Interview

Interview with ELIZABETH BEAR

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BearE-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Elizabeth Bear?

Elizabeth Bear is totally not Spartacus, or the Batman. Unequivocally.

I am, however, a third-generation science fiction reader, a pretty decent cook, and a Hugo-award-winning writer.

Your latest novel, Ancestral Night, is due to be published by Gollancz in March. It looks really cool: How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

Ancestral Night is the story of Haimey Dz, a hardscrabble salvage operator who uncovers evidence of a tremendous crime and a powerful ancient technology. In so doing, she becomes a target for all sorts of interested parties with uses for this information, or the desire to suppress it.

It is indeed part of a series — first in the series, in fact–but each of the books is meant to stand alone. I’m currently at work on the second book, Machine. Continue reading →

Interview with HOWARD ANDREW JONES

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JonesHA-AuthorPicWelcome back to CR! It’s been quite some time since we last interviewed you (2011!), so let’s start with an introduction for new readers: Who is Howard Andrew Jones?

When I’m not writing, I’m editing, and if I’m not editing I might be feeding our horses or repairing the horse fence, or reading, or playing solitaire tactical board games, or running a tabletop role-playing game, or cleaning the house, which unfortunately seems to be the spare time activity that gets the most spare time! I’ve been happily married to the same wonderful lady since 1991, and we have two kids in college, one about ready to graduate. I’ve been a TV cameraman and a recycling consultant and a technical book editor and a magazine editor and an adjunct professor of English. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed teaching, and if I hadn’t gotten that first publishing contract I might have gone back to school for my Ph.D.

I’m a fairly competent piano player, but don’t get much time to play anymore. I used to gig around in rock bands in high school and college, and picked up a little guitar skill as well, although I’m only good enough to strum accompaniment for singalongs. I hold a second degree black belt in Shotokan karate and am studying for my third. I have a deep love of ancient history and have long been fascinated with the Abbasid Caliphate and Hannibal of Carthage. Continue reading →

Quick Chat with EVIE MANIERI

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ManieriE-AuthorPicWelcome back to CR! It’s been a little while, so let’s start with an introduction for newer readers: Who is Evie Manieri?

Besides being the author of the (now complete!) Shattered Kingdoms trilogy, I’m a New Yorker, a UX designer, a mom, a knitter, and a classic film buff.

Your latest novel, Strife’s Bane, will be published in the UK by Jo Fletcher Books in paperback later this month. It’s the final book in your Shattered Kingdom series: how would you introduce the series to new readers, and what can fans expect from this novel?

The series is centered around the conflict between the Shadar, a tiny desert kingdom with a strategic natural resource, and the Norland Empire who have conquered and enslaved them. All of the books in the series take place within the same timeframe: Strife’s Bane picks up the story just a few weeks after the events of Fortune’s Blight. Strife’s Bane specifically is about the struggle of the Shadari to hold on to the freedom they’ve finally won from the Norlanders, while the person who engineered all of their misfortunes — one of their own — comes back to collect on her investment. Continue reading →

Interview with JAMES BRABAZON

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BrabazonJ-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is James Brabazon?

I’m an author, journalist and documentary filmmaker. I live in the UK, and I’ve travelled a lot for work — 72 countries and counting — investigating, filming and directing in the world’s most hostile environments. When I’m not writing I oversee the security protocols for high risk deployments on behalf of the UK broadcaster Channel 4.

Your new novel, The Break Line, was recently published by Berkley. It looks really interesting.

Thank you!

How would you introduce it to a potential reader?

The Break Line is a thriller that follows the adventures of the Irish spy-assassin Max McLean – a completely deniable, off-the-books operator who works for the British Government. After more than two decades of loyal service Max is given a target he decides not to kill. The consequences of that decision take him on an adrenaline fuelled operation to Sierra Leone in West Africa where he uncovers a sinister plot to bring the West to its knees. Trouble is, the bad guys are a lot closer to home than Max could ever have imagined possible… Continue reading →

Interview with GEORGE MANN

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manng-authorpicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is George Mann?

Hello! I’m a novelist and scriptwriter, based in the East Midlands, and I’ve been writing professionally for over ten years now. I’m a former publisher and, before that, a bookseller, so I’ve always been lucky enough to work with books.

Your next novel, The Revenant Express, will be published by Titan in February. The fifth book in your Newbury & Hobbes series, it also marks the 10th anniversary of the series. Congratulations! How would you introduce the novel and series to a potential reader?

Thanks! The Newbury & Hobbes series is very close to my heart. I see it as a Victorian Fantasy/Mystery series, with a little dash of the occult. Anyone who likes the idea of a lovechild of Steed & Peel from the Avengers, Hammer Horror, Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Who should find something to enjoy in the stories! Continue reading →

Interview with HANNA JAMESON

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JamesonH-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Hanna Jameson?

I’m a writer. 28. University dropout and current history student. I’ve written four books and lost an award for one of them! I like bourbon, true crime, and ghost stories.

Your latest novel, The Last, was recently published by Viking in the UK. It looks really interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader?

The Last is a murder mystery set in the months immediately following nuclear war, narrated by an American academic stranded in a remote hotel in Switzerland.

What inspired you to write the novel? And where do you draw your inspiration from in general?

I was inspired to write The Last by a few things, as novels are generally the product of several disparate ideas falling together rather than the outcome of one event. I was inspired by the hellish state of discourse following the 2016 US election, nuclear war jokes on Twitter, a historian friend of mine telling me about a long commute between different US states that got me thinking about the theme of displacement, J.G. Ballard, Stephen King, a curious true crime case in LA where the body of a girl was found in a rooftop water tank of what was then The Cecil Hotel. I also frequently draw inspiration from my own rage, despair, and sadness. Continue reading →

Interview with JUSTIN CALL

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CallJ-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Justin Call?

Justin Call – creator, storyteller, teacher, and analyst.

Actually, I’m not an analyst, but I spend more time analyzing things in a typical day than most analysts probably do in a week. I can’t help it. I analyze people, places, stories, games, social situations, and anything else that strikes my fancy. As a professional, I also write books, design and publish board games, and teach English to kids in China. I’m also a stay-at-home dad, and juggling the aforementioned jobs while watching my kiddos can be difficult (but rewarding).

Your debut novel, Master of Sorrows, is due to be published by Gollancz in February 2019. It looks really interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

It is interesting. Master of Sorrows is the first book in a tetralogy called The Silent Gods. The premise of the series is best phrased in the form of a rhetorical question (which, incidentally, is how I usually pitch the book to folks): ‘What if the prophesied hero were actually the reincarnation of an evil god? Would he save the world… or destroy it?’ If readers think long enough about that question, they’ll discover a lot of interesting themes that keep reappearing in the series such as ‘the nature of evil’ and the concept of the ‘monstrous other.’ Continue reading →

Interview with ADAM SCOVELL

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ScovellA-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Adam Scovell?

I’m a writer and filmmaker from Merseyside now living in South London. I’m a Doctor of music but I’m more known for writing about film and literature, as well as sometimes making short films on super-8 when money is available.

Your new novel, Mothlight, will be published by Influx Press in February. It looks rather intriguing: How would you introduce it to a potential reader?

I’d say Mothlight is an unusual story of obsession where a narrator’s mania is told through photographs and ghosts. It’s an analogue haunting where avoidance of the present becomes an addiction, even a compulsion, and where a sense of the self becomes porous and unstable. Continue reading →

Interview with WAYNE HOLLOWAY

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hollowayw-authorpicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Wayne Holloway?

I am a writer/director working in commercials, content and film/TV, based in London. I have spent a lot of time working in LA over the years. Have been writing fiction for the past five years, inspired in some ways by a job that has taken me around the world and back. To try and write beyond what I know biographically, but starting there, with things I have seen and heard and the people I have met, whether in life, other fiction or history…

Your new novel, Bindlestiff, was recently published by Influx Press. It looks really intriguing: How would you introduce it to a potential reader?

Bindlestiff is inspired in part by a screenplay I wrote for Forest Whittaker about 8 years ago, which never got made. So it is in part a satire on Hollywood, but no easy send up, a more tragic take on how we are all, to a larger or lesser degree (from viewer, to producer, to writer, to director, to actor, etc.), complicit in the system and the products it makes. I would say this frames the story, which, to put it simply, focuses on the escape act made by the characters in an unmade screenplay into prose. To be more precise the novel is about the relationship between these characters and the system of cultural production as it pertains to Hollywood and probably elsewhere, but here quintessentially. Continue reading →

Interview with STEPHEN COX

Civilian Reader Interview

CoxS-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Stephen Cox?

Born in America of British parents, I spent nearly all my childhood in Bristol, and I’m now an adoptive Londoner.  I have a partner and two teenage children. I’m a professional communicator, a science PhD dropout, a recovering poet, and a Quaker.

Under all those nouns are verbs.

I remember walking in the garden when I was small, telling myself stories.

Your debut novel, Our Child of the Stars, was recently published by Jo Fletcher Books. It looks really interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

It’s the Sixties, small town USA, the year of Woodstock and the moon landings. A childless couple, Gene and Molly, in the middle of a disaster, adopt a strange little boy, Cory, knowing they must hide him from the whole world to keep him safe.  It’s closely about family life and unselfish love, and also, shows the big struggles for peace and change, and how decency flourishes in unexpected places. Continue reading →