While it may sound like it mixes elements of science fiction and fantasy, author Khan Wong says his multi-timeline novel Down In The Sea Of Angels (paperback, Kindle, audiobook) is more of a “speculative / literary cross-over.”
Which may explain why, in the following email interview about it, he cites such disparate influences as David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas and the X-Men comics of Jonathan Hickman.
There are people who are convinced that we’re all living in a computer simulation. And others who just wish it was true because they’d like to leave now, please.
But in Daryl Gregory humorous cyberpunk science fiction novel When We Were Real (hardcover, Kindle, audiobook), people know they live in a computer simulation…and not a good one, either. Which is why two friends are taking a bus trip to see the glitches.
Well, that’s not the only reason.
In the following email interview, Gregory discusses what inspired and influenced this sci-fi story, including how he decided on the specifics of the sim.
Sometimes people joke that the only way they can escape their family would be to move to Mars.
Clearly author Joe Mungo Reed doesn’t think this way because, in his speculative fiction / science fiction novel Terrestrial History (hardcover, Kindle, audiobook), he tells a multi-generational story in which a family is pivotal in the colonization of the red planet.
In the following email interview, Reed talks about what inspired and influenced this sci-fi story.
In the following email interview about her new novella Deception (paperback, Kindle) — a side story to her Divided series of young adult dystopia science fiction action / adventure novels — author C.C. Robinson admits that, “I love novellas featuring secondary character side quests, as readers see more of the world and gain greater insight into the main characters.”
It’s easy to look at the world today and think our days are numbered…and it’s all our fault.
But in Lauren Stienstra’s speculative fiction novel The Beauty Of The End (hardcover, paperback, Kindle, audiobook), our days are numbered…and it’s a built-in feature.
In the following email interview, Stienstra talks about what inspired and influenced this thought-provoking science fiction story.
There are scientists who believe that, at some point in the future, we will have the technical ability to upload our consciousnesses into a machine. What they don’t talk about is who is going to maintain these devices. Will some people not be digitized? Will A.I. robots and constructs handle the maintenance?
In Mary G. Thompson’s new science fiction novella One Level Down (paperback, Kindle, audiobook), she not only explores this idea, but also has control of the construct leading to a rather untenable situation for one young girl…who isn’t a young girl at all.
In the following email interview, Thompson discusses where she got the idea for this story, as well as the particulars.
Most time travel stories mine similar territories. People go to the past, people go to the future, and either way something gets screwed up or fixed or both.
But in Philip Fracassi’s new time travel science fiction thriller The Third Rule Of Time Travel (paperback, Kindle, audiobook) he puts a new spin on this chronological conundrum.
As he details in the following email interview, it’s the titular third rule — and the second, and the first — that really change what you can do when you travel as well as where and when you can do when you get there.
When we talk about going back in time, it’s usually to kill Hitler or invest in Apple early or to see Led Zeppelin play The Whiskey in 1969.
But in Andrew Ludington’s new time travel science fiction caper novel Splinter Effect (hardcover, Kindle, audiobook), the person going back isn’t a murderer, an investor, or a music fan. He’s a professional time traveling archeologist.
Which isn’t to say he’s always above board.
In the following email interview, Ludington discusses what inspired and influenced this sci-fi story, including his plans to send his main character on more trips.
If you’re like me, then you’ve been a teenage boy who woke up on a strange spaceship, only to find the crew didn’t trust you because you have telepathic abilities, and since everyone knows that male telepaths are dangerous…
But while we’ve all been there, that doesn’t mean we don’t like reading stories in which this common occurance happens to someone else.
Which brings me to J. Warren’s young adult science fiction space opera novel Worldburner (paperback, Kindle).
In the following email interview, Warren talks about what inspired and influenced this sci-fi story.