Hello there!
If you’re reading this, allow me to officially welcome you to kylemaloneauthor.com. For those of you who arrived here as strangers, I’ll start with a small introduction. My name is Kyle. I’m a fantasy writer based in Cork, Ireland. I qualified as a pharmacist in 2017 and am currently studying for a PhD in pharmacology at University College Cork. I’m hugely passionate about science, healthcare, and education. But as you might have guessed, that’s not why we’re here.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been writing fantasy stories. My biggest inspirations as a child were the Lord of the Rings films and the worlds J.R.R. Tolkien created. Yes, you have my full permission to consider that a cliché. But even before the release of The Fellowship of the Ring in 2001, I can remember writing. I often think the first stimulus for my stories was my country of birth itself. I’ve grown up and spent most of my life in Ireland, an island nation boldly facing the North Atlantic. Geographically speaking, it’s a country of rolling mountains, lush plains, and never-ending rain. Worldwide, Ireland is famed for music, sport, language, and literature. Arguably its people hold the best reputation of all. The Irish are by and large friendly, open-minded, and welcoming to outsiders. Importantly however, the effects of a tragic history continue to be felt. So yes, the Irish are a warm and pacifist people. But not once in the course of Irish history has the island fully been at peace.
This is the world into which Kyle Malone was born. Growing up in 21st century Ireland is a privilege, but it does mean swallowing a cocktail of nationalist pride, religious guilt, class division, and century-old grudges. In order to wash it all down, a glass of myth and legend is at hand. It’s always struck me how many European countries seem to have a national narrative, and only here and there a sprinkling of something fantastical to pad out the record. In Ireland, the opposite is true. Irish history has existed as a vassal of its neighbour’s for hundreds of years. Only recently has the island started to forge a path of its own. But even before the Norman conquest, the history of Ireland is at best a rough sketch—a story of chapters and verses so wispy it threatens to disintegrate into dust at the briefest touch. An optimist would call that a romance. A cynic would call it a myth.
I once wondered which, if any, of my fantasy stories were inspired by Ireland. Nowadays I struggle to find one that’s not. Recently, it’s dawned on me that thousands of years of Irish truth are shrouded in mist, lost beyond memory. It’s as if—in some strange telling of Oisin in Tír na nÓg—time simply ceased to exist. As an Irishman, that kind of thought process fills me with anguish. As a fantasy writer, it kindles a sort of hope.
Looking back now, I can see quite clearly the effect of my homeland on my work. As a 90’s kid, I entered the world around the same time as A Song of Ice and Fire, George R.R. Martin’s sprawling fantasy epic. I quite literally came of age in the era of Game of Thrones. The series is famous for its morally gray characters, bloody battles, and the gruesome fashion in which Martin axes off our favourites. It is by definition grimdark.
As a subgenre of fantasy, grimdark has captured the zeitgeist in the same way weird hair did the 1980’s. Authors from Joe Abercrombie and Rebecca Kuang became seemingly overnight successes with such novels. But while I love the complexity and punch grimdark has brought to the genre, I never felt at home in Westeros or the Union. Not in the way I do in Middle-earth. Not in the way I do in Ireland.
The fantasy I write has always been skewed noblebright. The basic argument of such work is that the actions of one person can make a difference, and that even if the person is flawed and opposed by strong forces, they can rise to heroic actions. Even in death, they can improve the lives of those they leave behind.
I think it is hard to grow up in Ireland and not feel sympathetic to the noblebright cause. After all, much of modern Ireland has been defined by small groups of people trying to beat the odds. From the Rebellion of 1798 to the Rising of Easter Week, Irish history is a catalogue of tragic romance—a series of A Bridge Too Far-esque almosts that just weren’t meant to be. And no matter what we say in the revisionist narratives today, the people who fought for freedom all those years ago were far from perfect, and even further from united. But fundamentally, they set aside their differences and rallied to a greater cause. They laid down their lives, if only to improve the lives of those left behind.
In a similar vein, the Irish psyche and grimdark fiction also make a poor match. Arguably, the countries most suited to grimdark are those who have very few scabs to pick at to begin with. Certainly, I can think of a few nations who see themselves as the heroes of human history—the dashing and brave adventurers who we all owe a good deal of thanks to. Perhaps having played the hero for so long, it’s refreshing for them to cast themselves in another role. Conversely, it’s hard to imagine much fervour in Ireland for a story where we get to play the villain, or worse, the oppressed. There is simply too much trauma in real Irish history for an exercise like that.
Overall, I think the reason I want to write noblebright fantasy (or Hopepunk) is because it is the kind of fantasy which rhymes best with the story of Ireland. For millennia, we have mythologised our history—from the fianna to the flying columns. We did it because it’s the only version of our history that offered us something—some vague promise of a brighter future that we could work towards. In essence, it offered us hope.
With that, I welcome you again to my website. For those of you knew “You’re Listening Now”—a blog I wrote for years on writing, reading, and life as a college student—it’s good to see you once more. Unlike my old blog, I will focus solely on writing here. Why? Well, over the years, I’ve found myself torn in two on every social media platform. I’ve tried to present the full Kyle—from pharmacist to fantasy writer—and can honestly say I had a blast doing so. But now I want my writing to have a place of its own. It has grown to be such a huge part of my life, and I truly hope you choose to follow the journey.
Next time, I’ll tell you all about my work.
Kyle
“Do not be too sad, Sam. You cannot always be torn in two. You will have to be one and whole, for many years. You have so much to enjoy and to be, and to do.”
J.R.R. Tolkien
Kyle Malone 