Please introduce yourself:
Hello
everyone. My name is Chris Galford and I’m a bit of a bibliophile. In essence,
I surround myself with stories and never look back. I also may in fact be that
kid from the playground who got just a wee bit too creative with his
imagination. Dragons forever.
I
am the author of The
Haunted Shadows
series, a trilogy of fantasy books which includes The Hollow March and At Faith’s End, and will soon be wrapping up
with As Feathers Fall (to be
published March 20, 2015). My work has also been featured in Mystic Signals
Magazine, the Frogpond Journal, and soon, in A Bleak New World—an anthology
published by Raven International Publishing—to name a few.
How long have you been publishing?
My
first book was published in December, 2011 so…we’re going on four years now.
It’s been quite a ride.
Tell us about your latest book.
The
conclusion. The grand finale. The wrap-up.
Call
it what you will, As Feathers Fall is
the last in a trilogy (one that began with The Hollow March and continued
in At Faith’s End) and, hopefully, wraps up a lot
of loose ends for fans of the series—but hopefully has enough epic appeal to
snatch up some new readers along the way as well.
It
centers on the nation of Idasia, an empire settled into what should be a time
of renaissance…only to have lost itself to the horrors of revolution and war.
It is the crossroads where gunpowder and magic meet, as revenge grapples with
duty in the shadows, and family wars with the all-too-human precepts of self-interest.
Or,
more concretely:
“As fall the feathers of their
signet bird, so too fall the great and mighty of Idasia. One after another,
members of the Imperial family have been slain, through convictions forged in
steel and vengeance fueled by dark sorceries.
The Cullick family stands in the
ascendant, poised to snatch a crown long denied them, but they are beset on all
sides by the chaos they themselves have sown. Winter saw the horrors of war,
spring the sparks of rebellion, but as friend and foe alike surrender to
unspeakable crimes, summer may yet bring the soul of a nation to boil.
And if Rurik Matair and his broken
band of sellswords can cling to life a little longer, salvation may not be the
prize, but they might find a way to balance the scales of their mad quest and
put to rest the loss and bitter memories which have consumed all that they have
known…”
Who are your major influences?
It’s
a fine mix of modern and older favorites. When it comes to The Haunted Shadows
series, specifically, I would have to name the proponents of your grittier,
more realistic fantasies. That is to say, people like George R.R. Martin and R.
Scott Bakker. Wonderful writers, both of them. Characters that are absolutely
human—in all the wonders and flaws that entails—and worlds that breathe with
new possibility, as well as history. It’s the same reason I would cite Robin
Hobb as a continuing influence, honestly. Hobb is a master of character. I
could lose myself for days, weeks getting into the hearts and minds of the
people she produces, to the extent I truly feel it when they misjudge a
situation, make a poor choice, assail their own morality…it gives me tingles.
More
generally? I would throw in a touch of Camus for philosophic flavor, mixed with
a panache of Guy Gavriel Kay for personality.
Is writing your full time career?
In
a sense. Not creatively, unfortunately—though I would love to be able to say it
was! I also work as a freelance journalist, with side time spent as a contract
editor. I’m constantly on the run from one project to another. When you’ve
found your passion, though, you do what you can to engage it.
Do you feel that your material is
different than traditionally published authors?
In
short? No.
To
elaborate: We both have editors. We both have cover artists. We both have, as
Hemingway would put it, sat down at the typewriter and bled. The only
difference between us is, at the end of the day, one of us managed to wrangle a
company onto our side, and the other didn’t.
Who does the covers to your books?
Matthew
Watts. UK artist. Fabulous at his craft and quick, too. As soon as I finished
pitching my books to him, I swear he had a dozen or so ideas for pictures
already prepped to go. I could not recommend him enough.
What is your favorite part of being
self-published?
Options.
Freedom. Absolute control. Everything rises and falls on your own merits. Unfortunately,
that’s also the worst part, because your exposure is based on a one man or
woman operation, unless you have made some rather vocal acquaintances over the
years. You have to face long hours promoting that you would probably rather
spend writing, you stand a good chance of being ignored (and not necessarily
because people WANT to ignore you—have you SEEN the number of self-published
books out there today?), and we still live in an age where traditional and
self-pub tend to have a clash, so there’s some stigma there. It’s a rough road,
but also one that leads to nights where you can truly relax, knowing that you
have done good, hard work, and the credit is all yours.
Do you have Facebook/Twitter? How
effective are they as promotional tools?
I’m
honestly a little guarded in answering that. They are effective, to be sure,
but more so in connecting with the readers you already have than in necessarily
lassoing new ones. Twitter is where I’m most social, it’s quicker, easier, more
to the point. Facebook I tend to use for general announcements…steer people
back to the website. Hash tags, SEO, all these details have their
possibilities, and they can be effective tools in the right hands, but mostly,
they are funnels into larger things.
What is the most important piece of
advice you could give to someone just starting out in self-publishing?
Publishing
demands a hearty constitution. Be prepared to fight to be seen, to fight your
own dark thoughts, and to get knocked down more than once. The market is
inundated with work, slush piles are eternally on the rise, and standards have
not eased, no matter what you might have heard. Getting published is hard work.
You have to believe in your work, review and revise again, drive yourself and
your characters mad, and make sure it is, beyond all doubt, the best that you
can do before you put it forward.
It’s
not good enough to be the best you can be. You have to actively fight to get
others to see what your best looks like. Doubt is the death knell.
What does your family think of your
writing career?
They
probably wish I had just gone to law school! No, really, they’ve mentioned that
more than a few times.
In
all honesty, though, they have been immensely supportive. My brother is a
writer in his off hours, too, so that helps, but my parents have always pushed
the creative side of me and helped me to embrace those myriad thoughts dancing
through my traumatically imaginative brain. I’m sure at times they wished they
could turn it off, but they’ve never put a doubt in my mind. I dedicated The Hollow March to them,
actually, and At Faith’s End to my brother.
Do you also review other writers?
Of
course. I may be an author, but I’m still a consumer, and an avid one at that.
I have no problem removing my writer’s cap for a few hours a day to devour
someone else’s work and, when I’m done, I’m sure to have an opinion, just like
anyone else.
What changes would you like to see in
the self-publishing industry?
People
need to become more dedicated to the craft. It’s harsh, but it’s true. The
biggest differences people cite between us and the “big boys” tend to be one of
two things: quality of the tale and quality of the editing. I understand people
not wanting to shell out big dollars for editors, but the fact is: if a book is
illegible, it’s not professional, and if it’s not professional you’re doing
your potential readers a disservice. If you think you’re good enough to
publish, you should be taking the time to make sure your work is honed to its
best possible presentation. The self-publishing industry has gotten a bad rap
for this, and it’s something we need to start turning around.
Could any of your books be made into
films?
If
they could find a way to break the Hobbit into three separate films, I think
someone dedicated enough could find a way to make one of mine into something
for the screen.
What actors would play your characters?
I
have this vision of Mads Mikkelsen, Natalie Dormer and Idris Elba wandering
through the cast. It’s a beautiful vision. I want to go there.
Do you blog? Why?
It
was something I got into during college, originally to accentuate my
journalistic curriculum. I used to do reviews of movies, games, that sort of
thing, but over time, I realized more and more that what I wanted was to
showcase my own work, get my own thoughts out there—and not just my thoughts
about other people’s work.
It
has grown into my most regular outlet. Essays, poetry (oh, so much poetry) and
those scribbles not destined for a publisher’s doorstep or printed pages often
wind up there, as well as announcements regarding the scribbles that ARE meant
for other things. It’s a billboard, a water cooler, a journal and a magazine,
all rolled into one.
Do you have any certain ideas or ideals
that you try to instill in your work?
Family,
vengeance and the venomous intricacy of politics…with a fantastic bent. My
works frequently utilize the fantastic or unlikely to draw greater focus onto
the human aspects of existence. At its heart, The Haunted Shadows is a tale of
people struggling to find themselves at a time and place that seems determined
to tear traditional structures down. Evolution also plays a big part—evolution
of people, of societies, of thought.
Don’t
get me wrong: there’s action and plotting and a little coming of age…but when
it comes to ideas, one can’t rightly go into my books expecting tales of blind
chivalry, for example.
Why do you write?
My
sense of self would cease if I didn’t; not to mention, I’m pretty sure these
bottled imaginations of mine would run me into the ground. Ideas are legion for
me. If I don’t put them to paper, I sometimes feel like they would consume me.
Does self-publishing carry a stigma?
Absolutely.
I hate to say it, but it’s true. Go even onto a reader-intensive,
literary-friendly site like Goodreads and you can lose yourself in the
countless debates for hours. The industry has really been torn on
self-publishing—it’s a genie that can’t go back into the bottle, in one sense,
no matter how much some might want it to, but the genie also hasn’t found a good
way of playing along with its new neighbors.
Self-publishing:
either you love it or you hate it. That seems to be the case. Many are those
that still swear they won’t touch a self-published book, though, often for
reasons I spoke of earlier. We still need to find a way to merge the
traditional and the self-published into an effective partnership, so the
industry as a whole can move forward.
What
have you learned from reading other people’s work?
Writing
has no set path. Its endings and especially its journeys are myriad. Ignore
those that try to force you into a box; the greatest works speak for
themselves.
What would the consequences be of
the demise of the traditional bookstore?
A devastated interviewee, for one
thing. Libraries and indie bookstores have devoured a lot of hours in my
life…and those are hours I wouldn’t trade. There is nothing, nothing like
walking into a building lined with books, breathing in the pages, holding that
beautiful print in your hands.
Is it cheaper to head online? Of course.
Nor am I some Luddite that has somehow missed that phenomenon, but the simple
fact is: there is nothing quite like those old staples of learning, and I would
be sad to see them go.
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