Oct 6, 2026 · 31 min · 12 segments
My guest today on the Online for Authors podcast is Robert A Walker, author of the book Six Moons, Seven Gods. Robert A. Walker grew up in Northwestern Massachusetts. After graduating college, he…
What, when you said, "I'm writing", what made you say, "I'm going fantasy" versus all of the other possible genres out there?
When I first started writing, it was just kind of, okay, I have time on my hands now, I'm retired, I can do, get off my bucket list one of those things I always wanted to do, which is write a novel.
And interestingly enough, the first version of my first draft was so bad, it was so poor-
I mean, when I gave it to the developmental editor, they said, "Well, okay, wait a minute.
W- is this fantasy? Is this historical fiction? What is this? You've, you've gotta kind of pick one and then take your path."
And so that's when I said, okay, it's gonna be fantasy, and I have to sort of re-school and figure out-
It's, it is kind of hard when you aren't real sure what, especially early, especially when you've not done a lot of books, you know? Um, I often write, I'm, I'm very much a pantser, where I write by the seat of my pants.
I usually have a character or an idea, and it's usually just very small, you know, one little scene, something going on in my head, and then I just start writing.
And so many times I really do not know what the genre's going to be, and then when I'm done, it's like, okay, now I have to figure out where I'm putting this-
What, when you said, "I'm writing", what made you say, "I'm going fantasy" versus all of the other possible genres out there?
When I first started writing, it was just kind of, okay, I have time on my hands now, I'm retired, I can do, get off my bucket list one of those things I always wanted to do, which is write a novel.
And interestingly enough, the first version of my first draft was so bad, it was so poor-
I mean, when I gave it to the developmental editor, they said, "Well, okay, wait a minute.
W- is this fantasy? Is this historical fiction? What is this? You've, you've gotta kind of pick one and then take your path."
And so that's when I said, okay, it's gonna be fantasy, and I have to sort of re-school and figure out-
It's, it is kind of hard when you aren't real sure what, especially early, especially when you've not done a lot of books, you know? Um, I often write, I'm, I'm very much a pantser, where I write by the seat of my pants.
I usually have a character or an idea, and it's usually just very small, you know, one little scene, something going on in my head, and then I just start writing.
And so many times I really do not know what the genre's going to be, and then when I'm done, it's like, okay, now I have to figure out where I'm putting this-
The rest of this transcript — segmented and speaker-labeled, so you land on the exact moment something was said
Search every transcript — by keyword, by phrase, or by meaning, across every show Radar indexes
Trends — what is surging across podcasts, measured against its own baseline
Alerts — when a name you follow appears in a newly indexed episode
No account is needed to search Radar.