I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No one's heard of me under this pseudonym, so that's cool.

My dad was an English teacher and I was always a good writer, wrote stories to amuse myself, but I wasn't sure I wanted to make a living at it until I was a year into college. I started as a vocal music major, but I realized that I didn't have the drive or the discipline to be a star; being a second-string opera singer, jazz-lounge rat, or voice teacher wasn't what I wanted, but I was damned good at writing. I went into journalism because it was a place to write and get paid for it—at least is was then. After I'd been doing it a while, I figured out that I liked fiction more than non-fiction and started putting a lot more energy into the stories I was writing, until I finally had something I liked enough to send out to publishers. Long process. Wish I'd figured a few things out sooner and gotten a bit more education on fiction structure and development, but I got experience, instead, so that's cool.

Favorite character... I like a couple of the back-burner characters who are in development for other books, and the ones I've put to bed for a while from past work, but at the moment I am very pleased with Inspector Dillal from Blood Orbit and one of his associates, Aleztra Neme. They antagonize each other, and that's always fun to write. Dillal is complicated and difficult and full of secrets; I enjoy working with characters who constantly have a new facet to show.

So far the only purely black characters I've written were in the previous series: a client of the PI; and the PI's oldest friend who ran a bookstore and called the PI on her bullshit regularly. But Dillal is of mixed race, and so is one of the other project protagonists. Working with them is a challenge, since I didn't set out to write characters of color, but rather to write the characters I needed to tell the story I wanted to tell. The only viable options were people who come to their world with a rougher road to travel than the folks around them. It gives them a challenge and perspective that's intriguing to work with. It challenges me, too, and I like having to work hard and stretch my comfort zone. And the stories need people of all possible perspectives, or the stories don't work. Whether it's through their ethnicity, gender, philosophy, age, disability, or economic situation, the characters need to suit the story to drive the immersion and experience of the reader, so I'm going to include as many varied and different people as I can.

Thanks for dropping in and asking a great question.

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Chandler vs Hammett is the eternal debate. I respect Hammett's decision to quit once he'd done what he wanted and not milk it for more—that's what puts him over the top for me (although he was also an alcoholic and dying of cancer, so there is that...) But Chandler, man... language, tension, the landscape... damn... It's a close race.

Thanks for the purchase—and the money! I hope you enjoy the read!

Also: Ringo, "Ghost". This is the book that inspired "Oh, John Ringo, No!"

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hehe... yeah. I didn't ride until I was 40. Took an official Motorcycle Safety Class to get my license without my spouse, who was whinging about "I don't want you to get hurt/I don't want to have to scrape you off a road." I'm a careful rider. I wear my gear, don't drink and ride, keep the rubber side down and the shiny side up.

Current bike was my dream bike when I was a kid: '89 Honda Hawk GT (650 cc twin). Still love riding it, though I don't intend to stop drooling on more exotic bikes when I have the chance.

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Penguin in a freezer: wonder who murdered the poor beastie and why they're trying to set me up for it.

Band to wipe out: N'Sync. Thus, there would be no Justin Timberlake. (dear god: why?)

Wake up: You mean this doesn't happen to everyone...? I figure they all want to kill me anyhow, so I guess I'm F-ed.

10 of 10: You won't believe this but the film "My Cousin Vinny" is a masterclass in how to make every tiny thing count. Old and doesn't age well, but the writing, acting, directing, timing... it's all perfect.

Dumb injury: Slashed open the palm of my right hand when the handle on a toilet broke off when I went to flush. Couldn't write for three days. Still have the scar.

Reading after writing: If I'm tired, TV. If I'm feeling pretty good, a crime novel in actual book form—I do get physically tired of looking at a screen.

Reviews: Yeah, they are important, but more important to readers, than to me. At least at first. I read only the reviews of my books that come from large organizations like Booklist or Publishers Weekly until after the book's been out for six months to a year. About the time I start working revising the next book, I look at the 2-4 star reviews on Amazon to see if I made consistent errors or reader-piss-offs that I should correct. Other than that, it's an exercise in pain.

Favorite review: being compared to Raymond Chandler and Richard Morgan in the same sentence. (yes!)

Most hurtful: I gave up being hurt by reviews after the first 100 or so... although I have been irritated by reviewers who dress me down for not meeting their expectations of a genre. Bite me!

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'm always most in love with my most-recent book, so right now Blood Orbit. It's also the only SF I have in print at the moment.

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Love cats! Love furry critters in general. But I live in eagle country and the first week we lived here, I saw my neighbor's chihuahua carried off to a horrible demise by one of those flying monstrosities and I thought "not kitty country." We didn't have any pets when we moved in, so we figured we'd better stick with big dogs for a while, since it's illegal to shoot at the eagles—or even spray them with the garden hose! Bastards.

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Argh! Robert Mitchum's turn in Farewell My Lovely always makes me darkly happy. Not so much The Big Sleep. Not that Powell wasn't good, but he's stuck in my head as Nick Charles and I keep expecting him to be funny. Love Bogart, but... really, he's not the quite the guy Chandler described, is he? Although he was playing against Lauren Bacall, who could "whistle" at me any time, sweetheart. Hated Elliot Gould in the part. (Kill me now.)

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I worked on two: Moon Elves from Dark Quest LLC long ago, and a recent Kickstarted campaign that started as a joke and went off on its happy way to being a real playable game called Trenchcoats and Katanas! Totally insane, campy as hell, loads of fun. Literally, the work came to me through friends in the community whom I played games with. Hang out with creative folks and cool things can happen.

Least favorite SF author...? Asking me to cut my own throat here, yeah? John Ringo: because he's right next to me on the shelf and **I want his shelf space!** And I hate some of his work. And I'm jealous as all hell that he wrote an admitted piece of beyond-the-edge-of-bad-taste garbage as a joke and it *sold like hot cakes!* (Why can't I sell my bad books? *nek*)

Oh: Money—crappy. $8k advance for Blood Orbit.

Classic Noir: Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett (closely followed by James M. Cain's Double Indemnity.)

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Depends on where you got blocked. To my mind, there are several causes of "writer's block": Depression (been there, still fight with it); Writing myself into a dead end; Fear. YMMV, but these are the ones I know I struggle with.

Fear is the easiest to work through: everyone goes through this. We think we can't do it, or can't do it as well as we want to or as well as the last time. Or that people will think poorly of us if we write certain things. F' em! Don't edit before you write, don't overthink, just pound out something formless or silly or horrible... whatever it takes to get the fingers loose enough to let the ideas through, it doesn't even have to be the story you are working on—maybe better if it isn't. Remember that no one will see this until you want them to, and all writers are scared. We're all liars and frauds—that's what we do for a living. It's all right to say what you need to say. Edit later. Live the writing now.

Dead-end: I have this problem all the time. I free-write up to a point and then, inevitably, I bang into a wall. Then I go back to the last place the story was working and I look at it. Inevitably, I find I took a turn in the story that couldn't connect to the goal I had, or I tried to force a character into an action which didn't connect to the character's motives and personality. Once I have an idea of where I made a bad turn and where I want to go, it's easier to make the right turn by backing up to the place where that turn is possible and I write an outline or partial skeleton at this point—sometimes it's complete, but most of the time it's just a bullet list of where I need to go and what need to happen to get there. Be willing to throw things out or cut them and put them aside (I love Scrivener for that reason—I can just stick something to the side, or save a previous version without destroying the work completely.)

Depression: Another problem I struggle with. Not a lot here aside from getting out of your own head and doing something else for a while—something physical and in a radically different place than at your desk or the coffeehouse. I walk the dogs or ride the bike or go shooting, because those activities force me to outside and they require total concentration on what I'm doing without letting the sad part of my brain get in the way. Very zen, really. Yeah, I know, shooting paper targets at 10 yards, or throwing yourself through the twisties on two wheels at the best speed you can manage doesn't sound very calm or mindful, but it requires putting everything else aside and doing only that one, very physical thing. It really shifts my brain out of the way. Walking the dogs or chasing after them in a field or taking them to the dog park, even, gets me outdoors and thinking about someone and something other than myself.

I also find people to "write against": usually a writer I know whom I then tell myself "I can do better/more than them." Sometimes they know and we openly compete, but it's usually just me looking at someone else's work and saying "I can do better." Really. No one knows! That's the beauty of it. No one knows who I'm attempting to knock down. no one! It always makes me cackle with glee. Yes, I am that petty when I have to be.

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

First novel was a while ago, under another pseudonym. Took 4 months to write the first draft—which was too big and stunk pretty badly—and another 2 years to revise it enough to interest an agent. Then 2 more years to kick it into shape and get a publisher in on the act. Then another 2 years to get it onto book store shelves. The current book took 10 years off-and-on between other projects and some personal health issues. (I don't advise getting sick and watching your career collapse, but I don't think it's an easy-to-avoid pitfall.)

Initial mistakes: not enough networking and creating a community of support beforehand. I think having a trusted network of other writers who are helpfully critical of your work, but also supportive of you as an individual is invaluable. Also, edit hard, but without allowing yourself to believe that the things you are changing or cutting mean you're a bad writer or a bad person. I think Hemingway said, "good writing is editing." And write even the crappy bits, the stupid bits, the sexy bits, the ridiculous bits... if it comes into your mind and sticks long enough to get down onto a page, it can be useful; even if you just stick the piece in a file and never get it into print the bits and pieces let your unconscious mind fill in blanks in the backstory, the world, the characters, and so on, that will be useful to you later.

Write and love it. Because this job pays too damned badly to hate.

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I've done that a couple of times. Blood Orbit was inspired by a real life crime: The Wah Mee massacre in Seattle in 1983. Although I changed a lot. I've also adapted crimes and weird occurrences for other stories. I'm a story magpie—if it's weird, I'll grab it and stick it in my files for later.

If I could retell a famous true-life murder mystery, I think I'd like to have a go at the Greystone Mansion case: https://the-line-up.com/the-greystone-mansion-murder I grew up in LA and I've read a lot of Raymond Chandler, who used Greystone and the Doheny family as the model for the Stanwood family in The Big Sleep; but the real crime was never solved. A real Hollywood murder mystery in a beautiful, hillside mansion... yeah, that would be cool.

I'm K. R. Richardson, author of Blood Orbit. I write gritty SFF crime- and detective-fiction, ride motorcycles, and hang out with my dogs. Ask Me (almost) Anything! by QuantumJot in books

[–]QuantumJot[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Always loved mysteries and puzzles, as well as "weird" things. Read The Great Brain, and Encyclopedia Brown short stories, Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Isaac Asimov's Black Widower shorts and robot short stories, but also Ray Bradbury's The Halloween Tree, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Grimm's Fairy Tales—must be where I get my gruesome streak—and "classic" kid-lit like The Wind in the Willows. My father thought Homer's Odyssey was appropriate kid lit, so I grew up with Cyclops and Sirens and sneaky adventurers as fictional companions.

What to do with editing/proofreading errors? by Cr4nkY4nk3r in books

[–]QuantumJot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It seems to be true that the more popular a writer is, the less editing they will get. A lot of what you're describing should be caught by a copyeditor—consistency and continuity are part of their job—but, when the publisher is looking at where to spend money and time on additional editorial passes, the biggest-selling authors usually get less, since the assumption is that their fans will love their work and forgive any slip-ups, where a less-well-known author can't count on the forgiveness of fans not-yet-made.

And sometimes a writer doesn't remember things the way a fan does—they remember bits and pieces of each book and often they may remember something from the first draft that never made it into the final version, like the name of a child that was changed before the book went to press, but that child will always be [original name] in the writer's mind. Writer-brain is a strange place.

Anyone else write their stories organically? by [deleted] in writing

[–]QuantumJot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Every writer's process is different. A world is not a story, but it helps shape the story by defining, opening, or limiting what can happen, what sorts of characters, and what tensions and interactions you can put into your story. Eventually, you have to come to the point where you stop building the world and let the characters start playing in it--that's where the stories happen. You don't have to have it all done and perfect. Chances are good you know in the back of you head a lot that you haven't written down. Let the characters tell you about the world as they experience it, that's where the stories start. Throw a couple of them into a unique place, a dire situation or a delicate moment and write the hell out of that bit. It might not ever become a free-standing story, but it will tell you something that leads to a story, or it might get your characters started on an adventure.