How long have you been writing?
Depends on what you mean. In my real life, with science and other non-fiction topics, almost 40 years. As a fiction writer, about 3.
Which writers inspire you?
The older writers – Kipling, Chesterton, Doyle, Service, London. Out of the modern ones, it’s mixed bag – major writers – people like Butcher, Correa, Burst, Aaronovitch, and Wright. But all of them only with certain work. Then there are a lot of newer writer: Josh Reynolds, Jagi Lamplighter, Declan Finn, Paul Piatt – I wish I could do humor as well, Gail Martin, Ben Stevens… we could be here all day. I read less than I did and I still average one or two books a week.
And then Dean Wesley Smith – less his writing although I liked the Cold Poker Gang Series than his classes. I’ve also taken classes with Jagi Wright and Margie Lawson. Different missing skills. One thing my day job taught me is you die when you stop learning.
So, what have you written?
I have shorts published in Fantastic Schools Volume 1 – Deep School Tuition, Sol – What Hides from the Sun, and Impossible Hope – moulin Rouge’s Last Secret.. I also have on Amazon and other places some shorts as singles or collections – West Texas Cozies, Texas Otherworld, A Genetic Vampire and Lovecraft Lied are up.
For Novels, I have Daemonic Mechanical Artifacts and Thawing Hearts. I’ll be putting a few more mysteries and other shorts up in the next week. Then I want to get these novels out.
There are also some non-fiction writings. You can find this all on my Amazon Author page.
What draws you to Superversive writing?
So much writing is of the grim/dark. Heroes who aren’t. People who really any decent society who treat or get rid of. You can see it in the riots these days. A love of destruction and ruin for it’s own sake. As Chesterton says in the White Horse, we know what spirit inspires this.
And it’s a lie. Especially if you are at all Christian. There are very good people out there. Heroes have flaws but those flaws don’t deny the strength. In much of my life, and I’ve been around in this 60 plus years, I’ve meant good people who inspire and act as lights in the darkness. Some have been scientists, some martial artists or monks, but others have been ex-criminals. Heck, a few are still in the life. As one of my characters says “The whole dark/grim world is a lie. It’s a mask over glory.”
I think it’s as someone said “The point of stories is not monsters exist. It’s that monsters can be defeated.” (It’s not Gaiman. I think it was a paraphrase of Chesterton but I won’t bet money on it)
What are you working on at the minute?
As we do this interview, I am 3 weeks away from finishing a challenge to do a short story a week for a year. This week’s is a story in my fantansy world of Napoleon’s Genie. Historically, there were a few points where luck stopped Napoleon. He was sick at Waterloo and Wellington said it was still a near thing. His airship changed the Battle of the Nile, the Russian Invasion, and, well, in my world, Waterloo is a bloodbath the other way. Why? Because as I traveled worldwide in my day job, I learned how much history taught in the US comes from the Brits and reflects their propaganda rather than the truth. Like Islamic rule in Spain for example.
We aren’t going into fight scenes and violence in most stories. It makes pandas cry.
Outside of the challenge, I have four things in work: a YA novel about a boy who changes into a panda in a world roughly based on the old Slavic wolf-wizard – very very roughly. Like I stole words. Another is a story of Rus Vikings in China and that’s also YA, I think. And finally a urban fantasy novel about a nice engineering student who finds myths are real and one is trying to eat him. Again based on the idea of the Slavic myths but set in my beloved Texas.
I’m leaning Russian this year. I guess it counter balances the Genies’ series. I have another romance in work too. Set near but not in Ms. Bokerah Brumley’s Yearly Texas. It may be a bit saltier than the first. When we talk of people who helped me get started, she was my guardian angel in some ways.
Do you read much and if so who are your favorite authors?
As I mentioned above, two books or so a week and every 4 or so, I try to read something old. Kipling, Heinlien, Dumas, Anderson… one of the people who wrote in a different time. That’s limited because of the technical stuff I read for work and some theology and craft stuff.
And cookbooks. I love reading cookbooks.
One thing I have noticed, and I suspect it’s financial, is that many writers I like have series that run too long. A bunch of folks I used to read, I find I stopped because the story fades and grows stale. I think it’s very hard to go over some number of books without going stale. I don’t know that number. One guy I read managed 12. Most of the time it’s about 9 or so. Sometimes its three. I’m trying not to do that.
How can readers discover more about you and you work?
My amazon page, dentonsalle, has what is on Amazon. I have a website at www.dentonsalle.com and I’m also on FB although it might be months before I go there. It’s kinda a swamp.
The Helicon Society 