Cool another scifi author interview – let’s meet Jim Bowering! One cool thing you’ll notice in our interview is that Jim’s had a storied career as a firefighter and air traffic controller before turning his attention to scifi stories. Jim has an unusual approach to publication that I think you’ll find insightful. Come along for the ride as we interview Jim Bowering – scifi author:
Who are you?
My name is Jim Bowering – I’ve fought forest fires and controlled traffic in the air and on the sea. Now I write stories.
That’s interesting – I know very little about being an air traffic controller. What was that like?
I’ll tell you a couple of things. First, testosterone. There was so much testosterone in the air that it practically condensed on the windows.
Here’s a little story about a Christmas party for us controllers. We’re standing around with drinks in our hands when someone – probably me – brought up the question of how to preserve one’s night vision on a nocturnal trip to the bathroom. There were two essential considerations.
One wants to make sure that one’s stream is all contained within the bowl. One also does not want to stub one’s toe on the return to bed. You need light to hit the bowl, but you need your night vision to safely navigate your return. There were some suggestions like, turning on the light but closing one eye to use for getting back to bed. Or, Giving the lights a quick flash and then working off of the persistent vision of the location of things. They were good suggestions.
Then one of the women at the party, wives and girlfriends, asked, “Why don’t you just sit down?” There was a silence, then we all laughed at the absurdity. Testosterone does not sit.
The other thing is the sense of space and time and traffic that builds up in one’s mind while controlling air traffic. You get a sense of distance. Of traffic coming and going over the curvature of the earth. Of airplanes connecting distant points. The same thing happens with vessel traffic except the distances are greater and the speeds are slower. I wonder if a person with aphantasia could be an air traffic controller.
What would you like to promote?
Description: As Elgin wakes from a centuries-long sleep, it’s to the memory of danger and loss. Even in the confusion of re-animation, he wonders if this time she’ll be there. But then he remembers the mysterious Visitor and the perilous mission that took Frances from him, and darkness closes in again. Even so, there’s always the hope that this time will be different, that they will have found a way. It was always like this. Hope would always rise again, no matter how often it was struck down.
What got you into writing sci-fi?
I read a lot of science fiction, especially when I was young. It seemed natural to create something similar when I started writing my first novel. Success was finishing that first novel, and it’s finishing all the others I’ve written. I wouldn’t turn down fame and fortune if it seeks me out, but so far no one has showed up at my door with a briefcase full of money. I don’t have the stomach to chase it. Success is also writing stories that people like to read, and people keep telling me they do. I do wish more people would find them because that would mean that more people have got to enjoy them.
Creative Commons makes publishing and distribution relatively friction-free, and it frees people of any guilt they might feel at not paying me.
How do you make up cool worlds for your stories?
It’s where my characters would be, so I had to create a complete and cohesive setting. It’s simple. Imagine what a comet has to be like for people to survive and thrive on it, and solve each problem as it shows itself to you. That’s one of the beauties of SF: you can create your own reality. But since it’s SCIENCE fiction, you can’t ignore physics. You’ll find very little pixie dust in my stories.
Do you have a favorite character you’ve written?
Everybody loves Buzzard and so do I. Just wait ’til you meet him. You won’t be able to help yourself.-)
What lessons or messages do you try to share through your stories?
I don’t self-consciously insert messages. I just want people to have a nice, fun, colorful story to read. I’m sure there are “messages” embedded in there, though. It’s the author’s job to write the story. It’s the reader’s job to get any meaning from it. I’m sure there are all sorts of meanings in there that I’m not aware of.
What cool inventions do you think might become real someday?
Nanotools to work inside the body. In the story, the nanotools work in the hibernating body, fixing damage and correcting errors. This makes for a kind of conditional longevity. Two-way elements in screens so the cameras can be in people’s pupils. The two-way elements in the communication screens allow people to talk to each other while looking naturally into their eyes.
Jim, as a Scifi Author – can you tell us about how you write your stories?
If I can come up with a good first sentence, then I’m good for the day. Then it’s a matter of writing each page and chapter until it becomes a book.
When I was writing Green Comet I aimed for 300 pages, thinking that would be a reasonable size for a novel. But I also thought pages were 400 words long, and then I even ran over that. After writing that novel I had no intention of writing another.
My only goal was to write one to see if I could do it. It turned out that the people I showed it to thought it was pretty good, and I was still having ideas about the Green Comet universe, so I wrote an extension to it. I invited everyone else to add their own stories using those characters.
Creative Commons is supposed to be good for that. Nobody chipped in, but they liked my extension and they wanted more, so I wrote some more. Eventually it turned into writing another novel – Parasite Puppeteers. There was still more to say so I decided to make it a trilogy with The Francesians.
I very deliberately said that it wouldn’t grow beyond that. I didn’t want to be one of those writers who end up making their trilogies seven books long. Writing extensions led to me writing my novels in parts, which I still do now. My novels are shorter now, roughly half the size of those first three.
Who are your favorite writers?
My current favorite author is Louise Penny. Her Gamache novels show ordinary people learning how to be human.
What do you think the future of sci-fi looks like?
I don’t know, but there seem to be a lot of post-apocalypse stories out there.
If you could visit any world from your books, where would you go?
The comets.
Authors often have weird experiences with fans, publishing companies, authors, or other famous people. What’s your ‘weird author story?’
I think it’s funny when people learn that I write novels and I can tell that I’ve been enshrouded in an aura of mystique. Pupils dilate and they get a reverent expression … they’re in the presence of an AUTHOR. I try to bring them to their senses in a humorous way.
What else would you like to tell us?
- I suppose I could mention that I decided to license the books Creative Commons because I was inspired by Nina Paley and her animated movie, Sita Sings the Blues, which she originally licensed CC-BY-SA Nina Paley didn’t make me think differently because I wasn’t thinking about publishing at that stage anyway. Her example just made me see the possibility. You could read my posts on her and her movie if you like.
- Creative Commons frees creators, their creations and the people who experience them. An example of this can be found on my website where I’m recording people’s CC licensed stories and making them available. You can imagine the obstacles that would get in the way of doing that with things under absolute copyright.
Thanks for doing this Jim – it was great to meet another scifi author along with Buzzard, and the Green Comet series! I hope you feel welcomed to read other author interviews for inspiration and insight.
Write on!
