Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’m a physician and injured adventurer. No, I’m serious: my real life adventures have ranged from the funny and silly (like getting myself locked in a German nunnery by accident) to the beautiful (like scuba diving with sharks) to the severe and tragic (like breaking my spirit as I held the dying and watched sexual assault victims suffer without justice).
So I often write fantastical science fiction with a real life military, medical, or combat edge. When I’m not doing that, I play with trauma and pain and hope. The NEODYMIUM CHRONICLES is my five or six book series coming out from Wordfire Press, about young freedom fighters who talk to invisible beings; on the indie side I wrote BECOMING HERO, about the comic book character who shoots his author, and HEARTBEAT IN THE HALLWAYS, about a strange organic world of pulsing, living corridors above a planet destroyed by nuclear war. I’ve got lots of free stuff, both professionally and independently published, that you can get on my website, with more secret stuff you can get here if you’re outcast enough: http://byjenfinelli.com/you-want-heroes-and-fairies/
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Latest is kind of a funny word, because I’m always working on multiple things at once. But NEODYMIUM EXODUS is coming out from Wordfire Press Oct 2021, and it was inspired originally by scifi games my little brother and I would play with one of our friends. After fifteen years it’s changed to become something like a manifesto about hope, independence, diversity, and the question of suffering with free will. It’s me on paper–there’s lots of cool biological science fiction from my fascination with human and veterinary biology, lots of beautiful, impossible world-building, and lots of angst because of my experience treating and suffering mental illness. It’s kind of like if StarWars was written by a lonely military doctor with PTSD and a fascination for pretty colors.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
No, I am extremely normal. I never write naked or crying like you plebes.
What authors, or books have influenced you?
I love C.S. Lewis, and dream of meeting him in heaven to chat about storycraft and drink beer. Funny thing, one of my favorite StarWars books was actually written by the publisher who picked up my NEODYMIUM CHRONICLES, Kevin J. Anderson. There are scenes in JEDI SEARCH that stuck with me for a long time. I haven’t read a ton of Alicia McCalla’s work, but I have to say my writing style is similar to hers, if you’ve get a chance to pick up something she’s created, and you’re curious; I felt a deep kinship with what she wrote in the SUPERHERO MEGA ANTHOLOGY we did together.
The author who’s had the most direct influence on improving my writing is James Beamon, my mentor, editor for the professional publication ESCAPE POD, and former director of the SFWA. I hold that he is one of the best science fiction short story writers of our time, and I’m deeply honored to have him in my corner.
What are you working on now?
I’m doing a heavy rewrite of NEODYMIUM SACRIFICE, the third book in the NEODYMIUM CHRONICLES! I can’t really tell you what it’s about because that would spoil Book 2 and Book 1, but I can say it heavily features pheromone and neurotransmitter scifi inspired by cordyceps, moths, and other “brain control” insect phenomena!
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Nothing beats having an author newsletter and forming a real relationship with readers. Having a YouTube channel has made a big difference, too, and I wish I’d started it sooner.
Do you have any advice for new authors?
Get on critters.org and get real critique feedback. It makes all the difference. I met my mentor on there, and it changed my life.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Don’t offer to the Paragon of Truth the sacrifice of a lie–I’m paraphrasing Lewis, but basically don’t try to force your creations or your science to fit your particular worldview, but instead make the best creation you can, study science with the most honesty you can, and the divine will peek in naturally. Not just in fiction, but in your scientific work, don’t make what you think you’re supposed to make, but actually make the best thing you possibly can, and bleed and sweat and work your butt off improving it, taking all the feedback you can, and being as absolutely honest and real as you can in your journey of discovery, with a critical eye for all your sources and biases, and then discover heaven through reason.
What are you reading now?
Pendulum Heroes Book 4 by James Beamon. Pendulum Heroes is a guilty pleasure of mine; Beamon knows there are choices in there I REALLY disagree with, vehemently, but then these inventive worlds and characters make me HAVE to know what happens. It’s absolutely fascinating worldbuilding with really funny humor and fast action, and I really want Mel to be okay, after all the strange stuff that’s happened to him/her. You can check out Books 1-3 on Amazon (you can’t read book 4 yet because you don’t have access to the author mwahahaha and it’s not out yet).
What’s next for you as a writer?
Many many NEODYMIUM CHRONICLES books. I want to be Piers Anthony-level prolific, although it’s more important to me to have Tolkein-level lasting power, and I have Emily Dickinson level shut-in tendencies. So who knows. You might not even know my work until after I’m dead, and I’m okay with that. I want to last.
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
I am a tsundoku librocubilarist, but definitely my Aramaic/English Brit Chadashah, my Orthodox Jewish Bible translation, Perelandra by Lewis, and I guess BECOMING HERO because I’d kind of like to rewrite it if I had nothing else to do, and I would need to read it to do that.
Author Websites and Profiles
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