and, um, my substitute teacher somehow, some way got permission from, uh, the principal to finish the semester by reading us the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.

And, uh, you know, Mr. McKinley, lovely. He was a weird dude, but man, it just hit a home run. And that, that Christmas I asked my uncle, I was like, look, I, I, I want to play Dungeons and Dragons. I want to. I want to be part of this, right? You know, I'm 10 years old or whatever it was, you know? And so I got my first Dungeons and Dragons box set.

And I got my first copy of The Hobbit, you know, so I was reading that playing D& D and that just kind of opened it all up. Now you couple that with some of those video games that were available and you go to the old arcade stuff and you play Gauntlet, uh, or you play, oh, like you're just like, oh, that kind of stuff.

You can stand there all day long and your hands are hurting and you can't click the button fast enough to kill all the stupid, you know, and it just. You love it, right? And you absolutely love it. At the time, there was such a, I think, a gold rush of good movies that were either sci fi and or fantasy. And I think I had a foot in both camps, right?

So, like, you had the revitalization of the Star Trek stuff. You had the ascension of the Star Wars stuff. And those worlds, as they were kind of created, coupled, you know, and kind of bookended with some really cool things in the middle, like aliens and Indiana Jones. And then all of a sudden you get the release of Conan, the barbarian in 1982.

And the other movies were kind of shit, but like, at least Conan was, it was right on the nose. Uh, and, you know, yeah. You just, you feel all that. And all of a sudden, Lord of the Rings is in your face and you're like, and it just, you know, it was like, it just really brings it out in you. And for me, you know, it started with that at a very young age, that 10, 11 year old age, uh, and then it was just, I think a cascade of really cool things that came alongside that, that really, you kind of, kind of got me not in just into the genre, but also got me into the role playing, got me to be a movie fan, TV show fan of all those kinds of things.

And the spinoffs like. I guess I was in, I don't know, maybe middle school, high school when, you know, the next generation of Star Trek came out, but then you also had the next three in the Star Wars trilogy that, that, that were, you know, and even though we all put Jar Jar Binks aside, you know, ultimately there was some, there was, people couldn't wait for that, you know, and I, I was one of those guys and so for me, you know, Star Wars is, you've got this space opera meets, you know, Fantasy, right?

And it's like, everything comes together where you've got this crazy religion with, you know, sword fighting, but it's with laser swords. And it's like, you don't get much better than that. Right? So those are the things that sort of like culminated, I think those, you know, the gift of the game coupled with the unfortunate situation with my teacher that led to basically an indoctrination was like Tolkien one on one.

And, uh, my, I was, I was,

Rob Valincius: brain's like, pfft,

J.V. Hilliard: I was in, I was in, you know, the hobbits going down in the barrels in the river and out the back to escape. I mean, what 10 year old, what 11 year old is going to fall in love with that story? So of course I was, uh, I was, uh, deeply involved at that point. I never looked back.

Rob Valincius: Well, here's the thing with Star Wars, and I'll say this before we move on, okay? 1, 2, and 3 sucked when you went to the movies to see them as a kid. However, if you are to watch the movies now, the proper way to watch them to make you value those movies, you don't watch 1, You watch 4, 5, 1, 2, 3, 6. It's the proper way to watch the Star Wars movies, and it will make you, um, appreciate, and hopefully, if you're listening to this, you've seen Star Wars at this point, if not, it came out in the 80s, man, grow up,

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. Too bad.

Rob Valincius: Vader dies, you know, it makes you appreciate his death differently.

If you watch it that way, in my opinion. Um, and that's, that's something I went back and my fiancé's not into sci fi. But I had her do that. She does like the Mandalorian because of fuckin

J.V. Hilliard: Baby Yoda. My wife's the same way.

Rob Valincius: Heh heh

J.V. Hilliard: she'll watch Mando with me, but it's only because the baby, she doesn't call it Mandalorian. She calls it the baby Yoda show.

Rob Valincius: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Same here. She's not into sci fi. That's not her thing. She, she loves horror. We can watch horror movies and shit all day. Um, she loves like Dexter's, one of her favorite shows of all time, you know? So like the reboot is been, you know, we watch that. But, um, for us, you know, I, you know, the baby Yoda for the Mandalorian is, is in, but if you're gonna watch Star Wars, that's the best way to do it.

And in terms of like novels, um, Darth Plagueis, I don't, so I don't know if you've read any of the Star Wars novels.

J.V. Hilliard: Oh, are you kidding me? Of course. Ha, ha,

Rob Valincius: Darth Plagueis is a really good book. And for me, filled in a lot of gaps. Of, uh, 1, You get to know a lot more about the Senate. And everything, and all the things that he did to orchestrate that.

But, um, my favorite Star Wars novel since the trilogy was Darth Bane.

J.V. Hilliard: Mm hmm. So,

Rob Valincius: Bane was fantastic novel series.

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah, the Darth Bane series coupled with, you know, the, and the, the Darth Plagueis stuff, it does feel like it allows you. And that's the beauty of books in between movies. You know, you get to build the world around it. And then for the fandom that's there, it's not just, Hey, I watched a movie. Hey, I've immersed myself in this world and I know the nuance of it.

And I know what comes out of it. And there are ways you could correct it too, but you have to watch and make sure that it's, you know, canon or no longer canon. I mean, the Disney, the disification of it. Yeah. Has really kind of soured many, many people, this guy included, you know, on, on some stuff. Yeah. So, and, you know, and they throw out things for the sake of politics and whatever, like, just grow up, but get over it.

Right. And, um,

Rob Valincius: was that new series that got cancelled after one season? Cause they went like, full on, like, R. A., you know, the Jedi. You know, what was the big thing? It was like, they made the two twins

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah, well they made, yeah, the, the two twins, the, like, the center of the, of the, the, uh, Jedi slash Sith story. Right? When we all know that it didn't come there. Like, Darth, if you, if they talked to Lucas, Lucas was always affirmed that the chosen one that was gonna bring the, you know, the, you know, the balance to the force was always gonna be Anakin Skywalker.

And, you know, people forget that like Anakin becomes Darth, but then Darth comes back and his redemption scene in Return of the Jedi is exactly that, you know, he brings balance, you know, he and it's, it's because of, you know, he has to become Darth Vader to bring balance to the force. Right. And. If that escapes the average reader, it escapes the average watcher because you're just looking at, it's a pretty cool story and there's all these, you know, lasers and, you know, electricity coming out of people's hands.

And if you're not paying attention to the deep rooted story, and I think they got away from that on purpose. They wanted to kill the idea, you know, in a Disney way and introduce it through the lens of, of DEI and some other things. And just it, very disappointing, you know, just really, and I'm not. Not just that, but most of the stuff they've done recently has been subpar.

Like, I'm a sucker. I watch it all. They got my money. You know

Rob Valincius: mean, I don't watch the news show. I saw all the bad reviews. I'm

J.V. Hilliard: You didn't miss

Rob Valincius: gonna invest. Yeah, I'm

J.V. Hilliard: All you're going to do is you're going to save yourself some heartache because it doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. It's change for the sake of change, just so you could throw it in somebody's face as opposed to trying to do something that will build out the property that you've bought.

This wonderful property that billions of people have watched and loved, and you destroy it for the sake of trying to change something. And I think that's the biggest problem with it. And that's why, I mean, getting back to what you were saying about the books. You have to make sure that, you know, what you're reading, you know, some of that, you know, can stand the test of time, others of it, you've got to kind of like toss out, but you're right.

I mean, those books, some of those books and they've got some really high end, like, you know, the throne, like those throw, I don't know if you've read it, there's thrown novels. I mean,

Rob Valincius: I didn't watch the, I didn't read the Throm ones. It's on my list. It's on, it's on the list. I, I think the problem though too, and, um, I just, for me, Star Wars has always been an inclusive universe where You could be green or orange or a robot and still have a say in the world So I the whole like, you know introduce all this other DEI stuff I I don't know if I agreed with it in the Star Wars world because it was never an issue

J.V. Hilliard: yeah, same thing with

Rob Valincius: It really was never an issue,

J.V. Hilliard: Star Trek was the same way. You, you, that that was a way of addressing a social issue in the sixties and seventies. That was a hard thing to do, but you can get away with that in sci-fi or fantasy because there are no rules there. And so you can show inequality, you know, by doing that instead of, you know, and, and Star Trek, you know, broke rules, right?

They interracial kisses. And they had, you know, they, they showed, you know, different races fighting one another to a genocidal end and, and things like that. And they also addressed. You know, real time stuff like the Klingons were supposed to be the communists. They were the Russians, right? And we're the good guys, right?

And we're the Federation. And you got a lot of that with, with, with Star Wars too, where you didn't worry that Chewie was a Wookiee, right? He was just a Wookiee. Right. And it didn't matter who was who it just didn't. Um, you know, and I think that, you know, but when you make a political statement out of every single show, you lose, you just lose your base, you know, and people are crying about even the last three movies, I'm sure you, I'm sure you have an opinion on those too, but like ultimately, you know, I know, you know, that I don't,

Rob Valincius: it's tough, man. I mean, the last one, I think the last one, you know, they brought a, what's his face back and he tried to undo what they did in the prior movie.

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. The Ryan Johnson. Yeah.

Rob Valincius: But I mean, the damage was done, man. And it, I mean, it wasn't like. So bad that I couldn't watch it, but it just, none of it made sense.

It's like, you know, you need, you need a director. It's much, it's almost like if they took your books, right? And you wrote the first one, you envisioned everything. And then they brought in another author to write your second book. And then you came back to finish and write the third book. The second, you'd be like, what the fuck is this?

You have to stick with the creative mind because I don't care what people say. Like, I'm a creative, you're a creative, right? We all have different creative personalities. You just can't do it. It just doesn't Especially in a world like a Star Wars, Star Trek, Lord of the Rings. You just can't do it. It just doesn't make sense.

Because, I think it does change the source material.

J.V. Hilliard: it does. And I, you, you hit the nail on the head. I mean, there's. In, in authorship, it's called an author's voice, right? You can tell when I've written something and when another author has written something, then you can get close, you know, they have ghost writers and things like that, but at the end of the day, you can tell everybody has their own style and everybody has their own voice and you can, you know, if you read an author long enough, you can tell when it's not them.

Right. And, and you're like, this doesn't match up. Like, it's not even the same. It doesn't happen. And, and I think that's happened a lot there, you know, and I, I knew when they brought in the guys that had done a lot of Game of Thrones things. I was like, Ooh, this, the Star Wars might ramp this up. Uh, and then they should get, or they walked away from it, whatever happened.

And it just kind of blew up. And I'm like, uh, you know, and they have. All of their shows are directed by somebody else instead of having a director that directs the entirety of the series. And so then you get shows that are, you know, you'll get a series that's up and down based on the directorial direction, uh, that, that.

You know, ultimate captain takes that on, you know, and I think that's another thing that has a hard time, you know, pulling these things together. And I don't know. It's just to me. It's just not been what it should be. Uh, and it's a shame because I think a lot of folks have been disenchanted by it and some of not are not going back because of it.

You know, and I'm just like I said before, I'm a sucker. I'll watch it like three more fingers, you know, and just say, Oh my God, I can't believe I'm watching this and then complain about the fact that I wasted time watching it. Yeah. You know, but it's almost like if I don't watch the train wreck, I've missed something, you know, and I just don't get how Kathleen Kennedy and the rest of them over there don't see this as a train wreck.

They see this as some sort of master plot to change. And I honestly, I don't, I don't get it. You don't have to, the thing is good enough on its own, you know? And I, whatever, I, I can't

Rob Valincius: I agree, man. I agree. I agree. And, and, um, you know, you have people that are just like hardcore to the series and you just, you're losing them because you, you just, you're trying to make it something it's not. And, uh, I think if you're like, it's never, it's never had the problem. Of today. It's always been in just a, an open series ever since it was created.

Um, and you know, it's funny. I mean, look, the accolade was, was, um, it's done after one season. So I would be shocked if they kept it cannon in any way, you know, because everyone hated it. And then Kennedy's gone. She's stepping down. You know, so, I, she, I think because her and a lot of the main characters of that show went out on their marketing bend and were just trashing And, you know, talking about, you know, what, how they're going to change the series and look what, look, look, when, look what happened, everyone lost their jobs and the show got canceled because you, you, you can't do that to something like that.

Um, if it needed it. Yeah, absolutely. Let's shake it up. It, but it, it's always been a series where you could be who you want to be. And there was no like white and black

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. There's no judgmental stiff already. Yeah. It didn't, it didn't matter. It didn't matter. Yeah. And the acolyte. Oh, just it was rough to watch. I mean, it was the worst of the worst. I mean, I liked, you know, what they did with the Mandalorian. I thought was really good. It was different. Had like a Wild West kind of play to it.

It was kind of cool. Yeah, really cool. And then you look at like, when they went back to Obi Wan, uh, the mistakes that were all through that, the, it was, it was careless. They had characters, uh, in the, um, in the Boba Fett series that people that were playing main characters in it that had never watched the movies.

They had asked some of the actresses and they're like, well, we never saw the original. How are you acting in a movie that you haven't seen the original? Isn't that part of the homework? Right. Like I, and it just, they didn't

Rob Valincius: like, I still, I'm a sucker though. I still like Boba Fett. It wasn't the best. I still, I

J.V. Hilliard: They made the Tuscan Warriors good people, and Boba Fett had to be good now, and, and the, the little Vespa scene outside, there was like, I mean, you're Disney for Christ's sakes, and the best you can do is that, that, that looked like, I pulled it off of a, you know, a ride in an amusement park, uh, and then some guy that was hiding underneath it pulling it on a, it was just, oh,

Rob Valincius: little kid in me loved Obi

J.V. Hilliard: brutally

Rob Valincius: in me loved Obi

J.V. Hilliard: And of course the big bad monster has to be turned good, like the Bumble and, and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. Like, you don't need to, like, no, no, Boba Fett's supposed to be chaotic neutral. He's supposed to be chaotic, to use a D& D term. You know, he's not a good guy. He shouldn't ever be a good guy. You know what I mean?

And I, I just, uh, that, that was the beauty. That's why people were attracted to him because he was a cool bad guy to cheer for. That's why people like Darth Vader. He's a cool bad guy to cheer for, you know, and it's

Rob Valincius: My favorite archetype, by the way, like, book wise especially, is, uh, the, um, Wow, I just lost my train of thought in terms of, uh, what's it called when it's the Um, the good guy, it's the bad guy, the, the Arca, god, god

J.V. Hilliard: like a redemption arc.

Rob Valincius: Yeah, like, I like the, the bad, the bad guys, where you, it's, it's like you see how they became bad.

So like, for instance, like, I like World of Warcraft,

J.V. Hilliard: Like the origin story of the bad guy.

Rob Valincius: Um, the Lich King was a fantastic novel. Because you see. How he got to where he was. Um, and I really, and same thing with Darth Bane. You see, like, he came from this small mining planet, and he had an abusive dad, and all that stuff, and like, you see where he came from, and then where he ends up, and how he got there.

Um, what the hell is that called? That's gonna drive me fucking nuts.

J.V. Hilliard: Well, why that's important, and you know, I put that in my books too, is that no one's born evil. And so by them, if you're showing a character arc that tracks in a way where you as a reader, or you as someone who's watching a movie or a TV show, can identify with the mistake that they make. If they've come to a, and you make two choices.

And you could see yourself taking the same choice, making the

Rob Valincius: Anti hero. Sorry. Anti hero. That's what it is. Anti hero. Alright. Yeah.

J.V. Hilliard: for the anti hero, right? You always want to. Uh, and that's the thing. And you want them, you want to have them have that redemption arc. You, they have to have a chance to come back.

Darth Vader came back. Not everybody comes back. Right. And so like, you want that. And, you know, and I think, uh, for me and my novels, uh, well, I won't ruin them, but like, there's. There's a couple of guys take a step back and a couple of guys don't take a step back, you know, and, and I think that that's important too, because it's realistic.

Not everybody can come back. So your idea of Darth Bane showing his origin story and why he became who he became is exactly what people, that's where they, that's red meat. Uh, for a lot of readers, they want that kind of stuff. And Boba Fett, once you learn the backstory of Boba Fett, you're like, I can see why he does what he does and why he makes those choices.

And then, you know, again, the, the, the whole, I mean, my God, can we get away from spice and drugs and they're stealing it right out of Dune? It's just ridiculous. It's like, it's like so bad that it's lazy story writing, but all that aside, he's my favorite star Wars character of all time. You know, I want him, I want to cheer for him in that.

Series was so blah and I was waiting for it so much and it just, it went off the rails and it wasn't as bad as Accolade and, and maybe Obi Wan wasn't any good either, but like it was, you know, I still watched them all to the end, to the bitter end, my friend, to the bitter end.

Rob Valincius: I just started Dune. So I've never seen anything Dune related. I've never watched anything Dune. And the book is pretty good so far. I think it's like a 23 hour, it's either 20 or 23 hour, uh, audiobook. And I'm like 4 or 5 hours in. It's pretty good so far.

J.V. Hilliard: It has a lot of star. If you'd like Star Wars, which you had, which you do, you will like Dune. It has a little bit different spin to it, but it's a lot of the same concepts. And you'll pick up on that. You might not get it right away, but you will get it because, you know, they, you know, there's, there's a emperor and there's a certain sect of women that have a mental power that they can kill people with.

It's just like the force. And of

Rob Valincius: There's Spice.

J.V. Hilliard: Spice. Yeah. You know, that's where Spice was original to Dune and the Disney version of Star Wars has. is using that too. It's, um, it's a little weird, you know what I mean? That they run so parallel to one another, but it's good. It's good in its own way. It's just, in my opinion, it's not nearly as good as Star Wars, but, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's plotting.

It is really deep. Like if, for those that like epic fantasy, Or things that are, you know, like epic, uh, sci fi there is just, it goes deep. You will find every detail and every year. And someone named, I mean, Herbert does a good job with that stuff. It is just, it's riveting. If you like that kind of stuff, it's overwhelming.

If you're just in it for the entertainment.

Rob Valincius: Yeah, yeah, it's um, it hasn't grabbed me yet. Um, I, I have to be, I just bought your first book, by the way. Before we started this. I bought your first book. So I'm gonna check it out.

J.V. Hilliard: Are you listening? Are you reading

Rob Valincius: I'm gonna listen to it. I'm gonna listen to it. Um, for me, I have to be grabbed. Relatively early. Um, but I will come back.

Like, I always try to give a second and third chance for things. Um, it hasn't like netted me. Um, I'll tell you, um, Uh, what's the name of the book? Uh,

J.V. Hilliard: from the Dune trilogy or the Dune series?

Rob Valincius: No, let me go to my audible. Um, so,

J.V. Hilliard: Ah,

Rob Valincius: I, dude, I, I, I buy so many, I have the, uh, Audible thing, and I, and I get so many damn books.

J.V. Hilliard: The monthly.

Rob Valincius: yeah, I just finished the, uh, the Bobiverse series. I don't know if you've ever read that. It's by Robert, uh, or Dennis E. Taylor. Really, really, really good fuckin series. Very sci fi oriented.

Um, but I, And then, uh, The Will of Many, it's by James Islington. Really, um, really good book. Uh, Neil Shusterman has a good series, uh, um, called The Scythe, it's like, it's really good, I've read that. Um, but one of my favorite fantasy series, and I don't know why it's escaping me right now. Um, Red, the Red Rising series, have you ever heard of that?

J.V. Hilliard: Red Rising. Uh uh. No.

Rob Valincius: So if you leave my podcast today, I don't know if you're reading anything right now the Red Rising series is the the most recent series for me that has just Entrenched me into that genre and I I'm like Chomping at the bit for it. So it's a six part series. Basically. It's about a guy so like humans have colonized our Our universe, right?

You know, and, um, This guy named Darrow grows up on Mars and he's a, it's a mining planet and the way it's, it's almost like this, that the author took, um, uh, colors and they made them sex. Okay. Like S E C T sex. Okay. And, um, golds are. Perfect, right? They're, they're almost like, um, you know, the Aryans from the Nazis, right?

Blonde hair, blue eyes, tall, just, just perfect. Ripped and they're everything you would imagine a perfect species to be. Um, and then you have the other colors and they all have a sect, right? So red are, they live on Mars and they mine and, and then, um, you know, blues are, um, Smart and intelligent and they fly the ships and all this other stuff and uh, this guy Um, Darrow gets involved with a hit um on on mars.

They kill his wife It's very like you could read in the synopsis. I think you know, it's not anything i'm not giving anything away or whatever um, and that spurns him to join a um, a Kind of a faction to fight against things and what they want to do is they they call them. Um, I think it's um Cutters or splicers, and he goes through this process of, they basically create a false identity for him and turn him into a gold.

So he goes through all of this, um, like, plastic surgery to turn him from a red to a gold. Um, and he goes to this institution, like, all the golds go to this institution to, um, it's almost like going to, You know, a fancy school and they fight and whatever and then that's what determines their status, um, as a gold.

And, um, you know, he goes to this and he has to fake being a gold. And he does all this, and all this crazy, it's just, it's almost like Star Wars meets Game of Thrones. And there's just, like, there's a bunch of crazy turns and things, and it's a fantastic series. So if you're a big Star Wars fan, dude, seriously, Red Rising, go listen to it, go read it.

Please email me. You'll be like, holy shit, this is fucking great.

J.V. Hilliard: have to check it out. It reminds me, it sounds a lot like, um, there was a, and this goes back a while, and I think there was a movie made of it too, called Gattaca. Uh, where the future is determined by your birth and they take a sample of your blood and if you're in the 90s. You're part of the upper echelon and you get to go into space and do all these fun things.

And if you're someone else, you're just basically relegated to being a janitor, right? Like your job is to do, you know, hard labor until you're dead and they don't care about you. And I want to say that the same kind of storyline happens where this guy wants to get into space and he has to falsify himself in a way where he has to, you know, he has to Do piss tests and he has to give blood samples and he ends up doing this alongside of a character who's paralyzed and could no longer get into space because he wasted his time and became a drunkard and got himself paralyzed.

And so he sells his, his cells, his literally his blood, his eyes. Uh, this guy goes through this, this surgery just so they can get on in the space, but he has a heart problem. Uh, and it may eventually kill him, but it's all the things he does. To, to, to live out his dream. And it sounds like there's a lot of that in there, which is really cool.

I love that stuff. A really sort of dystopian kind of future. It's pretty bad ass. Yeah. I'll check it out.

Rob Valincius: It's called the Red Rising series. It's been the most recent series that has really Hooked. Like, really fucking hooked me. Where I'm like, aw, I'm so excited. And I love series like yours. That has three, four, five, six books. I need to know that I have some things that I can really kind of like get into.

Um,

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. Where you just throw yourself into it and you become immersed in the world. That's why I think world building is so important in my realm.

Rob Valincius: I don't want a one and done. I want, I want like one, two, I need a trilogy at least for me. Um, and that's actually how I pick a lot of my books. Seriously. I need like, I need, I need to know if I'm going to invest my time that I have this world that I can like live in. degree. Um, and I'm, I'm sure there's other people like me, but that's just me in general.

I, I need to have that story. Um, in terms of like you as an author, how, what's your writing process like? Because, you know, I've interviewed a lot of authors and everyone has a different aspect of how they write. You know, I interviewed a guy, he, he, he had to write in a bar. I interviewed one lady. She takes, she has to go to a retreat and not be anywhere near anybody.

Um, and she, she has word vomit where she'll write for, you know, three days straight with no showering and no eating and, you know, what, what's your, what's your process look like?

J.V. Hilliard: Mine's a lot more boring compared to those. Uh, you know, I, I, I look at myself as, as a planner. And part of that goes back to me being a nerd and a dungeon master, playing D& D for as long as I have. And when you play as a player, you don't have to do any prep work for it. You just have a character and then you respond to what the DM asks you to do.

But as a DM, you are a verbal storyteller. And you have to be prepared for different directional changes based on what the characters do. And so you have to know everything about the world. You have to know everything that can happen if they go left instead of right, or if they kill this person instead of helping that person, or if they decide not to help that person, how that

Rob Valincius: It's tough being a deed, a dungeon master.

J.V. Hilliard: is very, it is not, it is not easy. It's not for the faint of heart. You have to be good at it. Uh, and so for me, in order to do that, I've always built out my worlds as fully as I can. Uh, and so that's part of my writing process. I'm a big planner, like the woman that you mentioned that could sit there and write for three days.

I can never do that. Like, for me, I will, I'll put together an outline of my story and I'll write the end of the story. 1st, the beginning of the story. 2nd, and I use the outline to fill in the middle and I write those parts and then I go back. And even in some cases, I'll write an entire character storyline.

Separate of the other storyline and then mesh them together to make sure I'm not missing anything. And then in that, those mesh points is where you have to kind of reformulate the story to make sure it's smooth. And when you smooth it out, um, that's when the story kind of takes off. And when you're writing epic fantasy, you don't have a single point of view character, right?

You're, you have multi point of view characters. You're seeing through the eyes of the villain. You're seeing the eyes of several hero characters because these are people that you're going to be with for, you know, 10 books, 20 books, whatever, however long it goes. And so for me, it's really important to plan so that you're not missing any of those points, because the worst thing that could happen to an author or a dungeon master is to not have an answer for something that the players are going to do.

You can never walk away from the table saying, Oh, I didn't think that was coming. How do I adjust to that? Instead, you have to know where it's going. You have to know that that's a possibility. And so I eliminate all that by creating my own currency. I create my own pantheon of gods. I've created my own.

History of a world. I've got my own politics that are baked into the world. There's a history behind the politics of it. There's a history behind the families and the baronies and all those kinds of things that are part of the realm of warm and stir so that I have answers. And, and so the readers will also have answers.

And if they listen to, or if they've read it and understand where it's going, they'll see. things coming before they happen. Uh, and of course it's, you know, for me, that's a lot of work. Uh, but you know, I think it's important that you know that. Uh, and so I'm not a pantser. I'm not the guy that can write by the seat of my pants and just start writing a story.

I have to plan. Uh, and so for me, I'm a big plotter, uh, and, and that's my writing process. Now, where I can write, I write anywhere. I've written on planes. I've written in my hotel room. I'll write at a coffee shop somewhere. I'll write at my home. Um, that doesn't really bother me. I don't, to get you the juices flowing, I'll kind of reread some of the stuff I've written or look at some of the notes and get excited about what I'm about to write.

That always helps listening to the right kind of music or watching the right story, gets you ginned up and gets you ready to roll. Like those kinds of things are fun too. And, you know, for me, I've got, I've got. Points where there's motivation that if I'm writing a romance scene or from writing a battle scene, I'm listening to two different types of music, but the

Rob Valincius: Oh yeah,

J.V. Hilliard: you know, uh, you know, it's, it's usually planned out.

Like, I know where I'm going. I never sit down and just say, Oh, I don't know what the characters are going to do today. Let's find out. Never, ever, ever. Will that ever happen to me? Like, I know exactly where they're going. From point A to point B, how they're going to get there, what's going to happen before they get there.

And then I can write. So it's a lot of planning. Oh yeah.

Rob Valincius: I mean I feel like if I were to write, which I've thought about, I'm very, I have just like a very, I'm a pretty good dungeon master, um, I feel like I would be a planner too. I feel like I would have to know, you know, in my mind, like five steps ahead about what's gonna happen. Um, in terms of your books, did you weave any of your real life experiences into your novels?

J.V. Hilliard: You know, so the politics in my books comes from my years on the Hill in DC. The, um, some of the, uh, conflicts come from international affairs or they come from real life things I've seen in my, you know, My my uncle's condition, you know, and I saw what it was like to suffer from physical disabilities as a young man.

I grew up watching that happen. And so some of my characters are disabled. Right? And I do that in a way. So the main character is blind, save for some magic that he gets before you have a chance to even meet him. And the big bad villain is cursed without sight. And he's sickly and you have to figure out why he's sickly, what happened to him, how he got there.

And so you get this sort of like chosen one versus, you know, the false prophet thing that comes along and bangs heads, uh, in my novel as part of the hero's journey. Right. And so you've got a lot of that kind of stuff that's going on that I've taken from real life experiences, including things that I've taken from life lessons.

Absolutely. Absolutely. 100%. You know, and writers, they write what they know. Right? So experiences that I've gone through and things that I've I've learned along the way are baked into it because I've experienced it or writers are also very observant people. It doesn't have to be us. It could be other people and how that's worked with for them or how it hasn't worked for them and choices they've made.

Um, and even little things like quirks that people have that as an author, you could you. Dial up just a little bit and it makes it something really interesting and makes it unforgettable about a character. One of my characters I have is a comic relief guy. This, if you can imagine, it's sort of like a hobbit on steroids.

And he rides a war dog and he fights with these serrated edge daggers. And he has a face tattoo that looks like, you know, his face is painted. Um, you know, they call him Blue Connie because he has this blue tattoo all over his face. You know, and those kind of things. You know, that's something that I saw, you know, in real life, right?

You see weird shit, like whether it's a military thing or you see something in a bar somewhere and those are the kind of things that grab you and you're like, Oh, I got to write, I've got to make that part of one of my characters one day and then it's fun dropping it in. And you've got those little Easter eggs for yourself or the people that are around you, they recognize their Dungeons and Dragons character or they recognize a scenario that they've been in in real life and they're like, Oh, dude, you wrote that about me.

And you're like, uh huh, I did, but it's good. It's battle tested people. You've seen it and happen in life and you know how people react to it. So you want to take those, those themes and you know, weave them into your story.

Rob Valincius: And I feel like it makes you like more invested as well, like as an author, right? Because you're like pouring personal things into this, um, things that you've seen, things that, and, and it just, it also, I feel like it's got to help spurn those like creative juices to a certain degree.

J.V. Hilliard: yeah. Yeah. And you can get away with a lot in fiction that you can in nonfiction or even contemporary fiction, you know, because when, you know, I get in a car and drive down the street, people know what that is. I don't have to explain that in a book, but in my realm, I have to tell you, is the sky blue?

Is there gravity? Are you in a horse carriage buggy? Do you have a laser gun? Like what works? And you get a chance to build all that around it. So you could disguise stuff. So even the sharpest of, of witted people might not see it right away. And then when they finish the story, they're like, Oh yeah, I remember that.

That happened in my life. Or, Oh yeah, that happened in my Dungeons and Dragons adventure. And he just buried it in here. Cause it was a really cool plot angle, you know, stuff like that too. So it's a lot of fun.

Rob Valincius: That's awesome. So let's end on this. You talked about your series being licensed into an AR video, AR slash VR video game. What? Is involved with that and what is that experience like it's got to be pretty fucking wild

J.V. Hilliard: Well, yeah, first of all, it's humbling. Right? So you're taking that out of the mix that to know that it's

Rob Valincius: Your dog's like hell. Yeah

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah, that's that's the husky. Yeah, he's just letting you know that he likes it too. Can't wait to see it. But like the Thor, I've got to I've got Thor is the Siberian husky. And then I've got a Red Fox lab retriever named McLeod after the Highlander series.

Rob Valincius: captained a morgan

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah, there you go. Well played. Well played. But you know, the, uh, you know, but like for me, you know, having someone come to you and say, look, we want you to be part of the storyboarding process. In the beginning, you're worried about everything, you know, you're worried about the integrity of your, you know, you don't want to hand your baby

Rob Valincius: your baby

J.V. Hilliard: Right. But, you know, ultimately you learn the lesson that, you know. If you were taking a video game or writing a book out of it, you would just ask them questions and then I would go write a book about it, you know, and they would say, well, wait, wait, wait. And you're like, well, that doesn't happen in books.

And I had to learn the same lesson. So there are things I wanted in the game. And they're like, no, it doesn't work that way. Because as a gamer, especially when you're playing VR or an AR game, you don't have to always follow the plot line. You know, in my books, everything goes from point A to point B to point C.

And it's exactly the way I want. It's very linear. For them, you know, you've got to take into account that someone might want to help the villain. Someone might not want to help the good guy. Someone might not want to go on the quest line. They might want to do a side quest first, or they might want to build a character in a different way.

And so. As you're building an RPG game, um, you know, you take all these things in consideration. And for me, I learned that early on and I was like, look, just stay, stay out of it. This is their medium. They know it better than I do just be there as a resource for them. And as long as they stay within the guide rails of that, I think that's what I found joy in that is watching them do that.

As opposed to me trying to dictate things. It just doesn't work that way. 2027,

Rob Valincius: That's cool. And and will that be out sometime this year next year?

J.V. Hilliard: it looks like. So that, yeah, so they're doing, and they've teamed with Niantic, the, the, uh, company that makes Pokemon Go. So if, for the AR piece, that'll come out late 2026, and then the VR will come out in late 2027.

Rob Valincius: They were just bought by scopely. Did you see that? 3. 6 billion.

J.V. Hilliard: Yep.

Rob Valincius: be nice. I I'm in the wrong industry.

J.V. Hilliard: I was going to say it's, that's not a bad world to live in, right?

Rob Valincius: Nah, no, not at all. Uh, well look man, it was, it was a lot of fun. I didn't get a lot of stuff going on tonight. Um, can you tell my viewers listeners, uh, where they can find all your stuff, how they can get your books and uh, let's go from there.

J.V. Hilliard: I'm available pretty ubiquitously. You know, if you want to go to dragon moon press. com, I'd love for you to buy my stuff there because I get a better royalty when it comes right out of the publishing house. Uh, but if you're an Amazon shopper, you can find it there. If you download eBooks or you want audio books, all of my stuff is available on places like audible or.

Barnes and Noble or Rakuten, wherever you buy your stuff, you'll find me. You can also buy it on my website at jvhilliard. com. Pretty easy to find me there. And if you want to leave me a message, I try to get back to everybody within 24 hours. I'm pretty good at that. Some folks just like asking questions or want to see the direction of the next thing, you can sign up for my newsletter there and on socials, you can follow me at JV Hilliard books at, uh, you know, X Facebook, Instagram, Tik TOK, YouTube, and discord.

Rob Valincius: Awesome! Discord's a beautiful thing, man. I fucking

J.V. Hilliard: is, it

Rob Valincius: Um, it's, it's, it's the nerd gamer heaven of being able to talk. Until, I don't know, they, they might go, uh, public, so it could ruin everything. Every time you go public, man, it just,

J.V. Hilliard: Yeah. It takes it out of the hands. I know it takes out of the hands of where it was intended to be in the first place was why it was made popular.

Rob Valincius: Yeah, gotta love it. Um, my podcast, Drink Clock Pod, on all socials. Drink Clock Podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts. And, uh, we'll have this up shortly. And, uh, look, dude, it was a pleasure having you on. A great conversation. Let's do this again, uh, in a couple months, or a year, or whatever. Maybe we'll do it, uh, sooner to your video game release, which

J.V. Hilliard: I'll let, yeah, I'll let you know. I've got a graphic novel too. We'll talk about that next time.

Rob Valincius: I'm down, man. Look, it was a pleasure having you on, man. Have a great night.

J.V. Hilliard: My pleasure saving you. Thanks again. 

Outro Music