Author Interview
with John Rosenman
Author of Inspector of the Cross, The Merry-Go-Round Man, Alien Dreams, and A Senseless Act of Beauty
Please tell me a little about your current work in progress.
I’ve just finished going over the galley for Dreamfarer, a novel about a future when people can choose to be put to sleep in dream boxes or Cerebral Interface Units when they reach the age of 32 so they can have wonderful, exciting dreams for the rest of their lives that are much more fulfilling than real life. Go East, Young Man, my WIP, is the sequel and like Dreamfarer, it focuses on Sam Adams. Sam has joined the movement to overthrow the dream industry and he is traveling east from San Francisco to Denver. There he will meet fellow members of the Resistance for his next mission.
Where did you get the idea for this book or series?
The word “Dreamfarer” came to mind and I was off
to the races. Since we have words like “wayfarer,” “seafarer,” and “starfarer,”
then why not “dreamfarer,” which refers to a person who travels in dreams?
Almost immediately, I began to create a world with technology that created wonderful
dreams for the rest of a person’s life. I also explored the consequences--moral,
national, international, and extraterrestrial--of such technology. What would
happen to a person who woke up and for medical reasons, could not go back to
the divine, seductive pleasure of these dreams?
Do you write in more than one genre?
Yes. Besides science fiction and speculative fiction, I write fantasy, paranormal romance, horror, humorous metafiction, and one young adult / coming-of-age novel, The Merry-Go-Round Man.
But my major emphasis is on science fiction and
speculative fiction.
Tell me
about something that you believe makes your writing unique or worthy of
attention.
Two of my major themes are the endless, mind-stretching wonders of the universe and the limitless possibilities of transformation—sexual, cosmic, and otherwise, as portrayed for example in my short story “Dark Angel”. Also, I present a different view of religion. For one thing, though I’m not a Christian, I sometimes present my heroes as Christ-like figures. Elsewhere, God is a female spirit without substance that pervades the multiverse. (See Inspector of the Cross).
Is there anything about your personal history or personality that manifests strongly in your writing?
When I was a kid, a family friend gave me a subscription to Amazing Stories and fired up my imagination. Later I was infected by EC comics, Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, and terrifying SF movies like The War of the Worlds, Them!, and The Thing. To this day, I love to write science-fiction horror short stories and novels. Alien invasion, monsters, that sort of scary stuff. Also, growing up, I loved sports. I would have loved to have been a major league baseball player or a champion boxer. Well, I couldn’t, but martial arts and boxing appear in my fiction. In The Merry-Go-Round Man, for example, Johnny is an unbeatable boxer as well as an expressionistic painter.
What else would be helpful for readers to know about you?
I have a Ph.D. in English and retired nine years ago at Norfolk State University, an HBCU. I happen to be a tennis nut and play it often. When it comes to politics, I’m a liberal. I support the Me Too movement, Black Lives Matter, and equal rights for everybody, regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation and so on.
Excluding your own work, what underrated author or book would you recommend that more people read? Why?
I think Marina Julie Neary is an outstanding writer and her novels deserve more readers. Here’s what I wrote about Saved by the Bang:
You might not think someone could write a successful comedy with the Chernobyl nuclear disaster as a major plot element, but Neary’s novel does that and more. The satirical humor is sharp, edgy, and wicked, and the depiction of characters excellent. The author pulls no punches, and I laughed repeatedly while reading it.
For my writing career, having my father dissuade me from joining the Navy at 17 or 18 and paying my way to Hiram College, a nearby institution. The academic life refined and broadened me, and I took rewarding literature and creative writing courses. Eventually I became a professor and taught creative writing courses myself, even designed one in how to write science fiction and fantasy. And of course, I wrote and published a lot of fiction, largely as a result of my education. I sometimes wonder though what life in the Navy would have been like and how my life would have been different.
A few years ago, I came close to dying. Fortunately, my problem was diagnosed in the
nick of time. I have Celiac disease and must avoid gluten at all costs. Thanks
to the proper treatment, I live a normal life and can continue to write.
What question do you wish you would get asked more often?
Why do you write? Also, does being a writer make you different from other people, and if so, in what ways?
Do you have a catch-phrase or quote that you like? What is it? And why do you choose it?
Some come to mind. “Well, that didn’t turn out too bad.” I say this humorously when anything bad happens in a TV program or sports event. Let’s say somebody tries to do a difficult leap and falls into a dumpster, breaking his leg. “Well, that didn’t turn out too bad.” I say this because it’s so outrageous and improper. Also, I often laugh and get my family to laugh, too.
Another one I use is “And that’s not altogether a bad thing.” Also humorous. If I’m watching a game involving my favorite team, anything good or bad that helps us is “not altogether a bad thing.” My family laughs, which is why I say it.
Ah, here’s another, also humorous. I used to have a mixed-breed mutt for a pet. I referred to her as “a non-quality pooch.” The phrase, however, embodied my love for Yo-Yo.
The title of my longest, most ambitious novel came from a sticker on a car bumper: A Senseless Act of Beauty. It’s so deliciously insane or improper. C’mon, think of that. How can an act of beauty be senseless? Well, I’ve heard that sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.
Sometimes, when someone relieves me from work or strenuous activity, I quote Shakespeare’s Hamlet. “For this relief much thanks.”
I sometimes quote Walt Whitman. Here’s one passage I like because it suggests that logic and reason have their limits:
Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)
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Thanks to John for participating in the interview.
John's title, Dreamfarers, reminded me of a book I read many, many years ago by Brian Daley, The Doomfarers of Coramonde - which also reminds me lawyers are professional doomsayers, but that's beside my point. The copy of The Doomfarers I read was actually my cousin's book.
I only read it once and remember very little about it. The only character I remember is Prince Springbuck. I believe there was a sequel, but I don't recall that my cousin ever lent it to me. That cousin, by the way, is the one mentioned here, on the dedication page to Clamorous Harbingers, and anniversary of his death is this month.
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