My new story, Sitala, has just been published in the UnCommon Minds anthology. To celebrate, I’m interviewing some of the authors about their stories. Today, I’m talking to Daniel Arthur Smith about The Enemy Beyond the Walls. What attracted you to the UnCommon Minds project? I have long been an avid reader of magical realism and the UnCommon project excels at promoting the genre. What was the inspiration for the uncommon mind in your story? The current dumbing down of our society inspired me to create a world where a child who possesses the knowledge of Trigonometry is unique in her city. What are you most proud of about the story? If I succeeded, the story is an allegory for the dangers of dumbing down and villainizing intellectualism and knowledge experts. If you could merge someone else’s mind with your own, who would you choose and why? My lovely wife as I find grace through her. What uncommon mind would you like to meet and why? I’ve had a recent fascination with Lin Manuel Miranda due to his ability to merge history and allegory into new mediums. What’s the setting for your story? A lone coastal city-state shouldered by the mountains and the … Read More
The Unbearable Lateness of Being
So, yeah… I was planning on doing a monthly update on writing type stuff but it seems February has kind of gotten away from me. Of course, the obsessive compulsive part of my psyche won’t let me get away with not posting a January round up so if everyone could just pretend this is being posted at the beginning of February rather than the middle, I’d appreciate it. Thanks. January was pretty well dominated by my day job. We’re just finishing up a new game and we’ve reached the part of the project where we try to squish all the bugs. This is the point in development where all the dumb mistakes you made a year ago come back to bite you in the life-work balance. So, my days have been filled with seemingly endless bug reports and requests for “one last change”. We’re nearly done, at least with that bit, so with luck things will ease up for the next couple of months. Despite that, I managed to maintain my writing streak and hit 946 days at the end of January. I’m in full on editing mode at the moment but still managed to reach 17,971 words for the month which puts me ahead of last year’s January total of 15,720. … Read More
I Have Hugh Howey’s DNA
Nautically inclined indie author, Hugh Howey, is taking to the seas to live the life of a pirate or something. Sadly, the catamaran Hugh is having built doesn’t have space for all the books he collected during his rise to super-stardom so, a few months ago, he held The Most Spectacular Pot Luck Book Signing in the History of the Universe to clear out his storage. For a flat fee per item, fans could request items from his collection – anything from simple signed copies of his books to a Boba Fett action figure. The catch being that there was no guarantee they’d get exactly what they ordered – hence the Pot Luck in The Most Spectacular Pot Luck Book Signing in the History of the Universe. I ordered three “items” but was deliberately vague about what I wanted. I enjoyed Hugh’s Wool novels but Sand is actually my favourite of his and his “dark” story – I, Zombie is just too tempting to ignore. So, I asked for something related to those two books. The parcel arrived a few days ago and I wasn’t disappointed. First up, I got these: That’s a complete set of the individual Sand novellas, all signed. Next, there was a manuscript page from one of his Molly Fyde books. And … Read More