Podcast: The Once & Future Podcast interview

Today, I am a guest on Episode 108 of The Once & Future Podcast. Host Anton Strout gets me to open up about a lot of things, from my time in Hollywood, to my time as an editor, to the recent passing of David Bowie, to the Muppets, Star Trek, Babylon 5, and the fantastic effect of playing Spider-Man 2 video game. And of course we talk a lot about the Thrones & Bones series. Please, check it out!

Interview in The Leaf

A wonderful article about my visit to Riverchase Middle School in specific and my books and school visits in particular has appeared this week online in The Leaf. 

Thanks to journalist Angie Bell for a great piece! 

“I like fantasy,” said sixth grader Haniya. “This book has really good characters. I like the dragons and giants.”

Meet the Author: Lou Anders Interview with PSJA KTRI TV

Recently, I toured the southern tip of Texas in support of the release of Nightborn. While I was there, I was interviewed by Celia Torres, Producer/Reporter for PSJA KTRI TV. That interview is now online at YouTube and Vimeo. The students I spoke with on my tour were especially wonderful, so please make sure to stay through the end of the interview, where kids from the schools I visited ask me questions!

Thrones & Bones for the Fate Accelerated RPG Episode 3

The third and final installment of RPG Gamer Dad's live Thrones & Bones role playing game (powered by Evil Hat's Fate Accelerated RPG) has gone up today, along with an interview with Yours Truly! I cannot tell you how cute RPG Gamer Boy is, nor how utterly honored, flattered, and tickled I've been by this whole thing. I'm truly grateful to the RPG Gamer Family for all they've done.

Meanwhile, for those coming in late, part one can be found in episode 35 and part two in episode 37. And for those wanting to play in the Thrones & Bones world themselves, RPG Gamer Dad and RPG Gamer Boy's character sheets for Karn and Thianna can be found here.

Crash Landing with Comic Book Outsiders

I am a guest today on the new podcast Crash Landing, spinoff of Comic Book Outsiders. 

The premise of this show, "Each episode we trap a guest on our crashing spaceship. They have one hour to salvage humanity's most important cultural artefacts before we maroon them on the planet of their choice. Crashing his landing craft this week is author, Lou Anders."

I had a wonderful time talking with host Scott Grandison and plugged many wonderful artifacts of earth culture in the process. Please check it out.

Reflections from the Road: NYCC video on YouTube

Filmed at New York Comic Con courtesy of Suvudu, I talk about Frostborn,the Thrones & Bones board game, Viking helmets, and... my fear of oatmeal.

The Jon Sprunk Interview

My friend, and awesome fantasy author, Jon Sprunk interviewed me for his blog. We talk about RPGs, Norway, cartography, world building, and wearing too many hats! Please check it out. Here's a sample:
Frostborn,

Lou: Music is always a big influence on me, whatever I’m working on. For this series, I’ve made a playlist that mixes Howard Shore’s score for The Fellowship of the Ring and his The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (extended versions of both of course), with Jeremy Soule’s Skyrim soundtrack, and, in preparation for book three, I’ve just added John Powell’s How to Train Your Dragon 2 and two versions of Carl Orff’s “O Fortuna,” (which you may remember from its use in the climax of the film Excalibur). Also, I blasted “O Fortuna” on the way to my first reading/signing to help get in the mood.

SF Signal Interview

This morning, I am interviewed by the wonderful Kristin Centorcelli for SF Signal. We talk about RPGs, Norway, children's literature, and more. And through the generosity of Random House Children's Books, there's a contest to win 1 of 5 copies of Frostbornas well.

Read the enormously titled, "A Chat with Lou Anders about World Building, Influences and What Makes FROSTBORN so Special (PLUS: Giveaway!)"

The Roundtable Podcast Interview

I am a guest today on the fabulous Roundtable Podcast. We talk about Hollywood, TV sets, screenwriting, publishing, and the most famous black blade in fantasy fiction.

I'll be returning to the podcast on November 6th, for their Workshop Episode, where we live-improve a writer's pitch (or perhaps just muck it up horrendously). 

Chiseled in Rock

Today, I am interviewed by Chiseled in Rock, the Official Blog of the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers. We talk about science fiction and fantasy publishing, but also about film and television, and answer the all important question Star Trek or Star Wars. Here's a taste, but please check out the whole interview:

CIR: Is there a type or style of science fiction and fantasy that you would recommend aspiring writers pursue or avoid? For example, are there topics that are overdone or ones that you think need greater exploration?

LA: That’s a dangerous question. You can’t really write for what you perceive the market to be, because by the time you’ve put the year or two in that it takes to write a novel, spent the year or more it takes to sell it, and then gone through the year it takes to publish it, whatever you thought was the hot category is half a decade out of date. We have a husband-wife author team, Clay and Susan Griffith, who have a very hot vampire-steampunk novel. You’d think they were capitalizing on a trend, but the truth is that steampunk wasn’t hot when they started and they joke that they saw vampires fall in and out of fashion twice while they were working on the first manuscript. That being said, as long as Game of Thrones is on HBO, the industry will be looking for another gritty, epic fantasy, and I personally am curious to see someone bridge the gap between urban fantasy’s core female readership and classic sword & sorcery fiction. But don’t write to someone else’s expectation. Write what you are moved to write. If it doesn’t excite you, how can it excite anyone else?

Beware the Giant Fire Breathing Robot

I'm a guest today on episode 80 of the Giant Fire Breathing Robot podcast. They say, "Andrew and Ashley pick the brain of Lou Anders, the steady hand at the wheel of Pyr, an imprint of Prometheus Books. We’d make the easy “what’s a book joke” here, but this interview is so full of great info and kick-ass book recommendations that we’ll just let the audio speak for itself. Lou gives tips for people who want to do his job, and he gives some great info for people who fancy themselves the next Tolkien."

You can listen at the link above, or download from iTunes. 

I Shoud Be Writing

I'm interviewed by the wonderful Mur Lafferty on episode 185 of her I Should Be Writing podcast. We talk about steampunk, piracy, forthcoming Pyr releases, and whether or not "write what you know" makes any sense. You can listen at the link above or subscribe to the podcast via iTunes.

Podcast: Comic Book Outsiders

I was a guest of the UK podcast Comic Book Outsiders this week. Hosts Scott and Steve got me talking about my lifelong love of comics and I shot off into many comic-related tangents while hopefully still talking about the superhero prose anthology Masked some as well. The podcast is available on iTunes as well as from the link above.

Scott and Steve, it was a very fun interview. Thanks!

Newsarama: Comic Book Superstars Go Prose

The comic book news and reviews site Newsarama has just posted an interview with me entitled "Comic Book Superhstars Go Prose in New Anthology MASKED." Newsarama contributor Zack Smith conducted the interview, which is quite extensive. Here's a sample:

NRMA: While a number of comic writers have worked in prose, it's not always typical to see them move from comics to this medium. Why do you feel that is, and do you think there is still an inherent prejudice against writers who come from comics?

Anders: No, I think that Neil Gaiman opened the door for that a long time ago, and that plenty of publishers would like to see his success duplicated. Fables author and Masked contributor Bill Willingham has one novel out from Vertigo and another coming from Tor. JSA writer and Masked contributor Matthew Sturges has written two books for me at Pyr (Midwinter and the just released The Office of Shadow).

I think that the move from screenwriter to comics writer might be a more natural fit, simply given that the format is similar (comic scripts being very similar to storyboards) and that novel writing and comics writing are different skills, but talented people are people with talent!

Podcast: My "umpteenth appearance" on AISFP

Post Show Toy Hunt

I've been honored to be a frequent guest on Shaun Farrell's excellent Adventures in SciFi Publishing podcast. The show has really grown in it's almost-100 episodes(!) and I've loved every one. When I was recently at the San Diego Comic Con in July, I got to be on Adventures in SciFi Publishing 2.0. Shaun and I sat down with coffee, muffins, and only minimal background noise, to talk about my anthologies Masked, Swords & Dark Magic (with Jonathan Strahan), ebooks, the various big conventions, and several forthcoming Pyr titles (among them Tome of the Undergates and The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack). I'm very pleased with how this interview turned out too (even if I don't look it in that photo). You can listen to it here at the direct link, or download on iTunes.

MASKED, MALLOZZI & ME (GateWorld Interview)

Art by Trevor Hairsine

Stargate producer, writer, and tremendous guy Joe Mallozzi is interviewed by Shaun Farrell on GateWorld today. He talks specifically about his story, "Downfall," that appears in my superhero prose anthology, Masked.

"I have long harbored a desire to switch gears and try my hand at writing prose. The only thing that stopped me from, say, tackling a novel, was my time-consuming commitment to Stargate. That and the fact that writing prose is really, really, really hard. Oh sure, scriptwriting is tough as well, but it’s a different kind of tough."

Locus magazine selected "Downfall" as the best story in Masked and said "It's a nicely twisty story, involving throughout, with some worthwhile surprises." 

Masked: Suvudu Interview

"Superheroes are all about power and responsibility"

Matt Stagg's interviewed me yesterday for Suvudu, where we talked about the just-released Masked anthology of superhero fiction.

Here's a taste:

Tell me a little bit about Masked. This is superhero fiction, but most people associate superheroes with comic books. Why take them in a literary direction?

Superheroes have a long history of being portrayed in other media. I grew up on the Batman television show, the Spider-Man cartoon, the Superman films. George RR Martin’s Wildcards anthology series debuted in 1987. Superheroes in other media is nothing new. What is new is the mainstream recognition that superhero storytelling can be as sophisticated as any other genre.

Marjorie M Liu on MASKED in the Wall Street Journal's Speakeasy

New York Times bestselling author, and MASKED contributor, Marjorie M. Liu, is interviewed in the Wall Street Journal's Speakeasy blog today on all things superhero.

Here's a taste, where she talks about the genesis of her story, "Call Her Savage": “I found myself lodged between a semi and a jeep—without even the promise of inching forward—and three words popped into my head: CALL HER SAVAGE. Which, as you can guess, pretty much summed up my emotions at the time,” Liu said. “I knew then that it was the title to a story.”

SF Signal's MIND MELD: What 'Sword and Sorcery' Means to Me

Art by Benjamin Carre

The latest SF Signal Mind Meld is up, and this one asks the question, "How do you define the sub-genre of 'Swords and Sorcery'?" For answers, they turn to the contributors (and co-editors) of my recent anthology, Swords & Dark Magic: The New Sword & Sorcery. Answers come from such luminaries as Michael Morcock, Joe Abercrombie, Garth Nix (whose answer takes the form of a poem!), CJ Cherryh, Glen Cook, Bill Willingham, JK Parker, Tanith Lee, Tim Lebbon, James Enge, Scott Lynch, Jonathan Strahan, and Yours Truly.

The entire post is well worth reading, though I think I'm going to find myself quoting Moorcock's "Captain Blood meets Cthulhu" quite a bit in the coming days.

Three New Lou Interviews for You (Say That FIve Times Fast)

What are the chances of three interviews going live on the same day?

This morning, I'm the guest on the wonderful Dragon Page Cover to Cover podcast, episode #410a. They say,  "Lou talks about how the iPad has shifted his reading preferences recently, and despite his deep and continuing love for physical books themselves, he can see where his future book buying may go the way his music buying went after iTunes became more widely used.Technology is changing the publishing game, and the guys talk about easy it’s becoming to be lured away from the book to the many electronic readers out there; about whether to use enhanced content for ebooks to encourage sales, the importance of having a quality story, and much more. Lou also walks through what happens on the path from manuscript to shelf: from the acquisition process, the editing process, the cover art process, and the book design process." This is my second appearance on the Dragon Page. I'm a big fan of the show and always have fun talking with Mike & Mike. You can listen with the direct link on the page itself, download, or get via iTunes.

Meanwhile, a brand-new, online magazine launches today, Redstone Science Fiction, from editor Michael Ray. Redstone is an online magazine that publishes "primarily science fiction short stories" and pays SFWA pro rates. Their first issue features "Raising Tom Chambers" by Daniel Powell and flash fiction story "Freefall" by Peter Roberts. There are also three interviews, one with  cover artist Kittyhawk, a popular webcomic artist, one with Joel Hardy, an engineer who works with scientific research on the International Space Station, and one with Yours Truly (conducted by author David Alastair Hayden). Check it out and give them your love.

Finally, I'm interviewed on The Mad Hatter's Bookshelf and Book Review as well. We talk about steampunk, anthologies, the submission process, my own writing, and, yes, hats.