What Inspires Writers

Compostela feature

The thoughts behind the stories in Compostela

For more than 1,000 years, Santiago de Compostela has attracted pilgrims to walk to the cathedral that holds St. James the apostle’s relics. The stories in the Compostela anthology in their own way tell the tale of futuristic travelers who journey into the dark outer (or inner) reaches of space, searching for their own connections to the past, present and future relics of their time.

These are the author’s inspirations for the stories.

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Janet Kellough Stays Tuned-In To Writing

Kellough Interview

Janet is currently celebrating the release of her new novel, the speculative fiction/thriller The Bathwater Conspiracy (EDGE Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing 2018). Janet is best known as the author of six novels in The Thaddeus Lewis Mystery series, set in mid-19th century Upper Canada: On the Head of a Pin, Sowing Poison, 47 Sorrows, The Burying Ground, Wishful Seeing (short-listed for the 2017 Crime Writers of Canada Arthur Ellis Award for Best Novel) and The Heart Balm Tort. She has also written two contemporary novels, The Palace of the Moon and The Pear Shaped Woman, as well as the semi-non-fictional Legendary Guide to Prince Edward County and her new release The Bathwater Conspiracy.  Also a storyteller, Janet has released two audio recordings, Swear On My Mother’s Grave and Fowke Tales Live at Lang. She lives in an old farmhouse in the middle of a red cedar fen in rural Ontario, Canada.
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Digging Into History With Mark Patton

Mark Patterson Interview

At nineteen Mark Patton shipped aboard the Research Vessel Chain as a helmsman for the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. By his mid-twenties he was flying out of Otis Air Force Base for the National Marine Fisheries Service on weekly North Atlantic Fisheries patrols. After graduating from Northeastern University, he became a roughneck for Delta Drilling in the Texas oil patch. He left Texas to become a police officer and later a head of Natural Resources on Cape Cod. Now retired, he devotes his time between the mountains of northern New Hampshire and his home on Cape Cod, where with his cellist wife, he composes music and pursues his longtime passion for writing.

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Allan Weiss, Grammar Man and More

Allan Weiss

Allan Weiss is the author of two books of short stories, Living Room (Boheme 2001) and Making the Rounds (Edge 2016), as well as a number of stories, both literary and science fiction/fantasy, in various periodicals and anthologies. A third collection, Telescope, will be published by Guernica Editions in 2019. Born in Montreal, Weiss moved to Toronto in 1980 to pursue doctoral studies at the University of Toronto. He earned his Ph.D. in English in 1985 and has taught at Ryerson, Woodsworth College, and York University. He is currently an Associate Professor of English and Humanities at York, specializing in Canadian literature and fantastic fiction. In addition, he is Chair of the Academic Conference on Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy, which is held every two years at the Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculation and Fantasy.

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Cooking Up Stories With Meg Pontecorvo

Meg Pontecorvo

A writer and artist dedicated to multiple genres, Meg Pontecorvo earned an MFA in Poetry Writing from Washington University in St. Louis and is a 2010 graduate of the Odyssey Writing Workshop. Meg has published a novelette, “Grounded,” in Asimov’s, and her artwork in collage and pen has been featured in experimental video performances in the Bay Area. A native of Philadelphia, she grew up in the Midwest and now shares a small apartment with her partner and cats in San Francisco, where she cooks in a tech-free kitchen.
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A.E. Decker, Clarifying the Confusions of the English Language

AE Decker

A. E. Decker hails from Pennsylvania. A former doll-maker and ESL tutor, she earned a master’s degree in history, where she developed a love of turning old stories upside-down to see what fell out of them. This led in turn to the writing of her fantasy novels, The Falling of the Moon and The Meddlers of Moonshine. A graduate of Odyssey 2011, her short fiction has appeared in such venues as Beneath Ceaseless SkiesFireside Magazine, and in World Weaver Press’s own Speculative Story Bites. Like all writers, she is owned by three cats. Come visit her, her cats, and her fur Daleks at wordsmeetworld.com.
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Agonizing Over Fiction
With Judith Field

Judith-Field-Interview

Judith Field was born in Liverpool and lives in London. She is the daughter of writers and learned how to agonize over fiction submissions at her mother’s (and father’s) knee.

She has two daughters, a son, a granddaughter and a grandson (who inspired her first published story when he broke her laptop keyboard. Unlike in the story, a magical creature didn’t come out of the laptop and fix her life). Her fiction, mainly speculative, has appeared in a variety of publications, mainly in the USA. She speaks five languages and can say, “Please publish this story” in all of them. She is also a pharmacist, freelance journalist, editor, medical writer, and indexer.

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With Judith Field”

Jeannie Warner
Has Something To Say

Jeannie Warner Interview

Jeannie Warner spent her formative years in Colorado, Canada, and Southern California, and is not afraid to abandon even the most luxurious domestic environs for an opportunity to travel almost anywhere. She has a useless degree in musicology, a checkered career in computer security, and aspirations of world domination.

Make sure to check out the audio of Arkham k-12 Science Fair written by Jeannie Warner.

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Has Something To Say”