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Writing Tips: Combining Fantasy and Science Fiction

Most genre stories are either Fantasy, with wizards and magic swords, or Science Fiction, with space ships and ray guns. Very rarely do you ever find something that combines both, and even then it's usually done very badly. The old "I got my wand and he has his ray gun" approach. So, how is one to more skillfully combine these seemingly opposing genres? In my own novels, I like to mix and max genres a bit, and so have done quite a bit of Fantasy mixing with SF. So, in this short article, I will try and give what tips I can.

The first thing you must do is define "magic". For myself, I just define it as another force in the universe, like electricity or nuclear power; a force that can be accessed by those trained to do so. Not unlike how a psychic uses his mental powers, only a wizard uses his mind to draw upon powers greater than himself, the way a transistor uses a small amount of voltage to control a far greater amount of voltage.

Okay, now that we have a definition, we can figure out how to work it into a SF universe. Science Fiction is an extrapolation of science that might or could be, of how science might some day be able to do what seems to be nearly impossible. Sounds like a pretty goo approximation of what a wizard does with his magic spells. Whatever rules you dream up for how magic works on your world, keep them consistent, just like you would for a science. If it takes a certain set of circumstances, words, or powders to conjure forth a ball of fire, then have the characters do it that way every time (unless you make a point of one character having found a better way, then explain why and how). If there is a law of Nature that says something like every spell must create an equal and opposite reaction someplace, or have a certain type of side effect, then remember to keep that in there as well. Do NOT go for the “well, it works because it's magic, so there"; that isn't any more satisfying than in SF when you have "temporal physics makes my head hurt" as the sole scientific explanation behind some self-contradictory time travel effect because you wrote yourself into a hole. Everything has a logic o its own, just remember to keep it internally consistent; even if the characters don't know the reason or science behind the magic, you as the writer must have it detailed somewhere in your notes (and you WILL be keeping notes).

Now that we have laid a logical foundation for our magic, it should be easy enough to combine such elements of Fantasy into our SF. Mixing creatures from either genre is no different: how is fighting a dragon any different than aiming your blasters at the Giant Space Mongoose of Alpha 9? That leaves the Magic vs Science and the Clashing Cultures.

Guys come down in a space ship into what seems like a primitive society. Been done before many times in SF, now we just add in the fact that, while the locals know almost nothing about Physics and Electronics, it is the advanced invaders who are seen as the primitives by their complete lack of understanding of magic. You can get a lot of interesting interactions from this. Or the wizard who opens up a portal to drop him into the middle of a spaceport. Of course, if the spaceport is used to visitors from other worlds, no matter how they choose to arrive, then you have the landing strip where the ships land (be they powered by antimatter or magic pushing enchanted sails) and another area where personal portals can open up; landing beacon or portal beacon to home in on, the end is the same.

And who says that the forces of magic and science cannot interact? A spell designed to bend light would be quite effective against a laser. Or how effective would body armor be if someone could change it into pudding? Not to say that such consequences are automatic though; certain types of materials may have more inherent resistance to physical change- be it from a magic spell or transmutation ray-gun- than others. And that lightning bolt the wizard just conjured forth still has to hit the target, and if the target is protected by a deflection field, or covered in a special high tech suit that grounds the charge into a battery, then wizard and Tech would be equally matched.

But that still has Magic and Science in competition, we want to combine them, use them side by side. Imagine a world where the basic structures are like medieval castles, only the stonework is reinforced by rebar and high-tech materials, then protected with magical runes designed to strengthen the walls, protect them against explosions and magic spells. Or the special blaster gun: you can't put a homing chip on a packet of energy the way you can a missile, but you can place a magic spell designed to aim it truer to its target, and its power pack could be supplied by magic so it won't run out. Or that most prime of combinations, the Technomancer; part technician, part wizard, he blends elements of magic and science together, because after all isn't Magic just another field of science.

Try to be artful when you blend the two, creative. Use your mind to think of the logical consequences of Magic and Science, either in opposition or together, for Logic is the one commonality you have to bridge Fantasy and Science Fiction. Use it with care.
Maldene II: Mysteries Of Olde

Interesting. I recently read the Echo series by Kent Wayne and they merge science fiction with fantasy successfully. Although Wayne does class the books as dystopian science fiction.

Jack Vance danced along the boundary of SF and Fantasy very successfully for many years. Elements of fantasy and folk magic that work seep through his SF

Jim wrote: "Jack Vance danced along the boundary of SF and Fantasy very successfully for many years. Elements of fantasy and folk magic that work seep through his SF"

There are a few notables that know how to combine Fantasy and SF, but I can probably count them on one hand.

Nice! Thank you! But the problem is then, how do you market this combination of Fantasy and Science Fiction?

Where do you find the readers who will tolerate this? And if you have an answer to that, how do you convey this readership when querying agents and publishers? What label do you give this combo?

These are issues I ran into when trying to market a novel that includes both psychics and aliens.

Since then, I've started my own small press publishing house and I will probably publish that book one day -- but then I will run into that very issue as a publisher: How do I reach readers for this combo?

And yet -- I know they must be out there because don't many of us enjoy both genres? I'm thinking only fantasy readers will be open to this idea. What do you all think?

You've made some excellent points and tips for writing it, though. Thank you for sharing them.

Lianne wrote: "Nice! Thank you! But the problem is then, how do you market this combination of Fantasy and Science Fiction?

Where do you find the readers who will tolerate this? And if you have an answer to tha..."
Marketing would be my big problem on anything I do. I'm a great writer but a lousey PR guy. I have some rave reviews, and I guess it helps that the first novel of Maldene looks like a more typical epic fantasy (the SF elements do not creep in until starting in Book 2), but me and the real world just do not seem to get along. Reaching readers for anything is my one significant weak spot.

Mark wrote: "Lianne wrote: "Nice! Thank you! But the problem is then, how do you market this combination of Fantasy and Science Fiction?

Where do you find the readers who will tolerate this? And if you have a..."

Sorry to have brought up this hard truth, Mark -- I feel your pain! The book marketplace has so divided itself into these isolated categories, when we know there are readers who would love us to cross over and combine as long as we're telling a good story! And whenever something slips out into the marketplace that breaks down these barriers and becomes popular-- still, it's not enough to create change.

This is why I'm turning back to self-publishing after a brief adventure trying to fit my work into those little boxes. Not going to happen.

Best wishes to you! Don't give up on your visions and I won't either! Magic and science are just two names for the same thing, right? Because much of science only pretends to know the way things work ...

(And don't forget to read Real Magic: Ancient Wisdom, Modern Science, and a Guide to the Secret Power of the Universe.Nope, he's not a relative; it's just a very cool book written by a scientist.)

Lianne wrote: "Mark wrote: "Lianne wrote: "Nice! Thank you! But the problem is then, how do you market this combination of Fantasy and Science Fiction?

Where do you find the readers who will tolerate this? And ..."
I've been in the struggle almost as long as I've been spitting out novels, and yes currently after some forays into the world of "sure I can help you, gimme money", I have my own self publishing thing going, and (crossing fingers) some people that love my stuff enough that they'll be doing stuff for me as i do stuff for them and we all make money. my self-publishing name, BTW, is Vault of Knowledge... which is a bit of an in-joke and also a place that appears in "Maldene II: Mysteries Of Olde".

As I have said before. We already have a combination of fantasy and science fiction and it is called Star Wars. SW was NEVER science fiction or fantasy, yet people enjoyed it. Why, because when all was said and done, it was a rousing story that got people interested. If you can write a rousing story that will interest people, no one will give a crap what genre it is in. Be it historical fiction, fantasy, adventure, romance, or Saturday night dog walking, if the story interests people they will buy it. There is, unfortunately, one huge condition to all of this.

The people have to know that is there. That is the problem here. Our books here are for the most part self published. They are unknown to the general public who usually do not go past the best sellers list in the Times for their books. I am beginning to understand that people like, main stream professional writers and publishers treat self published books with all the care consideration, and compassion given to a medieval leper. No body likes us, no one wants us, but the new technology allows to exist. There are always some exceptions, but for the most part, self published authors languish in obscurity.

Welcome to the real world.

WA

Speaking of Obscurity, read my fantasy novels on Kindle and B & N.

The Forest of Allund
The Laughing Gods
Demigod

Just because we languish in obscurity doesn't mean we can't try.

Wilbur wrote: "As I have said before. We already have a combination of fantasy and science fiction and it is called Star Wars. SW was NEVER science fiction or fantasy, yet people enjoyed it. Why, because when all..."

I think Star wars was best described as "Space Opera". The Jedi tricks in there (choke hold and such) are basically psychic powers that can be explained away as telekinesis, empathy, telepathy, and the like, which makes it more SF with some mentalism/psychic stuff as opposed to outright magic (no wizards muttering magical phrases under their breath). He-Man was out and out SF + magical fantasy, though I would never use that as a prime example of the art. There's a few examples, but for myself i love mixing up the genres- leave the straight stuff for the other guys. Fr instance, my other series "Cyberdawn" goes at it the other way around. Whereas Maldene is fantasy with elements of SF, Cyberdawn is SF/cyberpunk with elements of magic and horror.

First, I write what I would call anthropological fiction. It has some unreal stuff, maybe you'd call magic; it has technology too. However, it is about people and the cultures. When I wrote, I never asked myself the question as to whether it was science fiction or fantasy. In my universe (actually this universe slightly reimagined), with its five or more forces, telepathy was quite possible.
Second, what do you mean, Lianne, by your small press publishing house? Is it just to publish your own books or do you plan to take submissions?

Mark wrote: "I think Star wars was best described as "Space Opera". The Jedi tricks in there (choke hold and such) are basically psychic powers that can be explained away as telekinesis, empathy, telepathy, and the like, which makes it more SF with some mentalism/psychic stuff as opposed to outright magic (no wizards muttering magical phrases under their breath)...."

I think your comments about Star Wars is a good one showing the sheer breadth of the genre.
The other thing about SF is that, if the reader wants, jedi stuff (as an example) can be explained away as telepathy or whatever.
The writer merely needs to write it, the reader is perfectly happy to fit it into the category they want to. You as the writer might think of it as magic, it doesn't really matter.

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”.

Jim wrote: "Mark wrote: "I think Star wars was best described as "Space Opera". The Jedi tricks in there (choke hold and such) are basically psychic powers that can be explained away as telekinesis, empathy, t..."

In my own books I treat magic as another force in the universe, but one that is accessed by a sentient mind by way of focusing said mind in different ways to channel what is desired. Certain rituals and words help to focus the mind as desired, and thus we have "magic spells". The person "casting" the spell turns himself into a conduit for these forces, which means the effort takes a certain amount of exertion- thus giving us a built-in limit for our stories. In fact, i even have one off-world character in the series that at first keeps wondering if it all isn't some sort of psychic manifestation. Of course, this whole approach makes it easier to blend the concepts of magic in with those of science fiction.

My Temperstria series has strong science fiction elements mixed in with the fantasy. I have a universe consisting of multiple planes of reality - the Great Cosmic Sandwich - with an energy gradient so that each plane had more energy than the one below. The power of magic is drawn from the vast inter-planar repulsion forces that keep the planes from touching. Then it's simply a matter of converting that energy into other forms of energy or matter as directed my the will.

In previous writing, I even had Techmagic, which used devices to harness the power of magic, blurring the distinction between technology and magic.

Whether a laser beam is generated by magic or technology, it must still conform to natural laws like reflecting off shiny surfaces. By the same token, if you have a lighted candle, it makes no difference whether it was lit by a match or with magic, the result is the same. In fact, if you didn't see it being lit, there is no way to tell how it was done.

Gary wrote: "My Temperstria series has strong science fiction elements mixed in with the fantasy. I have a universe consisting of multiple planes of reality - the Great Cosmic Sandwich - with an energy gradient..."
Much the same with my own. Everything must conform to it's own internal logic as well as basic natural laws. At the least, the writer should know what those laws are even if the characters in the story do not (then maybe leave a few for the reader to figure out on his own).

I fully agree - what is tech and science to us would be magic to an earlier time! It's all a matter of perspective - like anything!

Darryl wrote: "I fully agree - what is tech and science to us would be magic to an earlier time! It's all a matter of perspective - like anything!"

A lot of the time I just leave it to the reader to decide whether it's magic or science they don't understand. After all we are letting the reader explore a world, we're not school teachers didactically explaining everything to them in detail :-)

I remember many decades ago reading Robert A Heinlein's , Number of the Beast - it must have stayed with me! The book I'm writing now and having fun with combines parallel worlds, aliens, elves, flying motorcycles and Unicorns, combined with a midlife romance. It's a 2nd in a series and there's a plan for a third. Keeps me out of trouble!

I remember many decades ago reading Robert A Heinlein's , Number of the Beast - it must have stayed with me! The book I'm writing now and having fun with combines parallel worlds, aliens, elves, flying motorcycles and Unicorns, combined with a midlife romance. It's a 2nd in a series and there's a plan for a third. Keeps me out of trouble!