I've written, to date, five fantasy novels (including the Rat Runner Series), nearly a dozen Oddly Lit Novella's (goosebump-esque) and a series on strange fiction (mad science). Yet hardly a handful on post apocalyptic even though it's my most sort after read?
This is actually a testament to how much dedication I put into my writing, I think. I can write a fantasy novel and not have to google the crap out of everything to make it work, because the science I go by is mysterious and only adheres to a few basic concepts of reality.
I don't need to know how Carminasote acts as a barrier to protect angelic wings from environmental factors to make it work, I don't need to know the elemental make-up of a deflammation spell to know it'll freeze a flame on contact. All I need to make sure is that it works for my story and propels the reader onward in an adventure.
you don't get those liberties with sci-fi.
If you're writing a world surviving nuclear fallout then you need to know how radiation works. not just 'it gives yah cancer' but the why's, the when's, the how's even! When I pick up a science fiction story, I want more than just the fiction and this is why I so rarely get through a sci-fi novel without thinking 'well that doesn't sound plausible' before throwing it aside without passing chapter five.
Sci-fi doesn't have to be sci-fact! Everything you write can be absolutely B.S, but the point is to root everything in reality but make what grows from it fictional. A seed that sprouts an elephant, as it were, and a great sci-fi writer will have you believing a seed can bloody well sprout an elephant.
I've dedicated years to understanding the basic concepts of everything I write in my Post Apocalyptic novels Toxic City, and to make it come across as common sense to the characters and the readers. Don't get me wrong, I may have missed the mark in some places, but the important part of any journey is knowing where to start and if you are a sci-fi writer and you start with the fiction and not the science, then you're not being true to the genre.
I'm stubborn on this part because I've spent my whole life trying to find sci-fi books that hit this mark and so far no modern writers that I've found have. They're still good stories, but they don't make me run to google to find out if what they write is true or even remotely plausible.
Evidence of this goes back to all those star-ship/space programs that were once fiction to the audiences at the time, but are now reality for us. Mobile phones, Tablet Devices, Ray guns, space travel, on and on and on have all been predicted by old sci-fi writers and screenplays because they hunkered down to learn the facts first and follow with the fiction.
I have a passion about learning and writing a sci-fi novel should be as much a learning experience for the writer as it is for the reader. It's helped me grow and helped me story grow. I hope this eventually shows through my series on Toxic City, a seven year work in progress that has been my pride and joy of my writing collection. Time will tell.
Thanks for reading and please share your thoughts!
