Interview with Jennifer Rahn
Q.
Your latest novel,Dark Corridor
is set in the same universe as a previous novel of yours, The Cyanide Process. So to begin with, can you tell us
about this universe?
The Sphairan Universe consists of several colonies that originated
from Earth, and each one is primarily looking out for itself. A given
colony tends to have a certain speciality, and many of them were
seeded by a unique Earth culture, which has then evolved in the
absence of other Earth cultures. Some colonies are planet bound, such
as Xuizo, which is a mining colony and predominantly French, Ursalia
which is an agricultural colony and predominantly Canadian, whereas
Sphaira is an administrative colony and very multicultural. The
Sphairan authority over other colonies is variable. Because of the
vast distances, regulation and law enforcement can be difficult, and
in many cases is managed through private firms. There are also ship
bound colonies, such as the Yoshinogari, who have a reputation for
being pirates, but have rebranded themselves as a respectable
corporation. Sarah’s Cove and Fat Boyo’s Den are pirate coves
along the Merry Porto asteroid belt. There are also hidden cities
residing in pirate territory, outside of Sphairan influence, and
semi-legitimate contractors, such as the Kvinesdal Elite—mercenaries
who have unregistered “nests” scattered throughout the space
regions. Everything from goods to technology to personnel are traded.
A lot of this is impacted by politics and/or containment of disease.
Q.
How about introducing us to the protagonist of Dark Corridor –
Adynn Sheffield. She’s an interesting character. For our readers,
what makes her tick?
Adynn is ultimately looking for family. She desperately wants a
home where she can trust everyone has her back, and she will return
that loyalty ten-fold. She is done with having family taken away from
her by the power-hungry and greedy, and is in no mood to back down
from a fight. If she must be the one to stop the entire universe from
being run over by bad guys, so be it.
Q.
Do your stories have a common theme of females fighting the system or
am I reading too much into this?
Hmm. I think maybe I would say females existing on their own terms
within the system. I didn’t intend for them to be overtly feminist,
and I think the male characters are equally important. My first two
novels (fantasy, with Dragon Moon Press) both had male protagonists.
The next two (science fiction, with Bundoran Press) have female
protagonists, and the one currently kicking around in my head will
have an alien and a trans female as leads … I suppose it’s a
progression of sorts. What is a common theme for me is having to walk
between diverse cultures. Both my parents are immigrants, one from
northern Europe and the other south-east Asia, so being a born and
bred Canadian myself, there were always three cultures in our
household.
Q.
You’ve been published in ten anthologies. Quite an achievement.
What’s the difference between writing a novel and writing short
fiction?
Thanks! I think writing a novel is much easier. The plot arc,
character development and expository background don’t have to be
crammed into a few paragraphs, all the while avoiding the dreaded
“info-dump”. Writing short stories takes some real skill (which I
didn’t already have!) However, the benefits are huge. Aside from
the (relatively) instant gratification, it’s helped me build
discipline as a writer in terms of being economical with word use and
writing to spec. Best of all, it’s allowed me to work with a broad
range of truly fantastic editors and learn from them. Two notable
individuals are Hayden Trenholm and Claude Lalumière.
Q.
Of all the short stories you’ve written, do you have a
favourite?
Ascension, which appeared in Tesseracts Eighteen:
Wrestling With Gods. It features Bobby Fong, a death match
fighter trying to escape into Nirvana. He almost makes it…
Q.
Some of the anthologies you’ve been published in have been
described as ‘very Canadian.’ What’s your take on this?
It’s home. It’s comfortable. It’s a nice starting point.
Obviously, I don’t want to be confined by it, but I do like being
published with people who are close enough to personally interact
with. The Canadian writing community is a lovely group of people to
be immersed in.
Q.
Do you have a favourite Canadian author?
Currently, Chadwick Ginther. I absolutely devoured Thunder
Road. Axel Howerton is a close second. I’m really looking
forward to the sequel to Furr.
Q.
Okay back to science fiction. Hard science fiction – what is
this to you and how is it different from fantasy in your own words?
Being a scientist myself, I would say hard science fiction is
fantasy. (Ha!) Half the fun is making stuff up, and I’ve been
cautioning my work colleagues who might read my fiction that they are
not to tell me if they find mistakes in the science—they can
keep that for lab meetings. On a more serious note, I think hard
science fiction is fun, because of the “what if” factor, which
can be explored and speculated about without having to generate any
actual data. All the glory without the slogging. I would say that in
comparison to fantasy (at least the stuff I write), it’s more
constrained by rules and logic. When I write fantasy, I tend to be
more emotional.
Q.
Do you research hard science fiction topics?
I do, but not in the same way I would for a science paper. It’s
more along the lines of reading a few abstracts and then daydreaming.
Part of the science in The Cyanide Process was dreamt up after
listening to the first half of a seminar during a cancer research
symposium, then letting my mind wander when I was supposed to be
paying attention to the second half.
Q.
Okay, finally, your writing has been described by some as rather dark
in subject matter. Is there another side to you we should be wary of?
Nah. Not anymore. I think I purged most of it when writing The
Longevity Thesis. Admittedly, I was frustrated with life when I
wrote that. I’ve moved on. Things are pretty awesome now, but that
doesn’t mean I’m going to let my characters off any easier!
Glad
to hear it! Thanks for the interview and good luck with the book
launch. Dark Corridor comes out on May 26th.
You can find Jennifer Rahn’s amazon page here,
her webpage here and
connect with her on goodreads here.
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