Can you give us a brief overview of your latest book?
Is it part of a series?
EVER THE HERO is the first
in a series, featuring Kit Baldwin, a young woman who’s just trying to make
ends meet in a world where he divide between haves and have notes is not
demarcated in wealth and privilege, but power - super power. As her city
struggles to meet its dues for a corporation of superhero guardians, she finds
herself in possession of a powerful object that could be the answer to her
struggles, and the city’s as well.
Have you ever had a minor character evolve into a
major one? Did that change the direction of the novel at all?
Definitely. A character in
the novel, Abi, came out of nowhere and transformed from a bit role into an
integral part of the book and eventually, the series. I don’t outline and
mostly write from intuition, so a big part of the process for me is discovery.
I love when I discover a character on the page, as the reader does.
Did you try the traditional route to publishing, i.e.
querying agents/publishers?
Absolutely. It’s been about three years from when I first started properly writing the book (though the initial idea dates back to 2011) to publishing it. In that time, I queried the book extensively, getting several requests for fulls. The book never seemed to be able to get over the hump, though a lot of the feedback was helpful in pushing the book toward where it needed to be. Once I got there, I considered continuing to try and find an agent, but by that point one book had become three, and I was inspired to make my own luck by friends who self-publish and do it well.
Absolutely. It’s been about three years from when I first started properly writing the book (though the initial idea dates back to 2011) to publishing it. In that time, I queried the book extensively, getting several requests for fulls. The book never seemed to be able to get over the hump, though a lot of the feedback was helpful in pushing the book toward where it needed to be. Once I got there, I considered continuing to try and find an agent, but by that point one book had become three, and I was inspired to make my own luck by friends who self-publish and do it well.
What factors influenced your decision to self-publish
your book(s)?
More than anything, I wanted
to make my own way. Many of my heroes in art are men and women who have made
their own luck. In just about every other medium, music, film, comics, art, you
very often have to start out by producing your own work. You pay no penalty for
it, in terms of how the work is perceived – self-financed indie films often lead
directly to Hollywood gigs, the same as demo records or YouTube videos do. Only
in literature do you pay a price for publishing your own work, and I paid
enough early in my career for going the traditional route. I sold my first
novel in 2008 and the publisher sat on it for years. I lost time, confidence
and nearly my career and that steered me toward a want for control.
If you used a graphic designer/publisher’s designer,
how involved were you during the creative process for your cover?
Alia Hess (www.cultofsasha.com) painted the cover,
and it’s amazing. I had some pretty solid ideas on what it could be, but it was
a dialogue over a few months about how it would shape up and ultimately it was their vision and talent that brought it to life. I simply wouldn’t have had the
courage or confidence to do this without Alia.
Do you belong to a critique group? Have they helped
improve your writing?
I would be nowhere without
my critique group. Probably the most fortunate thing I’ve done maybe ever was
luck into my group when I did. I was very disconnected from other writers at
the time and I had these books I didn’t know what to do with. More than
partners, I’ve made very good friends, and it changed my life.
What is your writing process? Do you listen to music
or do you like silence?
I write very fast, but
things take a long time to gestate with me. Ideas percolate for years. I used
to listen to a lot of music, but now not as much. I can write anywhere though,
loud, quiet, bus, train, airplane, doesn’t matter.
Besides writing, do you have any other passions?
I love travelling, biking,
photography, usually some combination of all three. I’ve lived in Ireland, and
I’m lucky to say I know someone just about everywhere.
Some fun facts about you, which do you prefer – dogs
or cats? Chocolate or vanilla? Coffee or Tea? Talk or Text? Day or Night?
Dogs and cats, chocolate,
tea, talk, night.
What’s next for you?
The series will continue in
2020, first with a novella, BLOODBACK, which will be out in May, and then the
next novel, THE JUDGMENT OF VALENE, a bit later in 2020. I’ve just finished a
new space opera novel separate from this series that I’m very excited about,
and I’m debating what I plan to write next.
Buy Links:
Author Bio:
Darby Harn is the author of
the forthcoming novel EVER THE HERO. His fiction appears in Strange Horizons, Interzone and other
venues. He graduated from the University of Iowa and studied in the Irish
Writing Program at Trinity College, in Dublin.
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