A Goodreads user asked Sebastien de Castell:

I finished Spellslinger a couple of days ago and I absolutely loved it! The magic, the action and all the characters were awesome (after all, it's not every day you get to read about a talking squirrel cat). My question: Pretend you are a powerful Jan'Tep mage, but for some reason you can only spark a single band. If the choice was yours, which would you choose (including shadow) and why? Thank you!

Sebastien de Castell Hi Giovanna,

I'm delighted that you enjoyed Spellslinger!

To your question: iron, ember, breath, blood, silk, sand, or shadow . . .

Hmm . . . Iron is very practical in that it enables control of physical forms, so that would certainly have some advantages. Ember deals with energy such as fire and lightning, but those tend to be either useful for very specific situations or else a bit too violent for my tastes. Breath is weakest on its own, though it has properties that enable communication over distances and subtler manipulations of air and gaseous forms. Blood can be used for both healing and torment, but there's a certain darkness to manipulating living beings. Sand can be potentially very powerful as it affects time, but it's very difficult to do and very dangerous if you get it wrong. Silk lets you affect minds, which could be extremely useful but I'd have a huge moral dilemma with doing so. As to shadow . . . no, let's not talk about that right now.

So, with all that said, If I had to choose one, I think it would be either Iron or Breath for me. What about you? What one form of magic would you choose?

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