Terry R. Hill
Houston, Texas
Good morning, Terry and welcome to Vision and Verse, the Place for Art and Authors. Thank you for being with us today, Terry. Your books sound exciting. And the fact that they are written by an NASA engineer gives them so much more credibility than those written by, oh, say a first grade teacher from Ohio. Promise me you will not read my books. Come back and see us when Book Three comes out. Now, can you tell us what you have written?
Third Exodus, and New Dawn (both of
the sci-fi series “In the Days of Humans”)
What is your favorite genre to write?
Science fiction
Favorite food.
Too hard to say. But I would have to
say real Italian or Greek would have to be my favorites.
Tea or coffee?
Coffee
Pizza or ice cream?
Pizza
Wine or beer?
Wine!
Where would you like to visit?
New Zealand
Favorite musical artist.
Impossible to say.
Do you listen to music when you write? What?
Yes, but it is entirely dependent on
the scenes that I’m writing. It could be anything from classical to thrasher.
What makes Terry Hill laugh?
While I enjoy intellectual
humor, being half British and raised around that culture, I enjoy a good go at
dry humor. Of course since I’m male, I still enjoy the joke repertoire from
Junior High.
Favorite work of art or sculpture.
I would have to say
the great pyramids of Egypt. Largely they were for show and thus I consider
them works of art. And they are my favorite, not because they are beautiful,
but because they have inspired countless amounts of wonder, amazement and are
the embodiment of early mathematics and herculean human feats (to mix cultural
metaphors).
How old were you when you started writing?
Odds and
ends when I was 19. First novel, 42.
Describe your perfect evening.
Sorry, that involves
rather intimate details involving my wife.
Such a romantic you are! Where do you get your inspiration?
Largely from
science news articles and random thoughts that manifest themselves during my
commute to and from work.
What do you do when you get a writer's block?
I scan
my list of scene writing prompts of my WIP and move to the next one that I’m
inspired to tackle. There’s always at least one that I can work on.
Who is your favorite author?
I don’t know it is
possible to pick just one. It is like asking which is my favorite flower, or
which bird song do I like the most. Some of my favorites are Clark, Heinlein,
Joel Rosenberg, Anne Rand, Octavia Butler, to name a few.
Best book you ever read.
See previous dilemma. My own?
Can I say that?
Last book you read.
Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies by Nick Bostrom
What would you do for a living if you weren’t a
writer?
That’s easy, a NASA Engineer. That’s how I spend my work days.
One of my original goals was to provide science
fiction to the masses that was firmly grounded in real physics, real space flight
operations, real experiences of being in space and using the hardware, etc.
Having worked in the industry for almost two decades, it seemed like a natural
union of both aspects of my life.
It sounds odd to say that one would want to maintain
realism in their fiction, but that is exactly what I desire. We have learned a
lot about living and working in space since the greats – even Asimov – started
writing. Some things they got right, some they didn’t. So now I want to offer
up stories and themes that are re-anchored and extrapolated from today’s
reality of space travel and science.
Who is the one person who has influenced your personal
life the most and why?
This I would say is a truly impossible question for me
to answer as there have been so many amazing people in my life. To say my
mother was the most influential person would do a gross disservice to my
father, and visa versa. To saw it were the people in my community growing up,
would be unfair to the people whom I’ve grown to know and love along the way
after leaving home.
If the aeronautical engineering business ever flatlines, buddy, I think you have a career in diplomacy. If you could sit down and have a conversation with ONE
person, living or dead, real or fictional, who would it be and why?
Joseph of
Nazareth (father to Jesus). Not because I am a religious man, but because you
don’t hear much from Joseph. Being a step father is a tough job, a real unsung
task that many do poorly. And given all the stir Jesus has made through out
history, I would love to have the chance to sit and talk to Joseph and get the
real skinny about those events so long ago.
What advice would you give someone who aspired to be a
writer?
Do it because it adds awesomeness to your life, not because feeding
your family depends upon you making money from your writing.
"In the Days of Humans:
Third Exodus" and second volume of the series “New Dawn” seem to be pure hard
sci-fi. Do you think it is, and if so in what ways is it like or unlike other
works in the genre?
Yes, in all classical senses Third Exodus and New Dawn are pure science fiction. However—yes, there’s always a
‘however’—I would also venture to saw that it crosses over multiple genre lines
just by the nature of the story and multiple plot-lines. Living through the
drama and political posturing, the terrorism and the violence that facilitated
the end of the world in chapter one and then living through the world that was
left after the apocalypse, some might consider it an action-thriller / horror.
And this is to say nothing about the psychology associated with experiencing
life-changing events and the decisions we have to make during those very trying
moments, and just being human.
A sizable piece of Third Exodus takes place on Earth and
includes covert ops, political corruption, murder, action, and personal emotional,
gut-wrenching decisions to be made—not everyone gets to escape the end of the
world the second time. This portion of the book would really fall within the
political / action-packed fiction arena where you would expect similar plots as
what you might find in a Clancy novel.
In addition to the realistic
world of space flight, I wanted—and to some degree had to—introduce more
fantastical technology to keep the plot moving along and to facilitate the epic
nature of the novel story line. Certain sections of the book might be familiar
in approach to what we saw in the first Star Trek movie where they spent a
significant portion of the movie trying to figure out what V-ger was. But I also want to give readers something
more to chew on other than just a nice action-packed sci-fi novel. I didn’t
want to have the philosophical threads be so weighty that the average reader
couldn’t slog through and enjoy just the story, but I did want to throw some
ideas out there that would sit in the back of the reader’s mind and percolate
questions. I’ve saved the intense philosophical questions for New Dawn! J
New Dawn is dark, intense,
uncomfortable, messy, horrifying, and in your face about a lot of things that
are “normal” to being human that we tend to not want to address or confront.
And lastly, there is the
human element, the human condition, that I feel is critical to examine and
place into the text. Life is about our experiences and our relationships, and
thus I spend a lot of effort in the book to develop those aspects and the
eventual outcomes. People grow, learn, make friends, make enemies, fall in
love, have sex, and die – not necessarily always in this order unless you’re a
black widow spider.
Do you consider your book to
be a post-apocalyptic future story? Is it dark, or mostly hopeful?
Yes. To all of it. I like to
describe the In the Days of Humans
series as a post-apocalyptic future with hope. Plagued with apocalyptic dreams
my entire life as a product of growing up during the cold war, participating in
‘duck and cover’ drills in school and living next to an Army ammunition depot
during my childhood, I have lived through the end of the world a thousand
times. And let me tell you, every single way you do it is horrifying.
But those are futures that
come about in worlds where people lose all hope. Normal life is hard enough and
can be very, very overwhelming and depressing if you let it, so I always give
the promise to the reader that if they will stick with me on the journey
through the novel that I will deliver them to a better day. That hope of a
better tomorrow is what keeps us as a species driving through the hard times so
that we or at least our children will have a better tomorrow. So I carry
forward that promise into my novels such that people can have a path through
the woods and back into the sunshine if ever they were to find themselves in
the worlds within my novels.
For those
who might be interested in my writing or style thereof, I offer up the
following two snippets from “In the Days of Humans: Third Exodus”
One
tick of the clock passed. The President exhaled. How had their well-meaning
efforts led them here? The hope and fate of the world likely was held on the
point of his decision. It wasn’t supposed to work out this way. “Unless there
are any better ideas...?” He paused but was not met by any reply, “Alright, go
make it happen!”
The
crowd quickly began to disperse. The phone rang. Everyone stopped in place as
if rehearsed and slowly turned to face the President as he answered.
“Hello?”
The muffled sounds of an excited voice came from the other end of the line.
Sinking into his chair, the President’s face paled and turned graven as he
ended the call. Oh God…
“Sir?”
The
President spoke quietly and with great effort. “We no longer have control of
our nuclear arsenal. There are reports of at least fifteen domestic launch
signatures. The preliminary trajectories will take them to D.C. and fourteen of
the largest cities in the US. The same is being reported by all of the other
countries with nuclear strike capability.”
The
lights flickered and went out. The room erupted with action as all bodies
mobilized in an effort to come up with evacuation plans for all the major
cities, including their own.
A
rather frantic staffer approached the President. “Sir, we need to get you onto
Air Force One, now! We have sent for the First Lady to meet you at the plane.”
He
sat motionless, stunned. What had they done? “Sir, we have to leave NOW!!”
….
The
last person was on board and the doors to Air Force One were still closing as
the aircraft picked up speed down the runway. The atmosphere in the plane was
organized chaos, but with movements of purpose. Silence dominated the cabin
when the President turned to the General of Special Ops and asked, “What is the
latest?”
“Sir,
we have taken down about forty five percent of the Internet hardware and have
units en route to directly take down as much of the rest as they can. Sir, I
have to remind you that the original Internet was designed by the military to
survive and negotiate hardware taken out by a nuclear attack. It has evolved
over the last sixty or so years. I honestly don’t think we can take it
completely down. We have reports of a thirty percent success rate at taking out
the satellites. Our anti-missile system was not designed to fire away from the
Earth and take out communication satellites in geostationary orbit. We lost
control of that system five minutes ago. We just can’t keep ahead of Blue’s
decryption capabilities.”
The
President leaned forward in his seat and cradled his head in his trembling
hands and then slowly looked back up at the general. “That leaves us with only
one option. Contact any country still in control of their conventional or
nuclear weapons and ask them to strike all places on Earth where Blue has
assets. This is our only hope to have a future, any future. Send the list of
worldwide targets, and may God forgive me.”
From
the quiet of space where sound has no reign, the blue planet slowly rotated.
Silently the continents crept into view, the resplendent cerulean oceans and
forested landmasses were replaced by the glow of inflamed crimson and oranges
and the shadows of darkness. The cloud cover was occasionally punctuated with
flashes that parted the sky like the hands of God himself making room for the
growing, glowing, rolling columns that served as ferryman to transport the
souls of billions from the Earth to their respective, assumed destinations. As
the Earth’s surface rotated into the blackness of perpetual night, the places
where cities once illuminated the darkness now only briefly glowed with the
transient life of fire that quickly extinguished itself, leaving a world as it
had been before humankind walked upright across its face.
Or …
Evah
was early and stood alone in the desert on this unusually cloudy morning for
this wasteland, at the agreed upon coordinates. A clear path was worn in the
hard earth as she paced while waiting. She hoped that they would arrive soon.
Evah checked her watch for the thousandth time, and then heard what sounded
like three mighty drum beats off in the distance. That must be the sonic booms
of the Yamakarā, she thought to herself. They would be here any minute!
Scanning
the sky in the direction of the last signal of its approach she finally saw what
she was searching for. As large as a mountain and with the magnificent wings of
a mighty, ancient black dragon, the Yamakarā
punched through the cloudbank and glided silently to a stop on top of a choking
blanket of rushing air, dust, and sand. She caught herself jumping with joy and
clapping her hands like a schoolgirl as the vehicle rolled to a stop. Heat
radiating from the ship made it seem alive, overheated, and weary from its long
journey. This was not the spacecraft that left Earth four years ago; it was
something completely different. Something beautiful, but not of her world.
She
quickly moved to place the portable stairs where the external hatch should be
and secured everything in preparation for the egress of the crew. Almost
convinced it was taking too long and there must be something wrong, she sighed
with relief as the hatch opened inwardly and one of the young engineers stuck
his head out, waved, and shouted a greeting. To her surprise, as the crew
departed the ship her eyes welled with tears of joy. Her long departed crew had
finally returned home, if only for a short while.
Network
links:
·
Website: http://terryrhill.net
·
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/t.r.hill.author
·
Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7348871.Terry_R_Hill
Sale
links:
• CreateSpace.com:
Third Exodus:
https://www.createspace.com/4446863
New Dawn:
https://www.createspace.com/5109304
• Amazon
(Kindle):
Third Exodus: http://www.amazon.com/In-Days-Humans-Third-Exodus-ebook/dp/B00FLW1T0W
New
Dawn: http://www.amazon.com/New-Dawn-Days-Humans-Book-ebook/dp/B00PQO8HVO
• Barnes
& Nobles (Nook): Third Exodus: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/in-the-days-of-humans-terry-r-hill/1117116233
• Kobo
Books: Third Exodus:
http://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/in-the-days-of-humans-third-exodus
• Also
available on Apple iBooks – just search for “In the Days of Humans”
