BY ROSS GRIFFIN
How did you become lost in the realm of writing?
I think that my affection for writing came from my obsession for reading. As a kid, my favorite past time was reading and I remember being a part of many summer library reading clubs. I also remember pounding the keys of this old typewriter that my parents set up in the living room on a card table that we used for anything from puzzles to craft projects.
I wrote alternate lives for my friends and me—where we were anything from pirates to spies. For years I’ve had ideas bouncing around in my head, some scribbled on scraps of papers, Post-it notes and even napkins. I’m glad that the next evolution of my creativity has begun; getting published is culmination of a child’s dream.
What inspired your short story, “Spaceman In Time”?
When I read the theme of the anthology, “Back to the Future”, I immediately thought of the movie, and so the next question was ‘why would someone go back in time?’ There were so many reasons swirling around in my brain, but the one that I kept coming back to was regret. It’s a powerful motivator for good and bad.
People can make decisions [based] on that, or wish that they could change one or more events in their past, never thinking through the consequences and whether or not they could live with the outcome. Which is why I thought of the ending first.
From there, it was developing a character and a regret powerful enough that a person would still go back in time to change, knowing how things might turn out.
When you aren’t slaving away putting pen to paper (or pounding away on a keyboard), what do you do for relaxation?
Reading. I love to curl up in a chair and read. For me, I love holding a book in my hands; it’s old school now, but I still like the feel of it. I like anything from Tom Clancy to Stephen King to John Grisham to Chris Evans to Derek Landy. And then if it has Star Wars stamped on it anywhere, I probably already pre-ordered it.
Music. I can spend hours delving through lyrics and albums. Even in this world where iPods and Spotify have given us all musical ADD, I still love listening to that brand new album multiple times in a row, letting it just sink in and linger in my brain. Hours more on organizing my iTunes library. I have categories and subcategories which might also be divided a second or third time. Even the back files have to be perfect.
Do you feel that your ‘music ADD’ carries over to your writing in any way? Does it help or hinder your style?
Probably in some aspects. I’d say that pop culture in general oozes into my thought process. Some scenes in my stories make me think of a movie, a line in a book, or a great lyric from a song and I like to try and carry that over in some reference, whether vague or outright. I like to have inside jokes and references in a story that only people who know me, or get me, will catch. As to whether that helps or hinders, well, that remains to be seen. But I like to be optimistic and say both.
You mentioned writing alternative lives for yourself and your friends when you were growing up. Any plans to use some of those concepts for future short stories, or perhaps a full-length novel?
No, I don’t have any plans to resurrect those concepts. They were pretty rudimentary with cliche nick names and plots. Although, who knows what the future holds—maybe an homage to them might creep into something. Never say never.
If you were going to be sent backwards (or forwards) in time, where would you want to be sent? Why?
Backwards: I would love to experience the time where people wore three-piece suits, trench coats and fedoras. Gangsters were on the rise and were first being romanticized in silent pictures. I don’t know what it is about that time period, but I’ve always been fascinated with it. Gentleman in suits doing great things on both sides of the law.
Forwards: I’d like to go far enough in the future to see who got it right—Mad Max, Marty McFly, Luke Skywalker, Detective Thorn, or Rick Deckard. I kind of hope for a combination of Rick and Luke.
Is there a trick or technique that helps get your creativity flowing the best?
Music. Nothing fuels my creativity like something moody blaring in the background full of angst, hope, despair and wanting.
All right, final question and the most important: favorite Star Wars villain (aside from Vader), and why.
I’m going to go with Darth Bane. He created his own Sith Order after slaughtering everyone else and instituted the Rule of Two. It’s his order that eventually brought down the Jedi order.
Fisher lives in Gilbert, AZ. He is married and has no pets and no plants to speak of. His loving wife allows him time to ignore her while writing and listening to music loud enough that headphones can hardly contain it.
Fischer’s short story, “Spaceman in Time”, appears in The X’s Moments in Millennia: a Fantasy Anthology, released in January 2014.
Follow Fischer on Twitter @FischerWillis and Facebook.
Editorial Intern Ross Griffin brings to The X his unique perspective on life, which includes a strong and developing expertise in swords, knives, and other weapons used in the martial arts, from his home in Arizona, where he lives with his wife. Moments in Millennia is his first official project with The X.