Basically, genre is a very useful guideline for grouping together novels that share certain characteristics, but I think it can also be a trap–what Ursula Le Guin and many others referred to as the ghetto. It tends to create books that are in dialogue with nothing else but genre: and, again, dialogue is a good thing, and a terrific way to create new literature; but it’s not the only one.
The research is simple. I pick up phone and call a physicist. Or whomever. I don’t trust myself to do my own research because I don’t have the background. I should mention that, across thirty years, I’ve made countless calls, often to strangers who just happened to be at the office, say, in the Lowell Observatory.
I worked for thirteen years, failed to sell four novels, wrote short stories for a while after I gave up on novels, and eventually got up the guts to write more novels. My fifth and sixth novels were the ones that sold. The common thread through all of that is that I like the act of writing.
This historical horror story follows Kenneth Lockwood, a Lieutenant in the British colonial armed forces, marching from Nigeria to East Africa during World War II as he comes face to face with the horrors of colonization and war. A free eBook.
Laurie Stevens is the author of the multi-award winning Gabriel McRay suspense series and The Return, a new sci-fi/fantasy that pits AI against human consciousness.
