2009 Dayton Book Signing Q&A youtube video
Part 2Dictation by
bookwormsamJim: But if somebody wanted to do something like that, then they could, but otherwise if they wanted to do a more general story like that, then I have to wait until I get the rights back before I do anything. I don't know if anybody has been approaching Lionsgate about doing other stuff with it because I'm not sure they know I exist. <audience laughs> I mean those guys did not even send me a comp [complimentary] copy of the DVD. <audience laughs> I know, right! It is just not at all reasonable. But that's how it worked out. So, we'll have to see. I'd like something like that to happen. I would actually love to see an anime series that just did the stories in anime. That would be really cool but I don't know if it'll ever work out or not. I guess we just have to see. Over here on the right here.
Audience: I'm just curious, why is it on the cover art Harry is always wearing a hat, but in the books he never is?
Jim: Why on the cover art is Harry always wearing a hat? Because the art department decided that it should be so <audience laughs> I mean, like I said man, I'm just the writer. I think they figured that the fedora plus the wizard staff was kind of the perfect visual representation of private eye wizard, which is what the books are about. Although my personal favorite description that I've heard is Dirty Harry Potter. <audience laughs>
Audience: Is that why he's got a .44 Magnum?
Jim: Actually, yeah, he upgraded to a .44 Magnum after I heard Dirty Harry Potter. I just got to give him the "Do you feel lucky, punk?" speech but he'd probably get punched in the nose before he got to the end of it. I can't let him look too cool. That just wouldn't be Harry. Right here, please.
Audience: I didn't see Amoracchius or any of the swords in the book, so why is he holding the sword on the cover of the book?
Jim: Why is he holding a sword on the cover of the book? For the same reason he's wearing a hat. <audience laughs> Dude, I just write the story. The only time the covers have been close to whats been in the book is like when the editor would call and say, "Hey, we need to do the cover for Cursor's Fury and we were kind of hoping to do something with a water fury," and I'm like "Okay, have Tavi in Legionaire armor holding a broken burned standard at the bank of a river with two big lions made out of water coming up out of the river towards him." They were like "Ooh that's fantastic, that's great, thank you, Jim." And the editor hung up. I was literally sitting at the word processor working on chapter three and I said to myself, "How in the world am I going to get this character standing next to a river?" <audience laughs> That's the only way it'll work. So far that I know of to actually get a cover that matches the book. Right here, please.
Audience: I've got a hundred questions, about 90% of them would involve Turn Coat spoilers and I wish to leave here alive tonight. However, we have some involvement in Dresdenverse, if I can use that term without getting hit, of the Norse gods and I was thinking about McAnally and I was thinking about gods and god types and I thought about the Greek gods. Could McAnally possibly be a son of Dionysus?
Jim: What do you think I'm just going to tell you stuff like that? <audience laughs> I got a mortgage to pay. McAnally is not a Greek god nor a scion of the gods, I'll tell you that much. But we probably won't see much about McAnally until the big trilogy at the end. But yeah, the Norse gods and so on are involved and they'll get to do some more stuff and I'm planning on having a lot of fun with that, but we haven't quite got there yet. In the black shirt.
Audience: So I know the conclusion to Codex Alera is coming up soon. Are you planning another traditional fantasy series after that maybe?
Jim: The conclusion of Codex Alera is coming up so am I planning another traditional fantasy series to go with that was the question if you didn't hear it. The next project I do is either going to be a fantasy project that I'm going to write with my friend Cam Banks. Cam is also a writer. He's written a book called The Sellsword, that was part of the Dragonlance universe, that came out pretty recently, which was way cooler than it had any right to be all things considered, especially for his first novel. I hate people who write really well on their first novel. They disgust me. <audience laughs> Somebody like Cam, like John Scalzi, like Pat Rothfuss. I hate those guys. I might be doing something with Cam, in which case we'd probably do one or two books together. I'm not sure if that'll work out next or if I'll be doing my actual science fiction, science fiction book next, which is the next thing I want to take a stab at. Eventually, I'm going to be writing my epic, epic, epic fantasty epic. And it will be epic. <audience laughs> But I'm not good enough to write it yet. I'm still building up to be able to handle a story that big. But I do want to try a big old doorstop fricking fantasy series at some point. And that's what I'm going to do eventually. Its going to be elves, dwarves, and hobbits but I don't think anybody will actually realize that there are elves, dwarves, and hobbits. Except for you guys cause you talked to me. <audience laughs> I mean, come on, the furies are pretty much pokemon <audience laughs> So that's kind of what I'm looking at in the future. I've got enough ideas for stories that I figured up that what I have so far at the rate I'm writing so far, I'd have to live to be like 130 to write them all, so I've been working out. <audience laughs> But I don't know, 130. Right here please.
Audience: In the midst of writing and everything do you ever find it hard to separate the book from your actual reality and at night how do you turn it off so you can actually get some shuteye, if you ever do?
Jim: In the midst of writing, do I ever have trouble separating the book from actual reality and how do I turn it off at night so that I can get some shuteye? I'll answer the second one first and that is, no, I don't sleep at night. <audience laughs> Basically, I don't start working until about 10 o'clock when everybody else starts turning in, going to bed. If I try and write during the day, it's "Jim, you need to eat something" this and "Dad, I love you" that. I can't be expected to create. <audience laughs> in that kind of circumstance, so usually I'm sitting down and its just me and the dog hanging out and its nice and quiet and I get most of the writing done between 10pm and about 6am. And then after that its easy to sleep because my brain's turned to mush by then.<audience laughs> What was the first part of the question again? Oh, do I ever have trouble separating book from reality? When I do, my wife helps me. <audience laughs> It works out. Actually she keeps me grounded in many ways. Its probably good for me. Right here, please.
Audience: I had a couple of questions. First off, you mentioned your wife. I read her novels and I noticed that you had helped her quite a bit with those as she's gone along and I was wondering if you two were planning on doing a collaboration at any point in time?
Jim: Are my wife, Shannon, and I planning on doing a collaboration at any point in time? The answer to that is No. We decided that we want to stay married. <audience laughs> We wrote a play together in high school and nearly gouged out one another's eyes with pencils. I don't think that's coming up in the future. But we do bounce ideas off each other and stuff, when we're in a sticky spot trying to figure out how to get through it, you know, we'll talk to each other about it and then promptly ignore each other's advice. But it helps.
Audience: My next question, about the Codex series. I heard a little bit about how that particular series came about and I was wondering if you had gotten any feedback from the person who had given you those two awkward ideas to put into one novel and to see if he read them and what he thought of them?
Jim: Right, right. Okay, I'm going to have to tell you all the story. The question was, have I gotten in touch with the guy that kind of inspired the Codex series for me? When I started to put that series together, I literally wrote that on a bet. I was in a writing group online. There was a big discussion going on at the time. A bunch of us writing loudmouths were yelling at one another what we thought. None of us were published so it wasn't like we had a great idea of what was going on. One side of the argument was that the idea behind the story is what's sacred; that if you have a good enough idea, that the story will turn out to be good no matter how lame a writer you are and they said, "Look at Jurassic Park". <audience laughs> That's their example, not mine. I was on the other side where I said it doesn't matter how many times you've told the story, if you're a good story teller, you can put your own creative spin on it, you can put your own presentation on it that will make it a good story. How many times have we seen Romeo and Juliet done in many different ways? So this argument went back and forth. It was one of those arguments that you have online where you just hit the caps lock key right after you hit the reply button and then start typing. <audience laughs> That went back and forth for awhile and finally the pre-eminent loudmouth on the other side (I was the pre-eminent loudmouth on my side) said, "Alright, I tell you what, why don't you put your money where your mouth is. You let me give you a bad idea and let's see you write a good story out of it". And I said, "No, I want you to give me two bad ideas and I'll use them both". <audience laughs> Cause, like I said, inspired stupidity.
