D'Orc, by Brett Bean

(You can also read this review in Spanish/También puedes leer esta reseña en español)

D'Orc, written and illustrated by Brett Bean and colored by Jean-François Beaulieu, is one of this year's surprises in the comic book world. Issue #1 of this new Image series sold like hotcakes and began commanding very high prices on the secondary market. I admit it piqued my curiosity, but since the premise didn't really appeal to me, I didn't pay it much attention. However, the title kept making noise and receiving good reviews, so I finally decided to give it a try, something I'm quite glad about, because I liked it a lot. 

The protagonist of the story, also named D'Orc, is half-dwarf and half-orc (hence the name) and finds himself caught in the middle of a deeply entrenched war between the sides of light and darkness. Hated by both factions, D'Orc only wants to be left alone, figure out his origins, and uncover how much truth there is to the prophecy claiming he is destined to destroy the world. 

The tone of D'Orc is distinctly humorous. It reminds me quite a bit of I Hate Fairyland by Skottie Young and Beaulieu himself, but it is even funnier than that (or, at least, it made me laugh more). The pacing gives the reader no respite, and these first five issues collected in the volume I read are over in a flash. Despite this, the plot builds up little by little and leaves us in a rather interesting spot (and wanting to read more) at the end of this trade. 

Without a doubt, what I liked the most are the two characters that accompany the protagonist: the evil shield and the ghost chicken (I don't want to give away too much, because discovering them is part of the fun of reading it, but I assume those names alone have already caught your attention). The dynamic between the three characters is extremely fun, and some of the dialogues are truly hilarious. 

For its part, the artwork more than fulfills its purpose, and in a series with such a lighthearted tone as this one, the cartoonish style is a perfect fit. As I mentioned above, if you've read I Hate Fairyland, I'm sure you know exactly what I mean. 

While it isn't a series destined to change the comic book world, D'Orc is a highly recommended read, especially if you're looking to have a good time and a few laughs. I started it without high expectations and was very pleasantly surprised, so I'll try to get my hands on the next volumes to continue following the adventures of these three crazy characters.

Leticia Lara interviews Gareth Hanrahan, author of The Gutter Prayer

I am very happy for having the opportunity of publishing this interview of Leticia Lara with Gareth Hanrahan, author of The Gutter Prayer, one the most interesting fantasy novels that has been published so far in 2019. Hope you enjoy it, and remember that you can read the interview translated into Spanish at Leticia's essential blog, Fantástica Ficción.  

Leticia Lara: We met at Dublin at the Worldcon. Do you usually go to these conventions? What do you think about them? 

Gareth Hanrahan: I go to a lot of gaming conventions, which are very similar but aren’t quite the same thing. The Dublin Worldcon was my first fantasy/sci-fi con in a very, very long time. Conventions can be wonderful experiences if you approach them in the right state of mind, or once you make the right group of friends; there are some conventions that are like annual reunions, and I look forward to them all year. 

LL: You used to work as a game designer and now you are writing novels. Which are the common points (if any) in both worlds? 

GH: I still work as a game designer – my day job is still making up stuff about elves and vampires. There’s a host of common elements; they’re both modes of storytelling, both involve shaping character and backstory and plot to create an emotional experience. The difference is where that shaping happens – a novel is more-or-less fully formed when the reader encounters it, whereas a game only comes alive at the table. 

The biggest difference, I find, is open-endedness. A novel needs to drive towards a conclusion; games, by contrast, tend towards sprawling or even meandering plots and don’t always have a conclusion at all – and where they do, it’s more of a capstone than a carefully planned and foreshadowed conclusion. 

LL: What is your favourite RPG? What do you like best: being the master or being a player?

GH: I don’t really have a favourite RPG – I mean, if you held a gun to my head and said ‘choose’, I’d probably blurt out ‘Call of Cthulhu’, but there are so many games I adore. Dungeons and Dragons, Nobilis, Night’s Black Agents, The One Ring, Unknown Armies… Right now, I’m playing in a Warhammer Fantasy campaign and about to start running a Yellow King game…

I prefer running games, in general, but it’s a good idea to see the game from the other side of the GM screen, too. It keeps you humble…

LL: Does your background as a role player help you while writing fantasy?

GH: Yes, immensely – up to a point. Certainly, a lot of the tools and techniques are hugely useful, especially for world-building and small-scale plotting, for making the fictional world coherent and plausible within its own crazy rules. There are a few places where my instincts as a roleplayer and game designer clash with what works in novel writing and I’ve had to unlearn some lessons, but overall it’s been very helpful.

LL: What can you tell us about your ENnie awards? 

GH: The ENnie awards are one of the big awards in tabletop gaming. I’ve picked up a few, most notably for a project I co-wrote with Kenneth Hite (and, technically, with Bram Stoker) called the Dracula Dossier. We turned the novel Dracula into a game supplement, revealing its secret history as an after-action report written by British Intelligence after their failed attempt to recruit a vampire. We filled it with annotations, added characters, and connected it all into an epic campaign of modern-day espionage and horror. That pretty much swept the awards in the year it was released, which was incredibly gratifying. 

LL: What would be your sales pitch for The Gutter Prayer? Who is your favourite character from this book? 

GH: In a city of alchemists and strange gods, three thieves stumble upon the fantasy equivalent of the Manhattan Project – and, not understanding what they’ve found, try to use it to overthrow the corrupt master of the thieves’ guild. Many things explode or get stabbed. 

My favourite character… hmm. Weirdly, I’m very fond of Effro Kelkin, who’s a comparatively minor character. He’s an ambitious and cranky old politician who used to rule the city before he was forced out by the alchemists. I’m a big fan of political intrigue and double-dealing, so it was nice to be able to indulge in that on the sidelines of the fantasy carnage.

LL: Can you tell us something about your new book, The Shadow Saint? 

GH: The Shadow Saint is the sequel to The Gutter Prayer, set about a year later. The city of Guerdon’s recovering from the events of the first novel, and new factions and powers are moving into the wreckage. The story follows the efforts of two of these factions – the warring powers of the necromancers of Haith, and the fanatical followers of the mad gods of Ishmere – to seize control of Guerdon, as well as those caught in the middle of their intrigues. 

LL: Have you been contacted by a Spanish publisher interested in your work? 

GH: I don’t believe so – at least, I haven’t heard of any offer. The Russian and Turkish rights have been purchased, but that’s all so far. I’d love for it to be translated into Spanish – there are some Spanish fans and bloggers who’ve really enjoyed the book, and it’d be nice for it to have a wider audience there.

LL: Is there anything else you would like to comment? What can you tell us about your new projects?

GH: I’ve just finished up writing some of the dialogue for the Paranoia: Happiness is Mandatory computer game. My Night’s Black Agents: Solo Ops game – a game for one player and one Game Moderator, think Jason Bourne vs Dracula – just came out, as did Hideous Creatures: A Bestiary of the Cthulhu Mythos. I’m in the middle of working on a campaign for the One Ring RPG entitled Errantries of the King, which is set in Gondor in the years before the War of the Ring. Oh, and I’m working on another novel…

Leticia Lara interviews Emma Newman

I have the distinct pleasure of publishing Leticia Lara's interview with the great science fiction and fantasy author Emma Newman. You can also read the interview translated into Spanish at Leticia's blog, Fantástica Ficción. Hope you enjoy it!

Leticia Lara: If you are able to, would you mind letting us know if you've ever been contacted by a Spanish publishing company to publish your books in translation? What would be your sales pitch for your Split Worlds Series in Spain? 

Emma Newman: I have not been approached regarding a Spanish translation of The Split Worlds series. If I were able to pitch it to a publisher there, I think I’d say;

The Split Worlds is a completed urban fantasy series filled with mad sorcerers, evil faeries and feuding dynastic families vying for power. It explores personal freedom, social responsibility and the way that patriarchy can destroy the lives of both men and women. It also has a talking gargoyle and a kickass feminist heroine.

Leticia Lara: You write fantasy and science fiction. Which genre do you prefer to write? Do you use a different approach with each one?

Emma Newman: I don’t think I have a preference; for me the story-telling is the most important thing, rather than the genre that story happens to be in. I love different things about both. In science-fiction I really enjoy looking at current technology and thinking about how it could develop into the future, and how those changes impact upon the human experience.

When I write fantasy (and I have only written urban fantasy so far), I enjoy thinking about how magic influences power structures and the impact that would have on society and everyday life.

Leticia Lara: You are well-known as a writer and also as a reader of audiobooks. Is it very different to perform your own audiobooks in contrast with those written by other authors? 

Emma Newman: When I narrate my own books there is very little prep to do beforehand! I already know the story and the characters, and which accents are required to perform it. I love having the opportunity to perform my own work, as it means I can portray the characters exactly as I imagined them.

When I narrate books written by other authors, there is a lot of work before I even get to the studio. I read the book through, making notes about what happens in each chapter, and detailed notes about all of the characters. I look out for words that I am not sure how to pronounce and highlight dialogue that needs to be read in different accents. If there are characters who speak in accents that I am not able to perform, I need to acquire that skill. That can be a lot of work.

I enjoy audiobook narration very much, as it is challenging and interesting work. It’s like stepping inside the book. It is also very tiring!

Leticia Lara: Do you read your sentences aloud while you are writing to have an idea of how it will sound as an audiobook?

Emma Newman: I always read my work aloud as a fundamental part of my writing process. I think it is the best way to smooth the prose, and to get a sense of whether the dialogue sounds realistic. Sometimes the things characters say seem good on the page, but then when you read it aloud, you realise that no-one really speaks like that in real life!

Leticia Lara: In a recent newsletter, you told us that you were thinking about self-publishing new instalments of the Industrial Magic series. What can you tell us about this?

Emma Newman: That’s the plan! At the moment I am focusing on producing audiobook versions of the first two novellas (which were published by Tor.com), which I’m doing in partnership with the recording studio where I do most of my narration work. Once those are done and released, I’ll be writing the next novella in the series and plan to publish it later in the year.

Leticia Lara: I have eagerly read the three published books in the Planetfall Universe series. They are so different from one another but they also share some characteristics. How did you plan the series to develop this way?

Emma Newman: To be honest, I never planned a series at all! When I wrote Planetfall, I knew it was a stand-alone novel, and I had no idea if anyone would want to publish it. When Ace/Roc bought it, they asked for a second novel. I had some vague ideas about a baby left behind by one of the colonists in Planetfall, and I wanted to explore what the Earth they left behind was like. 

Planetfall was such a success that two more novels were bought, and by that point I’d had an idea for a psychological thriller set on Mars, and once that was written, I knew what I wanted to explore in Atlas Alone. As they are all set in the same universe, it made sense to have connections between the books in the form of common characters, and for important events to have ripples that affect all of them. It’s been a lot of fun tying the books together in a shared universe, but having the freedom to write stand-alone novels. 

Leticia Lara: Many of the characters in the Planetfall Universe series struggle with mental disorders (anxiety, depression…). I was specially touched by the postnatal depression in Before Mars. How did you manage to write such complex personalities with these problems?

Emma Newman: It’s a combination of drawing upon personal experience and doing a lot of research. I was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder many years ago, and while it is not the same mental illness as Ren has (the protagonist in Planetfall), there is enough of an overlap that I can write about common elements with authenticity. There’s a scene where she has a panic attack that many people have commented on as being hard to read, as it is so realistic because I wrote what I have experienced myself. As for the other aspects of Ren’s illness, writing those needed research and empathy.

I also suffered from post-natal depression, so again could draw upon my own memories of that time when I wrote Before Mars. That was really tough, actually.

Leticia Lara: In After Atlas we can see some of the problems that continued surveillance and the loss of privacy can cause in a society as well as the power of gigantic corporations. Were you trying to write a “cautionary tale”?

Emma Newman: That was certainly on my mind, although the thing that I was really concerned about at the time of building the world of After Atlas was the TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) deal that looked like it might be agreed at the time. I was really worried about how that could have given corporations the power to sue governments, and in the historical timeline of the Planetfall novels, the TTIP was agreed and corporations used that power to cripple governments financially so they could effectively commit a coup and take over all aspects of society, leading to the ‘gov-corps’ of After Atlas.

Thankfully the TTIP didn’t get through in the real world, but things have become worse since then in other ways. My novels are political, as science-fiction always has been. I do want people to look critically at the way things are now, and writing about how things could be if they carry on in this way, is my way of drawing attention to them.

Leticia Lara: There is a lot of expectation about your next novel, Atlas Alone. As the “end?” of the Planetfall Universe series (so to speak), what can we know about the book?

Emma Newman: I don’t see it as the end of the series, as I’d like to write two more novels set in that universe, but I may take a little break from the series before I do.

The protagonist of Atlas Alone is Dee, Carlos’s best friend from After Atlas. It follows on six months after the end of that novel. It’s all about recovering from trauma, immersive gaming and revenge.

Leticia Lara: Do you like going to literature festivals like Worldcons? What do you prefer to do in these places?

Emma Newman: I do! I have been to several Worldcons and am looking forward to the one in Dublin this year. 

As someone who finds crowds difficult, and who is quite shy, I do find them hard work, but worth it. I have many friends that I only get to see at these events, so it is lovely to catch up with them, and also with industry professionals like my editors and my agent. 

I like to keep busy at them if I can, and am always very pleased to get on the program, as I see those events as a way of giving back to the community. Whenever I can, I run my workshop on writing and anxiety, which lots of people have found helpful. It’s also wonderful meeting people who like my work.

Leticia Lara: What can you tell us about your new projects?

Emma Newman: I have started to write regular short stories set in the Planetfall universe for my newsletter subscribers, which I am really enjoying. 

I recently took up painting, and to my surprise, have sold some of my first ones! I have my first exhibition coming up at a UK convention which is so exciting.

As for my next novel, well, I can’t quite say what that is yet, as I am waiting for some news. But whatever happens, I do plan to write more Industrial Magic novellas and I’m also planning a new YouTube offering. I will certainly be busy!

Leticia Lara interviews Adrian Tchaikovsky

Leticia Lara has interviewed science fiction and fantasy author Adrian Tchaikovsky and has been so kind as to letting us publish the English version here, on Sense of Wonder. Remember that you can read the translation into Spanish at Leticia's wonderful blog, Fantástica Ficción. Enjoy!

Leticia Lara: Your novel Children of Time has been published in Spain as Herederos del tiempo and in the future we will also see Spiderlight translated. What do you think about getting published in our country? Can you tell us something about the translation process?   

Adrian Tchaikovsky: I’m absolutely delighted that I’m now published in Spanish, and it’s especially nice to see Spiderlight get the attention. I visited Spain for the Celsius festival a few years back and was delighted by the enthusiasm and energy of the fantasy fans there, and I’ve been desperate to get into print in Spanish ever since.

LL: Recently, you have announced the beginning of your new career as a full-time writer. How did you manage to write so much while still working as a lawyer? Have you noticed any difference in the way you write now?

AT: I think my natural writing style tends to be fairly economical – I don’t do a lot of multiple drafts or re-writing, but try to get things as prepared as possible before I embark on a book, meaning, hopefully, I can use my time efficiently. I am also lucky enough to write well late in the evening.

LL: This year you are going to publish three books (that we know of…): Cage of Souls, Children of Ruin and Walking to Aldebaraan. (Seriously, when did you invent the time-travel machine?). Maybe the most waited-for is the sequel to Children of Time but... what can you tell us about the three of them?

So Children of Ruin is indeed the sequel to Children of Time, and picks up from the hook in the very last epilogue chapter of that book, with the expedition to another terraforming site. Cage of Souls is a very different book – and the write-up on Amazon that my editor provided is probably a better pitch for it than anything I could do, but it’s a book set in the far future when the world is simultaneously dying and erupting with new life. The hero is a political dissenter sent to a prison out in the hostile jungles, and from there he gets to watch his world fall apart. Plus lots of monsters and some duels and murders. Walking to Aldabaraan is a novella about an astronaut who is sent as part of a team to investigate a bizarre alien object out around the orbit of Pluto, and who gets lost inside its impossible interior, which defies time and space. He’s trying to get home but he’s beginning to understand that if he does, neither his home nor himself may be the same as they were.

LL: Some of your books have an audiobook version. For example, Guns of the Dawn was performed by the wonderful Emma Newman. What do you think about this way of reading?

AT: I have become a big fan of audiobooks myself, and I’ve been very lucky that everyone picked to read one of mine has done a really good job of it. Audiobooks for me are a great way to re-experience books that I’ve read on paper because the narrator’s voice adds so much additional context.

LL: Are spiders your “trademark” as a writer? They seem to appear in different ways in a lot of your books. 

AT: I am very fond of spiders, although I’m also fond of arthropods in general, plus octopuses, reptiles and just about anything else that most people don’t like. Spiders have proved to be a particularly useful tool to write about because, of all Creatures, they are probably the most despised by most people. Hence if you want shorthand for an outsider or something inhuman, spiders are a Good bet.

LL: In Spiderlight you take the preconceptions readers may have about the classic D&D partyRedemption's Blade the story starts at an unusual point: the Big Bad Guy has been already defeated and the characters try to find a sense of purpose. These are very far from what one usually expects about this genre. What are you trying to achieve by introducing these changes into a classic fantasy story?
and you twist them with the introduction of a wild card. In

AT: Well, first off, the regular way of telling epic fantasy stories – Good defeats evil in a big fight – has been done a lot, and the one thing I do feel I have to try for is originality. Hence I love fantasy stories, but I want to give them my own spin. Also traditional fantasy (at least the post-Tolkien wave of the 80’s and 90’s, say) had many Works that didn’t really examine the implications of the worlds they were setting up – characterising everything as Good or evil means that Good gets to slaughter evil without remorse, and in both Spiderlight and Redemption’s Blade I really wanted to deconstruct this genre tradition and challenge it a bit. 

LL: Dogs of War and Ironclads are two novellas set on a near future. Both present to the reader possible problems of warfare-applied technology. However, Children of Time is set in the far future, Earth is not a relevant scenario and the spotlight is shared between a ragtag assortment Humanity's leftovers and a brand new species and its evolutionary road. What kind of science fiction do you like the best to write? 

(NOTE: Dogs of War is a full novel, albeit a shorter one)

AT: Honestly it’s a matter of letting the key concept of the book dictate the setting. Children of Time could only be a far future book because the spider evolution needed time to work. Ironclads and Dogs of War are both very much about the Now – our attitudes to wealth and privilege, to class and service and to the immediate future of humanity, hence if they’d been set in the far future they wouldn’t have the same impact.

LL: You've written many different books besides the previously mentioned like Guns of the Dawn a sort of Pride, Prejudice and Women at War, the Echoes of the Fall trilogy and the very impressive Shadows of the Apt (10 novel plus short stories!). At this rate, you'll end up writing on every format and about every main topic in science fiction and fantasy. Why is your range that wide?

AT: Thus far, I have stayed very much within genre, and I like to stretch myself about that far. I don’t tend to write horror (although there are some sections of some of my books that go there, a Little), I have occasionally cast looks at neighbouring genres like historical or crime/thriller, but I’m not one to assume that shifting styles like that would be easy, and I know I’d need a proper period of acclimatisation before I tried it.

LL: Maybe it is not well-known that you are a frequent boardgame player. Do you think some of your stories could be taken as a basis for developing a game? Which kind of games are your favorites?

AT: I would absolutely love to see a board game (or any game) based on my work! I’m personally something of a Eurogame player a lot of the time, and I like games that generate an emergent story just from the way the rules and player choices interact.

LL: What can you tell us about your new projects?

AT: I have just sent my agent the manuscript for a book called “The Brain Garden” (although it could be called something quite different by the time it hits the shelves) which is a great big story about parallel timelines and evolution and a whole load of other stuff. There’s also a novella I’ve just finished which is partly about wizards and partly about mental health, which was interesting to try. I’m still searching around for a title for that one.

Leticia Lara interviews Max Gladstone

Max Gladstone's Last First Snow will be soon published in Spanish as La primera y última nieve. The wonderful Leticia Lara has interviewed the author and has kindly allowed us to reproduce here the English version of the interview. Hope you enjoy it (and remember that you can read the translation into Spanish at Fantástica Ficción).

Leticia Lara: We are very happy about the publication in Spain of Last First Snow. What do you think about publishing The Craft Sequence in chronological order? Can you tell us something about the translation process?   

Max Gladstone: The Craft Sequence is a story of people living in a world that’s just passed through a century of calamitous change. In this way, the main characters of the story are a lot like us—even though some of them are wizards, some are skeletons, and some are made of stone. I wanted to tell that story the way Terry Pratchett told a story of the Discworld—by moving between different perspectives, and highlighting how many different kinds of stories the world might hold. So, while I wrote the series out of chronological order, I meant for them to be read in an order the reader might choose. (Though there are some orders that might make a little more sense than others.) It’s exciting to see how the tale strikes readers who pick it up at (or close to) the “beginning”! Though as we all know, there are neither beginnings nor endings on the Wheel of Time…

I haven’t been heavily involved in the Spanish translation process, though I have been available to answer any questions people have raised.

LL: It is said the narrative in books and in videogames is very different. How did you manage to write not one but two videogames in the Craft Sequence?   

MG: With a bit of sweat and a lot of typing! Videogame narrative and traditional linear storytelling have a lot in common, to be honest. In each scene, you need to find out what the character wants, in response to external conditions. That choice shows you who the character is, and brings them into conflict with their surroundings in interesting ways. In linear narrative, the writer controls the character, and the reader’s free to speculate about what the characters’ choices mean—why did she kiss her friend, rather than hug her or slap her on the back? In an interactive story, you have to give the players opportunities to choose what they’ll do, and then follow through with what that choice might mean. Games might seem to offer free will, but it’s free will within specific bounds, and the designers have accounted for (most) of the possibilities. So, is the will free? That’s a question for theology, I suppose. I loved the challenge of letting readers forge their own place in the Craft Sequence. 

LL: What can you tell us about your collaboration with Amal El-Mohtar in This Is How You Lose the Time War? Did you write each part on your own or was it written in a more complex way?   

MG: The main characters of This Is How You Lose the Time War are Red and Blue, secret agents on opposite sides of a war in time. They’re enemies at first, fighting battles throughout history; they start writing letters to one another as a form of dare or taunt, but as their dangerous correspondence deepens they realize they have a great deal in common—both warriors in the depths of the war. Amal and I each wrote one of the characters, and their letters, the stories weaving together as we worked. For most of the writing we were right across a desk from one another. It was an electric process!

LL: Empress of Forever is coming out in 2019. It is described as science-fiction story, "a feminist Guardians of the Galaxy crossed with Star Wars". But my favorite part is when it is compared with Iain M. Banks books. Is it a tribute to his figure or is it a subtler influence in your writing?   

MG: I love Banks! I’m a huge fan of his work, and I find its central question, the big “what if we win,” endlessly fascinating. What would a culture (or Culture) look like if we got more or less what we wanted, a world without material constraint? What stories would we tell? How would it interact with the rest of the universe? I think Empress of Forever takes a darker spin on that—a vision of where the power and logic of posthumanity might lead—along with a lot of love and a lot of blowing things up. I wouldn’t say I sat down to write a Banksian novel—but my admiration for his work shines through. And there’s one major hat-tip, which I won’t spoil.

LL: Last time we talked, you were a writer beginning his career and now you have a lot of novels in your account (and short stories, novelettes...). Has your writing style changed? Do you find it easier to sit and write?   

MG: Well, on a certain level writing hasn’t changed—you still have to sit or stand at the keyboard and make the words happen in order. But I think my style has changed. I outline more, since I have to write faster and also since the consequences of getting things wrong have become more dire. I used to care less about months spent chasing narrative dead ends—but now I have deadlines and those deadlines have deadlines. I feel like I owe a certain level of consistency, so I try to play around beforehand, explore dead ends in the abstract, and then dive in to build a house I know will stand on a firm foundation.

Parts of writing are a lot easier. I know that when I get 2/3 of the way through the book, I’ll experience a stab of crushing despair. Happens every time. Knowing that, I can work my way out. But on the other hand, when I sit down to write a particular scene, I find myself haunted by other versions of that scene I’ve written before. Raw composition slows down as I spend more time figuring how to do it better this time, or differently. It’s a fun balancing act.

LL: Do you like going to literature festivals like Worldcons? What do you prefer to do in these places?   

I love big literature festivals. You have such a high quality of conversation there—people from all sorts of backgrounds, all walks of life, who share an interest in books. My ideal convention is just one big rolling conversation—seeing friends, hearing new positions, encountering new artists, and learning more about what brings people together.

LL: What can you tell us about your new projects?

MG: Nowhere near as much as I’d like. I think I’m allowed to say that I’m working on a big landing for the Craft Sequence—but beyond that, my lips are sealed.

Interview with Caroline M. Yoachim

Caroline M. Yoachim is one of my favorite short fiction writers (I highly recommend her collection Seven Wonders of a Once and Future World and Other Stories), so it is a big pleasure for me to team up with Leticia Lara to interview the author. Hope you enjoy it and remember that you can read the interview translated into Spanish at Fantástica Ficción. 

Leticia Lara & Odo: When did you know you wanted to become a writer? Which authors have influenced you the most? Is there any current writer that you admire? 

Caroline M. Yoachim: I wrote fiction when I was a kid, but quit when I started college. Back then I thought writing wasn't something ordinary people did--I knew books were written by people, obviously, but I didn't know any authors, so I figured I probably couldn't do it. Several years later a friend of mine casually mentioned that he was writing a book, and it dawned on me that if he could do it, maybe I could, too!

I grew up reading a lot of classic science fiction--Asimov, Clarke, Niven. I loved the vast scale and the sense of wonder they evoked, but I never really saw myself in any of the stories. At some point I discovered Octavia Butler, who is one of my all-time favorite authors. I love her ideas and her characters.

I admire too many current writers to list them all, but a few of my favorites are: N.K. Jemisin, Ken Liu, Nalo Hopkinson, and Ted Chiang.

LL&O: Does your background in psychology help you with your writing? 

CMY: It does! I think the human mind is fascinating, and several of my story ideas are drawn from by background in Psychology. "Five Stages of Grief After the Alien Invasion" was inspired by the Kübler-Ross model, which was originally used to describe the emotions experienced by terminally ill patients. "Four Seasons in the Forest of Your Mind" incorporates detailed descriptions of neurons. I also have several stories that examine the nature of human identity-- what defines us as individuals and makes us who we are?

LL&O: Lots of your stories are about family and grieving. Has becoming a mother influenced your way of writing? 

CMY: Even before I had children, family and grieving were themes that showed up in my work. I like to explore the relationships between characters, and how those relationships change over time. Having a baby is the beginning of a new relationship, one that is initially very asymmetrical because infants begin with such a limited understanding of the world around them. But as people age, children often become caregivers for elderly parents. Dealing with the loss of a loved one is almost an extension of that focus on relationships--a way of looking at what happens when a relationship ends.

Having children didn't introduce those themes in my writing, but I do think that being a parent gives me a deeper understanding of the parent-child relationship, because I've seen it from both sides now.

LL&O: You seem quite fond of using special structures in your stories, such as the flashmash or the “choose-your-own-adventure” format. Could you explain what a flashmash is and how you use it in your work? Does writing in a particular format influence the way you create your work? Or does the topic you want to write about lead you to a particular format?

CMY: My natural tendency is to write stories that are very short: flash-length stories of around 750 words. One of the things I sometimes do to write longer stories is to write a series of interrelated flash stories, which I can then mash together into one longer story. The first flashmash story I wrote was "Five Stages of Grief After the Alien Invasion," which is a series of five flash stories, each one focusing on a different stage of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance) told from the perspective of a different character.

When I'm writing a flashmash story, the structure usually comes first, and then I generate an idea to go with it. At one point I made a long list of things that I could use to divide a story into flashmash sections, many of which have since become stories: rock, paper, scissors; four seasons; five stages of grief; seven wonders of the world.

For most of my other stories, including my recent choose-your-own adventure story, the idea comes first and then I pick a structure that I think might suit the story I want to tell.

LL&O: In addition to writing, you also practice photography. Does seeing the world through the lens of a camera change your vision of the worlds you create (making them more visual, for instance)? Do you think that all arts are somehow related and that techniques can be borrowed techniques from one to another?

CMY: I think one of the reasons I'm so strongly drawn to photography is that I am not a visual person. The visual elements of my memories tend not to be particularly vivid or clear in my mind, and so photographs are sometimes a tool for me to recall the details that are not encoded in my memories. I'm not consciously aware of any ways that being a photographer influences my writing, but I don't have any way of knowing what my writing would look like if I didn't spend so much time looking through a camera lens. I've heard people say that short stories are like snapshots, and I definitely have a tendency to write things short.

I do think there are techniques that are similar between photography and writing. Perspective, for instance. A familiar subject viewed from an unusual perspective can work well in both a photograph and a story. Framing is important, too. What are the edges of your photograph/story--where does it start and end? How much of a photograph/story should the main subject fill and how much background should there be? 

LL&O: In many of your stories you explore the idea of identity and its relationship with our body, with our physical form, referring several times to philosophical problems such as the Theseus Paradox. Do you think that science fiction and fantasy are especially suitable for exploring this kind of questions?

CMY: The ship of Theseus is my favorite philosophical paradox. For anyone not familiar with the paradox, in its basic form it asks the question: If you have a ship and replace it, one board at a time, and all through these replacements it continues to sail, is it still the same ship? What if you take the boards you remove and build a second ship with those--which ship is the true ship of Theseus?

I like the paradox even when it involves ships, but where I think it gets really interesting is when you apply it to people. If you take someone and replace every one of their cells gradually over time, are they still the same person? What do we need to change about someone before we are forced to say "this is no longer the same person" or even "this is no longer a human"?

Science fiction and fantasy are well-suited to exploring these kinds of questions, because they allow me to transform my characters in a wide variety of ways. I've had sugar characters that dissolve and re-form, characters that transition from old bodies to new ones, characters that give up their bodies entirely. My goal is often to raise questions in the reader's mind, rather than to answer them. I hope my stories encourage people to think about what it is that makes us who we are.

LL&O: You write both science fiction and fantasy, and even some horror. Do you think that, nowadays, the frontiers between genres are blurring? Is there any genre that you feel more comfortable with?

CMY: I definitely think that the boundaries between the genres can be blurred. I sometimes play around with post-apocalyptic fantasy (which ends up being somewhere in between fantasy and science fiction), and some of my darker fantasy has a horror element. That said, I'm definitely more comfortable writing science fiction and fantasy than I am with writing horror. 

LL&O: You have written humoristic stories for anthologies such as Alex Shvartman’s UFOs, for instance. Is it difficult to combine humor and science fiction?  

For a long time I assumed that I couldn't write funny stories, but at some point Alex mentioned that some of the funniest stories he gets for his UFO anthology series have come from authors who didn't think they could write humor. So I decided to try my hand at it and submit a story for UFO3. Alex ended up accepting the story for the anthology, and since then I've written a handful of other humor stories.

Combining humor and science fiction was a lot easier than I expected, but only for a small subset of story topics--taxes, dissertation research, medical clinics. Overall I don't get very many ideas that lend themselves to humor, but I do enjoy writing them. 

LL&O: What are your opinions about the situation of women and POC in genre fiction? 

CMY: I tend to be a relatively optimistic person, and I'm encouraged by things that are currently happening in genre fiction. There are stories being published now that are told from a wide range of perspectives, and it is increasingly easy for people in marginalized groups to see themselves in stories, as protagonists and heroes.

I still see a tendency for white males to be the default, and everything else to be the exception. When people make reading lists, they tend not to be balanced. Reading lists that are all male authors will be labeled "top ten SF writers of all time," but a list with all female authors will generally be called "top ten women SF writers."

So overall I think we are making progress and moving in the right direction, but there is still work to do in embracing a more diverse range of characters and voices.

LL&O: Are social networks important for your relationships with other authors and with your readers?

CMY: Absolutely! Writing can be such a solitary endeavor, and social networks are a fantastic tool for connecting both with other writers and with readers. I am friends with authors around the world, and being able to stay connected with them online is immensely valuable to me. Things like fb and twitter also let me keep readers updated on what I'm working on. The main trick with social media is finding the right balance--I think it is good to spend some time there to stay connected with the online community, but if I spend too much time online I don't get as much writing done.

LL&O: What are you working on right now? Could you give us a sneak peek on your future projects? 

CMY: My fantasy story "Carnival Nine" will be out in Beneath Ceaseless Skies later this spring--of the short stories I wrote in 2016, this one is my favorite.

I've also been writing a lot of stories for anthologies recently. I have a few where the table of contents haven't been announced yet, but one that I can tell you about is that my story "Dreams as Fragile as Glass" will appear in The Sum of Us (http://laksamedia.com/the-sum-of-us-an-anthology-for-a-cause-2/), a charity anthology featuring stories about caregivers.

LL&O: Where can our readers learn more about you and your work?

CMY: I have a website: http://carolineyoachim.com and I'm also on twitter as @CarolineYoachim

LL&O: Any other thing you'd like to add? 

CMY: Thank you for inviting me to do an interview, these were fantastic questions!

Crossroads of Canopy, by Thoraiya Dyer

(Disclaimer: English is my second language, so I want to apologize in advance for there may be mistakes in the text below. If you find any, please let me know so that I can correct it. I'd really appreciate it. Thanks.)

Review Soundtrack: I suggest reading this review while listening to Canopy, by Emancipator (Spotify, YouTube). 

I tend to think and re-think a lot what books to read (so many books, so little time!) so it is very strange for me to see just the cover and synopsis of a novel and decide, almost instantly, that I need to get it, without knowing anything about the author and without having read any review or opinion online. But that's exactly what happened to me with Crossroads of Canopy, Thoraiya's Dyer debut novel. I saw that an ARC was available at NetGalley and, impulsively, decided to request it. And it turned out that my hunch was quite right. 

The first thing that stands out from Crossroads of Canopy is the amazing and very original worldbuilding. Dyer has imagined a whole world that exists on the canopy of a huge forest, with different kingdoms, cities, gods and beasts that are a delight to discover. The magic system is also wonderful, with a lot of depth and many surprises that the author unveils drop by drop. 

The way that the author subverts some of the usual tropes in high fantasy is also very refreshing. The story has just a little bit of Campbell's monomyth, but our protagonist, Unar, is much more focused on completely changing the status quo than your average hero. In fact, there is a lot of social criticism and exploration in the novel. The world is divided in three different classes (Canopy, Understorey and Floor), something that drastically affect how people are treated and what rights they have:

"And if you desired to feel the sun, what then? If you need fresh fruits to cure a child's illness? What if you had fallen and your family remained above, and they were forced to watch while demons ate the flesh off your bones?"

"That would be my misfortune." (...)

"Why them and not us?"

"Canopians are born under the gods' protection. It's your misfortune, as I said."

"Why can they not protect everyone? Are they so weak?"

"No! That is, I don't now..."

 "One Forest," Kirrik said. "One people. That is what the Master seeks in the future. That is what we hope to achieve. We believe the gods can and should protect everyone. And if they cannot, they are not true gods, and should be killed to allow the Old Gods to return."

This, together with the original magic system, reminded me of N.K. Jemisin's The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms and The Fifth Season, where similar issues are also examined.

The characters are also perfect for this kind of atypical fantasy story. Unar, for instance, is a very compelling case of a flawed but charismatic protagonist. She has a really clear goal that, sometimes, makes her take the wrong decisions, but despite that, she can still rethink her attitude when confronted with a moral dilemma. A very intriguing and really three-dimensional character, as many of the others in the novel. I did especially like the way the gods and their servants are depicted, all of them with their quirks and unique personalities. 

The plot is also interesting, with some nice twists and unexpected turns, but I found it a bit uneven sometimes. For instance, some of the chapters that take place in Understorey felt a bit longer than necessary, while the ending was, comparatively, much more rushed. Also, although the tone is very appropriate and well-chosen, the prose was too flowery for me in places, making some scenes a bit confusing. 

In any case, and despite the pacing problems, I enjoyed Crossroads of Canopy quite a lot and I recommend reading it. Thoraiya Dyer has invented a fascinating world, full of magic, monsters, gods and intriguing characters. Also, there are many open threads and unanswered questions by the end of the book,  so I am looking forward to reading the next volume in the series to find out what happens to Unar and her friends.          

(You can also read this review in Spanish/También puedes leer esta reseña en español)

Cristina Jurado reviews Certain Dark Things and interviews Silvia Moreno-Garcia

It is an enormous pleasure to have Cristina Jurado again at Sense of Wonder. She was one of the first collaborators of this blog and she is, without a doubt, one of the most illustrious. Today, she reviews Certain Dark Things while she interviews her author, Silvia Moreno-Garcia (you can also read this post in Spanish). Hope you enjoy it!

Certain Dark Things:

Vampires and drug trafficking in an alternative Mexico

I discovered Certain Dark Things in the most unusual way. I was talking to Lavie Tidhar when he mentioned the project he was working on, The Jewish Mexican Literary Review, the magazine he publishes with Mexican-Canadian Silvia Moreno-Garcia. I had the opportunity to ask her some questions, which I’m going to share with you in this review. When I inquired about the magazine, she replied: “I call it an avant-garde zine. It’s something I run together with Lavie Tidhar. I believe he called it… maybe he said it was a punk or underground zine? It’s just something we do for fun, a compilation of prose, poetry, interviews with artists. If we were in the 90s it’s the kind of thing we would have photocopied and stapled together and given away at grungy little venues. It speaks to the rebellious little shitheads in both of us. Anyway, check it out. It’s free.”

The first thing that caught my attention from this Canadian author was the fact that she writes exclusively in English. She told me that, for the time being, writing in Spanish was not an option. “No. For two reasons. By the time I started writing seriously I had already moved to Canada. I was very far away from Mexico. It didn’t seem convenient (especially at the time, it was 2006 and many magazines were still reading manuscripts and stories that came by mail). So it only made sense to write in the local language. Plus, I really enjoy English and the challenge of handling it because it was not, it’s not my first language. I want to improve my French at some point and get it up to the same level. Anyway, so there was that. Then there is the reality that there is no one interested in my work in a Spanish speaking country. There are no speculative fiction publishers or important magazines in Mexico. I have had two stories translated into Spanish, both for anthologies edited by Federico Shaffler called Teknochtitlán. This last one can be downloaded for free online and the Arts and Culture ministry of the state of Tamaulipas sponsored it. And that’s the way it goes. There is no commercial publishing of speculative fiction. It seems to be the same in other parts of Latin America, and even in Spain. Books are translated from English to Spanish but there is very little local talent being fostered. So then the few people writing in Spanish have to turn to one of the few, small publishers or have to self-publish, which is a big commitment because if you self-publish you are having to run a small business.

 I’ve had no queries from publishers to translate my novels into Spanish, so I also don’t know there’s much interest in my work. In general, I think editorials want a sure thing in translation and whatever cool cache I’ve accumulated because my novels have had some critical acclaim (NPR best of the year list, Locus finalist, British Fantasy finalist, etc.) I don’t think that’s nearly enough to make people terribly interested in me. It is what it is, I’m lucky to have sold a few novels in any language. I have translated several stories for projects I have edited (yes, I’m an editor, too) and toyed with the idea of a magazine that translates fiction in Spanish to English, or some sort of bilingual compendium, but this would be an enormous expense. I couldn’t undertake it. Maybe one day.”

I was curious about this writer’s writings and so I read Signal to Noise, a fantasy novel about ancient magic, music, teenage years and the awakening of love. I was surprised by its rhythm and good prose. Lavie already had talked to me about Silvia’s next thing, Certain Dark Things. So, when he mentioned the word “Narcovampires” I did not stop until reading it. 

I was very curious about the genesis of this story: “The trouble with me is I don’t keep organized notes”, explains Moreno-Garcia. “Since I work a full-time job I’m often working on fiction at weird moments. So I’ll be eating a hamburger during lunch and scribble something on a napkin. There are several instances where I got home and I couldn’t read a word because it had ketchup on it. And my notes are pretty frantic, too. So I don’t recall the exact genesis of many things. Certain Dark Things grew out of a short story I sold to a vampire anthology called Evolve 2. I’ve done a bunch of vampire stories with different approaches (“Stories with Happy Endings” has a Mexican reporter interviewing a vampire, “A Handful of Earth” is about Dracula’s brides, etc.). I was born in the border zone in Mexico, right next to the US, and that’s where there’s been a lot of narco crime in the past few years so I think it grew out of that. I think it was just a way to channel my anxieties about my birth country. Vampires are a lot less menacing than criminals, than poverty, than drug addiction. But as for was there a particular moment when I said “there are gangs,” it’s just blurry. The story really began for me when Domingo sees Atl in the subway, just an image, and then come all the questions. Who are they? Where are they going? What are they thinking? Sometimes it’s an image, sometimes it’s a line, it’s the hook that gets you going.”

The way Moreno-Garcia fits fantasy into every day life in a natural and credible manner is fascinating. About this, the author says, “I write in a variety of genres, not just fantasy. It just happened that my first few novels could be called fantasy, although they tend to overlap with other categories (Certain Dark Things has been called a cyberpunkish novel). It’s more evident in my short fiction that I don’t just use one ‘language’ because I go from horror to science fiction to anything in between. I’m actually moving away from speculative fiction right now and into crime writing in the next few years. I feel an affinity for fantasy due to my childhood and my exposure to folklore and oral storytelling but it’s not my sole focus. On the other hand, I like realist fiction very much. I like character studies. I like magic realism, which blurs boundaries. And all of this means I have an interest in the mundane and the strange things you find in the mundane. Which are multiple and many.”

The author introduces the novel through the character of Domingo, a drifting youngster surviving in the streets of Mexico City. His terrible personal story has not stripped him of certain innocence, and of the capacity to perceive the positive around him. His encounter with Atl, member of the Tlähuihpochtin, a matriarchal clan of Aztec females vampires, will change his life, making him discover from within the world of vampire families that control part of the drug trafficking.

Moreno-Garcia sets the story in an alternative present in which vampires are known to the world, and in which some countries have chosen to close their borders to them. In this context vampires are a different species than humans, and while humankind considers them very dangerous because of their enhanced mental and physical capacities, vampires despise humans because of their weaknesses. I think the novel reflects about xenophobia in a bidirectional way. “I’m in general more interested in intra-community conflict and issues of class and poverty. There are some scattered thoughts about colonialism in the book, but I don’t think it’s my Big Xenophobia Book. I have a Master’s degree in Science and Technology Studies and the focus of my research was eugenic science in the early 20^th century. It’s been interesting watching the rhetoric in the US these days because a lot of that is an exact reproduction of dialogue and thoughts about racial groups, which were in vogue in the early 20^th century. I could copy and paste words from famous eugenicists of the time and you would have a hard time knowing if Trump said it or it was someone one hundred years ago. The same fears are certainly there, the same ways of wording them persist. So at some point I feel I will write a novel, which focuses on that. I have a title for it (Villautopia) and a blurry outline. There was a novel in 1919 by a Mexican writer called Eugenia, which had eugenicist themes and in that book everyone lives in Villautopia. That would be the big Xenophobia Book. But I don’t know when I would work on it. But because of my research and my general interests it is very likely that some of the stuff I was exploring and had to do with eugenics slipped into the vampire book. So you may just be seeing my subconscious more clearly than I am right now.”

The author reinvents the vampire myth, enriching it with Aztec, Mexican and other cultural traditions’ references. “I don’t like writing series. I get bored writing in the same genre, never mind the same universe. The novel was bought as a stand-alone and I doubt the publisher might be interested in a sequel, I’ve certainly heard nothing of that sort. My next few books deal with other stuff so a sequel is not in the near future. It doesn’t mean I wouldn’t write another book in that world, but right now it’s not my priority and even if I did it wouldn’t be a series. There are too many topics that interest me for me to lock myself into one. I’ve written stories which reference Prehispanic cultures before. In this case, it seemed a natural fit. Aztec thought was concerned with notions of sacrifice, blood, life, battle and renewal. I thought it made a good background element for the character of Atl.”

Each vampire family displays different abilities: some are shape-shifters, others can alter the will of those around them, there are even some who can have food or can expose themselves to sunlight, etc. In a certain way, I believe the author is able to built a more updated and less idealized version of the myth, much less romantic than some modern takes, but far more interesting. The relationship of mutual dependency between Domingo and Atl help us understand the power struggles among vampire clans, the inaction of corrupt police, and the self-interested intervention of drug cartels. This novel is an interesting canvas of the organized crime scene in big cities. Apart from having a notorious world building, this story it is an urban fantasy full of adventures and local culture references. The end seemed to me especially well chosen, the only one that could offer a closure without falling into a predictable solution. 

This novel could be interpreted as a YA book (the main characters are young, it is the story of the becoming of an age, secondary characters serve as guides or helpers…). Nevertheless, the violence and the uncompromised language makes this book, in my opinion, an adult one. 

Silvia Moreno-Garcia also shared her future plans: “My novel The Beautiful Ones is out October 2017. I call it a novel of manners with a fantasy element. My agent has my next novel on his desk. It’s called Lords of Xibalba and deals with Mayan gods in 1920s Mexico. I’m hoping he can sell that. And right now I’m one third of the way through a science fiction novella called Prime Meridian. Which I also hope to sell. And after that I’m taking a year off to do some research and reading for my next novel, which is going to be a crime book with no fantastic elements set in the 1990s.”

(You can also read this review/interview in Spanish/También puedes leer esta reseña/entrevista en español)