Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Sabitha: Joseph Picard is joining us today, to talk all things science fiction. Joseph, what book are you going to tell us about?

Joseph: Rubberman’s Exodus is the third and final novel of my Rubberman series. Following Tara, the head Engineer, and her love and partner Sasha, the multi-generational bomb shelter is put at risk when fuel for the generator runs out unexpectedly. 2000+ survivors have been hiding from the after effects of war for over a century.

In that time, they’ve regressed into sub-cultures born from necessity, but have stagnated into ignorance and dogma.

In Rubberman’s Exodus, the blackout leads to events that force them out to the surface, and re-examine their way of life. From the Engineers who run the power generator, to the isolated workforce Subjects, to Citizenry, which was created to contain the worst trouble makers.

Everyone in the facility has had a taste of conflict over the years, but the Citizenry section has suffered the bloodiest of internal little wars, and most abusive little tyrants. (The previous book, Rubberman’s Citizens is all about them getting themselves sorted out… mostly.)

As the events of Rubberman’s Exodus unfold, across the facility, (not just Citizenry,) everyone will be facing threats they have no experience with. Threats from outside, where the big war happened, and the Enemy is known to patrol above.

I’m very pleased to have wrapped up the Rubberman series in a way I’m happy with, since the advancement of my multiple sclerosis (on top of my pre-existing paraplegia, whee!) makes writing very difficult these days.

Sabitha: What inspired you to write this book?

Joseph: The whole series was sparked from the notion of being trapped in a routine and job that feels meaningless, in near isolation. The characters took over, and the facility grew a life of its own, which demanded resolution. The Rubberman name comes from the Managers of the workforce, who wear rubber hazard suits, for reasons forgotten and misunderstood.

Sabitha: That is sadly very relatable. We have a lot of writers in our community. What’s your writing process?

Joseph: 1: Cool sounding idea/concept

2: Think of a way to make it plausible

3: Throw in likeable characters who have to deal with it. And not-so-likable characters to make things difficult.

I don’t do ‘proper’ outlines, but will make a point-form list of the big plot points I want to hit. I write through point 1, with the other points being suggestions. They’re all subject to total change if ‘uncovered’ events and actions of the characters take control.

As well, I’ve been sometimes labelled as ‘hard sci fi’, because I don’t use transporters or warp drives, etc., but I like my fictional science to be in the realm of very possible. And maybe soon.

Sabitha: What book do you tell all your friends to read?

Joseph: I’m frequently barking about Michelle Patricia Brown, who gives us characters with depth, and words with detail. She has a plot/character balance that’s similar to my own.

I’m currently in the middle of her After the Garden, set in a ruined future filled with shattered memories, uncanny ‘gifts’, and jerks who are basically a witch-hunting cult.

Sabitha: Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Joseph: The fastest link to type in is www.ozero.ca. My books in various formats are at my Amazon page.

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Sabitha: Tim Lieder is an expert in the weird and scary, as well as a good friend and great author. Today he’s here to talk about his collection of his Christmas themed horror stories, Sugarplum Zombie Motherfuckers. Tim, can you tell us a bit about this book?

Tim: There are three short stories in this book. The Xmas Video was a story about zombie porn that was directly inspired by Michael Hemmingson’s “Hardboiled Stiff” which I had published in Badass Horror. “Santa Claus Dies” was the kind of story I used to love when I first edited anthologies, the kind of hard-drinking loser stories that filled up Teddy Bear Cannibal Massacre.

Sabitha: What made you decide to self publish Sugarplum Zombie Motherfuckers?

Tim: The reason why I chose to self-publish was because of “The Man in the Red Suit”. This story was originally inspired by E.T.A. Hoffmann’s “The Sandman”, particularly the beginning when the narrator talks about his father telling him horrifying stories about a Sandman who steals children’s eyes. I had written one story in this vein and it amused me to write another one, only to make it about Santa Claus, whose mouth stunk of spoiled milk and sucked the life out of reindeer to make them fly. The second inspiration for “The Man in the Red Suit” was the Serbian genocide and the banality of evil. For some reason, I was having trouble selling it to the better horror magazines.

Sabitha: We have a lot of writers in our community. What’s your writing process?

Tim: I revise, give up, dig up an old story, try to revise that one. Sometimes I rip pages out of a public domain book of classic literature and steal phrases. If I’m getting confused about a story, I go back and revise it again to remember who is doing what. If I really hate an old story, I replace every “t” with a “g” and then run an autocorrect. Then I see what can come out of that. Basically, I am never going to give a word count because a productive day might involve getting rid of 1200 words as much as it would involve typing 320 words.

Sabitha: Do you have a “fan-cast” – do you have actors you’d cast as your main characters?

Tim: My favorite story in this collection is about a girl who grows up hearing horror stories about Santa Claus and when she’s an adult, joins a Serbian militia and helps to commit genocide. I’m not sure anyone would want to adapt it.

Sabitha: What book do you tell all your friends to read? 

Tim: There are a lot of books that I tell my friends to read, but I am China by Xiaolu Guo is a beautiful work about expatriates, world politics and the ways that privilege informs political stances. I also love everything I read by Junji Ito. He’s either the scariest or the funniest manga artist working today, depending on your mood.

Sabitha: Does the location the story takes place mean something to you or to the work?

Tim: “The Xmas Video” takes place in an apartment in the 1980s and the college is the University of Minnesota. “The Man in the Red Suit” takes place in 1990s Bosnia where militias were murdering Muslims while the rest of the world ignored the genocide. I’m obsessed with the ways that humanity can justify and ignore its atrocities. Whether Florida is trying to censor all African-American studies or Poland criminalizing suggestions that it was in any way complicit in the Holocaust, we love to forget just how evil we are. In the case of the Serbian (and Rwandan) genocides, America didn’t even have to forget. Americans were too busy paying attention to Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan to bother about mass graves. Even today, the main takeaway from Bosnia is that it’s just another reason to hate Tony Blair for his interventionist policies.

Sabitha: These stories sound like they draw on some of the richest traditions of horror, where the greatest threat isn’t the monster outside the walls, it’s the monster within our hearts. Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Tim: You can find me on Tumblr, Dreamwidth, and Facebook. If you want to read Sugarplum Zombie Motherfuckers, you can find the e-book here and audiobook here, or look wherever books are sold online.