Ask the Author: E.P. Clark
Answered Questions (12)
E.P. Clark
Hmmmmm.....That's a tough one. I really like pretending that I'm in the Harry Potter world, so maybe that one. Another world I love is Terre D'Ange from Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel series, although to be perfectly honest, I don't know that I'd have the nerve to visit the Court of Ever-Blooming Flowers :) I adore the Song of Ice and Fire books, but I'm not sure I'd actually want to live in Westeros or anywhere else in that world. I also love Robin Hobb's Farseer series, but again, I'm not 100% certain I'd want to live there, since I love the idea of being able to talk to animals but hate the idea of being executed for doing so!
Another world I enjoy that actually is a world is Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars from the Red Mars-Blue Mars-Green Mars trilogy. It really made me want to go to Mars when I read it. CJ Cherryh's Alliance-Union world is fascinating and I did enjoy thinking about being in either Upabove or Downbelow Station, but again, I'm not sure I'm actually cut out for it. Still, Downbelow Station and Finity's End in particular are must-reads for any scifi fan.
Another world I enjoy that actually is a world is Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars from the Red Mars-Blue Mars-Green Mars trilogy. It really made me want to go to Mars when I read it. CJ Cherryh's Alliance-Union world is fascinating and I did enjoy thinking about being in either Upabove or Downbelow Station, but again, I'm not sure I'm actually cut out for it. Still, Downbelow Station and Finity's End in particular are must-reads for any scifi fan.
E.P. Clark
Gosh! It's hard to say, since I do a LOT of reading and reviewing, so it kind of depends on what shows up on NetGalley. However, a couple of things I'm definitely planning to read are "Through the Shadowlands," by Julie Rehmeyer, about her odyssey to heal herself from CFS/ME, and some more Politkovskaya and Prilepin. I'm working on a project on Chechen war literature for my "day job" of Russian professor, so I'll be spending part of the summer reading about that and writing it up. AND (self-promo here) I'm planning to release the next installment of "The Zemnian Trilogy" this summer, so I'm currently "reading" that, in the sense of revising it, and will continue to do so for the next month or so.
E.P. Clark
So many things, but here's a fun one! I bought a house last year. A couple of months ago I noticed an extra window that didn't match up with any of the windows in any of my rooms. Turns out I have a secret chamber that was boarded up in the inside and abandoned! The only point of ingress/egress is a small window that can only be accessed from the porch roof. I think this DEFINITELY needs to feature in a future novel!
E.P. Clark
Gosh! What a difficult choice! Hmm, let me think....
Well, I'm a huge Jane Austen fan, so Lizzie and Darcy have to be somewhere near the top of the list. In fantasy, I'd have to say it's probably Phedre and Joscelin from Jacqueline Carey's first three Kushiel books. And as a child I was extremely fond of both L. M. Montgomery's Anne stories, and the Laura Ingalls Wilder books, so Anne and Gilbert, and Laura and Almanzo (who were actual real people) will always have a special place in my heart.
Well, I'm a huge Jane Austen fan, so Lizzie and Darcy have to be somewhere near the top of the list. In fantasy, I'd have to say it's probably Phedre and Joscelin from Jacqueline Carey's first three Kushiel books. And as a child I was extremely fond of both L. M. Montgomery's Anne stories, and the Laura Ingalls Wilder books, so Anne and Gilbert, and Laura and Almanzo (who were actual real people) will always have a special place in my heart.
E.P. Clark
Hi John--Great to meet another PhD! Your book does sound interesting (I love Ireland and all things Irish!); however, Amazon frowns on review swaps, so I try to avoid them. If you are interested in getting more reviews, there are some groups on Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ for authors looking for reviews, such as Good Reviews, Review Group, and Fantasy Review Group. You can also check out Support For Indie Authors. In some of them you post your book and invite people to review it (there's no guarantee of a review, but it's free) and in others you have to "pay in" by reviewing other books. In that case you are probably going to get a review or multiple reviews, although you have no control over who the reviewers are and probably some will like your book and some won't. I hope this helps, and best of luck with your books! Elena
E.P. Clark
Just sent! I hope you like it, and good luck with your book as well. Elena
E.P. Clark
The harrowing experience of cranking out my dissertation and applying for academic jobs for several years in a row has really trained me to be able to write about all kinds of things all the time under all kinds of circumstances. A lot of the time now the act of starting to write allows me to bypass my higher mental controls and go straight for the text-generating subconscious, which I think is essential for writing. I think that's what a lot of people use drugs or alcohol to access, but for me pain and desperation were very effective! So being put in a situation where you HAVE to generate something and submit it according to a strict deadline can be very helpful, even if it doesn't feel like it at the time! In order to get to that state, I have some tricks, like writing by hand when writing on the computer seem too difficult or intimidating, and doing things to make the process less painful. For example, I listen to music. I have trained myself to have a Pavlovian response to music, such that it puts me in the mood to work. I have some go-to artists that I consider to be my "muses" when I need to write something really difficult. Kino (a Soviet band) got me through a lot of The Midnight Land, and I worked some of their lyrics into the book. My number-one groups recently have been Snow Patrol/Tired Pony, with Florence + The Machine, Of Monsters and Men, AWOLNation, and Ben Howard all tied for a close second, along with a bunch of Finnish artists. Somehow being exposed to something that's sort of like writing (I like to pay attention to the lyrics) but not exactly helps break down the barriers in my mind and allow the words to flow.
E.P. Clark
My characters and stories are really meaningful to me. I feel like I can say things through them that I can't any other way. And I live in the worlds they inhabit.
E.P. Clark
Do lots of writing! And reading. We don't tend to think of writing as being the same as something like music or dance, where you have to practice and practice and practice, but I think that regular practice is the only thing that will really make you a writer. Also, search for something that really matters to you and that also resonates with other people. Try to make the specifics of whatever you're writing about meaningful to readers who may never have experienced that specific situation, but have probably experienced the emotions it engendered--e.g., being ignored, being oppressed or controlled, being in love, etc. etc.
E.P. Clark
I'm working on a draft of "The Breathing Sea," the second book (which will probably end up being really long and split into multiple volumes like the other books) in the Zemnian trilogy.
E.P. Clark
I try to write a bit as frequently as possible, preferably every day, although it depends a lot on what else I'm doing--e.g., if I'm applying for jobs, finishing an article or a translation project (I finished the aforementioned Ph.D. in Russian literature and am now a professional academic as my day job), or doing promotional activities, I don't do a lot of writing since just like everyone else, I have a limited amount of time and energy I can spend on it. But the discipline of writing every day really helps and I've trained myself to become inspired by sitting down (or standing--I have a standing desk I work at sometimes) in front of the computer and writing. Normally once I start writing, the ideas start coming. Another thing that inspires me, weirdly enough, is being mad or upset about something. So reading a book that I think is poorly done, or reading something in the news that makes me angry, inspires me to write a rebuttal of it in my own work, often in very oblique form.
E.P. Clark
I'd been thinking about a Slavic-themed fantasy world that was part of a European/Middle Eastern-inspired world for a long time and already written some short stories based on it. I was planning to start on a new story when I came across the term "The Midnight Land" in some texts I was reading for an Old Russian Literature class (I was working on a Ph.D. in Russian literature at the time). I instantly knew that had to be the title of my next story, only when I sat down to start working on it, it kept getting longer and longer, so that it went from a short story to a novella to an enormous novel. In the same class I also came across the term "The Breathing Sea" to describe the White Sea, and I knew I wanted to use that as a title as well, so that's the title to the next book in the series that The Midnight Land starts. I've actually already written the final book (which will be split into several volumes because of its enormity) in the series. I called it The Dreaming Land, which was inspired by one of the suggested meanings of the word "Siberia." According to the story, it was called "The Sleeping Land" by the Mongols as they were crossing it. I loved that phrase and kept thinking about how to incorporate it into a title.
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