AMANDA DYAR: Danie, thank you for taking the time to chat with us. First off, tell us a little about yourself and what paths led you to writing.
DANIE WARE: I’ve always been a reader – from falling in love with Greek and Viking mythology when I was a cub, to discovering SF/F fiction as a teen. I think writing one’s own is a natural progression, it happens so organically that it’s hard to tell when the one becomes the other. Throughout my twenties, I wrote reams and reams of fantasy - stories and novels and all things outlandish and wondrous. I stopped writing for a while in my thirties but came back to it again a few years ago – and had missed it a great deal!
AMANDA: What inspired you to write Ecko Rising and what did you learn in the process of writing your first novel?
DANIE: Ecko Rising came from the creative community that we shared in our twenties. We were re-enactors, traveling all round the UK to bash each other with a variety of interesting steel weaponry, and we shared all sorts of massive visionary projects – pretentious and creative and occasionally explosive. Ecko is very much a product of those times, though his surroundings have distilled with age and experience. Well, a little bit anyway.
AMANDA: Ecko seems like an unlikely hero. Tell us a little about his character and what Ecko Rising is about.
DANIE: In Ecko Rising, I’ve done the unthinkable and thrown fantasy and science fiction together. Ecko himself is futuristic anti-hero – rebel, assassin, cynic – he’s all sarcasm and bad language (consider yourself warned!) Love him or hate him, he’s a character that provokes a strong reaction, and that’s exactly as it should be. Put him in an essentially fantasy setting, tell him he has to ‘save the world’… and then see what happens next!
AMANDA: Do you enjoy fantasy/sci-fi writing more than other genres? And why?
DANIE: I enjoy the scope of its imagination and vision. I do read other genres, as I’ll mentioned below, but it seems that SF/F encompasses so much potential and so many sub-genres, and is even now branching out in scope and capability to do worlds of exciting things.
AMANDA: How did your work at Forbidden Planet influence your work on Ecko Rising?
DANIE: Working at FP has immersed me in the world of genre publishing in the UK – ten years of running signings and events at the stores has meant that I’ve known many of our authors from debut novel all the way to the top of their profession – and the UK genre publishing community is very close and supportive. It’s also, in equal parts, both intimidating and inspiring – knowing what these talented people are really capable of and trying to live up to those standards!
AMANDA: Who or what influenced your style of writing?
DANIE: That’s always a hard one to answer because the influences are so many. In my teens, Stephen Donaldson’s Covenant series, and Julian May’s Saga of the Exiles. In my twenties I read more SF – Gibson and Stephenson. In my thirties, I stopped reading genre almost completely and picked up Palanhiuk and Bret Easton Ellis. In my forties, I’ve come full circle and I’m back to reading SF/F – and discovering how much it’s changed in the intervening time!
AMANDA: What advice do you have for other writers who are trying to get their first book published?
DANIE: Never give up. It can be frustrating, demoralizing, defeating and exasperating – and every writer has been there, knows all of those things like personal friends. Don’t let them get to you. Hold to your dream, and don’t let go!
AMANDA: When can we expect to get our hands on Ecko II? And what other projects do you have in the works?
DANIE: The second Ecko book, Ecko Burning, will be out towards the end of this year and I’m now halfway through the third of the trilogy. He’s got a way to go yet!
