Jay Swanson will be awarding print copies of Into the Nanten to two randomly drawn winners (US shipping only -- an e-book of Shadows of the Highridge will be substituted to international winners) and a print of the original artwork created for his series Into the Nanten (US only shipping) to two other randomly drawn winners via rafflecopter during the tour.
Shadows of the Highridge
by Jay Swanson
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GENRE: Sci-Fi Fantasy
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INTERVIEW:
1. What or who inspired you to start writing?
When I was 14 someone handed me a pen, stuck a gun to the
back of my head, and after cocking back the hammer said “You have ten minutes
to write a story that makes me cry, or I pull the trigger.” I got so absorbed
in just how many times Schrodinger’s cat called out for mercy that I didn’t
notice him leave, so I’m still uncertain whether or not he was crying, but I
haven’t stopped writing since.
Into the Nanten
was inspired as muchby my time living in South, Central, and West Sub-Saharan
Africa as anything– at least you’ll find a lot of my personal experiences there
on a soul-searching level. The direct inspiration to write it came very much
from reading Tim Butcher’s Blood River,
not even reading the book but just his forward. It was insane. I’d wanted to write
something serial, episodic, something that would be immersive. A real-time
fantasy blog following a man exiled into the world’s most hostile jungle seemed
to do the trick.
Shadows of the
Highridge, a spinoff of the story, was inspired by my need to tell
Salisir’s story. That and Tremors –
yes the cult classic starring Kevin Bacon – and Cry the Beloved County by Alan Paton (may his estate never discover
what I’ve done).
2. What elements are necessary components for this genre?
For real-time fantasy blogging? Well you need a computer,
the internet, WordPress (don’t bother with Blogger), and a penchant for
screwing your characters over. Into the
Nanten fits many genres. Whether epic, travel log, or even memoir, the key
elements are the same as in any story worth reading: conflict, conflict, and more
cannibals.
Granted you can’t have cannibals in everything or your readers start to get a little leery (like how
zombies are the crux of every other story right now). But you can have conflict
in everything. You must. Outside of that, the very reaches of the universe are
the limit for Fantasy with a capital “F,” and you can do whatever you like within
her bounds.
3. How did you come up with your idea for your novel?
Shadows of the
Highridge was a necessity born out of the longsuffering desires of my fans.
They plod along day after day with Marceles in Into the Nanten, reading his thoughts and waiting for the next
day’s offering (often in the throes of anxiety – he could have died in the
night after all). I wanted to tell them a little more, something that would
inform them about this world and key players in the conflict – and who better
to key in on than the man he’s searching for? The man he hates. The man whose
fingerprints are all over the gloomy jungle: Brin Salisir.
Salisir is a little like the Most Interesting Man in the
World if you swapped the beer with a sword and gave him a burning passion to
kill cultists. He’s street smart, capable, and a bit of a jerk. A lot of a jerk
sometimes. But the only way readers got to know him in season one of Into the Nanten was through the eyes of
Marceles, who clearly hates his guts.
I wanted to give them a different lens through which to view him.
Enter Vanig and Tolly, farmers whose lot had already been
terrible through ten years of drought before Salisir wandered in and made it
worse. The perfect setting to see a little more of who he really was.
4. What expertise did you bring to your writing?
I’m a Lord, a Royal Diamond Shellback, and a master of Crash
Team Racing. What more do you need?
Living in France and a variety of countries in Central,
South, and West Sub-Saharan Africa has given me every opportunity to have my
mind blown and my eyes opened to the world. It’s taught me just how little I
really know, how much I have to learn, and I’m starting to realize how little
I’ll ever figure out. I think that’s a good place to start for someone who’s
hoping to do the same for others.
5. What would you want your readers to know about you that might not be in
your bio?
I’ve snuck into a few countries illegally and, one of those
times, almost started an international conflict. Heh. Just do your homework
before you choose which borders to hop. It’s those kinds of adventures that
help inform the gut-wrenching moments in my stories, and which I hope to better
capture on the page as I grow.
6. As far as your writing goes, what are your future plans?
There are plans I can’t talk about, so… why… am… I? I can,
however, say that I hope to Kickstart a third season of Into the Nanten in a couple of months (stay tuned!) and write
another spinoff novel that will center on Salisir as the main character. I
think it’s finally time to get inside his head.
7. If you could be one of the characters from this book, who would it be
and why?
I can’t remember which book you’re asking about so I’ll just
say Salisir because he’s in both. He’s a total jerk, but Marceles (Into the Nanten) is me in his
self-righteous know-it-all-ism, and Vanig (Shadows
of the Highridge) is me in his cowardice and self-deceived sense of
superiority. So yeah, I don’t want to be those guys because they’ve already got
the worst parts of me. I’ll just be badass mysterious Salisir and wander off
into the jungle after I kick some ass and set some international wrongs right.
8. Can you give us a sneak peek into this book?
Shadows of the
Highridge (inspired in part by Kevin Bacon’s Tremors and Alan Paton’s Cry
the Beloved Country) takes place on the abandoned borderlands of the Old
Empire, struggling through a decade of drought and the aftermath of plague.
Vanig is within grasp of saving his farm, just a few dusty miles from the water
that could change everything, when soldiers arrive suspicious that he might be
at the root of an even greater catastrophe nearby. Because all of the farmers around
him are dying in bloody massacre, and somehow he’s fine.
Into the Nanten is
the journal of a warrior exiled for murder. To cover up the exile for what it
is, he’s given public orders to enter the most hostile jungle in the world, the
Nanten, and search out a man who disappeared there 20 years before: Brin
Salisir. Salisir went in search of a cult drawn from the darkest dredges of
humanity and rumored to have taken root at the heart of the Nanten; what
Marceles doesn’t know is if the rumors were true. Monsters, cannibals,
intrigue, betrayal, and tons of beautiful illustrations by Nimit Malavia (who
you might know from the cover art of Marvel’s Fabels comics).
9. Do you belong to a critique group? If so how does this help or hinder
your writing?
Nope, but if you read enough reviews you start to think you
might be in one.
10. When did you first decide to submit your work? Please tell us what or
who encouraged you to take this big step?
I haven’t! That’s my dirty little secret, although I have
been asked to submit by a publisher who I admire and respect, so that’s about
to change.
11. What is the best and worst advice you ever received? (regarding writing
or publishing)
Best advice I’ve ever received is to just do it. Sit your
butt in a chair and stay there until there are words on the page (this can be
really, truly, physically painful). As far as publishing goes, know that it’s a
vicious and competitive world out there, but the majority of people in it are
still really amazing. Odds are against you. Work hard, and do it for all the
right reasons (among which money, recognition, awards, fame, and the approval
of others do not count).
12. Do you outline your books or just start writing?
Normally I just start writing, though I’ll plot out
character arcs in advance (and always, always know the ending). For this new
project about which speaking is strictly forbidden, I’ve done the opposite. I’m
actually plugging it into a structure as I learn about the structure itself and
am having a blast developing it from a more outline-y vista. Kudos to Mur
Lafferty for pointing me in the right direction on this one.
13. How do you maintain your creativity?
I’ve been wondering on this a lot lately because I hit a
wall a couple of months ago and it wrecked me. I even fell behind on entries
for Into the Nanten, which means
everything grinds to a halt in the wake of waiting for me to write more (narration
and illustration need me first – this is exactly where I do not want to be).
Here’s what I’ve figured out so far:
There will always be highs and lows – periods during which I
create in brilliant bursts and others where I suffer some form of burnout
(largely thanks to brilliant bursting). Sleep, exercise, and routine are all
really important (and three things I naturally abhor). Giving myself regular
time and space to create, and then making myself do it whether I want to or
not. I get a lot farther when I lose a little of my
artsy-flowery/I’ll-do-it-when-I’m-inspired
notions and add a dash of business-time rhetoric to the mix.
14. Who is your favorite character in the book? Can you tell us why?
Tolly in Shadows of
the Highridge, hands down. She’s tough, quick on her feet, and sharp sharp
sharp. She’s a little mystery unto herself, and you will never knock her down
so hard she can’t get back up. I’ve actually been asked to write a book just
about her multiple times now, so who knows what will happen?
Dionus in Into the Nanten because BAD ASS
M**********ER. No one makes me growl when I write like Dionus. He's just full
of tremendous energy, boundless, yet bound up in a manly frame that is beset on
all sides by conflicts and assailants we know so very little about. He’s the
stuff of legend and damned if he isn’t a great friend to boot.
15. Are your plotting bunnies, angels, or demons?
I… what? “Are your plotting bunnies… angels…” I’m thinking
of scantily clad women at this point which seems fairly off-topic. Let’s take a
moment to look to the women in my work then, because it’s time to face the
squad. Early on my women were flat and relatively unobtrusive. I had the
rage-queen witch in White Shores, the
helpless damsel in distress in the same book, and… well that was it really. Dark Horse was slightly better, but
again she was pretty much helpless and passive.
I’m working on this ladies – Into the Nanten has some killers and so far in Shadows of the Highridge the ladies are polling as the favorite
characters.
Hellen is convoluted, complicated, and inexplicable to her
brother – the protagonist of the story. But we come to understand her, and in
the end we favor her heavily over Vanig (plus she turns out to be just plain
cooler than he is). We already talked about Tolly, but she’s a survivor,
brilliant, and not afraid to go after what she needs in the face of these
terrifying odds and obstacles. She’s also a smart ass and a bit of a pain.
In the end I’m not particularly concerned with highlighting
or being a “women’s champion.” I just want them to be real, fleshed-out, and
flawed like everyone else. I don’t intend to flaunt them as either bunnies or
angels. You can hold me to that ladies (be gentle).
16. Anything else you might want to add?
Random bit of travel advice, but if you’re ever in Paris and
you happen to like falafel (or you somehow have never discovered the wonder of
the stuff), then go to l’As du Falafel in the Marais. It’s inexpensive and
DELICIOUS. And don’t skimp on the ‘spicy’ red sauce. It’ll change your life
(and it’s France, so it’s not really that spicy). If ‘As du Falafel is closed
(which happens 50% of the time I try to go), don’t settle for any of the
neighbors. I’ve tried them all and none stand up. Come back later. It’s so
worth it.
Thanks the Angels
No, thank you =)
BLURB:
Moving along
the soil is the quickest way to die; for Tolly to survive she must learn to
stay silent. Life on farms like hers was difficult enough in the face of plague
and a decade of drought, but something worse has come to the foothills under
the Highridge Mountains. Something that will destroy everything she loves.
Mere miles away, Vanig’s search for water to revive his farm is cut short when soldiers arrive bearing dark news of disaster striking farms throughout the region – and they suspect he is the root cause of it all. Those suspicions spike when a disheveled warrior appears hundreds of miles from home and takes Vanig hostage.
Death looms in the shadows of the Highridge.
Mere miles away, Vanig’s search for water to revive his farm is cut short when soldiers arrive bearing dark news of disaster striking farms throughout the region – and they suspect he is the root cause of it all. Those suspicions spike when a disheveled warrior appears hundreds of miles from home and takes Vanig hostage.
Death looms in the shadows of the Highridge.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
EXCERPT:
Tolly had never run so hard.
The house was so far off. How could she make it?
The certainty grew within
her: Time was short. Why was she so sure? She could feel the panic rise.
“Tolly!” Nym was chasing
her. “Come back!”
No, she thought. Bring them
this way! But her lungs were already burning. She couldn’t yell any more. All
she could do was run. Please, Nym, just listen.
“Little sister!” A Truan
hand heard the commotion and came running from the other side of the house.
“Little sister, stop! Kanda says it is not safe!”
Get out of my way, she
wanted to yell. Run with me. But all of her air was spent on sprinting. The man
was closing on her. She would have to dodge him somehow. She couldn’t let him
stop her. He was ten feet away. Then the ground exploded beneath him.
Tolly fell, skidding to a
halt as her skirts flew up around her. Scrapes burned along her thighs and up
her backside. She heard screams behind her. The dust obscured her view. And
then, through falling earth, she saw half of the Truan’s body thrown into the
air by a tower of dirt.
No, not dirt, it was living.
A snake. A worm. The monster was thicker than ten men standing together and
jutted out of the ground twice as high. Three massive jawbones worked
separately to hold the torso of the Truan in place. Whatever was happening
within the mouth, Tolly didn’t want to see it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Jay Swanson is the creator
of Into the Nanten, the world’s first real-time fantasy blog. He is
also author of a spin-off novel, Shadows of the Highridge, the standalone
short novel Dark Horse, and the Vitalis Chronicles trilogy. Jay
grew up in Washington State, and has lived all over the world since then. Jay
served for three years with Mercy Ships, a medical charity that runs the
world’s largest private hospital ship, the Africa Mercy. In each country they
visit, Mercy Ships donates free surgeries to the world’s forgotten poor,
alleviating the suffering that so often accompanies a lack of access to medical
care. He started in IT, then worked as the editor for their international
Creative Pool, and finished as the on board Media Liason.
Paris will always have a
place in Jay’s heart; he lived in France for two years, but he’s currently
working in the US as a consultant on electronic medical records. Basically, he
lives on planes.
Jay has a background in
design and video production which have been instrumental in his self-publishing
endeavors. Jay was telling stories from an early age, and latched on to video
as soon as he discovered he could borrow people’s cameras. The stories that
would one day become the Vitalis Chronicles began to take form in
Jay’s head as movie ideas while he was still in college, and he began writing
them down when he realized that they might make good books as well as films
(and that if he died in Africa, there would be nothing left to prove they ever
existed). He started writing White Shores in May of 2010 and finished
on Christmas day of that year in Applesbosch, South Africa.
LINKS:
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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION and RAFFLECOPTER CODE
Jay Swanson will
be awarding an e-book of Shadows of the Highridge to a randomly drawn winner
via rafflecopter during the tour.
Thanks for hosting!
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