Catalysis / Denis McClean (ePub)

books is only 20-30% putting words on virtual paper. Critiquing your own work is the next 15% and then comes the editing, which is easily as challenging as the writing. Thankfully, my better half, Gina does a lot of that with me. I also try to produce what I would look for myself in a book. So it has to be all of eyeopening, unique and aspirational. There has to be real people with real flaws and quite a bit of soul searching, so the reader is encouraged to examine their own consciences on the widest variety of the human experiences that we touch together. The style is really important to me. To give a serious story the gravitas it deserves, I like to write more formally, so I steer away from slang and I don't use profanities, except when it isn't a profanity. For example, In Ireland, believe it or not, a profanity can also be a compliment.""So that's still short 20-30% of the overall investment. Where does the rest of the effort go?""Graphics for the covers and 3D images for my web site, plus web-site and blog updates, not to mention Facebook. I've gotten quite good at Gimp image manipulation but because I might only do one cover a year, I tend to forget all the finer points by the time I need to use it again. That can be really frustrating. There's also the small matter of getting the formats right. That's why I needed to revise my first book after I published it. There's no point in putting in all those nice sounding phrases and attractive styles, if the menu doesn't function correctly. It would drive me crazy to buy a book and then find I couldn't jump backwards and forwards using the Table of Contents, Bookmarks and also making and saving my notes etc. Everything that makes a good e-Book good must be built into. None of that happens by accident."OK. So, what's with the different genres? Book of Plebs is a spiritual/aspirational book, but the three books of the Catalysis Trilogy look like pure SF.""You have to choose a genre, and then maybe a second to keep the retailers happy but there is commonality. The bottom line of all my books is that they are about humanity and tomorrow, even when we're talking about exotic star-faring races and Artificial Intelligences. There's always a lot of cultural stuff mixed in there, even amongst the more exotic cultures I create. From a purely logical and scientific viewpoint, we will all have a common human denominator. It's not exclusive.""Wow. So what's next?""I'm at something of an impasse. The Catalysis Trilogy was a huge investment of time and energy. I mean, all my books are full length productions from 100K to 130-140K words each, which puts the complete Trilogy at almost 400K words, so I might try to produce some shorter works, but I'll also be guided by what people want. The thing is, regardless of size, I will still demand quality, because if I don't get that in a book, I'd feel I was being taken advantage of.""OK, so before I let you go, you assured me of quality, but what else will set your books apart from others?""Soul, for want of a better word. I'm not a religious person but I am spiritual and I think that makes up a lot of what we are, or try to be. Science Fiction and Fantasy can sometimes struggle when it comes to reputation. I mean, Zero to warp 10 in 60 seconds with all phasers blasting while reloading the photon-torpedo tubes might do it for kids and even the bigger kids, but I need to know how that works without everyone being mashed up against the back walls because of all those G-Forces. Even your average airplane seats have to withstand a set number of G's, so I need the science to be real enough to be believable and also the places where they boldly go. I believe I have set some serious markers with OCHRE, which was the second book of the Catalysis Trilogy. But I also want to write about now and tomorrow, not necessarily star-date 99999. I want my stuff to be serious enough to make serious people think about themselves and where are going as a species. I like to promote introspection but I need to do it on a huge stage that will stagger imaginations. I need to put soul into the characters."" ... oh, and one more thing - value. Each book of the Trilogy can be read as an individual book. If you like one, then you can buy another one later, and you don't even have to get them in the order I wrote them.""How does that work?""Planning - and a story so big that that no matter where you come in, you're in."