Q & A - Part 1
This short blog article is based upon a number of questions asked over the last few weeks by my fans on Facebook and on my blog. I’ve chosen the most popular topics and hope you find the answers satisfying. I have posted the original questions so you can see who proposed them, and specifically what they actually asked. As more questions come in I will put them together and do additional articles. So here we go with questions from P. Jary, D Robinson, M Peterson, B Knox, J. Harris and D Read.
Q. P Jary: What authors have influenced your work?
A. My favourites are Frank Herbert, J. R. R. Tolkien, R. Heinlein, Philip K Dick, Capt W.E Johns, H. G. Wells and John Wyndham as well as any of Bernard Cornwell's better works. Herbert and Wells are probably the two that influence me the most.
Q. D Robinson: Have you ever based any of characters on your friends or family?
A. Not on any of my family, but I have based many characters on people I know. This is mainly with secondary characters, of which there are many. If a character gets a few pages before getting killed they were probably based upon somebody I know. There are quite a few people that are even given the same names.
Q. M Peterson: I really like the way you wrote you last series with the historical arc. Are you going to attempt that again and are you going to use an Asian arc in the future?
A. I assume you are referring to the Black Legion series here. This is actually a very interesting question and is more down to you all as readers rather than me. Black Legion specifically follows the plot of the Anabasis but I absolutely would like to expand this to include great chunks of ancient history. The Greek Social Wars (not Obamacare I might add), rise of Macedon, retaking of Ionia and the march of Alexander would of course all fit nicely into the background. Then there are the other regions in the same period. The Greeks in southern Italy, the rise of Rome and the conflict with other European and Oriental peoples.
Q. J Harris: What was your first computer?
A. A Philips G7000 Videopac circa '78-79.
Q. P Jary: If you could be a space tourist, where would you go and why?
A. Where would I go? Well, Proxima Centauri of course, assuming we find a more promising set of exo-planets.
Q. B Knox: Tell me about the people on the covers. Are they models, cgi or people you know?
A. Good question and one that is a bit of yes and no. Some of the covers such as Fires of Prometheus and Black Legion have a few people I know. We have held a number of photoshoots in the past and these form the basis of many of the covers you see today. Spartan is often portrayed by a good friend back from when I was at college. The lady that plays the part of Teresa was a fencing buddy from a few years back, as was the lady on the cover of Champions of the Apocalypse. If you leave near me, let me know, you could end up on the front of a future novel!
Q. D Read: How do you write your stories?? Do you have a plan? Vague outline? Or just start tapping the keyboard and see where it goes?
A. This is a very popular question and one often asked by aspiring writers. I will take my two main series as the exemplar for this. Before I start a new series I to a one paragraph summary of the plot, much like a movie’s one page. If I think it has the potential to be more than one book I then write a second paragraph outlining where this book fits in and a few ideas for the long-term arcs. After that, I split up the story into a number of acts, usually three and then summarise them. Following that comes a twelve chapter list with a few sentences for each, and then I am off.
As I add characters I put them into a separate document along with any useful details. This file comes in very handy later on. The Star Crusades document is over sixty pages long now.
Q. P Jary: If money were no object, what car(s) would you have?
A. Well, I am a big fan of V8s so any car I choose would have to have one. Classic American cars like a '69 Chevrolet Camaro Z28 or '70 Plymouth Road Runner in perfect condition would work. Saying that, as some of you already know I am a fan of British muscle, so anything recent built by Jaguar or Aston Martin would be just great.
That's it for now. If you have any more questions please pop by my Facebook fanpage and let me know:
