Jesse Teller

Well, folks, this is a new feature of my blog. I hope you are as interested and excited about it as I am. I will now be doing interviews with authors every other Friday. I am calling this feature The Friday 13, as I will be asking 13 questions of our authors.

I’m really pumped about this first guy, Charles McGarry, author of Talindor’s Guest. I met him a month after I published Liefdom. He reached out then and we became friends. I am hoping to get his name out to you guys and lend a hand in his direction.

Let’s get into the mix:

Why storytelling? What made you yearn to tell a good story, and how long was this story within you before it came out?

I have always told stories since I was young. It probably started with wild, strangely concocted excuses and lies I would tell my parents. I’ve always been an avid reader, and loved a good story. My stories started coming to me back in 2009 or 2010 in dreams and waking fits of inability to sleep.

What character from your book fills you with hope?

So many do, but Shara Daro would have to be my answer. A young girl from a small village who is chosen to become a water mage. She is thrust untimely into a battle against an unspeakable evil who has perverted the elements, and must unfortunately grow up much too fast. As I was writing her story, and every time I read it, I am filled with great hope.

What character from your work frightens you, makes you feel dirty to write?

That would have to be a malevolent dragon known as Kerrag. I seethe hatred every time I write about him. He is that despicable.

Your main character walks into a bar. What happens?

Well my main character in Talindor’s Guest is a teller of all the different stories from his travels, including Shara’s and Kerrag’s. He wouldn’t walk into a bar, but rather just appear there, and everyone would wonder what happened and swear they had drunk too much, haha.

The main character in my current work in progress is an Assassin, and when he walks into a bar everything goes silent. Every eye turns toward him, because his reputation precedes him. A select few even dare to talk with him. He hates watered down ale, and so do I, so that part is easy to write.

When you are writing, tell me about the emotions that are running through you and what it takes to work alongside them.

The hardest one for me to get a handle on is compassion. I feel others’ emotions such as distress, grief, and disgust very deeply, even for my fictional characters, and so when I get ready to kill a character, or do something particularly distasteful, it’s tough. Even for minor characters, because everybody has a family. I’m also a very lighthearted, friendly, and caring person, so for me to write a dark, vengeful, and/or deranged person takes a certain divorce from myself.

How do you police your production? Do you have a word quota, or a page goal, maybe you work for a set amount of time? Do you place demands on yourself when you’re working? How do you meet those demands?

I set my own loose deadline for publication, and I try to get a minimum of 2000 words at a sitting. It doesn’t always happen, but I do try hard. My goal is at least 90K words, but if it goes beyond that I’m totally cool with it. I’m currently at 45K. The daily project total widget on Scrivener is immensely helpful.

A publishing house gets ahold of you and wants you to take over writing an established character. For instance, DC Comics calls you and tells you they want you to take over writing Batman. What is the dream? What established character would you love to write?

Oh wow, I would LOVE to write Batman. I love writing dark and complex characters, and I love the version with Christian Bale the best.

Everyone has at least one specific challenge that holds him or her back. What is that challenge in your work and how do you overcome it?

I can get easily discouraged by stressful things going on in my life. It’s very hard for me to write under stress. That is something I am definitely working on.

How did you find the time to write this book with your busy life? What ideas do you have on how others can make time in their lives?

Well, I wrote whenever I could find the time, and some stories came quicker than others. I do have to confess that I did some of my writing at work on excessively slow days. So, I guess you could say I got paid to write my book? *Insert sheepish laugh

Without giving any spoilers, what is your favorite thing about this book?

For Talindor’s Guest, my favorite thing is The Inkmaster. He is a very intentionally ambiguous character that I had amazing fun writing. For my work in progress, it has to be the character that evolved into book two for what was originally a standalone novel idea. I love how characters surprise me.

If we wanted a good story, one that you didn’t write. Where would you send us?

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. Absolutely brilliant! I could read it over and over again, and I plan to. Anything by Gaiman is pretty damn good.

Let’s talk about tools. Do you have a word processor that you would tell us to use? Is there a certain computer that has become your favorite? What do you look for in a keyboard? What would you absolutely have to have if you were to sit down and write your next book?

I can’t do without my Macbook Pro, and I use Scrivener for my writing. They just released an app for iPhone and iPad as well, but I have not tried it. Oh and I shouldn’t call my friend and professional amateur editor, Tracy, a tool, but she is a huge asset to me, lol.

If we read your work and crave more, can we find more that you have written? Will we ever see another book by you? If we fall in love with your work, how can we find you and everything you have done?

My next book, Assassin’s Crucible, is planned for release in the first quarter of 2017.

You can follow my Amazon author page and my website is www.charlesmcgarry.net.

 

Charles McGarry is an author, a blogger, and a truly unique individual. A self proclaimed free thinker who loves to think deeply about many issues, Charles is constantly immersed in questions about reality. He is married to the love of his life, has two amazing children, and a rather eccentric cat. He was raised on a small hay farm in southern Utah. As an only child, his home terrain gave a perfect backdrop to explore his active imagintation.

A very eclectic individual, Charles enjoy all kinds of different movies and music and is a huge bookworm, of course. His genres of choice are inspirational non-fiction and Fantasy, and he isa huge fan of authors like Terry Brooks, JRR Tolkien, and Christopher Paolini, CS Lewis, Wayne Dyer, and Eckhart Tolle.

Charles is enamored with ancient world history, especially Egyptology, and also likes to play video games. He is also a proud health nut, and a huge fan of yoga and meditation for releasing stress.

Charles writes books within the broad Sci-Fi/Fantasy genre, as well as some inspirational material, and is defined by his unconventional nature. If asked about his claim to fame, he would answer “I have a thing for dragons.”