Ask the Author: Mark Hayes
Answered Questions (1)
Mark Hayes
Hi James
At the end of the day its down to the storys I want to tell. I don't actually write in one specific genre. While my latest novel A spider in the eye is certainly a steampunk fantasy and is the first of three in that genre, Passing Place spans multiple genres, and indeed styles, as while the main storyline is set in a bar that isn't a bar, whose doors open to different times and places, a lot of stories are told by the bars customers which individually sit in their own genres, and are told in different ways depending on the storyteller. The novella A Scar of avarice does the same thing, though to a lesser extent.
Cider Lane, which was my first novel is not in any genre at all, unless it counts as a thriller, it is in essence a 'straight forward' contemporary novel.
Fantasy or speculative fiction makes up a large portion of my bookshelves as does science fiction. But I read extensively in most genres. Stories are what interest me, stories explain the human experience, humanity has been telling itself stories since long before they invented the written word after all.
I like the fantasy genre's and like to write in them simply because they enable you to tell more interesting stories and explore them in ways that other genres just don't allow. While still allowing you to explore that strangest of creatures in all creation, humanity, and the darkness and light at its heart.
My view on fantasy is much the same as Terry Pratchett's in that regard. He once said, and I paraphrase slightly.
'I wrote a story about the struggles of a man against his inner doubts and struggles with his flaws against the desire to do what is right, rather than just what everyone expects him to do. Then I put one damn dragon in it so they told me it was fantasy'
At the end of the day, I can never resist a good dragon or an airship or two for that matter, I just don't let them get in the way of the story.
Hope that makes sence.
Mark
At the end of the day its down to the storys I want to tell. I don't actually write in one specific genre. While my latest novel A spider in the eye is certainly a steampunk fantasy and is the first of three in that genre, Passing Place spans multiple genres, and indeed styles, as while the main storyline is set in a bar that isn't a bar, whose doors open to different times and places, a lot of stories are told by the bars customers which individually sit in their own genres, and are told in different ways depending on the storyteller. The novella A Scar of avarice does the same thing, though to a lesser extent.
Cider Lane, which was my first novel is not in any genre at all, unless it counts as a thriller, it is in essence a 'straight forward' contemporary novel.
Fantasy or speculative fiction makes up a large portion of my bookshelves as does science fiction. But I read extensively in most genres. Stories are what interest me, stories explain the human experience, humanity has been telling itself stories since long before they invented the written word after all.
I like the fantasy genre's and like to write in them simply because they enable you to tell more interesting stories and explore them in ways that other genres just don't allow. While still allowing you to explore that strangest of creatures in all creation, humanity, and the darkness and light at its heart.
My view on fantasy is much the same as Terry Pratchett's in that regard. He once said, and I paraphrase slightly.
'I wrote a story about the struggles of a man against his inner doubts and struggles with his flaws against the desire to do what is right, rather than just what everyone expects him to do. Then I put one damn dragon in it so they told me it was fantasy'
At the end of the day, I can never resist a good dragon or an airship or two for that matter, I just don't let them get in the way of the story.
Hope that makes sence.
Mark
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