…IS IT NOT ME?
PEOPLE often ask me if the characters in my books are fictitious, or based on people I have come in contact with during my life, or actually me in disguise. The answer is yes. While all of the above are guilty, much of the character of my principal protagonists and antagonists come from reflections on my own life and experiences. I find it makes them more alive, convincing and realistic, since, well, they’re from actual memories.
Okay, so I’m not an olfactory (“smell”) savant like Draff Rob Brie [Septican-Smite] in THE EDGE OF MADNESS (Aignos 2020) by Raymond Gaynor, or a political genius like Shawn Clarke in its prequel, TOTAL MELTDOWN by Raymond Gaynor and William Maltese, or a secret agent working for Cerberus like Joseph Falk in QUANTUM DEATH by Raymond Gaynor and A. G. Hayes. But they are a lot like me in their intellectual awareness, double-barreled emotion and fearlessness in the face of challenge. In addition, like the first two protagonists, there’s the issue of LGBTQ and bromance, and the last one, straight love and romance.
There’s also the issue of location. Being a military brat, I’ve traveled to all 50 states, living, at least for a short time in half of them. Anchorage, Seattle, San Fran, Los Angeles, San Diego, Salt Lake City, Denver, Tucson, Yuma, San Antonio, Chicago, Kansas City, Huntsville, Washington DC, you name it, I’ve either visited or lived there. Add White Horse, Dawson City, Vancouver, Halifax, Frankfurt, Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki, Amsterdam, Madrid, Paris, Bern, Vienna, Rome, Athens, Moscow, Novosibirsk, Tokyo, Honolulu (okay, I’ve never been to the United Kingdom, Australia or Africa but they’re definitely all on my bucket list), and I draw strongly from my memories of what makes each location, the culture and people unique. That gives my stories, in my opinion, a strong sense of plausibility and presence.
My supporting characters are often drawn, again, from personal experience. When traveling, keeping conscious and, as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had his famous protagonist Sherlock Holmes say, seeing rather than simply observing, individuals replete with unique characteristics and foibles, jump out and into the mind, one after another. The hardest part is remaining conscious and storing away their characters for later literary use. The eminent writer, Sigmund Freud has pointed out that in the average person, ninety-five percent of brain activity is unconscious. Half of the challenge of authoring is moving the balance towards consciousness of the unconscious, and half of the excitement of reading is witnessing another do just that. It’s what I like to call “inspiring” one’s readers. Waking them up. Reconnecting them to the myriad senses and feelings constantly swirling about.
My narration is third person, past tense (though my KINGSLEY & I series by Gary Martine, another nom de plume, was written in first person, present tense like a private diary to lend a sense of naughty voyeurism to the exploration of a questionably bisexual love affair). I like a literary quality narration. It’s something a reader can hold onto when the characters, dialog or action gets unruly. It also lends contrast to the characters, making them, in my opinion, stand out even more as living, breathing individuals.
Having said all that, it’s not the pieces but the whole that makes a work great. I invite you to get hold of a copy of my latest work, THE EDGE OF MADNESS and tiptoe right up to the brink of the precipice, experience at gut level a plausible future, then return and marvel at the feeling of being alive in the here and now.
The Edge of Madness
Total Meltdown: A Tripler and Clarke Adventure
Quantum Death
Kingsley & I
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0999693859
Okay, so I’m not an olfactory (“smell”) savant like Draff Rob Brie [Septican-Smite] in THE EDGE OF MADNESS (Aignos 2020) by Raymond Gaynor, or a political genius like Shawn Clarke in its prequel, TOTAL MELTDOWN by Raymond Gaynor and William Maltese, or a secret agent working for Cerberus like Joseph Falk in QUANTUM DEATH by Raymond Gaynor and A. G. Hayes. But they are a lot like me in their intellectual awareness, double-barreled emotion and fearlessness in the face of challenge. In addition, like the first two protagonists, there’s the issue of LGBTQ and bromance, and the last one, straight love and romance.
There’s also the issue of location. Being a military brat, I’ve traveled to all 50 states, living, at least for a short time in half of them. Anchorage, Seattle, San Fran, Los Angeles, San Diego, Salt Lake City, Denver, Tucson, Yuma, San Antonio, Chicago, Kansas City, Huntsville, Washington DC, you name it, I’ve either visited or lived there. Add White Horse, Dawson City, Vancouver, Halifax, Frankfurt, Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki, Amsterdam, Madrid, Paris, Bern, Vienna, Rome, Athens, Moscow, Novosibirsk, Tokyo, Honolulu (okay, I’ve never been to the United Kingdom, Australia or Africa but they’re definitely all on my bucket list), and I draw strongly from my memories of what makes each location, the culture and people unique. That gives my stories, in my opinion, a strong sense of plausibility and presence.
My supporting characters are often drawn, again, from personal experience. When traveling, keeping conscious and, as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had his famous protagonist Sherlock Holmes say, seeing rather than simply observing, individuals replete with unique characteristics and foibles, jump out and into the mind, one after another. The hardest part is remaining conscious and storing away their characters for later literary use. The eminent writer, Sigmund Freud has pointed out that in the average person, ninety-five percent of brain activity is unconscious. Half of the challenge of authoring is moving the balance towards consciousness of the unconscious, and half of the excitement of reading is witnessing another do just that. It’s what I like to call “inspiring” one’s readers. Waking them up. Reconnecting them to the myriad senses and feelings constantly swirling about.
My narration is third person, past tense (though my KINGSLEY & I series by Gary Martine, another nom de plume, was written in first person, present tense like a private diary to lend a sense of naughty voyeurism to the exploration of a questionably bisexual love affair). I like a literary quality narration. It’s something a reader can hold onto when the characters, dialog or action gets unruly. It also lends contrast to the characters, making them, in my opinion, stand out even more as living, breathing individuals.
Having said all that, it’s not the pieces but the whole that makes a work great. I invite you to get hold of a copy of my latest work, THE EDGE OF MADNESS and tiptoe right up to the brink of the precipice, experience at gut level a plausible future, then return and marvel at the feeling of being alive in the here and now.
The Edge of Madness
Total Meltdown: A Tripler and Clarke Adventure
Quantum Death
Kingsley & I
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0999693859
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