My own brush with fame....
Aug. 17th, 2002 04:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
senoritafishSean Russell visited Barnes & Noble the other night, promoting his new book ( I can’t remember the title right now, but it’s second in a series). It must have been a bit disappointing, as there were only a dozen people there to listen to him. I had only read two of his books, but I really enjoyed them. Sea Without Shore and World Without End were a two-book fantasy series about a world where magic has been forgotten about, and science has become the way to explain natural phenomena. A Darwinian-style naturalist is disconcerted to find that not only does magic still exist, but he actually has a talent for it. It’s been a while since I read it, so I’m a bit fuzzy on all the details.
Mr. Russell was a tallish, a bit on the thin side, hair a bit Duchovny-esque (late X-Files), with a part in the middle, and unruly bangs on either side of his forehead, a goatee, khaki pants, a rayon shirt with a pattern of blue rectangles, and Teva sandals. He looked a bit like Brent Spiner about the nose and not at all like his picture on the poster. He told us his wife said that picture is old, and he needs a new one (he actually looked a lot better). I didn’t know where he was from, but I knew he was Canadian the second he said the word "about"(aboot -and he‘s from Vancouver).
Answers to questions:
-He said his first book (The Iniate Brother) was rejected by half a dozen people who absolutely loved it. It didn’t fall into any strict category (historical, fantasy, science fiction), and therefore wasn’t publishable. Is that sad? It was eventually published as a fantasy.
-He constantly dumbfounded when people asked very in depth questions on some his books - he doesn’t remember them in that much detail (somewhat like William Shatner on SNL). "I wrote "World Without End" in 1984, so it was a long time ago for me."
-With eight books under his belt, he still feels like a beginning writer. His advice to aspiring writers - "make your own mark," i.e. be original and don’t be copying anyone else.
-He works a 9-6 day in his spare bedroom/office, and his family is very good about not interrupting him. It’s a real mess - papers everywhere. He says NASA did a study and found that the most creative people have messy offices, so that’s his excuse (hear, hear).
-He tells his 4-year old son stories, but the child is allowed to pick the parameters. One evening, he was too
tired and wandered about a lot. When he was finished, his son said "That was really boring and it was too short."
-For pleasure, he reads history and anything about Darwin. He doesn’t read fiction as much as he used to because he spends all day creating fiction, and therefore it’s too much like work. However, he regards this as a great loss.
-When he was 10 years old ( and began writing), he made a conscious effort not the let his imagination die. Today’s school systems don’t really support this, and make every effort to squelch it - usually the kids with the most imagination are the ones disrupting the class.
-With his latest series, he reread Tolkein, and actually made a list of stuff he wouldn’t do in his own story. He used trial and error to find out what would and wouldn’t work.
-I asked him if he had an opinion of fan fiction, but he said he really wasn’t familiar with it, and had no opinion. The 14-yr old in the group interjected with "it’s mostly written by obessed people (like Trekkies) and they always want to change the canon of the story."(I realized later this girl was a bit obsessed herself, only with Tolkein). He did say he had always wanted to come up with a story about Radagast the Brown, a wizard who is mentioned in Lord of the Rings, but never really developed as a character.
Because my room rather resembles his office (so I must be really creative), I couldn’t find his books, so I had him sign my notebook. He looked at me a little strangely when I handed him my black-paper book and green gel-pen (Well, it was all I had with me). I told him we have kids the same age, and how much I enjoyed the abovementioned books - the biologist he described is really the kind I would have like to have been, exploring the world and discovering new things. He agreed - for Darwin, everything he saw was something new and different. He grinned and said he had several biologist friends keeping him on the right track, as he had none of that background himself. We chatted a bit about the eccentricities of four year olds ("They really think outside the box, because they haven‘t learned yet the way things are supposed to be." and "We were visiting a tall ship, which we was quite impressed with. One of the officers said ‘You can come out on a ship like this when you grow up.’’Oh no,’ he said. ’I’m going to be a hockey player.’"). Then it was time for him to go and my book group to start having its meeting. It was quite a pleasure taking to him and he seemed genuinely happy to be talking to people.
Mr. Russell was a tallish, a bit on the thin side, hair a bit Duchovny-esque (late X-Files), with a part in the middle, and unruly bangs on either side of his forehead, a goatee, khaki pants, a rayon shirt with a pattern of blue rectangles, and Teva sandals. He looked a bit like Brent Spiner about the nose and not at all like his picture on the poster. He told us his wife said that picture is old, and he needs a new one (he actually looked a lot better). I didn’t know where he was from, but I knew he was Canadian the second he said the word "about"(aboot -and he‘s from Vancouver).
Answers to questions:
-He said his first book (The Iniate Brother) was rejected by half a dozen people who absolutely loved it. It didn’t fall into any strict category (historical, fantasy, science fiction), and therefore wasn’t publishable. Is that sad? It was eventually published as a fantasy.
-He constantly dumbfounded when people asked very in depth questions on some his books - he doesn’t remember them in that much detail (somewhat like William Shatner on SNL). "I wrote "World Without End" in 1984, so it was a long time ago for me."
-With eight books under his belt, he still feels like a beginning writer. His advice to aspiring writers - "make your own mark," i.e. be original and don’t be copying anyone else.
-He works a 9-6 day in his spare bedroom/office, and his family is very good about not interrupting him. It’s a real mess - papers everywhere. He says NASA did a study and found that the most creative people have messy offices, so that’s his excuse (hear, hear).
-He tells his 4-year old son stories, but the child is allowed to pick the parameters. One evening, he was too
tired and wandered about a lot. When he was finished, his son said "That was really boring and it was too short."
-For pleasure, he reads history and anything about Darwin. He doesn’t read fiction as much as he used to because he spends all day creating fiction, and therefore it’s too much like work. However, he regards this as a great loss.
-When he was 10 years old ( and began writing), he made a conscious effort not the let his imagination die. Today’s school systems don’t really support this, and make every effort to squelch it - usually the kids with the most imagination are the ones disrupting the class.
-With his latest series, he reread Tolkein, and actually made a list of stuff he wouldn’t do in his own story. He used trial and error to find out what would and wouldn’t work.
-I asked him if he had an opinion of fan fiction, but he said he really wasn’t familiar with it, and had no opinion. The 14-yr old in the group interjected with "it’s mostly written by obessed people (like Trekkies) and they always want to change the canon of the story."(I realized later this girl was a bit obsessed herself, only with Tolkein). He did say he had always wanted to come up with a story about Radagast the Brown, a wizard who is mentioned in Lord of the Rings, but never really developed as a character.
Because my room rather resembles his office (so I must be really creative), I couldn’t find his books, so I had him sign my notebook. He looked at me a little strangely when I handed him my black-paper book and green gel-pen (Well, it was all I had with me). I told him we have kids the same age, and how much I enjoyed the abovementioned books - the biologist he described is really the kind I would have like to have been, exploring the world and discovering new things. He agreed - for Darwin, everything he saw was something new and different. He grinned and said he had several biologist friends keeping him on the right track, as he had none of that background himself. We chatted a bit about the eccentricities of four year olds ("They really think outside the box, because they haven‘t learned yet the way things are supposed to be." and "We were visiting a tall ship, which we was quite impressed with. One of the officers said ‘You can come out on a ship like this when you grow up.’’Oh no,’ he said. ’I’m going to be a hockey player.’"). Then it was time for him to go and my book group to start having its meeting. It was quite a pleasure taking to him and he seemed genuinely happy to be talking to people.
