Col Buchanan Books in Order

Col Buchanan was born in Lisburn, Northern Ireland, in 1973. From an early age, he turned to reading and writing fantastical stories as a way to get away from everyday troubles. The habit stuck.

At school, Buchanan has described himself as a quiet dreamer who preferred the back of the classroom. His later work as a copywriter came with a similar preference for the back of the office. It is an image that suits the books, which often watch large conflicts from the viewpoint of people trying to survive them.

His path to publication was not especially tidy. Buchanan has written about time spent on retreats in the Mourne Mountains, being homeless in Belfast, and getting lost in a Zen monastery. He tells those stories with a wink, but they help explain why his fiction has room for outsiders, wanderers, and people who do not fit neatly into powerful institutions.

Then Farlander arrived.

His debut opens the Heart of the World sequence, a four-book fantasy story set during a long war between the Free Ports and the expansionist Empire of Mann. It begins with Ash, an aging assassin from the Roshun order, and Nico, a hungry young man drawn out of the besieged city of Bar-Khos and into Ash’s dangerous work. Buchanan gives them a world of swords, guns, skyships, spies, and hard choices.

The next novels, Stands a Shadow, The Black Dream, and Fierce Gods, widen that conflict. The series moves between soldiers, political operators, fugitives, assassins, and ordinary people caught in a siege that has lasted far too long. The stakes rise, but the books keep returning to the cost of war for the people with the least control over it.

Buchanan’s fantasy mixes adventure with questions about power, faith, loyalty, and revenge. His characters are often uncertain, tired, or in over their heads, which keeps even the larger battles grounded. Readers who like a sprawling setting but want the action tied to personal choices may find a lot to enjoy here.

He later began The High Wild, an illustrated space-fantasy project centered on the Child of Jih, a living Rogue Prophetship, and her crew. It shifts the setting from besieged ports to spacelanes, but keeps Buchanan’s interest in people on the run who choose to help others despite the risks.

In recent years, he has described himself as mostly settled down. He still says that one of life’s simple pleasures is a late-night gathering around a fire with good friends.