interviews – The Viridian System series

15 November, 202314 November, 2023

Why do I write scifi?

This was the question posed by Patricia Lynn Josephine for a guest post prior to the Zanzibar’s Rings tour. I mentioned it in one of the posts here, but Patricia has changed her website, and the old content is no longer available. So here it is… a post written in January 22 that made me think.

Writing Scifi

Hi, I’m Jemima Pett, and I’m a science fiction writer.

Patricia asked me: why do I write scifi?

And I stopped.

I thought for a while, and nothing really happened in my brain.

Except… why am I a science fiction writer?

Why not thrillers, or romance, or adventure… I’d add mystery, but there’s usually a fair bit of mystery in my books, and usually some adventure, but not the sort that ‘action & adventure’ usually means. Five on a Desert Island sort of adventure, not the Da Vinci Code, although I do prefer to write scifi for grown-ups. That’s an audience that’s older than YA but not in need of the ‘adult’ tag, i.e, not X rated.

But why in space?

Why not Australia, or Norfolk, or the Grand Canyon, or somewhere else I’ve been several times?

Why a planetary system way above the plane of our galaxy, the edge of space where people only go because there’s an incredibly valuable metal that allows instantaneous communications across lightyears, even when travelling at the mythical warp speed—several times faster than light.

Well, that starts to answer the question, really.

I absolutely hate reading books where the author has got the details of the place wrong. So writing about imaginary places means nobody’s going to argue with you. It has to feel real, though. Even if the sky is pink.

If you can only do armchair research on your chosen location, it’s fairly helpful if the main details are very close to you. So close, they’re in your head. Even some of the science is imaginary. But the best scifi uses ‘possible science’.

I used to do things in my work which involved working out logical developments given a set of starting conditions. Building scenarios. What would happen if, instead of Brexit, the UK stayed with the EU, and the US decided to make a strategic alliance with (pick a country).

One set of scenarios I worked with (the Millennium scenarios) had three versions I liked for the future—approximately 2025—and one I didn’t. That one was called Atlantic Storm for short, and involved UK aligning itself with the US against Europe, and pulling away from events in the Middle East.

So the science of science fiction is not as farfetched as you might think.

asteroid value — from Universe Today Aug 2009

Many science fiction writers use their own particular specialisms as their starting point. Mine is people and planets. Others have more psychological approaches—try Juliana Rew’s Unwinding for a really mind-bending story. Becky Chambers does absolutely amazing things with people and aliens, and alien people, with a big biochemistry influence. Sue Ann Bowling used her genetics specialism to create evolved people with a very interesting background—akin to Arthur C Clarke’s The Sentinel, but more fully developed.

And many, many people like shiny fast toys, enjoy space ships and battles, and the politics that go with them. Which is what scifi looks like to many potential readers, because of Star Wars and Star Trek, not to mentioned Battlestar Galactica and most (it seems) screen scifi. But Gene Roddenbury put lots of speculative fiction into Star Trek. All those ‘What If … the society of Planet X had been influenced by gangster movies and got stuck in that society?’

What If…? is what science fiction is all about.

It may not even be in space.

It may be quite weird.

Which is why it has the wider genre term of Speculative Fiction (spec-fic).

And that may be why I like reading it.

Just imagine what would happen if….

And if you like reading scifi or time travel books, why not join my SpaceTime Reading Challenge?

21 November, 202218 April, 2022

10 Things you didn’t know about… Jemima Pett

The last of my featured posts in the blog tour for Zanzibar’s Rings appeared on Lynn’s Romance Enthusiasm, which is pretty weird as it’s really a Romance blog behind an Adult blogger screen!

I thought as they already had a biography for me, I might as well go to town with the adventures my imagination took me on when I was a kid. Some of it is true.

Actually, it’s all true, but some of it mainly happened in my head. And as Dumbledore said, just because it’s in your head, what makes it not true?

10 Things you Didn’t Know about Jemima Pett

Jemima wrote her first book at around age 8, called the Whispering Stream. It was ten small pages long, and written in pencil.
Between 8 and 12, Jemima was a champion show jumper. She had six horses in a stable outside her house, and she won a medal in the Olympic Games with either Zingaro or Riversprite. She also built show jumps out of stuff from her father’s shed, and jumped over them in the garden. No, there were no horses, except model ones, whose stable was a shelf in her bedroom. They are still in her living room cabinet.
By about 10, Jemima had graduated to terraforming and designing fantasy islands. You know, if she had been born thirty years later, there would have been a huge career for her in gaming and animation.
Jemima’s careers advice at school was “well, you’re going to do maths at university, aren’t you?” Nobody said, but what next? And she hated maths at university. It wasn’t problem solving any more, and she was a problem solver.
Several decades (and careers) later, Jemima decided to get into ‘environmental’ subjects, since it no longer meant ‘heating and ventilation’. First she did some grad courses with the Open University, including geology, environmental impacts, oceanography and planetary science. Then she did a Masters degree and got into research related to energy efficiency and climate change.
Jemima absolutely loved working on research in energy efficiency and climate change, loved the people she worked with and the events she went to. Her particular skill is linking issues and ideas across different academic disciplines.
The low point of this part of her career was being at a reception to launch some research at the Houses of Parliament, and having to shake the hand of a particularly oily politician. How was it? Clammy.
Once she went part-time, she started writing again. A world running on strawberry juice in fuel cells featured strongly in her first series. She still thinks we should be researching the properties of strawberry juice as a renewable energy resource.
Her first seventeen guinea pigs (over twelve years) were immortalised in her first series by having characters named after them. Her latest two guinea pigs are named after characters in the series.
One vet she knew said he approached guinea pig diagnosis as follows: if he can’t identify it for a small mammal, he thinks horses and scales it down. So her guinea pigs are really show jumping horses, scaled down. Of course!

But you probably knew, or guessed, most of that.

And next month – it’s Christmas, or Yuletide, or whatever you’d like to celebrate for the winter/summer solstice.

17 October, 202218 April, 2022

Dear Reader, Love Author

The last stop in the blog tour last March was this one, at a site simply called Dear Reader, Love Author.

Dear Reader, Love Jemima Pett

Dear Reader,

When I’m talking to people at book shows, scifi gets a curious reaction. Some simply dismiss it out of hand, some love all the shoot-em-up high-tech space-wars stuff in it, and others look for something more in it.

I’m not really into the shoot-em-up stuff, but I do love space ships. But what I love even more are people, personalities, and the possibilities in creating alien entities. People who develop on planets unlike our earth are unlikely to have the same physical or emotional reactions as ourselves. If they are part of a human diaspora, then they might—but the culture the original settlers bring with them will alter their viewpoints.

If you think how many and varied our cultures on earth are now, how much more wonderful would it be out in the galaxy?

It’s really an ecology question. Why do creatures evolve as they do? What functions do their forms provide, and why so different from something else in the same niche? Are opposable thumbs really essential for grasping tools? How does one categorise ‘intelligence’ of wildly different forms?

That’s one reason I admire author Becky Chambers so much. Her worlds, her cultures, her people… her AIs growing sentient… all wonderful, and logical developments. It gets difficult to write scifi that has no influence from the authors I admire most.

So I settled on an out-of-the-way star system that is the main source of something the galaxy needs for instantaneous communication. One of the protagonists talks to the trees, and wonders what lifeforms were destroyed when they settled the planet. The Viridian System series stems from there. Some people thrown together, in institutional arrangements that most of them hate. A chance for an extended chase in search of a mythical sword, followed by a space accident that results in meeting aliens with a common goal.

And now the last in the series. People cut off from their loved ones in a galactic disaster. I didn’t realise when I was writing it, but it’s really about people adjusting to isolation, to changes to their customary freedoms, and rediscovering self-sufficiency. Mostly, it’s about missing loved ones.

It’s a mystery adventure set in another solar system, but you may find something of your own world that seems familiar.

I hope you enjoy it.

love,

Jemima Pett

~~~~

I was really pleased with this. It started me thinking of something – and then Patricia Josephine stepped in for an interview “Why Do I Write Science Fiction.?” That stumped me for days. You can see what I said on her blog!

Next time… the last one. It’s the third of the 10 Things… written with tongue firmly in cheek.

18 September, 202217 September, 2022

An Interview with Maggie Ingleton

Nearing the end of my features from the Feb-March blog tour for Zanzibar’s Rings, here we have a character interview.

I love doing character interviews. I ought to do more. I may inflict them on you in the next few months. I think you’ve had Lars, Pete and Zito in the past (here or on the Jemima blog), but this was the first time I got to let one of the girls loose. This featured on The Literary Nook.

Today’s guest is Maggie Ingleton from inside the pages of ZANZIBAR’S RINGS by Jemima Pett. It is a pleasure to have her with us at The Literary Nook!

What is your name?

Maggie Ingleton

What do you look like?

I’m kind of mid-height, trim without being curvy, blonde-ish, well, mousy with highlights. I look kind of bubbly. It’s the impression I like to keep up, anyway.

Where are you today and what are you doing?

I’m in the boys’ villa, and generally keeping the place running, although I need to cook a batch of meals later.

Describe the outside of your home.

It’s about halfway up the hill above town, with a lot of mature trees around it, some light like eucalyptus, some dark like oak and pine. Through the trees you get a glimpse of the three wings, I suppose you’d call them, all joined by a balcony that runs the length of the centre area, overlooking the patio and pool. It’s what they call modern style, sort of blocky but with big windows taking in the view, and blank walls at the back up against the hill.Yes, the boys are rich, and they’ve had to give it a makeover since it was damaged a couple of years back. So it’s, well, really nice.

You come face to face with your worse enemy. How do you react?

Oh, gosh. Well, apart from freezing, I try to pretend I’m fine, sort of fixed smile, and try to avoid saying anything. And make up something I have to be doing so I can get away quickly.

You keep a photo album of memories from your lifetime. If you could only keep one photo, which one would that be?

Well, we don’t really have photo albums any more, so that’s not too difficult. I suppose an image of the four of us together, having a nice time, maybe on the beach, or in a nice restaurant, would be what I’d most like. Me, Lars, Dolores and Pete.

Are you a morning person or a night owl?

You know, I stopped being either… after my planet was over-run, and eventually I arrived here to work, and then Lars and Pete sort of settled me permanently. I keep regular hours, the rest of them are often on different time zones. I guess I’m more of a morning person at heart, but we get to have a siesta at lunchtime anyway, so I can keep going in the evenings, too.

Do you have any phobias? What are they and how intense are they? How have they impacted your life?

I hate loud noises, loud, unexpected and possibly repetitive noises—I always think we’re being invaded again. I run and hide in a corner, or a closet, and curl up into a ball. I don’t know how other people can just take them at face value. There’s always a chance it’ll happen again. You have to be prepared for your world to come crashing down again. And I suppose these days there’s more to lose.

Open your wallet, purse, or briefcase. What do you find?

My viewpad, some make-up although it’s pretty minimal, I’m lucky that way. Comb and tiny mirror. Keytag—that has something coded into it that counts as cash as well as keys. That’s about it unless I’m with the boys and I’m carrying something they’ve forgotten.

You move into a new home. What’s the first thing you buy for it?

A new bed. Big and comfy. Although I’d hold off on anything other than white bedding till I’ve sorted out the decor.

What’s the last thing you do before you go to bed at night?

Clean my teeth. Then if I get to do anything that means I have to go to bed again, I’ll have a quick wash and maybe check the house is secure.

Who is your best friend?

Dolores. We were in the same line of work, and then when Lars and Pete came down from a mining trip we both got assigned to them one time, and then the guys asked for us back every time, and we sort of just struck up a friendship.

Who is your worst enemy?

The Federation, the Imperium, anyone that doesn’t treat women nicely, and anyone who wants to hurt my men.

Are you married or in a relationship?

Lars and I have an agreement, with promises, that we reckon is as good as marriage. I just didn’t want him to commit to a vow he couldn’t keep. (laughs) It’s because of some woman we saved when we were in space one time, and she couldn’t keep her hands off him. I swung round with a cooking pot in my hand and broke his nose! I didn’t mean to, but… Oh, it was so funny, though.

Do you have children?

No. It would have been nice. I love kids.

You are at the zoo. What is your favorite animal?

Something cuddly, like a koala, or a chinchilla. Aspoids are like huge guinea pigs and they are such lovely people. We don’t have zoos these days; everything is treated as sentient, really. Come to think of it, Lars is quite cuddly. Not hairy, though.

When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

I wanted to be a chef. I studied gastronomy at college before the planet was attacked. Although, before I knew what a chef was, I wanted to be a dancer, or a fairy.

If there was one thing you could change about yourself, what would that be?

I’d like to be braver. When there are emergencies or things going wrong, everyone seems to hold themselves together and do useful things. I just fall in a heap in the corner. I’d like to step up and get on with things like they do.

~~~

You know, I always thank characters for coming when I do my guest interviews…. Yes. We need more character interviews on here.

Maggie’s description of the villa started a hankering in me to do some illustrations for the Viridian series. I’ll show you when I’ve done some 🙂

Next time… Dear Reader, Love Author. Intrigued?

18 July, 202218 April, 2022

A Bookish Chat with… me

I did several interview type things for the Blog Tour which helped launch Zanzibar’s Rings in February. This is one with The Writer’s Life.

TWL: Welcome to The Writer’s Life! How did you come up with the idea to write your book?

Jemima: It’s the third in a series, after The Perihelix and Curved Space to Corsair, and I wanted to make a good climax to the trilogy. But I’m better if I start with a title, even if it’s just a working title. With an unashamed target of people who need titles starting with the difficult letters like Q, X and Z for their reading challenges, I picked Z, and named one of the planets Zanzibar. Then I just had to think of some reason my heroes would be getting into trouble in the fifth planet of their system.

TWL: Can you give us a short excerpt?

Jemima: This is how it starts:

Lars Nilsson, sometimes known as the Swede, ambled into the kitchen, scratching his groin and yawning.
“Mm, smells good.”
“You keep your hands out of that. This is space rations, no contamination allowed.”
“I’m clean!” Why did Maggie Ingleton always think the worst of him?
Maggie shook her head and stared at his hand.
Lars looked down. “Ah.”
“What are you going to do today, anyway? Although it’s not long before first sunset.”
“Dunno. I’m bored.”
It was all right for Maggie. This business of hers, cooking delicious meals for spacers who could afford to stock up on them, had gone from a favour to him and his partner, Pete, to a system-wide favourite.
Asteroid mining; how he hated it. Had Pete realised? Those meals were possibly the only thing Lars missed about the dirty, stinky, life-threatening business. And he got better food direct from the cook here.
Pete was away in the south, doing something with his family and the rest of the Corsairs. Dolores had taken her shuttle off to Scania, and should be back in about a week. Why had everyone left him on his own?
Maggie wielded a large stirrer to attack something bubbling in a huge pan. “How about checking your stocks or something?”
“Did them yesterday.”
“Practising for the big race?”
Lars shrugged. He could take a hint. He turned, heading for the balcony, adding: “No idea whether I’ll do it without Pete.”
Did Maggie reply? The sudden rush of steam screaming for attention masked anything she said.
Zanzibar’s Rings by Jemima Pett, ch 1.

TWL: What part of the book was the most fun to write?

Jemima: I wrote it as I developed the story, and then rearranged all the threads into a timeline later. So it was all fun to write, but pretty difficult to sort it into a good flow for the reader afterwards. I think I had most fun when they interrogate the baddie. Maybe I should do a legal mystery next time.

TWL: What’s one fact about your book that would surprise people?

Jemima: If you don’t follow space research, you may find it surprising that most planets have rings, or so it seems from data so far. Water worlds like Earth are the exception.

TWL: What other books are you working on and when will they be published?

Jemima: Zanzibar’s Rings brings the end of my second series. So although there are things in my head, not much has got as far as the computer page yet. There are three strands I’m developing, and none of them are likely to be out before 2023. The first is a middle grade mystery featuring a girl, JoJo Madeira, who can see ghosts, but there seems to be a lot of this about at present. Her first short adventure got good comments on my blog, though. The second is a spin-off in the science fiction world I’ve created, about a space rescue service for ordinary travellers. Then a third project is developing from my flash fiction last year, about a woman who spends her vacation time chasing down the places famous artists painted their masterpieces. She might find some mysteries on her way. I realise I’m more of a mystery writer than thriller or adventure, really.

TWL: Finally, what message are you trying to get across with your book?

Jemima: It’s only afterwards that I’ve realised there is a message, or even a theme. The theme is about missing people. The message is about having only one planet to provide all your resources. You have to become self-sufficient, and co-operate, fast.

TWL: Do you have any final words?

Jemima: I’ve really enjoyed writing this book and its predecessors, and like my other series, I’m really going to miss the characters. They’ve been great to have around, especially during lockdown. And so have my online friends. Thank you all.

~~~

Next month – 10 Things you didn’t know about… Asteroid Mining!