Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
278 Jeremy Szal | Science-Fiction and Fantasy Author
127 Plays6 hours ago
SFF author Jeremy Szal dials in from Australia to chat about finishing his trilogy, his writing and publishing journey and the experience of working at the Hugo award-winning podcast, StarShipSofa.
Support the show on Patreon! 💖 And get extended episodes, ad-free and a week ahead of everyone else. 🙏
For audio listeners:
Listen to The Chosen Ones and Other Tropes, Jamie's other podcast with Melissa Welliver and Naomi Gibson! 📚
Follow on socials! 🥳
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Guest Welcome
00:00:00
Speaker
Oh, a spicy question. love it. Because the writing is sort of everything, right? Like you can fix plot holes, but if the writer... So some readers love that and some readers are like, but I wanted more of this. So it's kind of, it's kind of a gamble.
00:00:14
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to the Right and Wrong podcast.
Overview of 'Wolfskin' and Series Discussion
00:00:17
Speaker
On today's episode, I am joined by science fiction and fantasy author from Sydney, Australia, Jeremy Sahl. Hello. Hello, Jamie. Thank you very much for having me on.
00:00:29
Speaker
Thanks for joining me. um Let's jump right in. And we always start with the latest publication, which is the third book in the common saga, Wolfskin, which came out in March of this year.
00:00:43
Speaker
Tell us a little bit about the the series as a whole and this latest entry. Absolutely.
Exploring the Plot of 'Wolfskin'
00:00:49
Speaker
So the book is about the um about the DNA of an extinct alien race. It gets used as a drug to make people get high on adrenaline and violence.
00:00:58
Speaker
So the main character basically ah goes to war to fight this Star Wars-esque empire that's slowly gnawing its way through the galaxy. ah Him and his fellow soldiers were shut up with this alien drug called Stormtech that basically makes them super soldiers, but makes them addicted to their own body chemistry.
00:01:17
Speaker
And so, you know, obviously he won the war but came back riddled with PTSD and trauma and within living in a body that is working against him. He's not even 30 and he's already, you know, all life is almost shot. um You know, and his body is so chemistry, so wide against him that, for example, he cannot think about Like you'll see someone holding a gun and he cannot think about too long about ah look at it for too long because he his body will make him snatch the gun out of someone's hand and press it into the neck and fire just for the adrenaline rush.
00:01:53
Speaker
It will make him go and steal or something valuable that he doesn't need and doesn't want just for because it craves that ah it's an addiction. It's a drug. um So, you know, life is obviously not easy.
00:02:07
Speaker
ah But then he gets a call and it turns out that his fellow squad mates are being murdered and that his younger estranged brother is the prime suspect. And so he has to go and find out what's going on.
00:02:20
Speaker
But then it becomes a choice between doing right by your flesh and blood family, the one that and that doesn't want to barve you, and the people who are not your flesh and blood family, but they are your brothers and sisters who got you through hell, who stood by you through...
00:02:37
Speaker
your worst moments and who, you know, helped you survive basically. um And so, yeah, it becomes this, you know, the actual family versus found family and to to do right by one, he has to betray the other.
00:02:49
Speaker
And so that's the whole emotional core of the story. And yet the clo more he investigates, the more addicted to the drug he becomes. um And so it's basically things go from bad to worse as they do in most of these, are most of these stories. And so, yeah, that's, that's, it's not about,
00:03:06
Speaker
who is killing these people. It's about, um, you know, I know like you, hit the you basically know who is the guilty party almost immediately on, but it's about, you know, what's happening. What's the larger conspiracy behind this.
00:03:19
Speaker
Can I save this person? can I redeem him? Doesn't even, does he even want to be redeemed? Is there anything left worth that is worth saving? Is there anything that I can do to make this right to make up for all these lost years?
00:03:30
Speaker
Um, it's a very personal story, a very, very character driven story. Um, It's basically my attempt at mashing up my favorite series, which in this case is like Mass Effect and Red Rising and Altered Carbon, say things like that.
00:03:46
Speaker
And the stories get more and more space opera and more and more epic and weirder and more alien as they go along. And by the third book roll, by the time the third book rolls around, we have been plunged into an intergalactic war because it turns out that that Those aliens that the drug comes from, the storms it comes from, they're not exactly extinct and they're not exactly friendly.
00:04:09
Speaker
And there are some very bad people who want to bring them back.
Series Progression and Conclusion
00:04:12
Speaker
And so we get this very wide-reaching, wide-scale conflict, and yet we don't lose sight of the emotional core of a story, which is the relationship between these two brothers who have um had you know been torn apart and are trying to build ah ah build something together again.
00:04:31
Speaker
and the relationship between the the central cast and how they survived the ongoing terror. It is, yeah, and I'm in i'm immensely proud of it.
00:04:42
Speaker
ah These books, especially the third book, was pretty challenging to write. um But I, yeah, I started writing it when I was 21, I think, the first book, Stormblood, 2016.
00:04:53
Speaker
two thousand and sixteen Um, and now I'm, I'm 30 and the third book has been published it's out. And yeah, I'm in, uh, I'm very happy that it's finally out. The story is done.
00:05:04
Speaker
Okay. So this is the final book in the series.
Reflections on Concluding the Story
00:05:08
Speaker
It is. Okay. Do you think you'll revisit this or is this like, like this universe maybe do like spinoffs or anything like that? Or do you think this is like, you're happy with, with where it is and and that's where you're going to leave it?
00:05:19
Speaker
um I think that I will do, like I'll think I'll, I will definitely write shorter fiction and like novellas and little side projects within the universe. Cause I think I set things up deliberately so that it could contain multitude of stories. I mean, i wrote it in such a way that if I wanted to, I could spend the rest of my life writing nothing but stories in this universe. I it a space opera it i mean, there's infinite possibilities and events and things that could happen. I mean, you know, the galaxy is the limit.
00:05:48
Speaker
um and there's enough you know characters and factions and various things like that to uh to let it happen but um i don't think i will see myself for now at least writing another novel in this universe and i don't think because i need change of scenery and i certainly don't think that i would ever write about the same character or the same cast of characters i think like the story is for that character is done for back of the main character it's done I've placed him and his ah the people around him in a place where I'm happy with and I'm satisfied that everything's wrapped up. And I think that do chewing the cud, i think, would dragging it out would i think would ruin it a little bit. I think there's something to be said about the um the finality of trilogies and the three-act structure ah that it allows you to do.
00:06:38
Speaker
and I think that it's very rare that the fifth or sixth or seventh book in a series is better than the first or second or third. There are exceptions, fish ah certainly, but I think that when you go basque book three, I feel like you need to have a very good reason to do so, um yeah at least for me. And i I don't feel like I could justify it, even if I wanted to. And at the at the moment, I don't want to. so Yeah, I agree with that. I think...
00:07:05
Speaker
I think, yeah, there's there's a real joy in something ending and ending really well. I get this so much with, i play a lot of video games and you you play like a bit like like ah a single player, which has like a very fixed storyline and and its and it starts and it ends. And I'm kind of happy with that. And I'm like, that was such a great experience. I think so fondly on it. But when you play a game, that's this sort of open-ended open world, do whatever you want.
00:07:30
Speaker
you can keep going for hundreds and hundreds of hours. I find that ah I'll peter out on that. And then, and then my memories thinking back to it was like, did I enjoy that? I don't, I can't remember because I just ended up, it ended up becoming sort of just a thing that I did and not like a story that I was immersed in.
00:07:47
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. i feel like there's a lot of, them no, it does. I feel like as well with on the video game metaphor that I often feel when I complete the main story and I know I've wrapped things up, the world feels a little bit empty now that I know that the main story is done and I'm just tidying up the side things.
00:08:04
Speaker
Yeah. It feels like there's something hollow about it. Like it doesn't feel like there's anything propelling me forward. Again, there are exceptions. um You know, the Witcher three and cyberpunk 2077 have some of the best side quests in the I've known video games. In fact, I think that some in some cases they better than the main quest lines. I think with Witcher that's true, yeah. But certainly, yeah, yeah, yeah. And um there are certainly games that like you know it's but so much fun to go and explore different factions and see what comes along. But I do feel that, yeah, there is a certain...
00:08:32
Speaker
um false extension with those with those games and you do you just feel like, okay, what I'm actually doing here, like that that drive that that that kept me going, that led me having the story continuing on, like it's kind of gone. I mean, there there there are certainly games that are actually delay doing the final mission or go up and tie the full side missions because I know that once the credits roll that something will have inadvertently changed and I'll be like, yeah, okay, it's time to move on now.
00:09:01
Speaker
Yeah, I agree with that. and And taking it back to books then, I think
Balancing Extended Series and New Elements
00:09:05
Speaker
you're right. In in some ways you're right when you say like, yeah, if you if you've written a trilogy or a geology or you know you have like ah your original story, to expand on that, I think, yeah, you need a really a really good idea if you want to continue using those characters. But I think the other thing that some authors do I think I saw on your website that you you cite Joe Abercrombie as one of your influences. And I love the way that he did the first Lord um universe where he did the original, the kind of the first trilogy. And then he just kind of did a big time skip and shuffled around and like you see some of the characters, but then there's new characters and they're the main characters. And then he just keeps like jumping forwards and in time and you're in the same universe interacting with the same characters, but
00:09:48
Speaker
he kind of shifts the focus constantly. I think that's a really clever way of expanding within a universe. No, for sure. I actually had this conversation with Joe not too long ago, um, because we were talking about it and, you know, the the whole thing with, with trilogies and in turning the series on.
00:10:03
Speaker
And I think he did it right. I think like he's continuing to operate within the same first law world, but he's not continuing the story of the main, of the central cast, like none of the central yeah main cast of the, um,
00:10:18
Speaker
ah Blade itself, Lost Arkham Kings and Before They're Hanged, none of them are the protagonists in the later books. they they They make appearances, some of them, and some of them are aside major side characters, but none of them are the main character.
00:10:33
Speaker
and yeah i think that And I think Joe's the one who said this to me. He said that like you know I could have You know, I could easily probably pitch, you know, to my to my publisher, like, you know, a half a dozen young Logan Ninefingers books.
00:10:47
Speaker
And we could probably do it. We could probably get away with it. And we could probably sell it. Like, you know, my editor wouldn't be too happy with it because we have the same editor. um She said, you know, my editor, Jillian, it's like she wouldn't be too happy with it, but she could probably do it. But do I need to do that? Is there anything left to say?
00:11:02
Speaker
and And I said to him look, I honestly don't think so. Like, I think that like, does does the world even need, you know, doesn another one of these dozen books? Like, I don't think so. I mean, if if you if you don't feel like you have anything left to say, then what are you actually doing? I mean, I think that if the author wants to do it and they have a reason, then they absolutely should. I mean, just this week, it was announced that Veronica Roth, the author of the Divergent series, is going back to that world and is writing a fourth book.
00:11:28
Speaker
And immediately you had swarms of people online saying that she was accusing her of being, um you know, milking the franchise, being being a cash cow. um And she went on and said, you know, guys,
00:11:41
Speaker
ah My series has written 40 million copies. I can write whatever the hell I want and I'm comfortable. I don't need to do it. I'm doing it because I want to. I'm doing it because I choose to. like i like i mean She's had three movies come out um you know and and you know God knows how many translations. So she's in a position where she has the freedom to do what she wants to do. And so...
00:12:04
Speaker
the fact that she's choosing to do a fourth book after all these years, I'm sure that she actually has a story to tell and that she wants, and she has a good reason to do so. Um, I don't think at the moment for my own books that I do have one, but I can see how someone would, but it all depends on the book on the series. Cause I, you know, I have no idea what Veronica is going to choose to do with her, um,
00:12:28
Speaker
with a fourth book but i do know that you know if joe were to bring out a log logan nine fingers book i'd be like really joe i mean you need to and i'm only saying this because you know because i know that joe ah agree like you know we talked about and he agrees with me and he hasn't done a young logan nine fingers book because he's got other stories to tell and he's got fantastic stories and so many of more opportunities and his books are fantastic. Like the devils is one of the best books of the, of last year.
00:12:57
Speaker
Um, yeah and you know, and I think that it was great because it was totally new and it was, uh, he was working from a, uh, from like slate. And so there was nothing to build off of. And he did that fantastically.
00:13:09
Speaker
Yeah, I think prequels are especially precarious because with a character like Logan Ninefingers as well, the the mystery of everything that happened in when he was younger and that you get kind of snippets of it as people mention these stories when you're reading them, that it would be so hard for him to write something that would be in line with what all of the readers have like separately imagined that journey to be like for him. So it would just be so hard to please everyone with that.
00:13:37
Speaker
pre Of course. I mean, don't get me wrong. I would love to have more Glocktar. I mean, who wouldn't? But yeah I think that the, um, you know, there's only so much spice you can have. And while, you know, Glocktar is one of the best characters in fantasy fiction,
00:13:54
Speaker
I don't know that continuing on with this retreading the same steps is necessarily something that, um that we, that need or that we need. And I mean, I certainly Joe hasn't written any more books with Glockner as a protagonist. He's written as a side character.
00:14:11
Speaker
um And I think it's worked perfectly since then, but I i don't know that it would work as a, as a protagonist. Like, and as you said, you know, filling in all those gaps, it you'd have to hit all those high points and i and hit all those marks so you maintain that consistency because you certainly can't go back and unwrite what you've done.
00:14:32
Speaker
um And I've, especially if though some of those choices are contradictory in nature, or you have to sometimes write your way through these very big narrative obstacles that you set for yourself.
00:14:44
Speaker
I mean, I've i've had people come to me and they say, hey, I'd love to have a prequel ah where, you know, a prequel story, a prequel book featuring the the brothers on the planet where they grew up.
00:14:55
Speaker
And i you know, that would be, it could be fun. but at the same time, i think that the reason why it's resonated with so many people is because we've gotten some brief flashback sequences there. We've gotten some brief chapters and brief snippets of things that happened. But I think that is where the, um the, the cream of it lies, it's,
00:15:16
Speaker
why it's considered ah so well, why it's so well considered is because it's brief and it hits the mark for them. Like you really need to, I need to hit the gong, like the flashback sequences.
00:15:27
Speaker
For example, yeah I would have stretched those in and into an entire novel, I don't think I could sustain it. And I don't think it would, could be sustained. um And I don't really think I have anything to say that I couldn't say in a couple of chapters. And so I don't really know what the point would be.
00:15:45
Speaker
Yeah. But like you said, and like if the author note like has a really good idea, anything can work. I generally am ah never that engrossed in prequels, but then Andor was one of my favorite things that I'd watched like in the past few years. oh yeah And that's obviously the Star Wars prequel. But like when I heard about that as an announcement, I thought, why would I want to like...
00:16:07
Speaker
see, see a story about a character who I know is going to die in a later. So I know he's going to survive. So where are the stakes? But then obviously the, the skill of the writing and the way they put that together was that it's not really about him and whether he survives or not. It's about so much more than that.
00:16:22
Speaker
Yeah. i think the reason why and a work decides having some of the best writers working today or working together to make star Wars for adults. And I don't just mean, know, more swearing or sex or anything like that, but like you the empire actually are actually terrifying.
00:16:37
Speaker
The main characters are adults who make concrete decisions that the the motifs and ethos um and mores about revolutions and um and you know fighting against the empire and fascism are all so ah so well orchestrated and so well explained and so well thought out.
00:16:58
Speaker
um you know all the decisions have emotional weight and gravitas and that you actually feel the the impact of these decisions that these characters make and how it has ripple effects throughout the empire it's also all that aside it's also written by a different cast of people than the people who made Rogue One and it is also um doesn't take place before like it doesn't take place before episode one right I mean like Phantom Menace so doesn't take place like you know 10,000 years before then focusing on a totally different cast of people. You're like, oh, well, yeah, that's, that's interesting. But what is the narrative hook here?
00:17:35
Speaker
Um, you know, but because it's, it can be slotted in, into these events that we know, I think that it, it's somehow is the exception. I, like, I think that, you know, the fact that it's certainly well written is certainly, um,
00:17:49
Speaker
the fact that it's well written is certainly in its favor, but I feel like the fact that it was a different cast of people who are going off and doing it is is's certainly something that can't be discounted. If George Lucas came along tomorrow and it was like, oh, actually, there was this other thing that happened before at Phantom Menace or this thing that happened before episodes five and four and five, I think we would all collectively roll our eyes and say, really, George? Really? You couldn't have done this decades ago?
00:18:16
Speaker
Really? Yeah, yeah i think you're right. um So to conclude that, which was which was a great little chat, I could i could keep going for days. For now, you're you're going to kind of take a breath, take a step back from this universe, but there's a good chance that you'll write some sort of other bits around at at a later date.
00:18:36
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I already have one or two shorts that I've um got rough drafts of. I'm sitting on my hard drive, not completed yet, but I've got ideas brewing, but nothing concrete. And I'm certainly not in a hurry because I've got other projects that I'm working on. And there are, unfortunately, only so many hours in the day. and Despite being a science fiction writer, I have not found a way to add hours to those days.
00:18:57
Speaker
Okay, right. We're striving to. you need to we need to find out what Brandon Sanderson's secret is, because he's definitely adding hours to the days somewhere. for for sure. the state of The state of time and space does not affect Sanderson.
00:19:10
Speaker
He's on his own plane of existence. Yeah, absolutely. um Before we head over to the cabin, um I did want to ask about you. um You worked as an editor for the Hugo award-winning Starship Sofa. um to Tell us a bit about about about that. I'm not too familiar with the Starship Sofa. so first of all, what is it as like, what's what's the
Role as an Editor for Starship Sofa Podcast
00:19:35
Speaker
service? what What are you guys offering?
00:19:37
Speaker
So Starship Sofa, every single week, For many, many, many years and continuing to this day, um we would play a short story in audio form. So some of the like one of the most famous stories that we played was the first audio adaptation of Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang, the story that became Arrival, the movie Arrival. We we played that.
00:19:59
Speaker
We had to remove it afterwards when Ted asked us to remove it at a later date. um When I was there, I would go basically go to authors like Georgia Martin, William Gibson, Helen Nelson, and a slew of other authors. And I would say to them, hey, I really like the story that you've written there. could i please Could we please play it on a podcast and get someone to read it? We'll pay you a certain amount and we'll obviously do promote you and and everything like that.
00:20:26
Speaker
And 99% of authors said yes. And at a certain point, I opened it up for submissions for the first time because we'd never done an open call. ah it was only just It was only solicitations until then.
00:20:38
Speaker
And we i would basically go and select from the from the slush pile and I would select the stories that I that are liked. And that i would sometimes I would go and either buy them or sometimes I would go and say to the author, look,
00:20:52
Speaker
I feel like we're not quite there yet. Here are some suggested changes that I think would benefit the story. If you're willing to work on this with me, then we'll... um then I'd like to take another look or I'll work or, you know, we'll, ah I'll make this cheese changes with you. And i'm we're both happy with it. We'll proceed. And I was fortunate enough that about two dozen authors, um, were, um, wanted to do that with me. Like I never had an author turn, turn me down ah in that way.
00:21:18
Speaker
Um, I think I was, was 17, 18 I started working there.
00:21:24
Speaker
Wow. Yeah, I was still in university at the time. i think I actually, was think it was like my, night just before my 19th birthday where, when George R.R. Martin offered to, um agreed to let us play one of his stories.
00:21:37
Speaker
And the story that we played, Men of Greywater Station, it was, at the time, it was not available online. It had never been reprinted. It was a story that was written in the 70s. It was published in an anthology and that was it.
00:21:50
Speaker
We had to hunt down a downer copy, buy a hand copy, still rare copy. And we did it. We got it to the audit ah narrator and he went and read it online and George liked it. And he said as much in his blog and that I tell you now, that was a highlight of my career, that editing career. And I don't think I've, the only thing that's topped that is that when for episode 500, I reached out to Harlan Ellison,
00:22:13
Speaker
uh, by phone and asked him if we could reprint one of his stories. And if you know anything about Harlan Elson is that he was notoriously cranky and verbally violent and had, you know, he basically, if, if words are bullets, the man was a machine gun, just spewing ammunition across the battlefield, shattering into anyone within earshot or out of earshot.
00:22:39
Speaker
He was, uh, He was quite a character and he talked my ear off for about 10 minutes about the, one of the morality clauses in the contract, because he was like, well, I don't want to be a held accountable because some half of with a stutter in 200 years time gets annoyed with the work is offended by the word and, and digs my body up and drags it to court to persecute me.
00:22:58
Speaker
And, and I was like, yes. Okay, sir. We'll we'll remove it, sir. ah Yeah. It was, ah it was quite a fun conversation. Yeah. at the time. But yeah, I was i was editing it a for about six years, I think from 2014 to 2020. Sorry, 2020.
00:23:13
Speaker
Yeah, um yeah I had to stop when i shortly after just before my book was published because I did not have the time to do it. I mean, I was already struggling to to do it all before then. I actually, I think I had like four or five assistants who would be with me and who would read stories with me.
00:23:33
Speaker
and would parts would read stories from the slush pile and either reject them or pass them up to me. um And there was one time, I think, one of the most memorable stories we got was a story by Arcady, my team.
00:23:45
Speaker
It was sent to us cold. Like, I didn't ask her send it to me. She just saw our open call and submitted it to us. And it was an original story. It was written second person. I hate second person.
00:23:56
Speaker
I hate it in in the use of it in fiction. And for the for the uninitiated, it's the story when the story is written as you said that you went to the store and you bought milk for your dog instead of I went to the store and I bought milk or he went to the store. That's weird. Yeah. It's you it's you said, right? It, it, it, yeah, it's, it's jarring, isn't it? Right.
00:24:16
Speaker
And it was already, you know, this is like 80, my team. So it was already flowery and esoteric and wonderfully weird. I, I didn't know what to do with it.
00:24:27
Speaker
I was like, I don't like the voices jarring to me, but I can't reject it. I just can't. I wrestled with it for weeks. I sent it my two of my assistants and I said to them, what what's going on here? is this Is this right? Like what's going on? Like it should I, am I seeing things?
00:24:43
Speaker
ah They read it and they both passed it up and they both said to me, please, please take this. i love this story. Please don't reject it. I want to continue. And eventually i actually had to buy it because i was like, no, no, no, I i got to run this. I kind of can't let this one go.
00:24:57
Speaker
And so we played it and it's the only story in second person I've ever purchased, ever run. And I told Arcady this when I met her in Seattle last year and she said, I'm really glad you did because I couldn't tell that story anywhere else. So I'm glad you bought it. And I'm so i glad I bought it too.
00:25:15
Speaker
But yeah, no, it was a wonderful experience. I got the chance to read thousands thousands of stories were sent to me and I got to see, work out what makes a good story, what makes a good opening, how to land an ending, how write in a way that compels the audience to keep reading, how do you draw someone into a world while establishing character and how to use an economy of space because we were a short fiction podcast. The majority of the stories were over in an hour.
00:25:43
Speaker
And so that was an hour's recording is about 6,000, 7,000 words, give or take. Um, and so, yeah, we had to really be careful about the length, the sort length of stories that we were playing.
00:25:55
Speaker
Um, and, you know, make sure that there was still, you know, they would draw people in to listen to them because no one's got time for a three hour short story. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, but yeah, it was, it was a hugely rewarding experience and I'm, I'm really glad that I did it. And to this day, I have people coming up and to me and saying to me, you know, I,
00:26:13
Speaker
really enjoyed your work there. I love the stories that you recorded and, and that sort of thing, which is always nice. Yeah. Wow. What an incredible experience, like a sort of onboarding experience for like publishing and writing as well for, for when you were like just a teenager that must say you must have, you must've learned so much just being ah around like such company and such incredible writers.
00:26:39
Speaker
Wow. Yeah.
00:26:45
Speaker
There's one thing I did learn though from it is that you couldn't go to writers and come to them with a hat in hand and have be reverent, ah you know, ah respectful to a fault, right? They were still writers. They're still operating as a business. You had to go to them and say, hey, this is a story that I'd like to play because I think it's it's this, this, and that will pay you this much.
00:27:08
Speaker
Let's talk, right? You couldn't go to them and say, you know, well, you know, please, sir, may I have may i have this story? um You know, because then they said, well, who the hell are you, right? You know, what you okay what do you want from me? What's your scam here?
00:27:20
Speaker
Right. I would always go to them and I, ah you know, and admittedly I've made some a little bit of mistakes when I started off, but I spoke to some other editors and they gave me a few guidelines and said, yeah, this is the way you need to approach people when speaking with them and when soliciting fiction and talking to their editors. and And this is how you convince them to sell your work. This is how you, you know, have a conversation.
00:27:41
Speaker
And I'm still really grateful for the, for that experience. And I think that's part of the reason why I've, you know, kind of thrived sometime in the community and why I continue to know people who I've worked with over the years, because I've built those relationships on.
00:27:55
Speaker
Yeah. Incredible. Um, and a great experience, um, for, yeah, for, for like a growing writer and lover of literature. Um, we are at the point in the episode where I ask you, Jeremy, if you were snowed in at a cozy woodland cabin in the middle of nowhere, which book would you hope to have with you?
00:28:15
Speaker
Would it be cheating to say an iPad so I could have unlimited amount of books? ah ah Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Fair enough. um The, any of the, the red, ri I'm going to cheat again and say like the red rising trilogy. I would, there would definitely, those are my favorite books by far.
00:28:33
Speaker
um I've learned so much of them as a, as a writer and as a person and as a reader, I can read them endlessly. um There's so much depth to them, even in even in the cadence of the prose, even the rhythm of the um a language that's used. There's so much for me to to gain from them. And so I think if was smeared up, I would definitely be curling up with the with with that trilogy, with those books.
00:28:56
Speaker
the the I presume you're talking about the original the trilogy? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You could bind those into one book. It would be chunky, but I'm sure you could you could glue those together. Yeah.
00:29:08
Speaker
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that that even those the three, like they're still shorter than some of the Game of Thrones books. So yeah, like you could make it work. I mean, they're definitely shorter than the Stormlight books. so yeah ah Awesome. That's a great choice. I'm a huge fan of Red Rising as well. I am still hoping for some kind of adaptation, but it keeps being stuck it stuck up in the in production.
00:29:32
Speaker
um So next up, we are going to get into some more craft bits and chat about ah the writing process and more about Jeremy's journey and experiences with publishing. That will be in the extended episode, which you can find at www.patreon.com forward slash write and roll.
00:29:51
Speaker
Well, my editor did go back and make me add it all the yous back in. So... Okay. So it's a, it's a sensitive subject for you.
00:30:03
Speaker
um Awesome. Listen, that brings us to the end of the episode. It's been so interesting chatting me Thank you so much, Jeremy, for coming on and telling us all about your kind of writing and publishing adventures and, and, and your latest book to cap off the trilogy Wolfskin, which is out right now in all the usual places for anyone listening who wants to buy it. Thank you so much. It's been great.
00:30:23
Speaker
yeah morris Thank you so much for having me, Jamie. It was a true pleasure. Yes, it's been such so fun. And for anyone listening, if you want to keep up with what Jeremy is doing, you can find him on Twitter, Instagram, and Blue Sky at Jeremy Saal. Or you can head over to his website, jeremysaal.com.
00:30:39
Speaker
As I said, Wolfskin is out right now, so you can go and get it at your local bookstore. To support this podcast, like, follow, and subscribe. Join the Patreon for ad-free extended episodes and check out my other podcasts, The Chosen Ones and Other Tropes.
00:30:50
Speaker
Thanks again to Jeremy and thanks to everyone listening. We will catch you. on the next episode.