Being Garrulous (again) with Benjamin X. Wretlind(Part 1)

For those few of you who read Chewing the Cud in the Myriad Spheres, the previous conversation between Benjamin X. Wretlind and myself, here is another exciting installment! Due to its lack of brevity (which is chiefly my fault) we have decided to break it into two parts. Enjoy!

BXW: So I was reading over your latest blog post, Inventing a Universe, and a thought popped into my head: during the writing of Sketches from the Spanish Mustang I spent a great deal of time getting into the characters' heads, walking the paths they might take, looking at the town through their eyes.  Likewise, with the novel I intend to start this summer, Driving the Spike, I have already started the process by walking some railroad tracks where an accident occurred 108 years ago.   The idea, of course, is to see the world through the eyes of my characters.  However, with Science Fiction, especially with imagined worlds (or parallel universes like you discuss), how do you see the world though your character's eyes?

MKR: What I like to keep in mind is that people are people, whether they lived ten thousand years ago or ten thousand years from now. If I were a Clovis hunter following herds of mammoth across the Great Plains I think that, despite the vastly different way of life, my fellow hunters and I would sit around the campfire at night and shoot the breeze just as I do with my friends today. The technology would be different, our clothes, our language, our way of perceiving the universe would all be different but we would still be human beings. A heart not unlike mine would beat in the breast of my Clovis twin. I would want food, shelter, love, companionship. In the two hundred thousand years our species has wandered this Earth that has not changed and there is no reason to believe it will change in the near future.

Now, I have never taken down a mammoth with a spear. But I can imagine it. As a writer, imagination is key to understanding other people, people who eventually become "characters." Would it help if I could go back in time and see how a hunting party surrounded and felled a mammoth, where they jabbed their spears, how many of them it took? Of course. But I can't, so if I were to write a mammoth-hunting scene my imagination would fill in the blanks that the archaeological record has left behind. So it is with science fiction. When we write about the future we are not writing from a blank slate. We have all of human history to draw on to understand how human beings will react in different situations. For example, we know that we tend to be suspicious and aggressive when encountering intelligent beings not like ourselves (from history, we have the sad lesson of the Europeans' encounter with the indigenous Americans. In my fiction, look at the treatment of the Squamata in Sergeant Riley's Account and Sullivan's War: Book II.) Another example from history that I draw on is the simple fact that people generally want to be free of oppression. The entire Sullivan's War series is about this and how many times throughout history has a power structure has fallen due to the discontent of the oppressed? Here where I live in the Southwest, Hohokam civilization collapsed around 1400 CE and there are Pima legends that indicate that the people rose up against the powerful.

So writing science fiction is simply writing about people. I cannot see alien worlds or travel through hyperspace in a ship but my brain is capable of understanding what they might be like. My imagination can fill in the gaps left after taking the entire shared experience of human culture into account. I see their worlds because their eyes are like mine. I share their hopes and desires because those are common to all human beings across history. And my invented universe is not that different from our own, when you really examine it. There are real-life parallels to many of the things I write about.

Now, what I find interesting is that in Castles you described experiences unfamiliar to you despite the fact that those experiences are real for all too many young women across the country, across the world. For me, that is as remarkable a feat as bringing to life an alien landscape. We've talked about this before, but would you care to talk a bit about Maggie's story?

BXW: As I've mentioned before, I believe Maggie spoke through me in a way that's really hard to describe without coming off sounding--how should I put it?--bat-shit crazy.  The fact I squirrel away information that comes to me via media may have enabled my subconscious to postulate how a woman might view a certain situation more so than a man who is trying to force the character into action.  For example, I had a lot of trouble near the middle of the story related to Maggie's view of abuse at the hand of her boyfriend because that's just not something I'd ever experienced.  Somehow after a few months or years, though--and after dealing with abusive people as a manager--Maggie spoke up.

Getting into a character's head is important to me, and that's one reason I like to interact with their supposed environment if I can, and if I can't, then to spend an inordinate amount of time researching that environment. However, in A Difficult Mirror, a dark fantasy epic novel to be released (hopefully) next winter, I couldn't walk around the environment since it didn't exist.  Not that I couldn't take clues from other stories, but that the environment just didn't exist.  (That's a bit vague, I know, but the novel isn't out yet.)

You brought up something I'm curious about. I've mentioned to you before that I was never a huge fan of science fiction; that distinction fell to my brother. I was the fantasy type, the one who believed in dragons and wizards and spells, oh my!  However, some historic science fiction I've read has held a sort of special place in my heart simply because of the impact on our present.  I am, of course, talking about the work of Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, or Arthur C. Clarke.  Even Philip K. Dick. Their imaginations of technological advances helped pave the way for our present.  Writers like Ray Bradbury or George Orwell, on the other hand, wrote people into the future--much like you describe--and did so without the need to characterize or build up technology that didn't exist.

How do you view technology in your stories? How do you imagine worlds without borders or limitations, and do you hope to one day create something that would inspire some future geneticist or engineer?

MKR: Technology. Well, let me first point out that I am not technologically-minded at all. I am endlessly fascinated by it but if I had to actually try to describe how an intricate piece of software or hardware operated, I'd probably be trying to do it with sticks and a length of string. So, the technology in my stories isn't particularly original. I'll readily admit that. I rely on many tried and true tropes of the genre: hyperspace travel, energy weapons, fold-up tablet computers, three-dimensional displays. Now, since the Sullivan's War story line is supposed to take place about five hundred years in the future, this may seem like pretty low-tech stuff. I actually have a reason for this that will eventually reveal itself as I continue to explore this universe. I will just say that just because a technological advance is made doesn't mean it will be readily accepted.

I suppose I am comfortable with a certain level of technology, a level that has already been explored by many science fiction writers and is accepted and liked by a great many science fiction readers. Again, my own ignorance about technology prevents me from currently writing anything like cyberpunk. I just don't have the background to do it justice. So I really don't see my science fiction as the type that will inspire future engineers. Rather, I see my work as inspiring (if, in fact, it inspires anyone at all) future humanitarians, future philosophers. Remember, science fiction is about exploring how humans respond to fantastical situations as much as it is about inventing and describing cool technology. This is one of the reasons I consider 2001: A Space Odyssey to be my favorite book. Clarke had the scientific knowledge to make the technology one hundred percent plausible but the story is, essentially, about humanity. I mean, it begins with the dawn of consciousness, with the evolution (via external means in his story) of creatures that would one day become human beings! Because of his invented world of the near future, his characters--Dave Bowman in particular--are able to have experiences that no other humans have before experienced. How it affects them is just as fascinating as how future technology, such as the HAL 9000 computer, might work (or not work). How does the realization that an alien intelligence has visited our solar system affect them?

I often think about what would happen if we were to wake up one day and have undeniable proof that we were not alone in the universe. What effect would it have on world religions? I mean, in the 16th century Copernicus developed a heliocentric model of the solar system and while no one with any sense would deny the truth of this model today, there are many who still have a very geocentric, or Earth-centric, view of reality: that we, human beings, are at the center of God's divine plan, that, in fact, we are created in God's image and are his chosen species. Remember, it was only two thousand years ago that not only were humans God's chosen species on the planet, but a very specific group inhabiting the Levant were his chosen race. I speak from a Judeo-Christian perspective, of course, because it is the tradition that has most shaped the Western world. Now, this type of thinking has been used to justify and explain our dominance on this planet. But what if another, intellectually superior species managed to cross the vast distances between star systems and arrive at ours? God wouldn't seem to favor us so strongly then, would he?

I do believe in a creator. To believe in a specific god requires more faith than I have, though. I must trust that the creator, whatever it may be, gave me the ability--via evolution--to observe the world empirically for a reason. We are a species that is meant to question the world around us, not invent angels and devils to which to ascribe the mysteries of the universe. To return to my main point, this is my focus when I write science fiction. I hope to inspire future dreamers, people who will look at our world and see it for what it really is but also see what it can be if we throw off the shackles of tribe, of clan, of race, of nation, even of species. I know that to date my work hasn't explored this as fully as I would like but I am working toward it and my next project, Chrysopteron, will fully explore these ideas.

Read Part 2 here!

SULLIVAN'S WAR: BOOK III Arrives May 18!

Hello, all! I am very excited to officially announce that Sullivan's War: Book III - Edaline's Dawn will go live next Friday, May 18! The journey began in December with the release of the prologue to the series, Sergeant Riley's Account, and was followed by Book I in January and Book II in March. Combined, those books have received over twenty 4- and 5-star reviews and have been a nearly constant presence on Amazon's "Bestsellers in Science Fiction Series" list.

Book III sees the end of the Sullivan's War story line. Rick Sullivan will finally return to his home planet of Edaline and fight to free Edaline's people of their oppressive government. It will also reveal the fate of Frank Allen. And what of the bounty hunter Harvey? Will he continue to be a thorn in Sullivan's side? And what role do the mysterious hyperspace entities have to play in Sullivan's future?

To find out, get Sullivan's War: Book III - Edaline's Dawn next Friday! Please visit the Sullivan's War page on my official website for more information and for links to purchase Books I & II:

http://www.michaelkrose.com/sullivan-s-war

A Excerpt from Sullivan's War: Book II

Dear Friends,

Following this introduction is Chapter 1 of Sullivan's War: Book II - A City without Walls. If you like action-packed science fiction, you will love Sullivan's War! The series has been receiving rave reviews on Amazon and has been a regular inhabitant of Amazon's Bestsellers in Science Fiction Series list. If you enjoy this preview, please consider purchasing Book II from Amazon or Barnes & Noble (links here). If you've yet to read Book I, links to purchase it can be found here.

Best,

Michael

---

     Trenton was a miserable place.  So miserable that not even the corporate mining interests would touch it.  They had touched it at one time, briefly, just long enough to build a habitation and mining complex that covered twelve square kilometers.  And they had touched it just long enough to let two thousand men and women die when the planet’s highly unstable tectonic plates shifted, destroying a quarter of that complex as the planet’s surface split apart and lava flowed up through the fissure and into the streets.

     They could send automated machines, steel behemoths that could mine and process fifteen tons of rock per hour, but their accountants had convinced them that it wasn’t worth the risk.  The loss of a dozen machines would break any mining interest.  The loss of two thousand men had been quite a bit less costly.  No, there were other worlds to exploit.  It was best not to risk it.

     Because of this, all this and a dozen other reasons, Harvey cursed under his breath when he saw the tracking data on the stolen freighter.  It had left Damaris after Richard Sullivan had stolen it and, presumably, killed its owner, a freight runner named Oscar Jones.  Then the ship had disappeared.  It was only a matter of time before it would turn up again, though.  Harvey had been waiting ever since, waiting for a probe or any other passing ship to pick up the freighter’s identification signal.  It was finally detected by a private ship that had done a fly-by over Trenton.  They were sight-seeing, looking at the impressive lava flows, but when their ship flew within range of the freighter it had silently logged the ID signal, as was routine, then uploaded that information to Damaris’s planetary database upon its return.

     Harvey had flagged the ID signal and when the freighter’s location finally reached him he was ready to go within six hours.  He didn’t know what Sullivan was doing on that god-forsaken world but he hoped he’d still be doing it long enough for Harvey to find him.

     Harvey had cursed again when he and Ross arrived at Trenton.  He’d never been there but the sight was overwhelming.  It was a Mars-sized rock covered in a thick atmosphere.  It had boasted life a million years ago but now the tectonic shifts, the eruptions and the continent-wide lava flows had killed off all but the simplest of microbes.  It was technically a moon, not a planet, orbiting a gas giant that shared the same sun as Damaris.  Sullivan had not gone far.  It was clear he wanted to keep close to Damaris for some reason.  Harvey didn’t much care why.

     As Harvey’s ship dipped below the cloud layer and the forbidding surface came into view, a notice popped up on the screen in front of him.  The freighter’s ID signal had been detected.  Sullivan was still here, or at least the ship was.

     Harvey programmed the ship to touch down near the freighter.  “Alright,” he said, turning to Ross.  “You ready for this?”

     Ross, in response, tapped the firearm at his side and smiled.

     “Good.”  Harvey checked his own gear.  “But if we’re lucky, he’ll already be dead.  It would mean no bounty, but I have a bad feeling about this one.”

     Rebreathers weren’t absolutely necessary on Trenton but Harvey and Ross wore them anyway.  Keeping clean air in their lungs would help them if they had to confront Sullivan.

     They touched down in a landing zone next to the freighter.  This part of the complex had been one of the industrial sections.  Massive warehouses lined the streets in each direction.  This was where the minerals extracted from the ore had been transferred to ships for transport off-world.

Ross scanned the freighter and the area around it.  There were no life signs.  Cautiously, he and Ross exited their ship.  A lack of life signs didn’t necessarily mean anything; bioshrouds were technically illegal but Sullivan could have easily picked one up on Damaris.  That planet wasn’t a member of the Stellar Assembly and the legality or illegality of devices like bioshrouds didn’t concern them too terribly.

     Harvey approached the stolen freighter, gun drawn.  The number written across the side of the hull in white matched the number Harvey had on record.  This was definitely Oscar Jones’s ship.  Harvey knew Jones had been the man who’d smuggled Sullivan off of Earth after Sullivan had killed the assemblymen.  Why Sullivan would, almost a year later, track down and kill Jones wasn’t known.  Harvey didn’t much care about that either.  The death of Jones only meant that Harvey’s bounty would be bigger.  The Stellar Assembly paid good money for multiple murderers.

     After searching the freighter, Harvey and Ross entered one of the warehouses.  There was nothing in it.  A search of several of the other structures revealed those to be empty as well.  The mining company had kept men on the ground long enough after the disaster to make sure all the equipment was loaded onto ships and taken off-world.

Harvey took out his tablet and studied a map of the mining complex.  If Sullivan was still alive he’d be in the residential zone.  Despite the company’s removal of all their equipment, Trenton had been abandoned hastily after the accident.  There would probably still be a fair amount of canned and dehydrated food left in the miners’ apartments.

     Slowly, deliberately, Harvey and Ross made their way to the residential zone.  Harvey studied his bioscanner carefully every few meters.  Even if Sullivan did have a bioshroud they didn’t always function perfectly.  Contraband items weren’t necessarily manufactured to exacting standards and all Harvey needed was a temporary glitch for Sullivan to register as a blip on the scanner.

     Ross didn’t need any such gadgets.  He’d been Harvey’s right-hand man for six years and the bounty hunter’s ability to sense his prey was uncanny.  Harvey could count a dozen perps that would have gotten away if Ross hadn’t been with him.  There were two or three more that would have taken Harvey’s life if Ross hadn’t been watching his back.

     So when Ross held up a fist as they entered the residential zone, Harvey halted.  He followed as Ross silently padded up to the side of an apartment building and ducked into the building’s entryway.

     Harvey lifted his rebreather from his nose and mouth.  “What is it?”

     “This building.  I saw movement in a fourth floor window.”

     Harvey looked through the glass doors of the apartment building.  Aside from a thick layer of dust, the lobby looked as it might have when the miners and their families had lived here.  But the dust revealed that someone had been here more recently than that.  A trail of footprints led from the doorway to what Harvey assumed was the stairwell.  The elevator wouldn’t be operational, of course.  There was no power in the city.

Harvey scanned the lobby.  “Alright,” he said.  “I’ll go around and find a back exit and make sure there’s not another way up.  You watch the main stairwell from here.  I’ll let you know if I find a way inside.  If I do, take a position just to the side of the stairwell door.  If I don’t, I’ll meet you back here.”

     Ross nodded and drew his gun.  Harvey hugged the side of the building as he made his way around it, watching the windows above him.  He arrived at the rear of the building and found the emergency exit.  He pulled at the handle.  Locked.  He continued on around the building to make sure there were no other doors.  He rounded back to the main street, took another glance at the windows above him and made his way back to the front entrance.

     Ross wasn’t there.  Harvey peered into the lobby.  There was no sign of his partner.  Harvey hadn’t signaled, so Ross should have stayed put.  No, Ross would have stayed put.  The only thing that would have moved Ross from his position would have been Sullivan.  Sullivan must have come down the stairs; Ross must have seen him and taken chase.

     Harvey drew his gun and opened the door to the lobby.  Once inside he could more clearly see Ross’s boot prints in the dust leading toward the stairwell.  Harvey traced those steps and peered through the small square window of the stairwell door.  All clear.  He pulled open the door and winced as the hinges creaked.  He opened it just enough to slip through then held it so it closed quietly behind him.

     A central shaft ran down the stairwell.  Looking up it he could see the top floor ten, maybe twelve, stories up.  He watched carefully for any movement on the stairs before cautiously making his way up.

     Ross had to be in the stairwell.  He would have followed Sullivan until he exited onto one of the floors.  Ross would have then waited for Harvey in the stairwell before pursuing Sullivan further.

     Harvey worked his way up the stairwell.  When he reached the halfway point between the ninth and tenth floors he then knew that Ross wasn’t in the stairwell.  For some reason he had pursued Sullivan into one of the dark corridors alone.

     The fourth floor.  That’s where Ross had seen the movement, so that’s where Harvey would look for Ross.  He thought about radioing his partner but decided against it.  If Ross was close to Sullivan, Harvey didn’t want to give away his position.  Worse, if Sullivan had gotten ahold of Ross’s earpiece… no.  That wasn’t possible.  Sullivan, from what Harvey had read, was good.  But Ross was better.

     Harvey inched opened the door to the fourth floor.  Thankfully, this one didn’t squeak.  The corridor was almost completely dark, illuminated only by the light coming in through two or three open doors.  Harvey came to the first open door and peered inside.  It was a small but comfortable apartment.  A love seat sat facing a holographic projector.  To the right a kitchenette looked out over a counter into the living room.

     Harvey cleared the living room then approached the open door of the bedroom.  As he peered in he heard a faint noise behind him.  He made a quarter of a turn but before he could fully bring himself around something struck the back of his head.  Harvey reeled from the blow and landed hard against the wall.  He used his momentum to push back against the wall as he landed and flung himself at his attacker.  It was too dark for him to see the man clearly but there was only one person it could be:  Richard Sullivan.

     Harvey barreled into Sullivan with his shoulder, knocking the gun from his hand.  He used his weight to try and land hard on Sullivan as he fell but Sullivan managed to roll away.  Harvey’s knee struck the floor, sending a bolt of agony through his leg.

     As Harvey was temporarily incapacitated by the pain, Sullivan retrieved his gun and pistol-whipped Harvey across the side of the head.  Harvey went down.  He struggled to maintain consciousness but lost.  The dim light in the apartment faded even further and then all was black.

---

I hope you enjoyed this preview of Sullivan's War: Book II - A City without Walls. Please follow these links to purchase the books in the Sullivan's War series.

Sullivan's War: Prologue - Sergeant Riley's Account This stand-alone novella doesn't directly involve the Sullivan's War story line but it is a great introduction to Rick Sullivan's universe.

Sullivan's War: Book I - All Good Men Serve the Devil

Sullivan's War: Book II - A City without Walls

Sullivan's War: Book III - Edaline's Dawn Coming in May, 2012!

Inventing a Universe

"If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch,

you must first invent the universe." - Carl Sagan

Let me begin with a confession: I believe in parallel universes. I believe that any possible universe that can exist, does exist. There are people much smarter than I am who could tell you all about string theory and probabilities and lots of other stuff that it requires a degree in physics to pretend to fully understand, so I won't get into that. I will only say that I have no proof for this belief. There is nothing supporting it besides faith. Just as I have faith that there is a creator, I have faith that there are parallel you's, parallel me's.

As a writer I am completely astounded by the fact that everything I write, everything that I put down on the page, has or is or will happen to someone in one of these universes. The Myriad Spheres universe in which the Sullivan's War story line takes place is really out there (or over there, as the case may be). When I write, do I somehow subconsciously tap into this reality? Probably not, but it's an idea that I fancy.

So when I find myself writing about this universe, I feel like I owe something to the people in it to get it right. And this is where another confession comes in: I didn't get it right.

The very first story I wrote in this Myriad Spheres universe is a short story called Sleep. All the elements were there that would eventually lead to this fully-realized universe, encompassing forty-six inhabited planets, most of them governed by an interplanetary body called the Stellar Assembly. This idea of thousands of freighters traversing the cosmos via hyperspace was also there. But I didn't quite know why all these freighters would be, for the most part, privately owned. In fact, the justification for this system wouldn't come until much later, in Sullivan's War: Book I - All Good Men Serve the Devil:

     The interstellar passenger ships were among the largest of the space-faring vessels. There were, of course, larger cargo vessels operated by a few corporations but most freight was transported by smaller ships. Due to the vast distances and long travel times between markets a system of small-fleet operations, or even individually-owned cargo ships, had developed. A corporation, no matter how organized, simply couldn’t keep track of its ships and cargo on such a large scale, especially when news of any problems or delays took months to reach headquarters.
     Passenger operations were a little different. Flights didn’t have to be arranged on short notice to fulfill the varying demands of the interstellar marketplace. The passenger flights were scheduled years in advance. Every Monday a flight left Earth for Faris, every Tuesday for Oceanus and so on. And with an estimated sixty billion people spread out across forty-six inhabited worlds, there was never any shortage of passengers.
     Often, those who needed to make last-minute plans would have to book passage on the much more frequent and flexible freighters.

Now, this is something that worked to my advantage when it came time to write Sullivan's War. Rick Sullivan needed a way to get from planet to planet under the radar and he could do this on freighters but not on passenger ships. But this has nothing to do with my mistake. In fact, in Sleep there are two.

First, I list the travel time between Silvanus and Faris as thirty days aboard the Ares, which I mention is an older ship and isn't moving as fast as newer vessels. When I finally sat down and plotted out all the distances using tokens and a tape measure (writing science fiction is sophisticated work!) I discovered that it would have to be one month and twenty-seven days for all the other travel times in Sullivan's War to make sense. Oops! I highly doubt that any reader would ever realize this (or care) but it made me realize that it is very difficult to invent a universe, even if it is already out there, fully formed, just waiting for my psyche to tap into it.

The second mistake I made has to do with the planet Faris itself. In Sleep, the main character Jane searches the Freight Transporters' Database and finds out that Faris allows for orbital disposal of waste. If you've read Book II of Sullivan's War you'll know that the Farisians are highly protective of their planets' environment and probably wouldn't cotton to this sort of thing. Oops!

I know that as I continue with the Rick Sullivan novels and write other stories in this universe (I have half a dozen ideas to develop) I will make more mistakes. But you should know that I really am trying to get it right. I am trying to keep the details of this universe consistent, I am trying to create a believable world, given a few not-outrageous suspensions of disbelief. And I think that readers are responding to this. I have had several nice reviews commenting that they enjoyed the political nuances that are at play throughout the Sullivan's War series and that the universe seems plausible and authentic. I am trying to make this universe as real as possible, and that includes creating a full history that takes into account politics, technology, the biology, geology and environments of various planets, inter-planetary conflict and more than a few remarkable individuals like Rick Sullivan who are destined to have a greater impact on history than most other people.

I take great pride in inventing this universe and if you have read Sleep or the Sullivan's War series, I want to tell you a secret: there are many elements within each story that, if you like my writing and continue with it, you will see come into play in future stories. It is my hope that each story I release will contain a small nugget of information that savvy readers will pick up on and remember when they read the next book. Just to reveal a couple, the hyperspace entities that are introduced in Sullivan's War: Book II will play a very big role in Rick Sullivan's future adventures. And the Squamata, the species native to Edaline that were introduced in the Prologue to Sullivan's War, Sergeant Riley's Account, will make an appearance in Sullivan's War: Book III.

If you haven't read any of my work but do decide to pick up one of my books, I hope this information will enrich your reading experience and bring the Myriad Spheres universe alive for you. It is very much alive for me and despite the unsavory elements that inhabit some planets (and the Stellar Assembly) I think it's a place full of wonder and excitement. If you would like a glimpse of it, please see the links below.

Best,
Michael K. Rose

Related Links:

Sullivan's War: Prologue - Sergeant Riley's Account
Sullivan's War: Book I - All Good Men Serve the Devil
Sullivan's War: Book II - A City without Walls
Sleep - A Science Fiction/Psychological Horror Short Story

Sullivan's War: Book II Press Release

UPDATE: Sullivan's War: Book II is now available! Go here for more information and links.

Dear Friends,

Following is a press release to announce the upcoming release of Sullivan's War: Book II - A City without Walls. I am actively looking for people to interview me or those who will be willing to share the press release on their blogs, websites, Facebook pages, etc. If you would like to help make this book launch a success, please email me at myriad_spheres@yahoo.com. Thanks in advance!

---

Since author Michael K. Rose released Sergeant Riley’s Account in December of 2011, this introduction to the science fiction series Sullivan’s War has received rave reviews and has been a frequent presence on Amazon’s “Best Sellers in Science Fiction Series” list. The release of Book I in January, entitled All Good Men Serve the Devil, has also made it onto that best sellers list, reaching a rank of #30, and has earned glowing reviews of its own.

Now Mr. Rose is set to release Sullivan’s War: Book II - A City without Walls. In this thrilling new installment, Rick Sullivan must track down the man who’s kidnapped the woman he loves, all while avoiding a ruthless bounty hunter and trying to move forward his ultimate plan: to free his home planet Edaline of its oppressive regime.

Filled with action and suspense from beginning to end, A City without Walls is sure to please not only fans of the Sullivan’s War series but all fans of the science fiction genre.

Don’t miss out on 2012’s hot new science fiction adventure series! Look for Sullivan’s War: Book II - A City without Walls on March 30 at Amazon’s Kindle store and Barnes & Noble’s Nook store.

You can find out more about the series by visiting these links:

Sullivan’s War: Prologue - Sergeant Riley’s Account
Sullivan’s War: Book I - All Good Men Serve the Devil
Sullivan’s War: Book II - A City without Walls

Praise for Sullivan’s War :

"Once you start reading this series, you will be hooked."
"Gritty, hardcore sci-fi with a fascinating twist, guaranteed to please!"
"A sci-fi thriller laced with action and political undertones. A Must Read!"
"Mr. Rose knocks another one out of the galaxy...."
"The writing style is engaging and creative...."
"[T]his thrill-a-minute ride will keep you glued to your seat until the very end."
“With sharp prose, delicate and--at times--stabbing dialogue, scene setting that is on par with the best of the fiction writers of the past, Rose delivers a one-two punch to the gut that makes this reader want more and more.”

Oh Boy! Politics and Religion in Writing!

     I sometimes wonder if it’s possible to be a writer and be non-political. Not in the sense that one is a news hound and watches the debates with bated breath, but in the sense that one has a very clearly-defined political ideology. I wonder this, of course, because as I write I find my own political ideology slipping into my stories. I do not intend to do this; it’s just that as I write situations seem to naturally arise that ask--nay, beg--to address political issues.

     In the Sullivan’s War series, the whole idea of political corruption is, of course, an ongoing theme. I suppose some will read it and say “Aha! He’s commenting on our own current administration!” Others might read it and say “I’m with him! There’s no doubt that he’s referencing a certain administration that ran for, oh, say the first eight years of the 21st century.” And still others might say “What a scathing metaphorical indictment of the Taft administration!”

     I find this interesting but the truth of the matter is, I’m not doing any of it. The Stellar Assembly, the main governing body in Sullivan’s War, is not flawed by way of design; it is flawed because it relies on human beings to carry out that design. And believe it or not, human beings are flawed.

     Our main flaw, I think, is that of greed. Give a group of people a supply of anything and one or some of them will grab a larger handful than the rest. The greedy person will, of course, justify this behavior in a variety of ways and will no doubt not see themselves as greedy but as somehow “more deserving” or “more capable of managing the resource.” If anything will be the downfall of human civilization, I believe it will be this trait.

     I think the Prologue and Book I of the Sullivan’s War series are very open to interpretation. It’s a bit accidental that it turned out that way but I’m glad it did. Now, Book II, due out on March 30, will probably reveal my political stripes a bit more clearly. I considered the effect this may have on readers. Will they like me and my work less if their political beliefs happen to run counter to mine? Will my work be polarizing, with some proclaiming me to be a genius, others calling me an ignorant hack?

     I figure the only way to avoid this from happening is to focus not on politics, but on religion. There’s a safe subject. Questions about the afterlife do arise in Sullivan’s War: Book II, but those questions are left largely unanswered. However, my next project after Sullivan’s War, a novel called Chrysopteron, deals rather directly with the issue of religion.

     Briefly, it is about a generation ship called the Chrysopteron that is en route to a distant planet. An event occurs aboard the ship that gives rise to a new religion and this religion becomes a point of contention for the future inhabitants of the planet once they begin to realize that many of the things they believe may not be true. The novel touches on many themes but one of the issues it examines is this: is religion a net positive or a net negative for society? It also asks whether or not historical fact should be an acceptable tool to condemn a religion. Specifically, are the merits of a religion really dependent on whether or not what its adherents believe is true? Can a religion survive being exposed as a complete fabrication? Can the religion carry on with its followers now viewing their mythology not as historical fact but as moral allegory?

     Of course, like any good religious story, there must be ambiguity. What really happened aboard the ship? Sure, the legend that arose around this particular event is exposed, but the event itself… was there something more to it? Will another event that occurs in the story’s “present day” assume the same significance that the first did for the main characters’ ancestors?

     Now, I know that many will read Chrysopteron and see it as a condemnation of religion. It is not my intent for it to come across that way, but the story requires it. What I mean is, if the religion in Chrysopteron is not called into question, there is no story, at least not the story I wanted to tell. This is one of the reasons that, despite being nearly finished with Chrysopteron, I intend to spend a few more months on it. I want to make a strong point, of course, but not in a way that will alienate readers. I want to leave readers asking questions about their own beliefs, not feeling as though I’ve made an obstinate proclamation regarding religion.

     In the end, I realize that tackling such issues as politics and religion is bound to leave some people unhappy. But for whatever reason these two things are so inseparably tied to our history and our culture that any writer is missing exploring a significant part of the human condition if he does not address it at least occasionally. And I do not believe a person ever became a writer so that he might be timid. So if you are a writer I say to you: be bold but be considerate. If you have a particular point of view to express do not do so with rage and bluster. Rather, let your skill as a writer allow you to weave that point into a narrative where it will find a natural home, where it will engage the minds of your readers and, even if they close the book disagreeing with you, will at least have them closing it thanking you for engaging them with grace and humility. There are highly political authors who never learned this lesson and they are the truly polarizing figures. They are the ones that drive a wedge between opposing sides rather than bringing them together in civil debate. With my writing I hope to do the latter.

Sullivan's War - A Reorganization

I'm currently working on A City without Walls, the second "part" of Sullivan's War. I ran into a problem, however. There are four sections which take place some time apart. I wanted to indicate this separation of time without doing the "Two Months Later" thing so I decided that each section would be separated by its own subtitle. For example, the first section of A City without Walls will be called "Promises."

Now, the natural thing would be to call these things parts. "Part I - Promises," for example. However, I've already used the word "part" to describe each book of Sullivan's War. I couldn't have Sullivan's War: Part II - A City without Walls with a "Part I - Promises" in it. That would just be too damn confusing.

So what I am doing is changing the title of each "part" of Sullivan's War to "Book." Each book will have four parts and each part, four or five chapters. This will require me to redo the covers of all the books but it shouldn't be too much of a problem.

So the new titles of the books in Sullivan's War are as follows:

Sullivan's War: Prologue - Sergeant Riley's Account
Sullivan's War: Book I - All Good Men Serve the Devil
Sullivan's War: Book II - A City without Walls
Sullivan's War: Book III - Edaline's Dawn

I apologize if this causes any confusion for my readers. I am only glad I decided on this change before Book I was released. All mentions of Sullivan's War will follow this format from now on.

Best,
Michael

January Writing Update: Sullivan's War Begins!

Sergeant Riley's Account has been out a little over two weeks now. I think sales are decent and unless they completely drop off I think it will remain on the Amazon Science Fiction Series Bestsellers List, increasing exposure. It is a Prologue to the series Sullivan's War and as such is independent of the main story line. It is a complete story in and of itself and both Sergeant Riley's Account and Sullivan's War can be read independent of one another. However, reading Sergeant Riley's Account beforehand will help flesh out the universe in which Sullivan's War takes place.

Regarding Sullivan's War, Part I of the series, All Good Men Serve the Devil, will be out on January 20. This is when I hope sales will really take off. A work called a "Prologue," after all, does not sound as engaging to a reader as a "Part I." It is currently in the hands of my wonderful beta readers and I have already received a very encouraging response from one of them. Part I ended up coming in at around 33,000 words, which translates into about 130 printed pages. Yes, this is short, but I am looking at the entire series as a novel-length endeavor. My goal for the Prologue along with Parts I-III is 80-90,000 words, or 320-360 pages. Hardly epic, I know, but this is partially intentional. I want the series to be fast-paced and exciting; I want the reader left wanting more and actively looking for the release of the next part in the series. I also want it to have a serial feel and the goal is for Parts II and III to be released in March and May. You will not have to wait too long to find out what happens next!

On January 1 I began working on Sullivan's War: Part II - A City Without Walls. This will wrap up several storylines begun in Part I and will prepare you for the exciting conclusion to the series, Edaline's Dawn.

On another topic, I have decided--after writing out my goals for 2012--to bring my novel Chrysopteron to completion this year. Look for it after Part III of Sullivan's War. There is also the possibility for a new series at the end of the year and running through the beginning of 2013. This is still unformed but I have a general idea of where I want that series to go.

In closing, I would like to refer you to my special offer. If you read Sergeant Riley's Account and leave a review on Amazon I will send you Part I of Sullivan's War for free. I hope many of you choose to take advantage of this offer.

Please go here to read about and purchase Sergeant Riley's Account. Watch this page for Sullivan's War: Part I - All Good Men Serve the Devil.

Thank you again to all my friends and fans! Together I hope we can make 2012 an exciting year for science fiction!

Best,
Michael

December Writing Update

Well, here I am, about a month and a half since I first published Inner Lives: Three Short Stories. I am still very fond of that collection but the breakout hit has been my short SciFi/Horror story Sleep. I think I hit a ground rule double with the cover and description. And the reviews have absolutely blown me away! Such high praise is definitely not what I was expecting for a short story that made the rounds of the fiction magazines and was rejected by them all without so much as a "how do you do." Now I only hope that my future work is received as warmly.

About that future work. My last post introduced you to Sullivan's War. This series will span four books of varying length. The prologue, Sergeant Riley's Account, will be out this coming week. It is a novelette at about 10,000 words. Part I of the main story line, All Good Men Serve the Devil, is currently sitting at around 30,000 words (a novella) but there are some scenes I need to expand (not to pad, but because it is needed). Parts II (A City Without Walls) and III (Edaline's Dawn) have yet to be written. Part II  has been outlined and looks like it will come in as a novella as well.

So, since each part will probably be less than novel-length, I am going to hold off on producing print versions of each title. Near the end of 2012, when the series has been completed, I will then compile them all and release the whole story arc in print.

In short fiction, I have recently completed a story called "Main & Church." It is a quiet, literary story like the ones in Inner Lives and I am quite happy with it. I will be revising and editing it before too long and will then submit it to a few markets. If it doesn't sell I'll then think about releasing it as a stand-alone ebook. I also have a collection in the works called Visitors. I have three stories about alien visitation that I am still tweaking and if I get to a point where I am happy with them Visitors will probably be out sometime next year.

And then there is Chrysopteron, my epic, generations-spanning saga chronicling the triumphs and failures of the human race. This is my baby, I've been hand-holding it for a long time (it's been in the works about two years) and I feel so strongly about it that I want to be absolutely sure that it is as perfect as I can make it before releasing it out into the world. It may or may not be released in 2012. It will depend on how long Sullivan's War takes to complete. But have no fear, Sullivan's War will be completed by this time next year. That is my major goal for 2012.

I have one other SciFi novel (and, as always, many short stories) that I want to work on sometime within the next few years as well as a non-speculative fiction novel called Disreputable. If you have read Henry James's The Aspern Papers think of an updated version of that with some very important differences.

Watch for the release of Sergeant Riley's Account this coming week. I hope you find the description engaging and that you'll take a chance on it. As always, thank you to all who have bought my ebooks, reviewed them, mentioned and RTed me on Twitter or even just browsed my blog. Without all of you I am nothing as a writer.

Best,
Michael

Coming Soon: Sullivan's War

In about a week's time I will be releasing the prologue to a series called Sullivan's War. Sergeant Riley's Account will introduce the planet of Edaline and provide some back story for the following trilogy of books. Those books will follow Rick Sullivan as he battles to free his home planet from tyranny. Below are the prospective covers and titles for each book in the series. I'd love to know what you think!

Best,

Michael

Edit: I have now standardized the font on all the covers to reinforce the fact that they are part of a series. I think they now look much stronger as a whole.