It's Friday again, my lovely peeps🐣!
I had taken this Monday off and that's the reason I much rather prefer a Monday PTO than a Friday one. You just get off a long weekend and bam! It's the weekend again! Now, if you take Friday off, sure the same three day weekend is nice, but the following week back feels extra long...
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We're back! Did you enjoy yesterday's review of Thrill Switch? I hope so, I enjoyed the book enough to start rambling about it and had to edit it to make sure it wasn't just a very long blob of feels! Now that you got to know the book a little better, it's time to continue onto the next part of the Cyberpunk-Filled April tour, which is to get to know the author behind Thrill Switch. And today's post will be exactly that! Let me introduce you all to the creator of Ada, Joon, and Switch, as well as VR world of The Holos, Tim Hawken!
A Cyberpunk-Filled April
With how much I've grown to love this genre, I decided to dedicate an entire month to cyberpunk. Having been introduced to many amazing authors, including some hidden gems in the indie community, I wanted to spend my favorite month getting to share this genre via interviews and book reviews. Initially, having only a genre-themed TBR, I ended up getting to work with Fanatical (with help and thanks to Charlotte) in featuring their Cyberpunk Stories: Build-Your-Own bundle and from there, was able to also work with a few authors to pull together some interviews.
So sit tight and grab a bucket of popcorn as I introduce a handful of lovely authors and titles!
Welcome welcome! Let's start off with an introduction! Can you please introduce yourself to everyone?
I'm Tim Hawken, an award-winning word slinger from Australia. I mostly concentrate on dark sci fi and fantasy, but occasionally branch out into other weirdness, like once playing a dead body in a Nicolas Cage movie (hello, professional corpse).
When did you start writing? What has this journey/career been like for you?
My first book, Hellbound, came out back in 2010. Since then I've been banging my fists on a keyboard professionally yet quite unprofessionally.
What/who inspires your writing? Can you share some early influences such as films, games, or literature titles/creators/authors? What drew you to this genre?
Almost too many to name, but I'll have a crack. I grew up in the golden era of 80s horror and sci fi. Clive Barker was a big early influence, but so was JRR Tolkien and John Christopher writing wise. I then studied literature at university and branched into writers like Salman Rushdie, Angela Carter and Hunter S Thompson. Since then, gritty books and films with philosophical undercurrents have really sparked my imagination. The Matrix and Fight Club are two that spring to mind immediately. The Matrix was definitely my gateway drug into cyberpunk, after which I went back and read Neuromancer, Snow Crash and Altered Carbon. I was hooked from there on in.
How do you go about creating or developing your characters? Who or what inspired them (fiction / real person / both)?
They're generally a blend of people, real and imagined to create someone unique yet lifelike. I'll normally start by sketching out their background, before digging into motivations and conflicting values. Once the guts of the story gets going they then tend to take on a life of their own.
While I don't write books, some of the most wild story ideas come to mind on a random Tuesday morning, lying awake in bed at 3 am. Can you share your writing process? Do you plan it all out and sit down to write a portion each day? Or do you come up with plots and characters as you go, only sitting down when you too get that random 3 am burst of creativity?
My best ideas come while walking, or just before I fall asleep. I have no idea why. I don't sleep walk, but that would be an absolute gold mine. Process wise, I plan everything out before I start writing but prepare to be flexible. Things always change. If I have a solid road map, those detours feel like more of an adventure.
Neon lights, skyscrapers taller than you can even imagine, technology that may not even exist yet…Visuals are so important and unlike movies or games, readers must rely on text to visualize scenes. What techniques do you use to go about and help make your book/scenes more immersive? What goes on in your mind when you're trying to "design a set" for when a character walks into a new setting?
When thinking of a new setting, I put on some music that suits that space, close my eyes and start imagining. Once it all starts to form, I'll add in specific details - a quirky neon sign, a putrid smell, or a passerby with penises for arms. That sort of thing.
Technology has evolved and so has cyberpunk. I love reading recently published cyberpunk books, modern/contemporary, and comparing them to books written between ~1980s-early 2000s. When you think of the future, what comes to mind? Do the recent developments of technology such as artificial intelligence (or even something in the household like how air fryers can make me a cookie or french fries) make their way into your books?
What's scifi without tech?! I definitely weave in emerging trends and developments into my books. Biotech is one I'm super interested in right now. Neural implants also. They'll definitely feature in the next novel I'm planning.
When it comes to writing, what are some of the hardest moments or challenges you've faced as an author? What are some of your favorite and/or most memorable moments?
Every single book, when I get to the middle I want to set the whole thing on fire and start working as a shelf stacker at my local supermarket. Every. Single. Time. But then I remember, I hate supermarkets even when I'm not working there, so it motivates me to keep going.
Do you have any tips or advice you'd like to share with aspiring authors?
Finish stuff. That's my number one tip. You learn so much more about writing and your story once you've finished. It feels like trash, but then you tease out the strands, delete things, mix them around and polish something into titanium. None of that happens unless you finish a first, shitty draft. Finish stuff.
Thanks so much for joining this interview! It's been such a pleasure! To close it off, let's throw in a fun question. You have won a ticket to a fancy restaurant for dinner and may bring two people with you. You've decided to bring one of your characters as well as someone who has influenced your writing with you to the dinner. Who are the two people you are bringing and what are you guys chatting about?
I'd definitely bring Ada Byron from Thrill Switch. The chances of inappropriate jokes during dinner would be high. She also doesn't shy away from a good argument. Hunter S Thompson would also get top billing. To cap things off, it would all happen in a VR lizard lounge. Thanks for having me and see you there!
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Thanks so much, Tim, for allowing me to interview you and for participating! Thrill Switch was a thrill to read and I had a good and solid book hangover afterward. I felt foreign out here in the real world. I might not have felt what being in the virtual world is like, whether it was unsynced like when Ada went in for the first couple of times in the book, or synced like how utterly real and attached Joon was to his avatar and virtual life, but stepping out of the world you created and finishing the book made me feel disorientated for a while!
You can all find Tim over either on IG or Twitter (both handles @Tim_Hawken). He has a website as well ad I'll drop the link to that riiiggght [HERE] and you can also locate his book in the Cyberpunk Stories bundle [HERE]. As with the previous interviews, as we wrap things up for today's post, I'll leave you all with a little spotlight for Thrill Switch. You can view details about the book either right below or you can visit my review of it by clicking [HERE] if you missed yesterday's post.
Title: Thrill Switch
Author: Tim Hawken
Genre: Fiction, Science Fiction, Cyberpunk, Crime, Police Procedural, Mystery, Thriller
Length: 264 Pages [e-book]
Published: 16 November 2022
Publisher: Seahawk Press
LINKS:
Goodreads: [LINK]
Amazon: [LINK]
Disclaimer: Thank you Fanatical, my contact, Charlotte, and the author for participating in this bundle. An e-copy of this book was provided to me as part of helping feature the entire bundle and so, by connection, I'll be extending the disclaimer to this book review as well. However, no free copy of either the bundle or the books affects my thoughts for this book and all opinions are my own.
"Like a cross between Ready Player One meets The Silence of the Lambs…"
Detective Ada Byron is pumped to be assigned her first murder case–until she sees the crime scene. Someone has been killed exactly the same way as her father was seven years earlier. But, impossibly, he died using VR and the programmer responsible is still in prison.
To see if this is a copycat or something more sinister, Ada must confront her father's killer: the enigmatic Jazlin Switch. What she discovers will change the face of both the real world and the metaverse forever…
Content advisory: contains violence, references to sexual abuse, and adult language.
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And that's it folks! Thank you so much for stopping by and keeping up with the latest releases to this tour. There's one more [bonus] interview to come, with Mark Everglade, this Monday the 22nd followed by one last book review related to the 2024 bundle (04/25 Thursday), before I end this tour with a final book review as a throwback to last year's bundle (04/29 Monday). Though the 2023 Fanatical bundle has since expired, replaced with this year's bundle (which also comes to a close in a couple weeks, in May), there's no reason to not forget some of the wonderful books and their authors! So stay tuned for a bit more cyberpunk related content and I'll see you guys on Monday!
Have a lovely weekend!
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