Interview with my Peeps #2-Martin Richard Thomas

Do you prefer the term author or writer?

Call me "old-fashioned", "pedantic", or just "stuck-up" but "writer" strikes me as more generalist than "author". A writer, in my head at least, produces articles for magazines, journal entries, technical documents to order and so on. An Author specifically writes books. It's a simple demarcation of roles rather than a desire to set myself aside from writers in general.

In school, were you a nerd, jock, goth, prep…what?

I was a Nerd/Rocker. Simple as that. I never felt the urge to really go along with the crowd, save to avoid bullying. That and I like science, nerdy stuff and the colour black. I pretty have two colour schemes, "Black" and "Not Black".

When did you first feel inclined to write?

I did enjoy writing creatively in English Literature at school. The creative writing assignment in exams was the one I left until last so I could just keep going until time ran out. It wasn't until a night out in my late twenties/early thirties when a conversation turned to an idea for a novel that I seriously considered finishing one (there was an abortive attempt in Uni, which I should go back and delete then start again but nothing that was going to be considered a serious attempt).

What is your favorite character in everything you have read and why?

I do love "Silk" from David Eddings Balgariad etc. He portrays himself as totally amoral, but deep down he has a sense of decency, warped though it may be. He is also the witty comic relief, not necessarily because of his intelligence or wit but he can act as the foil as well.

What is your favorite character you have created and why?

I do like the crazy ones, they have a real sense of freedom that is hard to obtain within the constraints of a defined moral and societal code. It has been said that a hero is only as good as his villain (I think it was in an M. Night Shyamalan film - I do like the line although I don't like any of his films). Investigator Celeris is, if you ignore her growing insanity, an accomplished, intelligent, collected woman who takes the world on her own terms. It's hard not to envy that about her. To write she is an absolute dream, you can't imagine her recoiling with horror at the suggestion of something to do with the cry of "but I can't do THAT!!!" She'd just get out and do it, if it suited her. If it didn't she just wouldn't and there's nothing you could do to change her mind.

Name some of the authors that influence your work.

Laurence Rees work "In Their Darkest Hour" has been a great source of inspiration, not only for the horror invoked by his real life accounts of World War II, but also some of the heroism and self-reflection from the instigators and victims. Much of what is reported of that period is of heroes and villains, black and white. In that book he tells of people who are ashamed of what they did, or view their actions as just a thing they were forced into. The full gamut of human coping mechanisms. Given the similarity of the Empire in the Phoenix novels to the Nazi's and others like them throughout history it was an invaluable book of source material.

Other authors include David Eddings, David Gemmell, Sir Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, Tom Holt. Many of which are no longer with us - I wish they were still writing books for me to read.

What is the hardest thing about the author world?

Marketing, I suck at that. I feel it's way too egotistical for me to go on about how great my work is as I'm pretty sure it's not all that. Some people who have reviewed my work disagree with me on that, but I don't think I'll ever get over the feeling that what I write isn't really good enough.

The best?

I have to say the following review for "Phoenix: Penitence" really made my day:

"This author has a unique and delightfully artful way of writing. The expert mastery of dialogue and language is as entertaining as the story itself. I was immediately transported to this world and its totalitarian structure which is analogous to The Inquisition set in a far flung future after a nuclear event. Usually I can read quickly, not so with this prose. Impressively, the sentence and paragraph structures require close attention to each word because much meaning is attached. That is not to say this story is hard to understand or tedious to read, it is to say that this writing is not dumbed down. True lovers of literature will love this no doubt, regardless of a preferred genre.

The first tale and the introduction to the Phoenix: Rising novel use the far future to shine a light on the horrors of fanaticism and totalitarianism. Excellent."

Thank you Ron Baker, if you ever read this.

I also had a fan tell me that reading (in general but including my books) help her keep her feet on the ground in relation to a major illness. She also designed several playing cards for me from the covers of my books. I never thought that anything I could write would make that much of a difference to anyone.

Tell us about what you have coming up in 2018.

I will hopefully be releasing "Phoenix: Deliverance", which picks up just after "Phoenix: Dark Eagle" and features Terentius Catilina once again. This is also a prequel to "Phoenix: Rising" but set after "Phoenix: Ashes". I'm also working on a piece for an Anthology called "42 and Beyond". This Anthology will be a collection of Space Opera short stories. I'm also hoping to work on a strange amalgamation of styles (Science Fiction, Science Fiction Fantasy all mixed in with time travel and Japanese mythology) called "The Kitsune Paradox", I'm not sure if that will be just a short story, a novella or a full novel as yet - or even if it will be out this year.