Eleven Questions

After a stressful month at work, it appears that I have gone a whole month neglecting my blog.  (And my other writing has suffered as well.)  To make up for it, I will be launching another blogskrieg.  That means more blog entries for you to read!  Excited?

I'll jump start this with these eleven questions Erin Latimer, fellow writer, sent to me a couple of weeks ago.

1)If you got to meet a famous author who would it be?
I would have really liked to have met Isaac Asimov.  The day he died was a sad day, knowing I would never meet him.

If I must answer from the living, I would pick Stephen King.

2)If you got to say only ONE thing to them, what would it be?
I love your stories, and I love your technique.
 
3)Make up a fake (and short) book jacket with these words included: Dishwater, hedgehog, nylons,wobbly, sausages, dangerous, angry. Okay, GO...

4)Who is your book boyfriend/girlfriend?
I had the biggest crush on Amy from H. M. Hoover's This Time of Darkness.  I must have read that book a million times, and I told people I swore to find that girl and marry her.  I ended up marrying a blond.  Heh!

  
5)Your publisher is paying for you to go anywhere in the world and write a book about it. Where?
I would actually pick the moon (you know--sci fi and all that).  But realistically, I would like to explore some musical roots.  Send me to Vienna, and then I'll write a book on the unknown story about how Beethoven made friends with an alien who eventually caused his deafness.
 
6)What is the most HORRIBLE book character you can think of and why?
I'm sure I could think of a more horrible character, and I really love the Foundation series, but I'd have to admit that Hari Seldon from the first book is one of the most uninteresting characters ever written.  I'm happy that Asimov went back to redeem himself by exploring Hari in subsequent prequels, but in the original book Hari simply appears and says, "Here you go - psychohistory."

7) Who is your favorite villain?
There are so many cool ones to choose from.  Sauron comes close to my favorite, but we only get to see him from a distance.  The Baron Harkonnen, though--we get to see up close and personal.  He is absolute power run amok.

Image by Edward Pun

8) What is your favorite book to movie?
Almost every movie comes from a book.  :)   

The Wizard of Oz is one of my all time favorites.

9)  What was the most horrifyingly scary book you've ever read? Why?
I don't seem to get scared by books anymore.  More recently, I got a little creeped out by Watts' Blindsight, but Stephen King takes the cake.  Take your pick: The Shining, Cujo, It, Misery.
 
10) What book series do you wish you had written?
The Hitchhiker's Guide.  It's my kind of humor.

11)When is the last time a book made you cry and what book was it?
Hmmm ... haven't done that in a while.  My own book The Silver Lining (which is still in revision mode) gets me going, but we authors always have a soft spot for our own characters.  Thinking way back, I remember the last book of the Rama series: Rama Revealed got me going.  More recently, a couple of the vignettes in World War Z got close.