Interview with Steven Piziks

by Renee Uitto

Steven Piziks is our speaker this month. He has written many science fiction novels. We ask him about his writing career and how he broke into the romance industry.

When did you start writing science fiction?

Hmmmm . . . good question. I think I wrote my first SF story back when I was about fourteen, though it never went anywhere, of course. I've been writing "fantasy"since I was eight or nine. My first publications--short stories--were all fantasy. Then, about twelve years ago, I got an idea for a science fiction story. I wrote it and my wife read it. This was odd, actually, because she almost never reads anything of mine until it's been published. She told me the story needed to be a novel, and I agreed with her. It eventually became IN THE COMPANY OF MIND, my first novel. After that, I was sort of pigeonholed as an SF writer, and it's all I was able to sell. Lately, though, I've been trying to break into fantasy again, as well as other genres.

How did you hear about our group?

Through Cindy Pape. She and her husband have been family friends for many years, though it wasn't until relatively recently that I learned she was interested in writing, too.

How do you balance writing, being a teacher and family life?

I don't sleep. That's only a half joke. I average six hours of sleep a night when school is in session. If it weren't for summer break, I wouldn't be nearly so productive as a writer.

How many novels have you had published?

Eleven, if you count the media books and novelizations. I've written seven original SF books, one Star Trek book, two movie novelizations, and a Harlequin Bombshell novel.

How did you come to write romance novels? In your opinion, are there some similarities to writing romance and science fiction?

I fell into romance, actually. I'm trying to break into the suspense market, so wrote up a proposal for an adventure/suspense novel, one that was intended to be the first in a series. My agent read it and decided it might fit Harlequin Bombshell. Harlequin editor Tashya Wilson read it and agreed, so now I'm writing romance under the name Penny Drake. So I didn't set out to write romance--it just sort of happened.

There are definite similarities between romance and science fiction. A psychologist friend of mine once told me that the most enduring stories are ones in which you have a normal setting, normal characters, normal everything, and then you introduce a single non-intuitive element. In science fiction, it's the piece of technology the story requires--time travel, nanotechnology, cloning, whatever. Michael Crichton did this in every book he's ever written. In romance, this element is the perfect romance with a happy ending. Readers of both genres also want characters they can identify with and plots that make them turn the page to learn what happens next. Many similarities!

Have you worked with a critique group? Please explain.

I do. I work with the Untitled Writers Group, which is based in Ann Arbor. I've been a member for--gad--twelve years now. The UWG was started by fellow authors Sarah Zettel and Nisi Shawl about fourteen years ago. The group's purpose is to help its members improve their writing and get their work published. We're ancient--fourteen years is paleolithic in writing group years--and we've survived a near-total turnover in membership. Sarah, who writes for Harlequin Luna these days, is one of only two original members left out of eight.

We meet every other Monday evening and get down to business fairly quickly. The last author to arrive is critiqued first. We go around the circle, and every reader has three minutes (timed with a stopwatch) to give a specific, polite critique of the piece. After everyone has gone, the author has three minutes to respond. Anyone who goes over the allotted time is fined at the rate of fifty cents per minute, and the money goes to the snack fund. At the end of the meeting, we hand out manuscripts for next time. We allow no more than four people to submit material per meeting, and submissions can't be any longer than 7,000 words. Longer pieces need to be broken up over two meetings.

I think the reason we've lasted so long is that we're extremely careful with our membership. We keep the number at eight people, and only admit a new person when someone else leaves the group. New members are screened carefully to make sure that everyone in the group gets along with them. All 'old' members are granted veto power over potential new members--it only takes one 'no' vote during the trial membership period to prevent someone from joining. It sounds snobby and harsh, but the group is actually warm and inviting, and we want to make sure that every single person feels comfortable with everyone else. Any tension or even vague dislike between two members could potentially tear the group apart, and we work hard to prevent that.

What is your writing schedule like?

During the school year, I usually write for a couple hours after supper and for longer periods on weekends. During the summer or on other school breaks, I usually write for four or five hours a day, starting in late morning. I can write in early morning if I have to, but it's harder work then, and I prefer to avoid it if I can.

I always start any book with a very detailed, blow-by-blow outline. My outlines run thirty pages or more, and I have to condense them before showing them to my agent or an editor. The advantage is that when it comes time to write the actual prose, it goes fairly quickly, since I always know what's going to happen next.

What made you decide to become a member of Greater Detroit Romance Writers of America?

I'm already a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, which is a great clearinghouse of publishing information. It's a relatively small group, though. The RWA seems to be a much larger community.

On your website you talked about novelization. Please explain what this is.

This is when Hollywood producers want a book based on their movie. You've seen them in the stores around the time the movie gets released. The cover always says 'Based on the hit movie!' or some such. Several months before the movie comes out, the producers send the screenplay to an editor, who calls an agent or two.

'Got anyone who wants to turn this screenplay into a book?' the editor asks.

'Sure!' says the agent, and then the agent starts making calls.

My agent called me once about two weeks before Christmas to ask me if I wanted to turn a screenplay into a book. The deadline was tight, though. The book was due the second week of January. In other words, I would have a little over three weeks to pull it off, with the holidays in there to boot. I have a small reputation for being able to write quickly, and I'd also already written a novel about multiple personality disorder (a theme of the movie), which was why I was being called.

I finally agreed to do it, partly because I like a challenge and partly because it paid twice as much as any book I'd written to date. I received the screenplay a few days later, read it, and chained myself to my computer. I pulled it off, and IDENTITY the book hit the stores just before IDENTITY the movie opened in theaters.

What advice would you give to new writers?

I'm going to steal from Octavia Butler: persist. If you stop writing, you'll never get published. Another good rule to remember is 'The money always flows toward the writer.' Anyone who tells you that authors pay to get published is lying to you. Agents get paid their commission when the author gets paid, not before. Editors buy books from authors, and authors don't ever send editors money.

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