I was lucky to get an interview with M.S. Olney, one founder of the EPICindie.net website and the author of the Sundered Crown Saga.

Please, tell us a bit about yourself.
Hi, I’m Matthew and I live in the UK. I work as content marketing specialist for a cybersecurity company by day and as an indie author and freelance copywriter by night. I’ve been an author for almost ten years and have had several books top the bestseller charts in several countries and on several retail platforms. My main book series is the epic fantasy The Sundered Crown Saga. It’s sweeping heroic fantasy that was inspired by epics such as Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones. I’m currently working on the final book in the series and I’m hoping to make it the best of the bunch and give the readers who have supported me over the years the ending they deserve.

Why should I buy your books?
If you love action, adventure, humour and loveable casts of characters then you should definitely give my books a try.

What got you into writing? And how long have you been doing it?
I’ve been writing since I was five years old. I started off making comic books for my classmates and have always loved telling stories. As I got older that passion took me down the path of journalism and eventually content marketing.

Why did you choose to write fantasy? And why pick this particular fantasy subgenre?
I never intended to write fantasy at first. I was never much of a fan of it until I finally got around to reading Lord of the Rings when I was thirteen years old. Everyone else was into Harry Potter but Tolkien was just so much better, so much more in general. I had an idea of a story brewing in my mind for years before I finally decided to set pen to paper. I first started sharing what would become Heir to the Sundered Crown on sites such as Wattpad and it was massively popular, so much so that it won an award! From then on, I was committed. I chose heroic fantasy as I love such tales and I much prefer to give hope to people than depress the heck out of them like some grimdark authors seem to enjoy.

Which other author has had the biggest influence on your writing?
As I said Tolkien was a huge inspiration, but I’d have to say my style is more like Bernard Cornwells. I love his style.

What’s the best thing about being a writer?
That’s a tricky one as sometimes being a writer can be a bit of a curse too. There’s always a story nagging you when often you just want to sit down and do nothing. Also, can interfere with sleep when the muse starts pestering you! I guess the best thing is that feeling when you sell a book, get a good review and hear from readers who’s lives your work has touched.

What’s the hardest thing about being a writer?
For me it’s finding the time. I have a lot on and sometimes when I’ve finished a full day of work the last thing I want to do is sit down and write. I would previously have said criticism but from experience I now know to just ignore the obvious trolls and overly harsh critics.

Do you have any tips or an author app, tool, or resource that you can really recommend we try?
Yes I do! The EPIC website that I created and run. My aim is to turn into the one stop shop for indie authors and readers. It has an Indie author directory, a book release calendar and now a resource page that lists services that any author can find useful.

As one of the creators of the EPIC website and companion Facebook group, would you take us through why you created such great resources for readers and indie authors alike?
EPIC was born from a disagreement with how another popular indie fantasy group was being/is run. It was run by a small clique of authors who ran it like their own personal group which I and others thought was unfair to authors struggling to get the attention they deserve. EPIC was made to give all indie fantasy and sci-fi authors a voice and to bring their works to the attention of readers.

Which of the sections on the EPIC website is your favorite and why? - Is there a section that you think gets too little attention? What is it, and why?
I love every section, EPIC is my baby. We have a great book review team and have a tonne of excellent content on the site now. It’s growing every month and with the new resource section, I hope many more authors will utilize it.

Let’s get back to you and talk about the future. What new projects are you working on?
I am working on a few projects. The big one is the Lucid Cycle, a new epic fantasy series that I will be releasing next year. As well as that I am working on some smaller projects and of course the final book in the Sundered Crown Saga. I also need to write book 3 in the Empowered Ones series.

Do you expect new technologies to come along soon that will have a huge impact on self-publishing? For instance, when will we see a decent novel written by an AI author?
AI art tools have exploded onto the scene and I for one welcome them. They are a massive help to authors as it allows them to create visuals to help them create their worlds quickly and cheaply. I don’t think cover artists and the like have much to worry about for now as what they can create still beats the AIs.

Do you have any dreams you’d like to share?
Finishing the series I have in the works is a big one! After that I have plans to dabble in the sci-fi genre and would love to have a crack at a thriller or mystery some time down the road.

Thank you for doing the interview, Matt. I wish you the very best of luck, and hope EPIC continues to grow so more readers will discover writers they don’t know.