Mary Schlegel grew up in the American Midwest, spending as much time outdoors as indoors, acting out imaginary adventures with her dog and horse, fancying herself a Medieval princess, and devouring literary fiction. She is now a full-time mom, homemaker, author, and artist. She writes fantasy and science fiction that are heavily inspired by her love of nature, science, and history, and her style is influenced by the literary fiction she loves to this day.
Mary is an unashamed tea fanatic, and was formerly a professional tea taster and brewer. She also has an unusual superpower for finding four-leafed clovers everywhere she goes, including foreign countries. She considers free-climbing a two-hundred-foot cliff on the coast of Northern Ireland, and working on a dinosaur excavation in Colorado to be among her more remarkable accomplishments. She, her husband, and their children live in a quiet village in the south of Ireland, where she enjoys working in their orchard and hunting for sea glass on the beach.
We talk about Mary's project for her Princess & the Pea retelling. We go down a rabbit trail about tea right off the bat. But we get back on track and have a lengthy discussion about skinwalkers and how they figure into her current project.
We also discuss losing her husband, Aaron Schlegel, in 2022, and everything that happened in its aftermath. Aaron was also an author, and we discuss the various aspects of dealing with another author's body of work after their death.
Mary spills the tea about her remarriage and the lengths her church went to put her and her second husband together, and moving to Ireland earlier this year.
Be sure to check Mary out on Substack!
Substack.com/@MarySchlegelAuthor
The Victorian City by Judith Flanders
Today, we talk to Becky Dean, author of debut YA Romance novel Love and Other Great Expectations. Not our normal fare, but Becky is completely awesome and also about to release a series of Space Opera books in 2023!
Becky Dean is a fan of adventures both real and fictional. When she’s not writing or traveling, she can be found drinking tea, watching science fiction shows or Jane Austen adaptations, or quoting The Lord of the Rings. Though she’s a proud Baylor grad and lives in Texas with her husband, she remains a Southern California girl at heart.
https://beckydeanwrites.com
https://www.instagram.com/beckydeanwrites/
(Please note there was some technical issues with our recording for Becky's feed. Producer was unable to fix in post.)
-- Watch live at https://www.twitch.tv/ldk_podcast
We're BACK! And we've got Travis W. Inman with us, discussing his newest book, Chrome World.
Travis W. Inman grew up in the ranch country of West Texas and worked as a cowboy for his first 20 years. Travis graduated from seminary in Dallas, Texas, and later served a year in the mission field in Mexico and South America. Upon his return home, he married Sarah, his wife of more than 25 years. They have two children whom they successfully home schooled.
Over the years, Travis has applied his skills to a variety of fields, ranging from marketing and real estate to criminal justice and law enforcement. Travis served in the United States Army where he overcame a devastating hip injury and was able to walk again despite the odds.
Writing is a life-long passion for Travis. His short stories and poems have been selected for publication in a variety of newspapers and on Internet sites. Travis’ writing includes children’s literature, action adventure, short stories, one act plays, love stories, westerns, sci-fi, thrillers, and drama.
Travis and Sarah Inman currently reside in Northern Virginia.
Visit Travis online:
https://www.traviswinman.com/
On this episode, we have Paul Smith, friend of previous guests, CW Briar and Jon Brhel. He's author of Jason and the Draconauts!
Paul Smith lives in upstate New York with his wife and two sons, where he works with emotionally disturbed and mentally ill children. He earned a master’s degree in social sciences from Binghamton University in 1999. A lifelong love of science fiction, fantasy, and superhero stories influences Paul’s writing. His most recent work was a popular weekly online series that generated over 20,000 views. Jason and the Draconauts is his first novel.
In Episode 70:
- The pitfalls of pantsing
- The guys give Liberty a hard time for ditching her outline
- Liberty keeps bringing up Scrivener...
- Bluetooth keyboards!
- Why reading out loud is an important editing tool.
- Paul's techniques for battling writer's block and why he hates frustration.
- Paul's thoughts on conventions and selling books on them.
- Whether FB ads are worth the paper they're printed on...
- Including fandom quotes in our books!
- What do your books teach you in the course of the writing?
- Get words on paper
Links!
- Paul D Smith (on Goodreads)
- Jason and the Draconauts
- The Council of Ancients
- Ready Player One (audiobook link)
- Brandon Sanderson
- Redshirts by John Scalzi (on audiobook!)
- Scrivener (again!)
- The Hobbit
- The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
- Dan Brown's The DaVinci Code
- Angels & Demons
As always, you can find complete show notes at LasersDragonsAndKeyboards.com.
Supernatural gifts, demons, and martial arts - oh my!
In our two segments with Amy Brock McNew, Aaron manages to break Amy before we barely even get started. Which is totally epic.
Amy, for those of you not in the know, is the author of REBIRTH, which debuts May 24th. She is an interesting character (and one you may be hearing more from in the near future!)
In Episode 22:
- Why Amy wrote REBIRTH, which sounds a lot like many other authors' reasons for writing their books.
- The cathartic background of REBIRTH for Amy.
- Amy teases the sequel, RECONCILIATION, in her description of her favorite character in the book. (There's popcorn involved!) And it makes all of us want to read Rebirth.
- Crazy looks from the neighbors (this story is totally worth the entire interview)
- Some of the freaky things that Amy ran across in the course of research, and how off so much of it was.
You don't know us yet, but we hope you'll like what you hear. Aaron DeMott, Joshua Hardt, and Liberty Speidel are the masterminds behind the brand new Lasers, Dragons, and Keyboards Podcast. We'll be talking to up-and-coming and established speculative, science fiction, and fantasy authors every couple of weeks. We're taking a unique approach to our podcast. Each interview is typically broken into two parts: a reader-centric part, where we talk to an author about their books. The second part of the interview, we'll be talking to them about their process, and writing in general.
So whether you're a reader or a writer, we think you'll get something out of our podcast.
If you're into science fiction & fantasy, there's a strong possibility that we're into the same fandoms you are. We're nerds just like you.
Where you can find us:
Lasers, Dragons, & KeyboardsAaron DeMott
Liberty SpeidelJoshua Hardt