Interview with W. Michael Gear, Author of PARIAH

I’m delighted to be hosting author W. Michael Gear today, author of the thrilling Donovan series. I just posted my review of the third book in the series, Pariah, and boy are these books good! If you love science fiction that combines elements of mystery, political maneuvering, the ecological ramifications of terraforming a new planet, and flat out exciting action sequences, you’ll adore these books.

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Welcome to the blog, Mr. Gear!

Delighted to be here! Thanks for the invitation!

Pariah, the third book in your Donovan series, hits stores today. For readers who aren’t familiar with the books, how would you describe it in order to hook new readers?

First, understand that I am an anthropologist. A student of human culture and behavior. Anything I write, be it historical, prehistorical, thriller, or sf, is filtered through that lens.

Parsed down to the underlying foundation, the Donovan books are about asking fundamental questions about human nature. The series is set in in the mid twenty-second century, on a world 30 light years distant. Donovan is a treasure store, filled with incredible rare metals and minerals. The catch is that getting there and back is a terrifying gamble—losing means facing a horrible death. And Donovan itself is no picnic. Humans aren’t used to living on worlds where the local flora and fauna will eat them. In the first book, OUTPOST, the question is: What would you do? Stay on Donovan where you’ve a ninety percent chance of being eaten? Or chance spacing back to Earth where you’ve a ninety percent chance of being marooned in space for all of eternity? The lure is, if you make it, you’ll be fantastically rich.

In ABANDONED, the novel is about the choices people make when they’re on the ropes. Technology is failing, and ultimately, survival may depend on seizing someone else’s resources. What are the moral implications of survival? And, of course, we learn more about Donovan’s unique biology, and how the planet is fighting back. The book works on a lot of levels, not just storytelling, but puts the reader between the thorny horns of dilemma. What would you choose? And, who is the victim here? Donovan? Or the humans?

The Donovan series intensifies with PARIAH. Some of the characters are infected by the local biology, essentially hybrids. Not only do they fail to fit in human society, but quetzal molecules are inserting themselves into human thoughts and actions. Beyond that, a new character will mount a challenge to Port Authority’s libertarian ethic. So, who’s responsible for protecting the people? Government? Or, ultimately, the people themselves? And, finally, there’s the ecological question of humans interacting in an alien environment. Once the genie is out of the bottle, how do you ever put it back? A question modern environmentalists and conservationists should be asking themselves.

Your books take place on the planet of Donovan, where humans have been working to establish a colony for the past thirty years. I personally love stories that deal with this kind of futuristic trail blazing, traveling to new worlds to see if we can survive in places other than Earth. Why do you think readers are drawn to this type of story?

SF is always a reflection of the world in which we live. Currently, we’re on a planet with 7.3 billion people who are being fed on just-in-time food inventories. The country is divided along factional lines that are as irreconcilable as those in 1858 before the Civil War. On the international stage, it could be 1938 all over again as global tensions rise. Where could you possibly go that would be more rewarding than Donovan? Well, okay, there are large apex predators who eat people, and creatures that will slip into your foot and multiply as they devour you from the inside out, but given a choice between the world of the WALKING DEAD, and Donovan, I’ll choose Donovan any day. And it’s wide open. With opportunity around every corner.

In my review of Abandoned, I mentioned that the story had a “Wild West” flavor to it. Was that deliberate, or did it simply evolve as you were writing?

I live on the frontier on a back-country ranch in northwestern Wyoming. A couple of years back, a cougar killed my dog in the front yard. As far as we can count, there are either six or eight fences between our front door and the North Pole; we’re on the edge of the Yellowstone ecosystem you see. That’s wilderness. My family migrated to Colorado as Argonauts in the late 1850s, and I grew up on a gold mining claim. Beyond that, I’ve lived in tents while doing archaeology all over the western US. Excavated buffalo kill sites and prehistoric villages. So I guess “frontier” is in my blood.  That’s also where the Libertarian ethic creeps in at Port Authority. (Even if Kalico Aguila really can’t get a handle on it. But that’s her problem.) Ultimately, people on frontiers see the world through a different lens. I’ve noticed that it doesn’t matter if it’s a small town in Wyoming, in the middle of the Red Center of Australia, or the bush in Namibia.

Your stories have a little bit of everything: adventure, danger, romance and mystery. What made you decide to add all these elements to one story, and what sort of literary influences helped you shape it?

The Donovan books are a mixture of intellectual thriller, suspense, mystery, science, frontier, politics, romance, and drama. A huge part of the story is Talina, our heroine, fighting for her psyche as alien molecules war inside her. So, is PARIAH a psychological thriller? I suppose so. Tam Benteen is attempting a coup at PA. So, is it a political thriller? Yes. Dortmund Weisbacher is face to face with wild Donovan. So is it a nature suspense? Guess so. And ultimately, the book is about justice. Keep in mind, we’re talking about a sustainable culture on a distant world. For the novel to work, it’s got to integrate everything that makes culture and characters click. Especially on a long-term arc that will carry though as many books as I hope the series will sustain.

As to the literary influence? That comes from our Prehistory novels. While we might be writing a “quest” novel like we did in PEOPLE OF THE LAKES, or a political thriller like we did in PEOPLE OF THE MORNING STAR, we’re still recreating a culture and people. All of which are multifaceted.

Speaking of mysteries, one of the things I’m dying to learn more about is what the heck is happening out in space. In Outpost we learn that spaceships traveling between Earth and Donovan are inexplicably disappearing, but so far the mystery of why hasn’t been revealed. Can readers expect to learn more about what’s going on in Pariah?

Oh, yes. They’re going to get a big shock with the arrival of Vixen. And, of course, Freelander will play an important part in not only PARIAH  but in book 4 UNRECONCILED. The key to all of this lies in the Multiverse, where ships go when they are forced out of our universe into whichever of the infinite universes that lie perpendicular to ours. Part of the flexibility Multiverse theory gives me is the chance to play with time and space in so many ways. Lots of fodder for short stories if I could ever get the time.

Meanwhile,   I’ll be digging into Multiverse theory in greater detail with the publication of ALPHA ENIGMA in November of 2020. AE is a near-future archaeological thriller that I can’t wait to see published. What happens if you dig up an 18^th Dynasty tomb in Egypt that is full of Third Century CE Mayan artifacts?

I’m intrigued, and 2020 can’t get here fast enough:-) As well as a writer, you’ve also worked extensively in the fields of anthropology and archaeology. Did you use any of that knowledge in your Donovan trilogy?

The answer is yes. The Donovan series reeks of anthropological theory from social structure, religion, biology, evolution (as Dortmund Weisbacher is about to find out in PARIAH) and every facet of the culture. For Talina Perez, her only path to salvation is through the mythological lens of her Maya ancestry. She has to travel to Xibalba, face the Maya Lords of Death, and syncretically  reconstruct herself as a composite. The books are loaded with anthropology from the polygamous Mundo people in ABANDONED, to the mystical cannibals in the up-coming UNRECONCILED. I guess you’d say anthropology leaks from every sentence.

I just discovered the other day on Facebook that you have already written the next book in the series! (And here I thought “trilogy” meant only three books;-) Can you share more information and tell us about anything else you’re working on?

Book 4, UNRECONCILED is sitting on the publisher’s desk, and we’re already working on art. UNRECONCILED is scheduled for April of 2020, and the proposal for book 5 is already being floated in New York.

Additionally, as mentioned above, DAW will be publishing ALPHA ENIGMA in November of 2020, and I will be starting the sequel in the next couple of weeks.

STAR PATH, Book 4 in the PEOPLE OF CAHOKIA series co-authored with Kathleen O’Neal Gear will be released in hardback this June, so all those people who can’t wait to get more of Seven Skull Shield, his dog farts, and the love-lorn Fire Cat and Night Shadow Star, will get their fix. As is always the case, there’s more trouble in Cahokia. And an old enemy makes a frightful return.

I have to admit I’ve seen the proof cover for Unreconciled and I’m beyond excited to read it! Last question: Please tell us three things about yourself that aren’t widely known.

1) Despite writing four successful series for three different publishers, I have either not heard from, or been turned down flat by the last 35 literary agents I’ve contacted about representation.

2) My novel THIS SCORCHED EARTH did not even make the short list for either the Pulitzer or National Book Awards, (What’s wrong with those people?) but it was a finalist for a Spur Award this year.

3) I haven’t made it to the Society for American Archaeology meetings now for four years in a row because of these pesky deadlines! All that beer is being drunk, and I’m not there to make my contribution to the cause!

Thanks so much Mr. Gear, this was a lot of fun!

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About the author:

W. MICHAEL GEAR is a New York Times-and international-bestselling author whose works have been translated into 29 languages and have nearly 17 million copies in print worldwide. Gear—an anthropologist—is the author or co-author of more than forty novels. He lives on a buffalo ranch in Wyoming with Kathleen O-Neal Gear, two Shelties, and 40 bison. He enjoys mile-eating motorcycles, large caliber rifles, and travel.

Read my reviews here: Outpost | Abandoned | Pariah

Find the books: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Book Depository | IndieBound | Goodreads