Like a lot of kids, Zack Lightman — the main character of Ernest Cline’s second novel, Armada (hardcover, digital) — has dreamed about being a space pilot since he saw Star Wars. It’s one of many reasons he spends his free time playing a space dogfighting video game. But when the alien invaders from his favorite game invade Earth for real, Zack realizes he’s hasn’t been playing a game all these years, he’s been training.
Writer Sarah Ghoshal is a new mom, a college poetry professor, and a suburban wife. But before you dismiss the poems in her new book Changing The Grid (paperback) and her upcoming chapbook The Pine Tree Experiment (due out in July) because you think they must read like Hallmark cards, you should consider — as she reveals in the following interview — how she’s also been inspired by Jim Morrison, The Descendants, and not that most middle-of-the-road of rock stars, Kid Rock.
Many music fans know Chris Gorman as the drummer from the band Belly. Still others know him as the professional photographer he’s been since Belly split up nearly twenty years ago. And I know him as the T.A. of my college video class who I used to interview when he was in the band Belly. But now, with the release of Indi Surfs (hardcover), Gorman has a new role: children’s book author and illustrator. I spoke to him about the inspirations for this book, both personal and artistic, and what it was like writing a children’s book about your own kid.
Since the original Star Trek TV show, people have wished we had transporters so they could go to The Ivy in London for Sheppard’s Pie. Or maybe that’s just me. But they might rethink their dinners plans after reading Peter Clines’ The Fold (hardcover, digital), in which some scientists invent a transporter they call The Albuquerque Door. Though in talking Mr. Clines about his new novel, it’s clear his inspiration for this sci-fi tale went beyond wanting to eat British food.
Last year, writer Chris Beckett explored the idea of a new Earth, one without a sun, in his sci-fi novel Dark Eden. But in his sequel, Mother Of Eden (hardcover, paperback, digital), Beckett continues the story of this human world not by picking up where he left off, but two hundred years later. Which, as he sees it, was a much more interesting way to continue this now ongoing saga.
While Dan Henk has made a name of himself as a tattoois and illustrator, he’s also often expressed himself as a writer of both fiction and non-. With Permuted Press recently reprinting his 2011 novel The Black Seas Of Infinity (paperback, digital), I spoke to him about the origins of this horror novel, as well as how this new edition compares to the original.
Though she learned to speak English from watching Scooby-Doo, there’s nothing cartoony about the scary writings of Ania Ahlborn. With her new book, Within These Walls (paperback, digital) hitting stories, I spoke to her about what inspired different aspects of this novel.
Every week for the last four years, Henry Rollins has written a column for the L.A. Weekly, a free alternative weekly newspaper in Los Angeles. And almost every week, some editor cuts something out or changes the title.
But while you might think this would send him into some Hulk-like rage — especially if you don’t know much about the man and his professionalism — Henry instead just saves the originals for an ongoing series of books he calls Before The Chop, the first volume of which is available both physically and digitally .
With the second, Before The Chop II (digital) now out, I sent him some questions via email to ask how much his editors change his work, if these changes have impacted how he writes for them, and why — after twenty years of writing about music, his life, and other real things — he’s never penned a work of fiction.
According to the Anxiety And Depression Association Of America, “Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S., affecting 40 million adults in the United States age 18 and older (18% of U.S. population).” In his new book, Anxiety As An Ally: How I Turned A Worried Mind Into My Best Friend (paperback, digital), writer Dan Ryckert — who I and other people know best as a senior editor of the video game website Giant Bomb, or from his previous gig as the senior associate editor of the video game magazine Game Informer — talks about how he’s found a way to live as one of those 18%.