Ask the Author: Steve Andrews
Answered Questions (8)
Steve Andrews
When I was a boy and into my teens I was sometimes awoken by a loud humming or droning noise that only I could hear. My parents and sister were unable to hear it and were fed up with me waking up the house about this. My mother said I was having nightmares but this made no sense because I was fully awake. I told UFO researcher and author Jenny Randles about it and she told me she thought I might have been experiencing hummadruz. The term is made up of "hum", "drone" and "buzz." I knew Jenny because I was involved with UFO research too and had had a number of sightings. Whatever the sound was I never heard it again after at the age of 19, a friend of mine, who was sleeping in the same room as me, woke up at the same time and asked what the loud humming noise was. I felt great relief that someone else at last had heard it. It remains an unsolved mystery.
Steve Andrews
Superman and Lois Lane are the fictional couple that sprang to mind when I considered this question. I think it is because I used to buy all the Superman comics when I was a boy, as well as those about the other superheros. I had a big collection of DC Comics, and also used to follow the adventures of Aquaman, The Flash, Green Lantern and others of the Justice League of America. These fantasy characters inspired me, and I even wrote a song entitled Superhero. I still love to watch movies about superheroes, like Superman and Batman. They were very much part of my childhood and are still with me today.
Steve Andrews
I rarely get writer's block, and if I do find I am stuck for ideas in something I have begun writing about then I move on to another writing project I can get on with.
Steve Andrews
Seeing my work in print. It is like gardening and watching a flower grow and one day bloom. When I write an article or book and eventually see it published is like when I see a plant I have grown produce its flowers.
Steve Andrews
Just write! I mean what I say there. If you feel you can write about something then just do it. And send your writings off to publishers and publications but don't get put off by rejections. Remember that JK Rowling got turned down by all the publishers she first tried. Just keep writing and keep promoting your work.
Steve Andrews
I am finishing writing an autobiography entitled The Dropouts. It looks in graphic detail at my past as a hippie and the darker side of the 1960s "flower power" era of peace and love. With it also came drug addiction, insanity and early death. My book is mostly set in Cardiff, Newport and London. It includes a chapter about the legendary New Moon Club in Cardiff that was once the haunt of hippies and up-and-coming rock stars from the South Wales Music scene. Some of these musicians, such as Paul Chapman (UFO and Lone Star) and Dodo (Racing Cars) went on to find fame as part of signed acts on big labels.
Steve Andrews
Very variable but often when I am travelling I find that ideas come into my head. I often end up jotting things down on any spare bits of paper I have with me for potential future use. I don't know why being in a bus, train or plane tends to inspire my creativity but it seems to do so.
Steve Andrews
I have long been interested in herbs and noticed that in some books on herbalism I had read that ancient herbalists, such as Nicholas Culpeper, had a system for assigning astrological rulers to specific herbs according to characteristics. So herbs ruled by Mars the god of war, for example, had something aggressive about their appearance or properties. This gave me the idea for my new book Herbs of the Sun, Moon and Planets. I decided to write about this subject, explaining what characteristics the herbalists used and to give examples of herbs under the dominion of the Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn.
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