Author Alan Campbell - An Interview

Alan Campbell is the author of "Scar Night," a fantasy novel urban and the first volume of Deep Gate Codex. His debut novel was published by Bantam in the United States and Britain gate. Alan is Scottish born and brought up, live in South Lanarkshire. He worked for a while, the development of video games, before he focuses on photography and writing. I had the opportunity to interview him about his writing and publishing experience.

On Writing

Mary: What is your desktop background, and when did you first examine Even a writer?

Alan: My writing background is not very impressive. English was my worst subject in high school. Apart from a couple of game design documents, scar Night prose was the only one that I have written since leaving school. Actually, that's not quite true. I have another record: a sentence so horrifying, it would be you want to stick your nose pencils and head-butt the computer screen. This won the Detective Fiction category of Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest (http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/), a contest for bad writing. Not the most favorable start for a would-be novelist. I am not really here to sell myself, am I?

Anyway, despite my lack of credentials, I have as a writer, before the book sells, but only in secret. The members of the various committees writing had always said to me, with what seemed like cheerful malice, how difficult it was, an agent and a publisher. Well, I have not much hope that the sale of my first novel. Rather, I simply puts away in the history of the love, and avoid embarrassing conversations with the assertion by a dolphin trainer, or a photographer, which is at least partly true, because I had to earn a small wage picture from the sale of magazines and newspapers and so on.

Mary: Who or what has influenced your writing, and how?

Alan: If a book I have read, more than once, then I have enjoyed it enormously, and so the author has probably influenced my own writing. Some of the candidates are more Mervyn Peake, M John Harrison, George RR Martin, Steven Erickson, and Clark Ashton Smith. I love the prose of Peake and Harrison GRRM's characters, the complex worlds Erickson, and the rich gothic weirdness of Clark Ashton Smith's tales.

Mary: I know They are currently with the second book of the Deep Gate Codex. Do you have any other projects you are currently working on?

Alan: I am also working on a novel for another US publisher, and I have a growing pile of other projects - short stories, comics, screenplays, all sorts of things - that I will have finished day.

a scar overnight, and the Codex Deep Gate

Mary: What is the target audience for your book?

Alan: It is really ripe for readers. I do not have a target audience in mind when I wrote it, I was just writing the kind of story I like to read.

Mary: What is your story unique?

Alan: Hmm ... All the stories are unique, but then I suppose a lot of them are similar. I decided not to write, the "peasant boy with a hidden past kidnap is a kind of assistant to the search for a magic stone, the defeat of the Dark Lord, threatens the green and pleasant land, where" history, because I Read that already. I wanted to write about airships and explosions and chains.

Mary: How did you come with the attitude of the Deep Gate, a city of giant chains hung over a precipice? What was the most difficult part of the global creation?

Alan: Honestly, I do not know where the idea of Deep Gate came. It just popped in my head and stayed there. The most difficult part was creating the world, I think, in the search for appropriate solutions to the multiple problems of maintaining a large army, cavalry, in such an unlikely place.

On Publishing

Mary: Why did you choose a traditional publisher for your book?

Alan: Select is not really the right word. I wanted to try for a traditional publisher for several reasons. Traditional publishers can get your book into bookstores throughout the country, and the market is huge. So you have a sales team behind you, press releases, advance review copies printed and distributed, advertising, a book launch. All of this, I imagine, would be a big difference. And, of course, you are against a deposit royalties.

Fortunately I had the good fortune to find a great agent: Simon Kavanagh of the Mic Cheetham Literary Agency, which has helped me more than I can say. Thanks to him my book was picked up by Tor in the United Kingdom and in the Bantam US.

Mary: What was the publishing process? Was it what you expected?

Alan: I did not know what to expect, to tell the truth, but I was pleasantly surprised. It all happened very quickly. The book publishers found in England and the United States, and then the list of foreign distribution companies began to grow. Page evidence and Covers flitted back and forth between me and editors on both sides of the Atlantic. Blurbs came from writers I respect and admire. Several film production companies expressed interest in (I am still my fingers crossed). The progress of each publisher were much higher than I had imagined they would. It was a wonderful, albeit a little frightening and scary, Mary experience.

: What measures have you taken to publish your book?

Alan: I have a blog at: http: //Anurbanfantasy.blogspot.com a website at: http://www.alanmcampbell.co.uk and a myspace site: http://www.myspace.com /scarnight. MacMillan also a nice flash site for me: http://www.panmacmillan.com/scarnight/

Other

Mary: Do you feel that you now would be published if you had not stopped their work as a video game developer?

Alan: I can not say. At the end of my old job, I have more time to write, but then I am only at the end of the spending so much time faffing around pictures of churches and fountains, because I had coding games. I should have finished the book if I stayed on as a programmer, although it may be a bit taken longer.

Mary: Are you a member of a writing group or websites?

Alan: I am a member of the writers group in Edinburgh.

Reader Submitted

Mary: The following is a question from a my newsletter Readers.

amalthea : When you have a number of ideas that are in circulation worldwide, and all of them are equally strong in your head, do one on one to the conclusion? Or do you want to go back and forth?

Alan: I shuttle between them all the time - a little bit of work on this case, a little bit on another. But I guess it is for everyone else. Which way works best for you.

Conclusion

Mary: What tips do you have for other writers?

Alan: For newcomers to writing fiction, I would recommend that you read a lot and try to enjoy the stories with a critical eye. This is not a new question, but I think it is important. You can learn a lot by writing books (active and passive prose, the importance of conflict and character development, etc), but I think it is helpful, as well as the audit of the books that you love, and wondering what it is you find it so attractive. Why is a fascinating special characters or why a particular sentence resonance with you? Likewise, if you do not like a book, try to understand exactly why, so that you do not make the same mistake yourself.

Also, remember what Ernest Hemingway said:

"The first draft is all shit."

Mary: Anything that you want to say?

Alan: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to blether away.

Mary: Take the opportunity to plug your finished book.

Alan: Well, if someone is interested in playing on a new fantasy author, then there is a lot to adapt, shameful go here:

http: //www.alanmcampbell.co. Uk/

And if you have any thoughts about what I should be in that the empty box to the left of my picture, please let me know.

Mary: Thank you for your time.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Mary_Jensen