Interview with Mik Wilkens, author of The Silver Cage.
Blog Interview
Hello, thanks for agreeing to be a guest blogger on my site. Could you please tell us about yourself?Thanks for having me, Jack! Let's see…something about me. I've done a lot of different things in my life, all of them creative. I've been an illustrator, trophy designer, graphic artist, programmer, multimedia developer, webmaster, and author. I love science, as well as science fiction, fantasy, and other speculative fiction. I'm a rabid Joss Whedon fan, I'm crazy about greyhounds, and I collect moose. I live in Scottsdale, Arizona, with my wonderful husband, a pack of retired racing greyhounds, and an ancient, three-legged demon in a cat suit.
How long have you been writing?I started writing when I was about 11 or 12 years old. At the time, all I read were stories about animals, either fiction or nonfiction. So that was what I wrote: stories about animals, told from the animals' point of view. I read a lot, too, so it only took me a couple of years to read all of the animal books in our local library (we lived in a very small town). After that, I needed to find a new type of book to read. That's when I discovered science fiction and fantasy. I started writing science fiction and fantasy stories soon after that, which is what I've been writing for the past several decades.
What authors would you say are your biggest influences?I saw Ms. Kurtz on a writing panel at Dragon*Con a couple of years ago; it was great to hear her talk about her writing and about writing in general, but I also learned that the first of her Deryni books is being made into a movie, which was very heartening to hear since it suggests that the type of fantasy stories I enjoy are starting to be recognized by Hollywood.
How did you find the road to getting published?Long. :-) I started writing in the early 1970s, but it wasn't until the late 1980s that I decided to try to get published. My first rejection letter was dated December 7, 1990. I was lucky because it wasn't a form rejection letter; it was actually typewritten on letterhead, addressed me by name, referenced my manuscript by the title, and was signed by a real person. For a rejection letter, that was pretty heartening. I kept writing and submitting novels (I'm terrible at writing short stories) for 20 years before I made a significant sale.
Tell us about your book?The Silver Cage is about David Conner, a down-to-earth guy who has everything going for him: he's got a great job, he has plenty of money, and he's just met Jennasara, quite literally the woman of his dreams. But David's world is turned upside-down when he finds himself on Lucasia, a world where magic is a force of nature and creatures of myth are real. To save Jennasara, David must learn the ways of this strange new world, master its magic forces, and decide who is his friend and who is his enemy.
You can learn more about the book, watch the book trailer, read excerpts, etc. at www.TheSilverCage.com
Where do you see yourself as an author this time next year?I'm working on several books right now. I'm almost finished with the sequel to The Silver Cage. It's called The Golden Drake, and it pretty much starts right where The Silver Cage ends. I'm also almost done writing another fantasy novel called The Greyhounds of Aeravon, which is the first book in a series of novels I plan to use to raise money to support the adoption of retired racing greyhounds. I'm working on a science fiction trilogy. All three of the books in the trilogy are finished in rough draft form. I'm doing the final edits on the first book, and then I'll start on the other two. Finally, I just submitted a science fiction novella called Esora, which is a follow-up story to another science fiction novella I have coming out in 2011 called The Price of Conquest. With all that in the pipeline, I hope to have at least a couple more books published by 2012.
Anything else you'd like to share?Anyone who'd like to keep up on my writing projects can visit my official author website at www.MikWilkens.com. I'm also on Facebook and Twitter, and I have a writing blog. Links to everything can be found on my website.
Hello, thanks for agreeing to be a guest blogger on my site. Could you please tell us about yourself?Thanks for having me, Jack! Let's see…something about me. I've done a lot of different things in my life, all of them creative. I've been an illustrator, trophy designer, graphic artist, programmer, multimedia developer, webmaster, and author. I love science, as well as science fiction, fantasy, and other speculative fiction. I'm a rabid Joss Whedon fan, I'm crazy about greyhounds, and I collect moose. I live in Scottsdale, Arizona, with my wonderful husband, a pack of retired racing greyhounds, and an ancient, three-legged demon in a cat suit.
How long have you been writing?I started writing when I was about 11 or 12 years old. At the time, all I read were stories about animals, either fiction or nonfiction. So that was what I wrote: stories about animals, told from the animals' point of view. I read a lot, too, so it only took me a couple of years to read all of the animal books in our local library (we lived in a very small town). After that, I needed to find a new type of book to read. That's when I discovered science fiction and fantasy. I started writing science fiction and fantasy stories soon after that, which is what I've been writing for the past several decades.
What authors would you say are your biggest influences?I saw Ms. Kurtz on a writing panel at Dragon*Con a couple of years ago; it was great to hear her talk about her writing and about writing in general, but I also learned that the first of her Deryni books is being made into a movie, which was very heartening to hear since it suggests that the type of fantasy stories I enjoy are starting to be recognized by Hollywood.
How did you find the road to getting published?Long. :-) I started writing in the early 1970s, but it wasn't until the late 1980s that I decided to try to get published. My first rejection letter was dated December 7, 1990. I was lucky because it wasn't a form rejection letter; it was actually typewritten on letterhead, addressed me by name, referenced my manuscript by the title, and was signed by a real person. For a rejection letter, that was pretty heartening. I kept writing and submitting novels (I'm terrible at writing short stories) for 20 years before I made a significant sale.
Tell us about your book?The Silver Cage is about David Conner, a down-to-earth guy who has everything going for him: he's got a great job, he has plenty of money, and he's just met Jennasara, quite literally the woman of his dreams. But David's world is turned upside-down when he finds himself on Lucasia, a world where magic is a force of nature and creatures of myth are real. To save Jennasara, David must learn the ways of this strange new world, master its magic forces, and decide who is his friend and who is his enemy.
You can learn more about the book, watch the book trailer, read excerpts, etc. at www.TheSilverCage.com
Where do you see yourself as an author this time next year?I'm working on several books right now. I'm almost finished with the sequel to The Silver Cage. It's called The Golden Drake, and it pretty much starts right where The Silver Cage ends. I'm also almost done writing another fantasy novel called The Greyhounds of Aeravon, which is the first book in a series of novels I plan to use to raise money to support the adoption of retired racing greyhounds. I'm working on a science fiction trilogy. All three of the books in the trilogy are finished in rough draft form. I'm doing the final edits on the first book, and then I'll start on the other two. Finally, I just submitted a science fiction novella called Esora, which is a follow-up story to another science fiction novella I have coming out in 2011 called The Price of Conquest. With all that in the pipeline, I hope to have at least a couple more books published by 2012.
Anything else you'd like to share?Anyone who'd like to keep up on my writing projects can visit my official author website at www.MikWilkens.com. I'm also on Facebook and Twitter, and I have a writing blog. Links to everything can be found on my website.
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