Of all the things people have suggested to solve England’s Brexit mistake, none have been as clever or as rife with televisual possibilities as Thomas D. Lee’s modern fantasy take on King Arthur and The Knights Of The Round Table, Perilous Times (hardcover, Kindle, audiobook). In the following email interview, Lee discusses what else inspired and influenced this fantasy tale.
In Philip K. Dick’s 1956 novella The Minority Report, and the Steven Spielberg movie version of it, crimes are prevented by people who can see into the future. But in his time travel thriller Myriad (paperback, Kindle, audiobook), writer Joshua David Bellin is taking a different approach to the justice system by letting people go back in time to undo crimes that have already been committed. In the following email interview, Bellin discusses what inspired and influenced this sci-fi story.
In the upcoming Assassin’s Creed: Mirage, fans of the historical action games will go on another adventures with Basim Ibn Ishaq, who was originally introduced in 2020’s Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla. But if you can’t wait for the game, Basim’s exciting life will also be explored in Jaleigh Johnson’s new novel, Assassin’s Creed: The Golden City (paperback, Kindle, audiobook). In the following email interview, Johnson discusses what (aside from the titular games) inspired and influenced this historical action story.
As the last few years have made abundantly clear, fallacies can be dangerous when enough people believe they’re true. It’s an idea at the center of Sue Burke’s new hard sci-fi novel Dual Memory (hardcover, Kindle, audiobook). Except that, as she explains in the following email interview, the falsehood believed as fact that influenced this story isn’t one that came up in the last few years, but a real one many years ago.
It’s funny to look back at the first Iron Man movie and think how that character got his own movie when he wasn’t as well-known as Spider-Man or Superman. But every character has to start somewhere. Which is what I was thinking when editing the following email interview with writer Neil Kleid about his new novel School Of X: The Phoenix Chase (paperback, Kindle), an X-Men novel about the mutant Kid Omega. Who? you might ask…for now…
It’s been a while since we’ve seen any Jewish people in The Old West. 1974’s Blazing Saddles, to be exact. And even then, it was the regular Old West, not the horror Old West. But the latter is what you get with Zachary Rosenberg’s new Weird West / historical horror / Jewish horror / LGBTQ+ horror novella Hungers As Old As This Land (paperback, Kindle). In the following email interview, Rosenberg discusses what inspired and influenced this multi-genre mash-up that even Mel Brooks wouldn’t have thought to mix together.
When talking about whether the idea for a book is good or not, we usually lay all the blame at the feet of the writer. But like movies, cakes, and cars, books aren’t just made by one person.
It’s something I thought about while doing the following email interview with writer Premee Mohamed about her first short story collection, No One Will Come Back For Us And Other Stories (paperback, Kindle), in which she credits the book’s editor and publisher with making it good as well as possible.
Oftentimes, when there’s a collection of short horror stories about animals killing people, said animals are of the fictional variety. But in assembling the anthology Killer Creatures Down Under: Horror Stories With Bite (paperback, Kindle), editor Deborah Sheldon decided that all of these tales had to feature real-life animals that live in Australia, including (but not limited to) the Quoll, the Goanna, the Blue Ringed Octopus, and the Rainbow Lorikeet. All of whom are pictured below in what I assume are photos found on the corpses of brave nature photographers. In the following email interview, Sheldon discusses what inspired this anthology, including why she went for real-life monsters instead of fictional ones.
While we’ve had tons of zombie stories set in modern times (The Walking Dead), as well as in the future (Dead Space), the past remains a largely untapped setting for stories of the undead. Or at least it did until Raphaël Guiton, Jean-Baptiste Lullien, and Nicolas Raoult expanded their undead board game Zombicide to include a medieval fantasy realm spin-off version called Black Plague.
But for people who prefer to read about the living impaired, instead of playing with them, writer C.L. Werner has you covered. Hopefully with a big sword.
In the following email interview, Werner discusses Zombicide: Black Plague: Isle Of The Undead (paperback, Kindle), the sequel to his previous horror-infused epic fantasy tale, Age Of The Undead.