Search

The Protagonist Speaks

Interviews with the characters of your favourite books

Open Search
Tag

Space Exploration

Logan Preaker, Seiner Butch, Amira Dhorian, and Tania Maestas (of Earth Warriors, by Lui Petri)

Dear readers, tonight with us are four unlikely heroes from Earth’s future. They are here to speak about the alien empire that declared war on earth, and about rising to the challenge when militaries and governments crumble.

Tell us a little about where you grew up. What was it like there?

Logan: Oh, an interview right here and now?

Tany: Oh yay! We besties are gonna get super famous after this!

Seiner: Tany, focus on the questions for this time, please…

Amira: So, this will be those archival questions back in Sorania? I can take that as you wish, dear human.

Logan: So, where do I grew up for each of us, you say? Well, I was raised near the Little Tokyo district in LA, which is where I could find many people of various ethnicities, most were good, and chatty and go to play around while my parents did their business, others didn’t care much, but my parents always taught me to always love everyone for what they do, instead what they are like. To see the inside instead of the exterior if you catch what I say. It didn’t came without sacrifices, but that’s how it was for me.

Seiner: Alright. Name’s Seiner Butch, originally from the old England, yet no teacups or grey rains as you assume from us. But that nitpick aside, got some dual parents like Logan had, with my dad being the best lawyer back then while I took my chances in studies and curriculums and all that bloke stuff. That’s how I got this brain, yeah. As for how we got here… long story, maybe next time.

Amira: I shall gracefully speak out now. Amira Dhorian, former princess of the Dhorian Royal Family from the Soranian Kingdom, one of the main planets of the Committee of Planets. As princess, I was instructed to practice my knowledge of diplomatic measures, as well as some close combat should the need of war arrive. For that nature, I grew up training in other planets with my brother Varris, where I also practiced my power to understand beings through their hearts and souls, something that benefited us Soranians for decades. Such where simpler times where I thought peace was the guaranteed form for all life forms. Sadly, that didn’t came to be.

Tany: Well, if you want to light up the mood, here ya go! Name’s Tania Maestas but call me Tany if you like! An El Paso girl from my travelling parents who wanted to make their cute lil’ girl smile even if they took odd jobs to feed me and all that jazz, get some besties in school and even try to make it fun for the others! And after the fun, I had even more in Dallas, where I tried to be a goodie one even when my grades didn’t grade on Einstein, but hey, I found my besties. But now… I can make besties with these three!

Seiner: Hopefully without getting to blow your staff up, that is.

Tany: Hey!

Did you have any favourite toys as a child? Any cherished memories?

Logan: Ah yes, I do remember fondly once I went to a day in the beach with my high school pals, just watching the sunset with people no matter who they were was the sight I can always cherish the most in life, the closest I could see in following what my parents and Richard wanted for me. That, and having dinner with the closest town hall in Los Angeles, that act of kindness I won’t ever forget…

Seiner: Me? It’s so obvious from me, but for your insistence, building my first ever functional robot with C-… My brother witnessed it in its full glory back in a park. To even achieve that a tender age? Must mean I have the gift… Or if you want something more sentimental, I’d say my 6th Christmas with whole family. The happiest I’ve been before it went down. No, not the time to say.

Amira: I have so many, but if I must pick one, it is when I felt the touch of Varris when I was born. Even fresh from birth, I could see that Varris’s touch carried warmth that showed me the beauty of a person, the first one I could read. Even if they kept a firm face, I could hear the joy and crying within him, to have a sister to look for. That is what I can cherish right now.

Tany: Awww. Oh, me? Oh, so many to pick, so little to tell, how can I… Oh, got it! Rapid fire! My 10th birthday party with the whole neighborhood, getting my only A+ in class, going to Berlin in class, and of course, tying my shoes, all made me smiley smile so very much I can tell you all day! Oh wait, I forgot when I won the arcade prize and-

Seiner: Next…!

What do you do now?

Logan: The de facto leader of the Earth Warriors while working in tandem with the UEF in the war against the Zlocu. It’s the choice we had to carry out to survive, if what the Guardian see in us is true. I strike with my blade to shield those who need to survive, and also to take down whenever possible, even though I believe there has to be other ways. Given I’m the only left in the family, I had to settle with them, but I like them, I really do.

Amira: Oh, Logan…

Seiner: I’m the gadgeteer and genius. If you need some transport or a specialized weapon or anything else to get through some messy obstacle, I’m your guy. Of course, it’s time limited in how I use them, so I must calculate which one is the best use, so I balance that out as much as I can.

Amira: Well, given that my planet is no more, I am still thinking of what I should do for my people’s memory, while I try to understand humans even more right now, even those oustside Logan, Seiner and Tany while I still look for Varris. It is a scary thought, yet for the sake of all, I must continue.

Tany: And I’m your magical jester student who can summon almost everything you need or if you want to get your sorry butt kicked like a naughty dog! You want some snow flakes to chill? You got it! Want to fire up a BBQ? I got you! Want me to slap little butts with giant gloves? I can-

Seiner: No. Cease.

Tany: But why?!

Logan: I… think because that would a bit too dirty for this interview.

Tany: C’mon, Loggie, not you too!

What can you tell us about your latest adventure?

Logan: Well, it was a close one to say the least, the first one since Amira got released from custody. Going into a stadium from San Diegoto rescue top scientists and some of our comrades in a hellish three way against the Zlocu was not in my bingo card but despite all, we got through, right guys?

Seiner: Oh, for sure, Logan. At least splitting up in each direction helped us to ease the pressure in knowing who to save and shield while we did our parts.

Amira: Yes, I certainly have done so much to secure everything in place, but when facing Yamja… I tried my best to control myself, but even then, there was so much I can handle. I am thankful for Logan for stepping on time.

Tany: And then we got some pizza party back at base to get everyone happy! Almost everyone though, that meanie Ji-ae sulked with that asshat Walty like we weren’t there. Is that the thanks we get?!

Amira: I believe they are still processing what has happened, especially with their partner.

Tany: Oh… yeah, move on, never mindly that.

Continue reading “Logan Preaker, Seiner Butch, Amira Dhorian, and Tania Maestas (of Earth Warriors, by Lui Petri)” →
0

Katrina (Cat) Mancini (of Life and Death on Mars, by Edward M. Lerner)

Dear readers, tonight with us is an astronaut, speaking about the second cold war in the near future and the race to Mars between the US, China, and assorted billionaires.

Tell us a little about where you grew up. What was it like there?

I was an Army brat, so you name it. A half dozen places in the US. All across Europe. Once Japan and twice Australia. I can mispronounce words and mangle syntax in five languages. Apparently I speak French and German like an Alsatian, which is an insult from both sides. Ask me if I care.

Anyway, the first few moves taught me not to get too attached to places – or to people. Don’t take that to mean I’m some kind of loner, because I also learned to make friends quickly. Having friends around the world? That’s seriously cool.

As odd as the lifestyle seems to most folks, it’s what I knew. Straight out of high school, I enlisted. Already then I’d had my eye on going to space, and any of the services would pay for an engineering degree. Becoming a pilot was the logical first step and the Air Force, by far, has the most pilots of all the service branches. You don’t want to know how Dad took it when I joined the Air Force. He coped better with the move to NASA.

What do you do now?

Commander of NASA’s international Ares mission to Mars. Pilot of Meriwether Lewis, one of the mission’s pair of spacecraft. The second ship, of course, is the William Clark.

Anyway, that’s what I did until … well, best I not say.

What can you tell us about your latest adventure?

Only insane people would think to throw together a crewed mission to Mars in less than two years. Those, unfortunately, are the people I work for. After President Wu announced a mission to Mars, no way was our president willing to let China get there first.

Speaking of lunatics, well, then there’s my unofficial overseer. More than anyone, Xander Hopkins was the architect of our mad dash. It serves Xander right that the prez plunked him into my crew to be her eyes and ears. Even if – eventually – he became a good friend.

What did you first think when you got to Mars?

Technically speaking, I didn’t. I got us safely to its moon Phobos. From Phobos, we dispatched an armada of robots to explore the world below. Because to actually set boot on Mars would have massively compounded the challenges – challenges which the other guys discovered all too soon.

At way less than one light-second’s round-trip comm lag with the surface we had real-time control of all those bots. We could, and did, cover lots of ground. Drilled lots of exploratory holes. Flew everything interesting up to our Phobos base for closer examination.

You know what? Forget the party line that from Phobos we were responsibly searching for Martian life. That we posed no risk of contaminating it – if it was even there – with earthly microbes. I wish to God we could’ve flown those last few thousand miles. Instead, we had Mars ever overhead. Like a mottled red dinner plate hanging in the sky. Looming. Taunting.

What was the scariest thing in your adventures?

Setting aside That Which Cannot be Revealed Without Spoilers, there’s still much to choose from. I’ll go with the landing on Phobos because landing is such misnomer. Phobos is basically a potato-shaped rock. Its longest axis is scarcely 16 miles. A rock that small has no gravity to speak of. You don’t actually land there. You very carefully dock with it – only there’s no docking mechanism to engage.

What you do is, you harpoon the damned potato, then slowly reel yourself to the surface. No one knew for certain till we arrived that’d this could even work. Would harpoons bounce off? Would their impacts spatter us with rocky debris? What if any of our tether reels froze at the last moment? What if tethers tangled? Coming down askew, not squarely on our landing feet, could’ve bashed in something critical and stranded us.

Surrendering control to a damned computer and glorified garden-hose reels is no pilot’s notion of a good idea. Scary as hell, in fact. Not that, in front of crew, I ever said any of that. But, okay, in the end, the landing worked as planned. We did get down in one piece.

What was the worst thing about living on a spaceship?

Had you asked me about any previous mission, I’d have said the crowding. Spaceflight is like a bunch of people living together in a closet. Or maybe I’d have said the smell, for pretty much the same reason. But those previous flights were to Earth orbit, or lunar orbit, or to the Moon itself – in every case, for just a few days.

The flight to Mars took six months! You can’t help but get used to the crowding. It’s that or go psycho. You can’t help but become immune to the stench. Which leaves … the people themselves. You can’t get away from them – or them from you. You can’t not get on one another’s nerves from time to time. Sure, the psychologists had had their say. They’d declared us compatible. As if they had any clue what it’s like.

Aboard Lewis with me were the aforementioned Xander, the mad genius behind our crazy mission plan, and the uptight Canadian flight surgeon, Sonny Ying. We were at times, despite our best efforts, like cats and dogs. Or maybe oil and matches. And utterly dependent on one another.

What is the best thing about it?

As it turns out, Sonny. She and I developed … a thing. Which, I’d hafta guess, became the worst part about the flight for Xander. There’s not a lot of privacy in a closet.

Whom (or what) do you really hate?

Xenophobe paranoid nutcases. They don’t want us to go home! In the name of protecting Earth from some imaginary Martian plague, the so-called Planetary Protection League is already a sort of plague on Earth. Damned Luddites.

Edward M. Lerner worked in high tech and aerospace for thirty years, as everything from engineer to senior vice president, for much of that time writing science fiction as his hobby. He is the author of sixteen SF novels (five of them collaborations with Larry Niven) and dozens of shorter works. His 2015 novel InterstellarNet: Enigma won the inaugural Canopus Award for fiction “honoring excellence in interstellar writing,” while other of his works have been nominated for Locus, Prometheus, and Hugo awards. He also writes popular science, notably including Trope-ing the Light Fantastic: The Science Behind the Fiction.

You can find Cat on the pages of Life and Death on Mars.

Browse our archives for past interviews, or follow the site by email (bottom-right) to know immediately when your new best-book-friend makes an appearance.

0

Anna Persson (of Red Desert series by Rita Carla Francesca Monticelli)

Red Desert

Dear readers, tonight we deviate from our usual Friday schedule, in order to celebrate the 40 year anniversary of the an important event in human space exploration – Viking 1 became the first spacecraft to successfully land on Mars!

The following interview was originally published in Italian as “Intervista ad Anna Persson” on http://www.kuiperbelt.it/intervista-ad-anna-persson/, and is republished here with permission.

Translation by Eric Klein.

Interview with Anna Persson

For several days now I am immersed in the lives of the creatures encased in what you call books. For days I come into contact with the entities in them and I interact with these entities, I can participate in their stories, the events that the imagination of the authors pour on the pages, whether they are digital or not.

My name is Lok and if you have followed me you know that I can do this and more.

Today I got in touch with Anna Persson, the main character of the Red Desert series by Rita Carla Francesca Monticelli. Anna is a friendly person yet reserved, it was not easy snatch two words from her. Since I’m not human I tried to be as empathetic as possible, trusting however on her curiosity about space and the endless creatures it hosts.

Warning, the following interview contains elements that reveal the events depicted in the books of Red Desert (they are called spoilers, aren’t they?). Continue reading “Anna Persson (of Red Desert series by Rita Carla Francesca Monticelli)” →

0

Blog at WordPress.com.

Up ↑