Have You Herd - An Interview with Benjamin Tolen Author of “Merged By Magic: A Meeting of Minds”

When author Benjamin Tolen sat down with Iona Dells with Eight Buffalo Media Group, the conversation quickly turned into a journey through memory, imagination, and the writing of his debut novel, “Merged by Magic: A Meeting of Minds”. Tolen chuckled as he described summers spent in a small-town library in upstate New York, where he discovered both his love of storytelling and the kind of escapism only books can provide. Those long hours of reading inspired a story that blends the everyday struggles of adolescence with the extraordinary complications of magic and identity.

At the heart of his novel is Artie Oswald, a 12-year-old boy who suddenly discovers that he is the clone of a centuries-old wizard named Uther. As if that weren’t complicated enough, Artie finds himself sharing his mind with not just Uther but also a third presence, Arthur—a sort of mediator between the two. It’s a premise that allows Tolen to explore the push and pull between youth and wisdom, impulse and restraint, fantasy and reality.

As our conversation began, we asked Tolen to tell us a little about his story.

Eight Buffalo (EB): Merged by Magic, A Meeting of Minds is your first novel. Tell us a little about it.

Benjamin Tolen (BT): Well, it’s a story about Artie Oswald. He’s a young adolescent who finds out he’s actually the clone of an old wizard. After getting sick and spending time in the hospital, this wizard’s personality—Uther—begins to emerge, changing Artie’s life for better or worse.

Tolen paused, smiling at the premise that sounds both whimsical and weighty. When asked what inspired him to write such a story, he traced it back to his boyhood.

EB: What inspired you to write a fantasy novel about a boy whose mind is shared by two other personalities?

BT: Growing up in a small town in upstate New York, I spent many summers in the library. That was my escape. I read everything I could get my hands on, and I loved stories with internal conflict. I wanted to create something that a twelve-year-old could relate to, but also something I could layer with the advice and perspective of fifty-plus years of life experience.

That blend of youthful curiosity and adult reflection is what gives Merged by Magic its distinctive voice. Tolen explained how his own experiences and observations shaped not just Artie, but the friends, family, and even antagonists who populate the book.

BT: A lot of the characters are inspired by real people I knew. Maybe not directly, but drawn from life. Some from friends, some from kids I grew up around. Like any good story, you exaggerate certain traits to move the plot, but grounding them in real experience makes them relatable.

The relatability was something we noticed, too, while reading the book: characters who feel universal, even when they’re facing magical or otherworldly challenges.

From there, the discussion turned to craft—how to juggle not just multiple characters, but multiple voices living inside the same head. Tolen described the careful work of making each voice distinct, from italicized internal conversations to the sailor-mouthed personality of Artie’s mother.

And of course, every good story needs an antagonist. Tolen revealed that for him, villains are never just “evil for the sake of evil.” They are shaped by shades of gray—an idea that feels true to life, and true to adolescence itself.

BT: The biggest challenge with villains is making them feel real. There’s no pure black and white in the world, but a lot of gray. Artie has to wrestle with that, just as all of us do.

Tolen’s willingness to explore moral complexity makes Merged by Magic stand apart from many typical fantasy stories. While Artie faces the usual schoolyard bullies, the real villain is something far larger: the ominous consequences of magic itself, carried into his life by Uther. It’s not a world of clean-cut good and evil, but a murky, complicated universe where choices matter... and where mistakes have lasting consequences.

EB: So your book ends on a cliffhanger, leaving readers wanting more. This must be the first part of a series? 

BT: Yeah, I’ve outlined five books in the series. The second one’s about halfway done, and I’m hoping to finish it next year.

Even as he spoke about the future of the series, Tolen was quick to return to the theme of growth—his own, his characters’, and his readers’.

EB: How do your characters grow throughout this first book?

BT: They grow a lot. People sometimes ask why the kids are so young, between eleven and fifteen. But I think it’s important for kids to see that people grow at different rates. Some grow faster, some slower. That’s part of what I wanted to capture.

It’s a theme that feels both nostalgic and timeless. Tolen recalled growing up with two brothers, each maturing at their own pace, and how those observations filtered into his characters’ arcs. “I wanted to write the kind of book my twelve-year-old self, sitting in that library for summers on end, would not only enjoy, but learn from,” he explained.

Writing, of course, didn’t come easily. Tolen admitted that capturing the voices of characters very different from himself, especially younger females, or from backgrounds unlike his own, was one of his biggest challenges. Fortunately, he didn’t face it alone.

BT: I was lucky to have a wonderful story editor who was critical in shaping those perspectives. Honestly, I dedicated the book to her, she is my editor and wife who deserves credit for putting up with my long hours of rewriting.

Rewriting was no small task. Tolen chuckled when asked how many drafts he went through. “Dozens,” he admitted, describing folders full of different versions, stored in multiple places just in case. The process took four years, truly, as his interviewer put it, a labor of love.

When the conversation turned to the book’s sensitive themes—ethics, boundaries, and relationships—Tolen grew more reflective. He spoke about the responsibility of writing for young adults, particularly when it came to questions of respect, morality, and the messy realities of adolescence.

 

BT: There are no guidelines for what these characters are going through, so they have to come up with their own. That’s important, especially for young readers, to see characters figuring out how to set ethical boundaries before they cross a line they can’t uncross.

It’s that attention to nuance that makes Merged by Magic resonate with readers of various ages. Beneath the wizardry and fantasy, the story is a mirror of the real struggles we all face growing up: how to treat others, how to make choices, how to live with the consequences.

Of course, not every reader interprets the book the same way, and Tolen is the first to admit that.

EB: Do you read your reviews? How do you handle feedback and criticism?

BT: I do. It’s hard not to. Some say you shouldn’t respond at all, that your job is just to write the next book. And I think there’s truth in that. But I also read reviews because they help me understand different perspectives I couldn’t have anticipated.

While some feedback has critiqued the pacing or the age of his characters, Tolen takes it in stride. A young-adult librarian even guided him to ensure the book stayed true to YA standards. “Not everyone grows at the same pace,” he reflected. “I wanted to capture that reality.”

The discussion then drifted into Tolen’s influences. He named authors like Piers Anthony, Orson Scott Card, and Stephen King, alongside an unexpected but profound source: his years of reading the Bible cover to cover. For him, drawing from a wide range of texts—sacred and secular, serious and playful—has helped him explore humanity from multiple angles.

BT: Reading widely gives you a broad base of understanding. You can draw from that to shape characters, story arcs, even styles of writing.

As the interview wound down, we asked Tolen what he hoped readers would take away from Merged by Magic. His answer was simple, but heartfelt.

BT: I wrote it for my twelve-year-old self. I hope readers see Artie, Uther, and Arthur’s conversations as a model, whether it’s talking through a problem in your own head, or with trusted friends. It’s about ethics, about trying to do the right thing even in difficult situations.

That sense of responsibility, mixed with imagination and wonder, is what carries the story forward, and what will undoubtedly shape the series as it unfolds.

Looking ahead, Tolen is already deep into the second book, which expands Artie’s world into something larger, stranger, and more dangerous. “At some point,” he said, “we all have responsibilities thrust upon us, whether we’re ready or not. The question is how we meet them.”

It’s a sentiment that could have come straight from Gandalf himself… and one that perfectly captures the spirit of both Benjamin Tolen and his magical debut.

You can find more information about “Merged By Magic: A Meeting of Minds” at http://mergedbymagic.com/


“Have you Herd-” Is a new feature for interviews with creators, authors, artists, and technologists Eight Buffalo Media Group is working with. Please check our blog for future posts.