1) What
were your favorite books growing up?
Terry Brook started it for me with
The Sword of Shannara. Then some cheesy young adult book called The TV Kid.
Lots of Hardy Boys mysteries and eventually I found Dragonlance (blah, but I
didn't know any better at the time), The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, the
Simarillion, R.A. Salvatore, and just about anything I could get my hands on
that was fantasy related (even some Stephen King).
2) Now
that you have, let’s say—some life experience, what would you tell your younger
self?
Stop being such a wuss! the world
doesn't owe you a damn thing, if you want something, go out and find a way to
earn it.
3) Describe
your typical day.
I wake up too early after having
gone to bed too late. Obligatory morning rituals lead to whatever healthy
breakfast option I feel like while I check email and book sales. Then I go to
work where I rant and rave over the incredible inefficiencies I find working
for the U.S. Army (as a civilian, I left my uniform days behind me years ago).
When the ranting is over and I come
home I check on email and books again, then depending on the events of the
evening and how everyone's feeling, I try to get some writing in. Usually I can
weasel in an hour or maybe two a day, though I've sneaked in more in the past
at times. This requires juggling dinner and homework for the kids as well, so
it's not a constant write-on situation.
After the kids go to bed is when
the real fun begins. Five out of Seven days my wife and I rush upstairs and
change into our superhero costumes, then we go down to the basement and she
mounts her treadmill while I pile up as many weights as I can on some bars and
proceed to pick them up, then put them down. Then I pick them up again and put
them back down. This continues ad nauseum until my wife is done treadmilling
and ready to hit the weights. Then I train her until she's swearing at me.
That's when we both know we've done a good job! It's off to the jacuzzi tub
after that and then bed.
Anything else that happens between
that tub and bed is, well, none of your business. ;-)
4) Who
is your favorite character in your books?
That's a terrible question to ask!
But that's okay, I don't mind. The voices aren't real anyhow, right? Right?
RIGHT?
I have a lot of books and every one
of them has characters I love in them. My absolute favorite characters
though...hmm, that's trickier. Carl Waters, from my Wanted series, is the kind
of uncompromising son of a bitch we all wish we could be 24 / 7.
Katalina Wimple, from my Lost Girls
series, is a wreck of a woman trying to put her life together but she just keep
screwing it up over and over again. In spite of her suicidal tendencies she's
the kind of character that gets under your skin because she is so irritable and
unpleasant. Before I knew it I'd fallen in love with her and wanted to protect
her. She had other ideas, unfortunately...
I've got a new fantasy series
called the Blades of Leander with a new fun character. His name's Alto. He's a
farm boy turned warrior that takes on a lot more than he ever realized when he
left the farm. His path of self discovery and, (eventually) vengeance is three
books of nonstop excitement and adventure. I can't wait to write the next book
about him and his companions as they get themselves wrapped up in something
else way over their heads!
My longest series yet, Voidhawk,
has a lot of memorable characters in it too. I've gone through a lot with them
over the past few years and I have to say that Dexter and Rosh are probably the
two strongest in those books. That's no slight to the many others that are
involved in the books though, it's just that those two always seem to be at the
center of things when something goes wrong!
The final character shout out I
have to give is for a woman that only shows up in two books, yet she's responsible
in part for shaping a world. Cassiopeia Nelson, a witch from my Dark Earth
series (Devil's Advocate and the soon to be released Soulmates). She's a living
and breathing (okay, and fictional) example of how people can learn how growing
up in a different culture can make the difference in life and death.
5) What
do you do when writer’s block shows up, settles in, and makes itself
comfortable?
I don't let it. No, really, that's
all there is to it. I write every day as long as circumstances grant me the
time to do so. When I sit down to write, I write. That's all there is to it.
There is no such thing as writer's block, it's all in your head.
6) Do
you find yourself pulling details from “real life” or does your imagination
rule the roost?
There's no room in my life for
reality!
7) What
was the first manuscript you wrote (even if it never saw the light of day)?
I'm not sure. It was either a
fantasy story loosely based on a gaming session (role playing - Dungeons and
Dragons) dedicated to my best friend at the time of a car accident that left
him critically injured and, 16 years later, dead. Or it might have been a bit
of Battletech fan fiction that is long since gone and buried (for good reason).
Those were stories written in my late teens, when I KNEW how to write a great
story.
8) Have
you ever pursued traditional publishing? Or did you go straight for indie
publishing?
Yes I did. My first five or so
books were traditionally published after a handful or so of rejections. I was
disgruntled with the system so I started up my own pub company with a friend to
help ourselves and other new writers out. That makes me technically
self-published and I haven't looked back since.
9) What
Works In Progress are brewing? Any
target dates for publication?
Soulmates, book 3 in the Dark Earth
series, is in the editing stages. I'm hoping to have it on the virtual shelves
by mid March. A fun bit of trivia about Soulmates is that it is a full length
novel and it only took me 8 days to write it.
My 6th Voidhawk novel, working
title: Voidhawk - The Edge of Forever, is my current project. I'm about 21,000
words into it and I've got a long ways to go. I'm predicting this one will take
me 3 - 4 weeks to write, but I still hope very much to hit a mid to late April
launch date with it.
What's next? I don't know. I may
revisit my Vitalis series with a third novel or I might answer the horns of war
I hear blowing in Alto's world. Or I could branch out into a couple of other
ideas I've had that have really piqued my interest. At this point it's anybody's
game. I even found a manuscript I wrote a couple of years ago and forgot about
that I may dust off and try to have some fun with.
10) How
can fans reach you? Website – Facebook –
Twitter – LinkedIn – Email – Amazon Author Page
All of the above! My links are
below but I love hearing back from people. I probably respond the best and
quickest to email and Twitter, but it's awesome for many reasons to get great
reviews and hear people on my Facebook page.
email: jason@booksbyjason.com
Twitter: @booksbyjason
