Space Wizards Anthology Interviews: Vanessa Wells
Meet Space Wizards author, Vanessa Wells
Today, we meet Vanessa Wells, author of The Inexplicable Temporal Trials of Julian Hale in the Space Wizards short story anthology.
Author interview
1. Which author (living or dead) would you most like to have dinner with?
Mark Twain. And his wife. I don’t want to meet him unless she comes too.
2. If you had the opportunity to live on a colony on Mars, would you go? Why/why not?
Depends on who is in charge of the colony… trusting someone with oxygen is a different level of trust.
3. Do you have any pets?
A cat named after the embodiment of death in Greek myth: Thantos.
4. Do you have any pet hates?
My cat does all the hating.
5. Are you a hoarder collector of anything?
Is it too cliché to say books and stories?
6. Do you prefer to write with no distractions or do you need something to help with creativity?
My playlists are EPIC.
7. What is your full-time job? How does that colour your writing?
I’m a telecom engineer. I tend to add systems into my writing because I am always thinking in them.
8. How do you know when a story is finished?
When someone demands you stop changing it and let it be published, because time and space are actual things.
9. What’s one thing you’ve learnt about writing that you wish you’d known earlier?
You can’t replace anything with talent. Talent lives in its own dimension and is wholly cut off from craft, from study, from experience. And you can use craft, study and experience to make a fair approximation of talent.
10. When did you first realise you wanted to write stories instead of just read them?
3-ish
11. Which fictional world would you happily live in – even if it was dangerous?
Star Trek – but you won’t catch me anywhere near the Enterprise and I will absolutely not wear red.
12. Do you hide foreshadowing or breadcrumbs in your writing?
*Evil writer laughter*
13. You have the choice to go back to when you are young. Do you start writing earlier in life? Why/why not?
I started reading and writing at three. Before that, I made my parents watch plays that I put on with my stuffed animals playing all the parts.
14. What first drew you to contribute to Space Wizards?
Vanessa Finaughty, of course.
15. Did the space element or the magic element come first for you?
The space element.
16. If your story were adapted for screen, what kind of adaptation would suit it best?
Anime.
17. Which spell would you absolutely misuse?
The one that lets me avoid the crowds when shopping.
18. Which everyday object would become dangerous if enchanted?
My cat? But any object would, really.
19. If magic suddenly became real tomorrow, what would you do first?
Safety testing.
20. If your story were a cocktail, what would it be called?
A Julian with a Twist.
21. Be honest: wizard hat – yes or no?
Absolutely not. Have you seen my hair?
22. Star Trek or Star Wars and why?
Both.
23. Are you a Firefly fan? Why/why not?
Nobody needs a reason to be a Firefly fan. There is only the question of why not?
Buy Space Wizards from Barnes & Noble, Apple, Kobo, Google Play Books and PubShare.
Prepare to be spellbound by this (mostly) light-hearted short story anthology offering a blend of science fiction and fantasy with one common theme: wizards and outer space. Imagine a galaxy in which magic is fused with machine, luxury space cruises run by cyborgs are the norm and familiars are a little… different.
Join the adventures of a powerful space wizard during wartime, a young wizard-in-training with her griffon familiar, and a time-travelling biker wizard who accidentally ends up in the future – well, sort of. Let’s not forget the caustic robot familiar cat, a faulty 3D printer causing magical havoc, spells gone wrong, space pirates, and a junior contract analyst who experiences a series of inexplicable, extremely inconvenient events as a result of a strange cube his team recovered as space debris.
That’s not all! A quantum conjuring that violates the laws of thermodynamics – check. A wizard in a Wild West-type setting – check. An ancient maths book that might hold the key to immortality – check. An adrenaline junkie smuggler and a daring rescue – check. Add an intergalactic circus with a shifty shifter, a bioship giving birth under dire circumstances and a moulting wyrmling with the potential to explode planets, and you have an anthology that is sure to enchant you until the last word and beyond.
Vanessa Wells is an author, telecommunications executive, and educator living in East Texas. She has written multiple fantasy and science fiction works, including the Seventeen Stones Trilogy, the Topeka Texas Chronicles, and the AREA 52 series.
Drawing on more than two decades in the telecommunications industry, Vanessa specializes in outside plant engineering, permitting, right-of-way issues, and network development. She is the creator of the Wells Method training program and writes extensively about the history, economics, and infrastructure that connect modern society.
Her current non-fiction work, Copper & Glass, explores the people and technologies behind the evolution of the telecommunications network.
When she isn’t writing, she’s usually reading, drinking tea, or chasing plot bunnies through the woods of East Texas.
