Who are you and what have you done with the Real Christopher Ruz?
I’m Ruz, an Aussie author, teacher, and one-time stuntman. The original, more handsome Ruz is buried in the potato patch. Don’t cry for him. He died like a punk.
Harry Potter world: what house are you? And what animal would be your patronus? Harry Potter houses are an artificial mechanism used to divide students ideologically and turn them against one another so they won’t band together and overthrow their oppressive wizard and witch overlords!
Also, Ravenclaw.
Are you a Think Everything Through Before Acting person or a Great Idea Let’s Try It! Person? I always dive in without thinking. Who has time to think? Huh. Maybe I’m not a Ravenclaw at all.
What got you into writing?
The Lord of the Rings BBC radioplay adaptation. My Dad used to play it for me on long car rides, and I fell in love with those mysterious worlds and grand battles of good versus evil. Some of my first stories were LOTR fanfiction when I was about six. They weren’t real good.
Why do you write now? I’ve got too many worlds in my head! There’s something special about being able to share them with the folk around me, a feeling of sharing the greatest adventure of your life. I can’t get that feeling anywhere else. So, I put these worlds and characters and conflicts on paper, and hope everyone else enjoys them as much as me.
What’s a book you remember reading as a teenager and absolutely loving? IT. I borrowed it from the school library when I was absolutely not supposed to, and read it late at night when my parents wouldn’t catch me. It was dark and dangerous like no other book I’d read before, and it sunk its hooks in deep. I reread it every few years, and it’s still special to me.
Can you name some formative books for your own writing? Gene Wolfe’s Book of the New Sun changed the way I saw storytelling. Elements of it seep into literally everything I create.
Stephen King’s IT, of course, seeded everything I write with malevolence. Finally, Piers Anthony’s Xanth series. Looking back on Xanth now, it’s weirdly misogynist and creepy and not something I’d recommend for young teens (or anyone). But for teen-me, Xanth showed me how a world could be ridiculous and compelling at the same time. It taught me to take risks.
Creative writing in primary school, what did you write about? Can you remember any stories?
SO MANY STORIES! They were mostly inspired by the videogames I played at the time, so I wrote a lot of Wolfenstein fanfic. My mother was horrified (and fair enough, too). But I was also already dipping my toes into horror, with a lot of Goosebumps inspired stories of children my age being stalked by werewolves and bog-beasts.
What do you do/where do you go for inspiration?
Current events plus personal drama plus horrifying imagery generally takes me somewhere fun. For example, my current WIP is about a North Korea-esque hermit state, the gigantic floating corpse of a dead god, and destroying incels. I have more ideas in the bank than I can deal with right now.
Do you believe in a divine muse? I don’t. My muse is sitting down in front of Scrivener and doing the work. I believe the ideas and the energy comes when you put yourself in a professional mindset.
What does your physical writing space look like?
My office is quiet and cold. My monitor is haloed with post-it notes covered in new ideas, potential plot twists, and character sketches. My desk is a travesty of old teacups and unfiled paperwork.
Open up your skeleton closet: can you tell me about an abandoned project of yours which seemed awesome when you started but you’ll likely never return to?
This could apply to any of my first four novels. I have a particular attachment to Alpha Slip, which was a near future cyberpunk psychological thriller about a psychiatrist diving through (and being trapped in) layers of a POW’s memories in order to extract key information on military crimes. I finished the final draft two days before the trailer for Inception dropped, and I was so disheartened that I never opened the doc again.
Favourites:
Star Wars or Star Trek?
It used to be Trek. Then it became Wars. Now I’m firmly on the fence. Fingers crossed for Picard!
Hogwarts or Narnia?
They’re both nightmares of child endangerment! Can I choose Destin instead?
Ideal holiday, price and time no concern, where would you go?
Japan. A nice town somewhere in the south, where the wind is sweet and the evenings are quiet, and I could eat well and write all day and pat random cats.
Favourite song to sing at Karaoke?
Shatner’s cover of Common People.
Favourite song to sing in the shower when no one else is home?
Rammstein’s Auslander. The tiles amplify my naturally weak baritone.
The weirdest hobby you have, other than writing?
I’m an artist in my spare time, mostly focusing on life studies and portraits. I don’t know if that counts as weird, though. I also paint miniatures, even though I don’t play any tabletop games that actually use them. I just like the zen calm that comes with all those tiny details.
— My bio: Teacher, designer, and one-time stuntman (don’t ask), Christopher Ruz is a rabid fan of fantasy, science fiction, body horror and crime thrillers. Born in Hong Kong to well-travelled parents, Ruz was fortunate enough to live in South Africa and Vienna before returning to live and work in Australia. His love of dark fiction began when a worn copy of Pet Semetary caught his eye at a local flea market. He bought it with his pocket money and hid it under his bed so his parents wouldn’t see. He was eight years old, and has been a little odd ever since.
Ruz
Ruz can also do twelve chinups. Neat!
His best known works are The Ragged Blade (Parvus Press, 2019) and his ongoing horror series Rust. Meanwhile, he publishes the Olesia Anderson series of pulpy spy novellas under the pseudonym D.D. Marks. He has sold stories to Andromeda Spaceways and Apollo’s Daughters, has beaten the grueling Immerse or Die challenge twice, and was a finalist in the 2017 Aurealis Awards. When not writing, Ruz teaches art and design at a west-Melbourne high school and works at boardgame conventions across Australia.
This is the latest in my series of Guest Posts where I’ve posed some deeply serious questions to some awesome writers. My questions are in bold.
Who are you and what have you done with the Real Trace?
I work in higher ed by day and write by night! It’s like a secret identity. Maybe too secret.
Harry Potter world: what house are you? And what animal would be your patronus?
I’m solidly GryffinClaw, and I’m pretty sure my patronus would be a tiny but fierce owl.
Are you a Thing Everything Through Before Acting person or a Great Idea Let’s Try It! Person?
Absolutely a leap-before-you-look person.
What got you into writing?
I can’t remember not writing, except for one distinct kindergarten memory of being angry about alphabet flash cards.
Why do you write now?
I write now because I believe I have stories inside me that only I can tell, and the act of creating those stories is exhilarating. And I feel like something essential about me is silent and sad if I go without writing for an extended length of time.
What’s the earliest story you can remember reading and loving?
I remember sitting in the back of my fifth grade classroom (the lonely, nerdy kid who switched schools midyear), and picking up a collection of Arthurian stories. Those stories completely enthralled me.
What’s a book you remember reading as a teenager and absolutely loving?
One sweaty Florida summer, I discovered Frank Herbert’s Dune and devoured the first three books. Something about the hot desert planet resonated with my sensibilities and my situation.
What are you reading right now?
Right now, I’m reading Naomi Novik’s Spinning Silver. Novik has such a command of prose and marvelous worldbuilding. I was hooked on the first page, and I adore her compelling heroines.
Are you a stop reading at the end of the chapter, mid chapter, or just whenever reader?
I prefer to end with a chapter, but sometimes I wake up midchapter with the book on my face when reading in bed!
Can you name some formative books for your own writing?
It’s impossible for me to overstate the influence that Le Guin’s work has had on me. Her thoughtful prose style. There’s a starkness, and a lush quality and a tenderness the stories exhibit. I’m drawn to work by writers who have similar sensibilities, like Maureen McHugh, Molly Gloss and Sofia Samatar.
How do you organise your personal library?
My books are organized by some mysterious brain pattern, I think. They’re not alphabetical but intentionally thematic, and I somehow know where everything is. I have a bookcase for each: favorite fiction/nonfiction books by women writers, books about writing plus current research for a stories I’m working on, books for more spiritual pursuits, stuff I should probably read eventually and works I’ve liked by dudes plus graphic novels and anthologies.
Creative writing in primary school, can you remember any stories you wrote?
My first story memory is of the Robotech fan fiction I passed around to classmates in elementary school.
What do you do/where do you go for inspiration?
I get a lot of inspiration from prompts or other activities that encourage randomness and combination, like scrambling words on book spines. I also like looking at visual art.
Is there anything you’ve seen passed around as writing advice that you really disagree with?
I think “writers write every day” is a tough standard and not right for everyone. Many writers have more than enough anxiety about creating and can do without advice like that.
I also dislike when writers talk about getting drunk as a metaphor for writing or a literal strategy, and when they talk about writing as though they hate it.
Let’s write clear-eyed and heady, joyfully and thoughtfully, even ecstatically, but not like we’re forcing or punishing ourselves.
What does your physical writing space look like?
My desk faces a wall where I’ve posted inspirational images and quotes plus a giant outline of my WIP. My bookcase of research and writing advice is next to the desk, and the desk itself is covered with notebooks, post-its and pens.
Open up your skeleton closet: can you tell me about an abandoned project of yours which seemed awesome when you started but you’ll likely never return to?
I started a magical adventure story set in a rabbit warren, and I’m not sure if I’ll ever come back to that one.
Any advice for anyone looking to start writing?
Find your community. Let go of your shame/ego about sharing your words. Don’t read Writers Digest, read Locus. Don’t pay publications to look at your work.
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Trace is a science fiction writer, a graduate of the Clarion West Writers Workshop class of 2010, and a contributor to The Future Fire . Trace served as an editorial assistant for Lightspeed Magazine’s special issue, Queers Destroy Fantasy.
photo by Amanda Petersen
She’s also a learning specialist for the University of California, LGBT mentor for the UCI Counseling Center and a former professor of developmental writing & Women’s Studies.
Trace is a big fan of teaching and learning as tools of empowerment. She might be obsessed with owls, drumming, utopias and dystopias and stories about time travel.
This is the first in a series of Guest Posts where I’ve posed some deeply serious questions to some awesome writers. My questions are in bold.
Who are you and what have you done with the Real TJ? I had to laugh, because I have actually gotten rid of the real TJ… or at least tucked her away out of sight. I used to work in national politics, so I crafted a pen name to keep my fiction separate from my work. (You never want your coffee shop AUs to besmirch your candidate’s good name. Granted, this was back when appropriate behavior in politics was an actual concern. ahem)
Over time, my political work waned and writing became my day job, so TJ eclipsed my original identity. Even my family has started calling me TJ. Even though… and this is a secret… there is no “J” in my real name. Every once in a while, someone from my old life finds me and is like, “You do what now?!”
If you had to describe yourself in terms of a soft drink, which would you be and why?
I am a Pepsi 1893. No one knows I exist, but when they discover me, they’re delightfully surprised by my nuanced complexity and smoky sweetness.
Harry Potter world: what house are you? And what animal would be your patronus?
I am so Ravenclaw that even non-Harry Potter fans have rolled their eyes at me and said, “Ugh, you’re so Ravenclaw.” My favorite phrase is, “Let me google that.” I’m currently taking five different classes and learning seven languages. I’m utterly ridiculous, but I will get that A+ if it kills me. I think, in 2019, I’m working on developing my gentler Hufflepuff side a little bit. My patronus would be a hedgehog. Prickly at first, but cuddly and friendly if you know how to approach the right way.
Are you a Thing Everything Through Before Acting person or a Great Idea Let’s Try It! Person?
Oh, I’m totally a think everything through before taking action person. I can never stop my brain from going a thousand miles an hour in a dozen different directions.
My only hope is to corral that energy into productive and not destructive channels. I’m also working on saying “yes” to more things. I tried it last year, and ended up in some wonderful situations that I would have declined in the past. Everyone ask me to coffee–I will show up!
What got you into writing?
I started writing when I was about ten. I read Five Go Off in a Caravan by Enid Blyton and was completely in love with the descriptions of four kids camping together alone. They would just randomly approach farmhouses and buy slabs of meat and baskets of eggs. The farmer’s wife made them cakes. It was darling. I immediately wrote Famous Five fanfiction, though back in the eighties, we didn’t call it fanfiction. I think we just called it plagarism. Anyway, I haven’t stopped writing since.
Why do you write now?
Ideas just keep showing up and I’m compelled to write them down. Whether I’m reading a nonfiction book, watching mindless televison, or grocery shopping, I keep discovering stories that tug on the edges of my consciousness. I love writing about people and the complex relationships they have. I also love writing about bizarre occurrances. In science fiction and horror, I get to do both.
What’s the earliest story you can remember reading and loving? Socks for Supper! It’s a children’s book about an old man and his wife who have only turnips to eat. The wife begins knitting socks and trading them to a neighbor for milk and cheese. She runs out of yarn and begins unraveling her husband’s sweater to get them more cheese. Eventually, she makes a new sweater for the neighbor. It’s too big for him, but he gives her the cheese anyway and hands her back the sweater, which perfectly fits her now-chilly husband. It’s so cute and warm-hearted that I bought it for my own kids to read. And as a big fan of cheese, this book spoke to me on a visceral level.
What’s a book you remember reading as a teenager and absolutely loving? I inexplicably fell in love with Jane Eyre as a teenager when it was assigned in class. I wanted nothing more than to marry a wealthy man with a mentally ill wife hidden in his attic. Now that I’m an adult, there’s just a heater in my attic and if anyone knows how to change an HVAC filter, please DM me.
What are you reading right now? I just finished Today Will Be Different, by Maria Semple. I’m taking a class with Maria and not only is she an excellent teacher, her writing is fantastic. Something about that book just resonated with me–despite the fact that the protagonist is intentionally unlikeable. I just sailed through the story and even teared up at the end, which is unusual for me.
What’s a book that you have on your shelf that you think might surprise people? I just finished the A-Z Guide to Black Oppression by Elexus Jionde. The cover is both shocking and beatiful–a nude black woman lying in a pool of blood and covered with hundred dollar bills. The book goes through aspects of racism and systemic oppression with both historical notes and anecdotal illustrations. It’s a rough and important read. Pay black women for their labor and buy this book.
Are you a stop reading at the end of the chapter, mid chapter, or just whenever reader? I have a goal of reading 25% of my current book each night. Now it doesn’t always happen, but when I reach that mark, I stop unless the chapter is really intriguing. If I finish a book in less than four sittings, I know it hooked me.
What book would you like everyone to read?
The Sun and Her Flowers by Rupi Kaur was a surprising read for me. I’m not usually into poetry (sorry, poet friends!) but this book just grabbed me. Her poems are visceral and affecting. As a collection, they tell a story about womanhood that many of us understand.
Can you name some formative books for your own writing? I read a lot of Stephen King as a teenager and I think that’s where my love of clean, stark prose comes from. The elegance of his stories is in the images he evokes, not the elaborateness of the word choices. I also loved Asimov and Hubbard as a kid. Oh and Piers Anthony. In some ways, what I write is in direct conversation with what those guys were doing. I see their flaws and low points and aim to riff off their work in a way that doesn’t have the same pitfalls. I can’t wait until thirty years from now when some kid is saying the same thing about me.
How do you organise your personal library? (alphabetical, dewey decimal, what’s your system?)
I moved cross-country a few years ago, so I had to get rid of most of my books. (I know, but movers charge by the pound!) I mostly read on my Kindle, but I buy physical copies of friends’ books so I can have them signed. I put them on my shelves in the order in which I buy them. Looking back through the spines, it’s a timeline of the signings I’ve been to and the friendships I’ve made.
Creative writing in primary school, what did you write about? Can you remember any stories?
I was such a secondary-world fantasy writer back then! Which is funny, because I don’t go near that genre now. I think because I associate it with my own childish writing. I still have some of those manuscripts tucked away around here. I had whole series’ written. I was quite prolific as a kid, but rarely showed anyone.
What do you do/where do you go for inspiration? Inspiration filters through everything I do as I go about my day. I’ll hear a phrase that sticks in my head or see a name that would make an intriguing city name. I have a huge file in which I capture these ideas. Some get made into stories and others wait for the future. I will say that having my file was incredibly helpful when I attended the six-week Clarion West writing workshop. About week five, when inspiration had deserted me and exhaustion had set in, I was able to open my ideas file and find a couple of things to cobble together into a story.
Is there anything you’ve seen passed around as writing advice that you really disagree with?
I’m at odds with the hardline “write every day” crowd. I tend to write on weekdays, because this is my full time job, but I’m at my best when I’m binge-writing. The longer I write for, the more I get into a state of flow and the work is better. Thirty minutes a day wouldn’t have the same effect. I aim to write 3-4 days a week for at least six hours at a time. You really have to experiment and find the process that helps you produce your best work.
Do you believe in a divine muse, and if so, what’s yours like? I do belive the muse arrives, but only after you’ve put in the work. I tend to be hit with divine inspiration around two hours into a hard writing slog. Some tidbit zings me, the clouds open, and the words pour out as fast as I can get them down. But I have to be doing the work first in order to get that lightning bolt.
What does your physical writing space look like?
I’m lucky enough to have my own office at home. One wall is covered with a huge 10′ x 10′ felt pinboard where I put up story ideas, enamel pins, and memorabilia like convention badges. I have a window that looks out on a very active hummingbird feeder and the entire neighborhood. But that means when a car pulls in, I have to duck so no one sees me. I do not answer my door during work hours.
When I need a change of scenery, I head to a building in Seattle that has a hidden- but-public lobby with tables, private offices, a café, and couches. I grab breakfast, work at a table or office for a while, people-watch out the windows, then settle into the couches to read. It’s like having a free co-working space. No, I’m not telling you where it is.
Are you more a ‘write drunk, edit sober’ Ernest Hemingway, or a ‘shut the door, eliminate all distractions and write for a set amount of hours’ Stephen King?
I definitely take more of the Stephen King approach. I sit down at a set time and pound out words until quitting time. Sometimes it’s like pulling teeth, sometimes it sails along. This is akin to the Ditch Diggers philosophy of writing (if you haven’t listened to that podcast, you should). Writing is a job like digging ditches. Ditch diggers don’t wait around for inspiration. They do the work.
Open up your skeleton closet: can you tell me about an abandoned project of yours which seemed awesome when you started but you’ll likely never return to?
I wrote an allegorical story meant to talk about the state of US politics and how it affects the most vulnerable people in society. It wasn’t until I got feedback from a few sensitivity readers that I realized some of the scenes evoked the pain of marginalized people to further the story. I debated whether this was my story to tell and decided to trunk it.
Any advice for anyone looking to start writing?
You only get better by practicing, so just start writing. It’ll be terrible at first, but you’ll eventually understand how to arrange words in the way that sounds right to you. Get in the chair!
Star Wars or Star Trek? Star Trek!
Hogwarts or Narnia? Hogwarts. The Turkish Delight is a lie.
Ideal holiday, price and time no concern, where would you go? I’d live on a ship for a year. There’s a cruise liner called The World which never stops sailing. You just get on and off wherever you want. It’s my dream to live there.
If you could plan perfect meals for a day, what would each be, and would you snack?
Okay, if perfect means how I shoud be eating, here’s what I would do: Meal planning is a task I enjoy. It’s the Ravenclaw in me. We have a diabetic in our household, so we tend to avoid sugar, starches, and grains. Most days, I eat an avocado, bell peppers and vegetable dip for breakfast. I’m not hungry for lunch, so I tend to grab nuts or pepperoni as a snack. Dinner is usually some kind of protein with roasted veggies and a salad. If the question refers to how I would like to eat, it would be hot, fresh Jersey Shore pizza sices as big as your head and cupcakes all day.
Imagine you won one of those ‘grab a cart and spend five mins in a store’ competitions. Which store would you want to win it for, and what goods would you be shoving in the cart first?
There is a local jewelry maker who has a shop called Angelwear Creations and I absolutely love all of her items. In five minutes, I could have one of everything.
Planet necklaces, beehive earrings, spiral galaxy jewelry… I’m flushed just thinking about it.
Imagine you’ve had your best ever year, what photos would you have from that year? Lots of travel with family, photos of us having fun in new places. Trying new foods, meeting old and new friends. And castles.
Desert island castaway time: you get three albums, three books and a luxury item, what do you choose?
For albums I’ll pick the Pacific Rim Soundtrack, Def Leppard’s Hysteria, Levi Patel’s Affinity. Books I’ll take Jane Eyre, Madame Bovary, and Great Expectations. For a luxury item I’ll take tweezers because nothing will be more annoying than getting a splinter on a desert island without tweezers.
What’s your favourite quote? It’s just one of those random insiprational memes, but it speaks to me: “Sometimes the fear won’t go away, so you’ll just have to do it afraid.”
Pokemon: if you were a trainer, what pokemon would be in your team? (you get 6)
Iron Man, Magneto, Frozone, Deadpool, Storm, and The Ancient One
Weirdest hobby you have, other than writing?
I take random glassblowing classes all the time. I don’t even want the glass thing you get at the end, I just want to play with the honey-like melted glass. I really want to touch it. But I won’t. Probably.
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TJ Berry grew up between Repulse Bay, Hong Kong and the Jersey shore. She has been a political blogger, bakery owner, and spent a disastrous two weeks working in a razor blade factory. She now writes science fiction from Seattle with considerably fewer on-the-job injuries.
Jamie Sands - Author 