This month I’m going to try to reply to dozens of questions at once.  The form of these questions is essentially as follows:  I really liked [name of book].  Won’t you please write more about [main character of book or more in the world of that book] ?

To date, I’ve published 61 novels,with four more scheduled over the next two years. Of those books, over the years, I’ve received at least one letter or email or blog comment asking that I write another book about the main character, or that “world,” in all but five of those books.   Given that I’ve written more than one book about a number of characters, as well as I can figure it out, that amounts to almost 30 theoretically “doable” books.  Although I do write fairly quickly, even if I can keep up writing more than two books a year, it would take me almost fifteen years just to answer all those requests… and that would be without writing about any truly new characters or worlds.  Does that I mean I won’t write any more Recluce books, for example?  Obviously not, since I’m doing that right now.  But it does mean that I won’t be able to write all the books that everyone has requested because I don’t intend to give up writing books in new settings or, occasionally, books with new characters in familiar settings.  It’s not that I don’t appreciate your interest and your love of particular characters;  it’s just a matter of my physical limitations.

How can we save the bookstores that are going out of business? I’ve been trying to frequent bookstores so they can stay in business, and I refuse to buy electronic gadgets that have books on them because I love to hold a book in my hands.

I understand the feel of holding a book, and I also like to look at them, but, frankly, I don’t know of any other way to keep bookstores in business except by patronizing them and encouraging friends and family to do so. The problem we face with bookstore closures is that each store location that closes makes patronizing bookstores harder because, for more and more people, getting to a bookstore gets more and more difficult and using an online bookstore becomes easier than searching out and traveling to a more distant bookstore — if there even is one in any convenient location.  I know.  The closest full-service new bookstore is over fifty miles from me, and the next closest after that one store is over 170 miles away.  So… for more and more people, the only feasible options are either e-books or on-line bookstores that mail books to them… and this makes it harder and harder for existing bookstores.

I wish I had a better answer, but I can’t think of one.

You don’t seem to be traveling or making as many appearances these days.  Why not?

The simple answer is money.  Because of the closures of so many bookstores [which limits the locations for signings] and the precarious state of the publishing industry, publishers are sending fewer authors on tour, and those tours –except for the very biggest bestsellers — tend to be shorter.  My publisher is no exception.  In addition, I’ve been invited to fewer conventions this year, and unless a convention is “local,” i.e., less than 280 miles away, or unless it’s World Fantasy Convention in the U.S., I generally don’t go unless someone else pays for it because the investment in travel, room, and food, not to mention time, gets very expensive very quickly.

Why do almost all of your characters in the Recluce books have red hair?

It only seems that way, but because of the comments over the years I decided to actually count. While it is true that I have more redheads in my books than do many other authors, those insist that all my characters are redheads are somewhat overestimating the numbers and the percentages.  According to my count, of the protagonists and their significant others in the Recluce books,  nine (9) are brown-haired;  six (6) red-haired (6);  three (3) blond; three (3) silver; and two (2) are black-haired.  That means redheads comprise 26% of the total, but brown-haired characters are 40%.

When will the next Imager Portfolio book be released?

Antiagon Fire has a  scheduled release date of May 28, 2013.

Some of the Recluce books are out of print.  Will the publisher reprint them?

Will the Recluce books ever be available in audiobook format?

I’ve been asked this question more than a few times, but I wanted to update people on the situation. Although my current audiobook publisher, Tantor Media, is committed to releasing The Imager Portfolio in audiobook format, to date, Tantor has not shown any interest in publishing the Recluce books in audio format. Nor has any other audiobook publisher… and I don’t have the equipment, the time, or the talent [or speaking voice] to do a decent job on my own.

Which of your “Ghost Books” do you regard your best?  I was fascinated with The Empress of Eternity and enjoyed The Eternity Artifact. I am not much into the ghosts and occult, but would like to try whichever book you regard as the best of this series.

I can’t pick out one book of these three as the “best,” because the “ghost” books are essentially what was once called a novel in two volumes and a sequel. The three books are not what I’d call occult in any sense of the word. They’re an alternate history with a thriller/detective plot in which ghosts are real electromagnetic occurrences, the results of which change the history of the our world. I’d recommend beginning with the first book, Of Tangible Ghosts, but if you want a slightly better overall “deal,” you might want to pick up Ghosts of Columbia, which contains the first two novels, plus the “historical” afterword that I wrote to explain some of the ways in which the existence of ghosts has changed history.

Why do you blog so much about politics?  Don’t you worry about angering readers with different views from yours?

I have to say that it’s pretty clear that happens.  It’s hard to say how many people feel that strongly, but some obviously do.  At the same time, what I find amazing is that I’m anything but an extremist.  I don’t like either excessive government taxation and spending or the use of government to push religious views, but I do see the need for a government role in regulating the excesses of personal and business behavior — but not everything under the sun. I’m trying to point out the strengths and weaknesses of both sides, and some pertinent facts, but none of us like it [and I don’t either] when someone brings up something that calls our deeply held beliefs into question. But isn’t that one of the things writers should do?

What I also find interesting is that people who enjoyed my books all of a sudden say that they can’t now that they “know” my views.  The books didn’t  change.

Why don’t you or your publisher set up an email list to notify people when a new book of yours comes out? I have missed the release on a few and happen to run across them months later.

Will you write more Imager Portfolio books about Rhennthyl”

I can understand the wishes of a number of readers who have posed this question, but it’s highly unlikely that I will do so.  That’s because the challenges that face Rhenn in the years after the events in Imager’s Intrigue will be of the subtle, tedious, and wearying kind that will drive men — and readers — to tear out their hair, without that much in the way of true excitement.  Any book that provided gripping excitement and increasing tension that could be relieved by heroic action would be false to Rhenn and the world in which he lives, and any book true to him and the world wouldn’t be that much fun or hold that much interest for most readers… and I’m not interested in writing either of those books.

Are you thinking about creating another totally new fantasy series?

I’m not to that point yet.  I’m still working on finishing the last Imager Portfolio book about Quaeryt [not necessarily the last Imager book, just the last one about him], and I’m committed to another Recluce book after that.  When that’s done… well, we’ll see.

Have you ever considered setting a novel — or a trilogy — in one of your fantasy worlds in a more technologically advanced time period, when the technology either approaches present-day levels… or even higher levels, with computers, nanotechnology and/or space travel?

I have to admit that I haven’t considered writing a fantasy in a high-tech setting, although I can see that such a setting would have serious adverse repercussions or limitations on every magic system I’ve thus far created. Imaging in space would be almost impossible, for example, as would handling order and chaos or attempting to find any lifeforce on which to draw.  Still… it’s an interesting idea, but I’m not about to promise anything… at least not yet.

Could you give a run- down on the approximate equivalents for your time references in the Imager series?

The week is seven days, based on the French equivalents:  Lundi, Mardi, Meredi, Jeudi, Vendrei, Samedi, Solayi.  A “glass” is roughly equivalent to 100 minutes of our time, and a quint is a fifth of a glass.  There are five two-month seasons [Winter, Spring, Summer, Harvest, and Fall].  The ten months are Ianus, Fevier, Maris, Avryl, Mayas, Juyn, Agostas, Erntyn, Feuillyt, and Finitas.  Each month is thirty-five days long.

Can anything be done to fix SyFy (formerly the Sci-Fi Channel)?  Anything good gets cancelled, and only “reality” shows stay on the air.

I have my doubts.  The problem is that, in general,  reality-style shows cost less to produce than what I’d call more solid shows. These days, everything in the entertainment field is based on attracting the widest possible audience with the lowest possible cost — unless the network/channel has a huge guaranteed audience for a specific show or the show is the very occasional blockbuster designed to drag in a wider audience to justify sky-high advertising rates (directly or indirectly). Even in niche markets, the suits want the widest chunk of the niche with the lowest cost.  This pretty much guarantees lots of low-cost, lower quality program with an occasional “show-stopper.”  Until these economics fail, I don’t see anything changing, at least not in the near future.

Will you ever start another fantasy series with another different magic system?

That all depends on too many factors to consider.  Right now, I’m committed for almost a year in advance, in finishing the last book about Quaeryt in The Imager Portfolio and then to another Recluce book.  After that… I just haven’t thought that far ahead.  I wouldn’t be opposed to it, but I’d have to develop a very different magical concept… and that’s far from easy.

Why are your blogs often so depressing?

I think the paradoxical answer to that is because I’m an optimist.  I really think that if I discuss difficult issues and problems people will consider them, and I hope that such discussions and thoughts will help lead to solutions.  One thing that I do know is that you can’t solve a problem that you refuse to acknowledge even exists… or one that you accept as a “fact of life,” rather than as a problem.

What is your opinion of fanfiction? Do you see it as theft of intellectual property or copyright infringement or is it simply a flattering way of saying “I really love your work”

Technically speaking, fanfiction is an infringement of copyright, and if someone gets paid for that, without the permission of the author, that’s definitely a violation of copyright.  At the same time, I don’t have a problem with fanfiction that’s restricted to a comparatively limited number of fans and not used in any commercial fashion. Fanfiction in that sense is a gesture of appreciation, but I would hope that it might be the first step for many of those fan writers toward creating their own worlds and characters, because we can always use more good writers.

In reading the “Ghost” novels several times, I’ve wondered if Vanderbraak Centre is near Colchester, Connecticut, in our universe.  If not, where would it be located?

Actually, the location of Vanderbraak Centre in our world is that of Plymouth, New Hampshire, the site of Plymouth State University, where I taught for several years in the early 1990s.  I obviously changed the arrangement of the town to a certain degree, but not that of the river or the bridge, or where the main streets are located, simply because in towns such as Plymouth/Vanderbraak Centre there’s usually a geographic and practical reason for their placement.  The university in the “Ghost” books is also located in the same place as Plymouth State is in our world.

When will The Green Progression be reprinted?

At this point, I have doubts whether it will ever be reprinted, given that it was, charitably stated, far less than a commercial success despite favorable reviews — and, for what it’s worth, was my father’s favorite of all the books I had written.

Now that Scholar will be released in the next week, can you tell us when the  next Imager Portfolio book will be available?

Princeps is currently scheduled for a May 2012 release date, but I don’t know yet whether that will be early or late in the month.

How many editors have you had?

That’s a question to which the almost any short answer would be misleading.  In the strictest sense, I have no idea how many editors I’ve had, for several reasons.  First, I have no way to determine how many editors looked at my early stories that were published by various magazines, only that they had to number more than four.  Second, while all but one of my novels have been edited by David Hartwell,virtually all of them were also edited by whoever his assistant editor was at the time.  The only book for which David was not the head editor was edited by John Douglas, who had been David’s assistant editor at Timescape and who bought my second novel for Avon at a time when David was between editing positions. Since David has been my editor for over thirty years I can’t even remember, let alone count all of the editors who have worked with him and me… except I can say that the vast majority turned out to be good editors in their own right [while I may not recall all the faces or names, any writer recalls a bad editor or copy-editor, and I don’t recall any bad editors, but I still recall the one terrible copy-editor].