Zilla Novikov's Blog, page 20

Behind the Screens: Tuesday Author Interview

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Sabitha : If there’s one thing we love here at Night Beats , it’s a shared universe. The Metacosm Chronicles caught our fancy as soon as we heard about then! N.A. Soleil, can you tell us a bit about yourself and your stories?

N.: Hi! We’re N.A. Soleil, pronouns ‘they’ (because we’re two people, though one of us is nonbinary and does use ‘they’ pronouns). I’m N. and my partner is A.

We have spent over a decade and a half creating an in-depth science fantasy universe from its foundation upward. We write novels from that universe, which we’ve dubbed the Metacosm Chronicles, and we just released our debut chronicle, Everdark. The short blurb: a psionic teenager becomes entangled in an interplanetary war … while also battling her own mind.

Sabitha : What inspired you to write this book?

N.: A. and I both had … troubled childhoods. A. was abused, and I had undiagnosed AuDHD and was chronically ill. We had both separately created universes in our heads to escape. When we met and started dating in our 20s, we found that our universes were creepily similar. (A 100% true fact: we both had a space military called the Rangers headed by an eccentric female Commander. Hi, Chani.) Over the next fifteen years, we merged our universes and started creating an overarching storyline for them. Everdark is the first step of many, and pulls a lot from our experiences of being mentally ill/autistic: being tethered to a reality that everyone else understands and we don’t, what ‘identity’ is when nothing is real, the actual toll that having to constantly fight your own mind takes, and how people bond while in hell.

Sabitha : Do you have a “fan-cast” – do you have actors you’d cast as your main characters?

N.: Not a full cast, but Jackson Wang would make a perfect Tyyrulriathula (snarky but soulful elven Bladesinger), Gwendoline Christie would make a great Chani (the aforementioned Commander—buff mommy, mostly cybernetics, knows far more than she lets on), and only Tilda Swinton could ever be Ichiryu (a tyrannical Elysian with too many minds and not enough mental real estate.)

Ty from Metacosm

Sabitha : How much research did you need to do for your book?

N.: All the research! A. has ADHD and has always hyperfocused on intellectual pursuits, so the Metacosm was very much built on real and emerging science, theology, anthropology, metaphysics and quantum theory, and good ol’ ‘what if.’

Sabitha :  What’s your next writing project?

N.: We have two other books fully written and ready to be polished up for publishing, and a fourth half-written. All a part of the overarching storyline, scheduled to be released one per year in March. ‘Codename: Book 2’ will be released March 2024. While not a sequel to Everdark, it’s the next step. We are also planning a novella as a sort of prequel to Everdark, into which a Night Beats cameo would fit rather well

Sabitha: We love Night Beats cameos—please tell us if it happens because it will be an absolute joy. Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

N.: You can find us on any of your friendly neighborhood social media as MetacosmChronicles (except for … *sigh* … X … which is MetacosmSeries) or at our website. Everdark and a snazzy bookmark are available from our shop! We’re currently most active on Facebook.

Redd from Metacosm

Wrong Genre Covers

Neuromancer as a Mr. Men book was suggested by Rohan. Have a funny idea for a Wrong Genre Cover? Email us at nightbeatseu@gmail.com, and if Rachel likes your suggestion, she’ll make it in a future issue. Or @ us on basically any of the socials.

Behind the Screens: Tuesday Author Interview

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Sabitha : It’s time for a murder mystery! Claris Lam has just the thrills you’ve been looking for, with her novel Winner Takes All . Claris, can you tell us a bit about your book?

Claris: Winner Takes All is an amateur sleuth murder mystery and the first book in the Harlow Mystery series.

Aubri Harlow thinks she’s found her dream vacation after winning a contest to an exclusive island resort for a whole week. However, her dream quickly turns into a nightmare when her ex-boyfriend Colin, ex-girlfriend Renee, and former university classmate Bastian end up on the same island as fellow contest winners.

Even worse? Colin is found dead barely a day into the vacation. Terrible weather prevents the police from arriving on the island to investigate. To keep herself safe, as well as her other companions, Aubri must find out who the killer is…or risk becoming the next target.”

Sabitha : I love a good vacation-gone-wrong murder mystery! What inspired you to write this book?

Claris: I was inspired by reading several murder mysteries from various authors to write Winner Takes All. Each of the mysteries had such interesting plot twists and characters that I decided, well, why not try writing my own?

Winner Takes All was my first attempt at writing a murder mystery, let alone one involving an amateur sleuth. Despite the challenges of creating a whole mystery and putting together all the clues that would lead to revealing the criminal, it was fun. I’m glad that the final, published version of Winner Takes All was the result of those efforts.

Sabitha : Do you have any suggestions to help people in our community become a

better writer? If so, what are they?

Claris: If you want to write in a particular genre, make sure that you read a lot of books in that genre. If I didn’t read so many murder mysteries, I would have no idea what familiar plot points and storylines readers might expect in a murder mystery to begin with.

It’s only by learning what story beats and other points are familiar in a genre that you can create a story that meets those expectations. Also, by familiarizing yourself with the genre’s expected material, you can find ways to possibly change them a bit to make your writing more unique and surprising.

Sabitha : What’s your next writing project?

Claris: I am currently writing several novels in differing genres – one is another murder mystery, but I also have a few fantasy books in the works!

Sabitha : Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Claris: Links to all my socials, main website and newsletter can be found through my Carrd. And here’s the link to Winner Takes All.

Mushroom Duxelles with Cold Rising

Fiction To Sink Your Teeth Into, a feature from author and professional chef Rohan O’Duill!

This month I had the pleasure to create a recipe for my debut novel, Cold Rising, that was released last month.

Cold Rising is a science fiction novella set predominantly in the underground metropolis on Mars. The agricultural zone there grows mushrooms and fungi, so I have created a miner’s version of mushroom duxelles. This is great as a snack on some toast, but is also very versatile—you can add it to almost anything. My son loves it mixed through some pasta, for example.

Ingredients:

1 tbsp of oil1 onion diced4 cloves of garlic400g of mushroomsFresh thymeCracked pepper and sea salt100g butterBread for toast

Equipment
• Frying pan
• Blender

Directions:

You can use any edible mushrooms for this dish. I grabbed a mixed tray of wild mushrooms in the supermarket for an array of flavours.

Roughly dice and saute the mushrooms, onion, garlic and thyme in the oil for about 5 minutes on a medium heat. The mushrooms will release water and you want to make sure that is all evaporated off.Add in the butter and continue cooking up till the butter starts to turn brown. This is called nut brown butter and gives an extra nuttiness to the flavour.Remove from the heat, season and blend. You now have your duxelles mix. Toast some sourdough or any nice bread and spread the duxelles on top for a delicious snack.

This snack will go pretty well with almost any beverage. So pick the poison of your choice and sit back and enjoy the show.

An Interview with Zilla Novikov

Dawn Vogel from History that Never Was interviews Zilla Novikov on her blog.

DV: Tell me a little about yourself and your writing.

ZN: I’m Zilla Novikov (she/her), a depressed millennial who is very tired of late-stage capitalism. Turns out, that’s an endless font of story ideas. People tell me I’m funny, or at least, that my writing is funny. My goal is for the reader to laugh through the tears.

Want to read the rest? Check it out here.

Cover Reveal Fail: Take Two

Moment after the cover reveal for our anthology, formerly titled Guaranteed Bestseller, we found ourselves with a problem.

This anthology tells stories about the lengths authors go to find someone willing to read their work, such as looking for readers in Hell.

In the real world, if you want someone to read your book, you sell it on Amazon. Yes, it’s a parasitic monopoly. There’s a reason we used Hell as a metaphor. But being a monopoly means they can make arbitrary rules which mere authors must obey.

We were told that using the word “bestseller” in the title was false advertising. Apparently, you can’t say bestseller on amazon any more than you can say dead on tiktok.

My friends, irony is unalive.

If you would like a copy of our anthology (now titled Instant Classic) for the low, low price of free, you can sign up for a review copy here. If you prefer to exchange money for goods and services, you can pre-order the e-book on (sigh) Amazon.

Behind the Screens: Tuesday Author Interview

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Sabitha: Today we’re turning the blog over to two Night Beats authors, Dale Stromberg and Tucker Lieberman, to talk about Dale’s story ‘Art is a Service’ in the upcoming anthology Instant Classic (That No One Will Read). Dale, can you start us off by introducing your story and the anthology?

Dale: The anthology collects satirical takes on the creative industries. Creators are indispensable in the crafting of the stories, songs, and images we all love, but their rewards are often paltry. If you imagine a stream of money trickling from the public towards the creator, then here and there farther upstream, various people have built dams. Each dam is a chance to skim a few bucks. One such enterprising skimmer is the interviewee in “Art Is a Service,” Nao Hovgaard, a publisher whose innovative marketing involves, among other things, a trampoline.

Tucker: So, novelists on trampolines. In “Art Is a Service,” Nao Hovgaard compares plugging novelists into AI to using “trampolines to the nth power.” Some authors might say it’s all unfair: the AI trampoline, the regular trampoline, everything. But if all trampolines are bad, how can authors write and market books? On what may we jump to elevate ourselves?

Dale: I feel there’s a nearly Darwinian, invisible-hand–like inevitability to the advent of the trampoline whenever art, music, drama, or literature are commodified and subjected to the inexorable libertarian robo-logic of consumerism. Authors who hope to make a living from their work are, in a pragmatic sense, engaged in a consumerist pursuit: offering a mechanically reproducible product for sale at a thin margin and hoping that a bunch of people will buy it—cumulatively earning one enough that, at the least, one’s bones don’t end up in a pauper’s grave. For this, one depends on an appeal to the many.

I see no inherent link between success in making such an appeal to the many and success in the loftier pursuit of “the good” (however you define it) in the arts. If the peacock with the biggest plumage gets the mate, then peacock plumage evolves bigger, even if it encumbers the bird’s ability to fly. When, in the creative industries, the bottomless inventiveness of a human on the make furnishes the world with a “trampoline”—a business tactic or marketing gizmo that appeals to different drives/desires than a creative work itself might appeal to—and when this trampoline produces more “sales experiences” than literary merit can do, then the trampoline gets the mate. It passes on its big-plumage genes.

If I’m not wrong, if the vending of stories on a consumerist model must lead in the end to trampolines, then what alternatives can we envision? The diametric opposite of the appeal to the many is the appeal to the one: scoring yourself a wealthy patron, like some kind of Renaissance poet sucking up to a viscount. Which sounds far-fetched to me, but—not gonna lie—it’s at this point that I run out of ideas. So I can write you a snotty satire of the garbage chute we’re all funnelling down towards, but if you want a ray of hope that things could be any different, I’ve got nothing.

Tucker: When you pick up a book, do you ever sense that the author or publisher believes they are performing a service? And does that make you feel well served or ill served?

Dale: Hmm… I want to think about “service” itself first. We will say so-and-so “served as president” or “served as CEO”, which certainly isn’t the same thing as “serving in the Navy” or “serving as a juror”. Furthermore, none of these positions is the position of a “servant” per se. I note that our society has a great penchant for talking about “service” even as we avoid referring to ourselves as “servants”.

To be a servant to an imperious master is a hard lot, but do we not also conceive of service as noble in its humility, as when one human bends voluntarily to wash the feet of another? Still, when I hear “service” (and maybe this is true for you as well), what comes at once to mind is an economic transaction (probably somewhat demeaning): the exchange of money for labour whose aim is not to make a thing but rather to do a thing.

So, if someone provides you a book not as a thing made but as a thing done, what are they doing for you? How are they “serving” you? Perhaps they are “serving your turn”—fulfilling some concrete use (and I am reminded of all those dreary claims that reading fiction will power-up your empathy, much as the consumption of fine cuisine can stock you up with antioxidants); if so, yes, I can easily imagine many authors/publishers solicitously offering a written work as a kind of utilitarian vitamin supplement to the soul.

Or perhaps they are “serving refreshments”—offering nourishment not because it will fortify you with nutrients but because to do so is a kindness, and will comfort you, and is one part of the conviviality and ease we hope our labours will purchase us. I tentatively speculate that this form of service is part of what motivates many or most true creators. I think it laudable.Or perhaps they are “serving you the ball” as in a game of tennis—sending something your way, maybe a lazy lob, maybe a more challenging slice, and provoking a response. A book like that will say, “Your move.” It will nudge you to hustle, to see and judge and react. My own values and preferences tell me that this is the sort of service I’d be glad to receive as a reader, and would hope to offer as a writer.

Tucker: Hovgaard spake, “Fuck the bestseller list.” Do you not think his judgment might be a bit harsh? Do bestsellers truly deserve the bad rap? I’ve heard that some bestsellers are good.

Dale: Oh, what Hovgaard hates is the list itself. He’s the publishing equivalent of a libertarian tech bro, which means he makes “disruption” a point of pride and nurses especial contempt for his victims.

Now, the NYT list is, of course, notoriously inaccurate, based on spotty data, and not in fact based on sales figures reported by publishers—entities which themselves appear to have little idea how many books of theirs actual readers actually buy. In other words, the list is emblematic of a shambolic industry which seems actively haughty about its ossified, opaque, esoteric and byzantine business practices. This is the sort of field any entrepreneurial legerdemainist like Hovgaard would hungrily eye, as a leopard on the Serengeti eyes a wounded impala: ripe for “disruption,” which is a stylish way of saying, “Finding someone who gets money doing a thing, and making that money come to you instead.”

Such disruptive exploits, to the extent they threaten to capsize the rusting hulks of the industry, might actually inspire some merry schadenfreude in authors, whose hopes and dreams have traditionally made us easy patsies for trade publishers—until we realise where we will end up sitting within the new model Hovgaard offers. It is, in truth, merely a new take on the same old crap: the capitalist monetising someone else’s years of silent, private, unpaid, invisible labour even as that labourer is made to feel fortunate for the chance to surrender most of the spoils… the offloading of risk down the hierarchy (where the authors dwell) and the shifting of wealth up the hierarchy (where Hovgaard waits to collect it)… the precarity, the exploitation… the pageantry, the hauteur… the squeezing of blood from every available stone. Same grift, new name—or, if you like, same book, new cover design.

On the other hand, my guess would be that Hovgaard has no opinion either way on bestselling books themselves. He’s agnostic. He’s never read one.

Sabitha: Thank you both for this—I am so excited for this project! Where can readers get their hands on a copy? And where can they find your other work?

Dale: They can get a free review copy of the anthology here—all we ask in return is they share the anthology on a platform of their choice. Or they can pre-order a copy on Amazon. I hang out on Bluesky, Medium, and Goodreads, and info about my work can be found on my website.

Read the best book for pay-what-you-can

Most Famous Short Film of All Time is one of the best books I’ve ever read. Period, end of sentence.

I can’t tell you why. There are books that burrow into me and change me as I read them. Vita Nostra did this too. VALIS did, thought I didn’t love it the way I love the other two, it still burrowed inside my brain and laid eggs. I am a different person because I read it, and I am glad.

I’m not telling you about the plot of Most Famous Short Film of All Time. Why would I do that? It’s not about what happened in the book. Sometimes what doesn’t happen matters more. Sometimes an absence is something too.

It’s on for pay-what-you-can. Go to Itch.io. Read it.

Behind the Screens: Tuesday Author Interview

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Sabitha: Want a witty science fiction thriller about the dark side of tech-bros? E.W. Doc Parris’s The Dent in the Universe is here to scratch that itch. Doc, take it away!

Doc: I tend to write matter-of-fact, hard science fiction grounded in the current scientific worldview, leavened with wit, and kindled by the warmth of human relationships. I’m a big fan of taking a scientific notion and asking, “What if?” Especially if that leads to questions of how badly this could go for humanity if things got out of hand.

For example: What if you could send information—internet data (emails, text, video, online orders)—into the past? What would you do? Order a pizza and have it arrive in an instant? Order that anniversary gift you forgot about? Place emergency supplies right where they’re needed before a tornado strikes? These sound like great ideas. What could go wrong? Well… what if your customers are monsters? Even just one? Because, y’know, some of them will be.

Sabitha : That sounds wild in the best possible way. What inspired you to write this book?

Doc: This story came from two conceptual vectors. The first was wondering how much trouble you could get into with the simplest possible time machine. Just a machine that allows you to send emails into the past. The second was, if everybody believes the zombie apocalypse is inevitable, how would it start? I mean, everybody has plans for the zombie apocalypse, right? Most movies don’t show us how it starts. Those two ideas came together in a really fun, scary way that you’re going to love.

Sabitha : I’m sure I will! Do you have a “fan-cast” – do you have actors you’d cast as your main characters?

Doc: The character Cliff Price was informed by a few performances by Cameron Britton (Mindhunter, The Umbrella Academy). Walrus Roberts could be played by some cross between Hurly on Lost (Jorge Garcia) and Jeff Bridges in The Big Lebowski. I only see Steve Jobs when I think of Stephen Lucas. Young Steve. 1990 Steve.

Sabitha : That gives me such a clear picture. What book do you tell all your friends to read? Besides yours of course!

Doc: I’ve just finished binge-reading The Murderbot Diaries, and I’m telling everyone about them. Most of them are novellas and quick reads or audiobook listens. Read those. Martha Wells is a genius.

Sabitha :  Do you have any suggestions to help people in our community become a better writers? 

Doc: Write those stories that you just can’t avoid. If you can sit and watch Netflix at night after work and think you’d like to be a writer, forget it. If you find yourself more interested in your story than in binging the latest streamer, if you can’t tear yourself away from your own story—those are the stories we want to read.

Sabitha : Absolutely. So what’s your next writing project you can’t tear yourself away from?

Doc: After The Aurora’s Pale Light, the next book in the WalrusTech Universe series, is released in the spring of 2024, I’ve got a story called The Land of Nod in the pipeline. It’s a story of the development of nanotechnology and machine learning being used to repair human neural networks for things like nerve damage or strokes. It feels like a miracle until things get out of hand.

Sabitha: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Doc: The Dent in the Universe is available exclusively on Amazon through November. Kindle Unlimited readers can devour it for free. You can find the link on the Magic Genius Books website.

Behind the Screens: Tuesday Author Interview

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Sabitha : Looking for a deliciously dark and dystopian science fiction novel? Look no further. We have David Arrowsmith here to tell us about his novel, Corona !

David: In a fallen London, how far will one man go to save his family—and himself…

…or is it already too late?

Trapped in his top floor mansion block apartment in Denmark Hill, South East London, can The Man escape and pick his way through the crumbling ruins of the city, avoiding the violent gangs that now vie for supremacy, and find his heavily pregnant ex-wife?

Can a belated act of heroism wash him clean of his sins, or is he too far gone?

In a world where civilization has fallen, what hope is there for the future?

Corona is a story about the dark—and the light—inside all of us. It’s about man’s inhumanity and humanity. It’s a story in which the threat, the danger, comes from within us—not from the undead or vampires or even a virus, but from our neighbours, our friends, and even ourselves. Corona combines elements of dystopian fiction with the literary survival horror of works like J.G. Ballard’s High Rise and Concrete Island. It’s the perfect read for fans of The Road, I Am Legend, The Last Of Us, Children of Men, The Walking Dead, Mad Max, or 28 Days Later.

Sabitha : What inspired you to write this book?

David: This novel began life as entries typed into the Notes app on my phone—a brief personal diary as I attempted to document the extraordinary and scary first few weeks of the lockdowns and that first summer under the cloud of Covid-19, trapped in a garden flat in SE London, with my wife and our young daughter. I didn’t want to publish a diary, or a factual account—and then I hit on the idea of turning it into a dystopian novel, inspired by my love of JG Ballard and his stories like High Rise, Concrete Island, The Drowned World, The Drought and The Crystal World. It’s also got some major The Last of Us vibes!

Sabitha: Do you have a playlist for your book? Can you tell us why you picked a couple of the songs?

David: I do! It’s on Spotify. I picked songs with a grimy, dark or mysterious and isolated London vibe – so there’s lots of classic 70s punk like ‘Anarchy in the UK’ by the Sex Pistols, ‘Guns of Brixton’ by The Clash, and ‘Message in a Bottle’ and ‘So Lonely’ by The Police. But the book also has a beauty and connection with the environment and the weather, hence tracks like ‘Bitter Sweet Symphony’ by The Verve, ‘Wild World’ by Cat Stevens and ‘Have You Ever Seen the Rain’ by Creedence Clearwater Revival. Give it a listen and let me know if you enjoy it!

Sabitha : Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

David: All my social links can be found here. Check out Corona here or here. Read my short stories, Nevada Noir, here.