Steven Savile has been a busy man. In between writing for two different IP projects (Slaine and Warhammer 40k), he's been busy preparing his latest release called Laughing Boy's Shadow. And then there was the Temple novella for Apex, his work on the upcoming Dr. Who anthology, and his regular essays for the Storyteller's Live blog. Oh yeah, and he co-edited (along with our own Alethea Kontis) the charity anthology for Tsunami victims, Elemental. Steve also operates a Nyx Books with Alethea Kontis, foremost among their titles is T.M. Wright's A Spider on My Tongue, a sequel of sorts to Wright's legendary A Manhattan Ghost Story.

Overwhelmed yet?

We're pleased to grab a few minutes of this man's time to talk about his recent Apex Publications project, Temple: Incarnations.

1) T.M. Wright calls you a "madman poet" in his introduction to Temple: Incarnations. How close is he to the truth?

Hah! Well, personally I think I am a rather boring and dare I say normal young man (okay, entering middle-age but until I have the cash lined up to have my crisis properly I am hanging on to that young man status). Terry is a writer I admire tremendously, his novel A Manhattan Ghost Story is perhaps my favourite novel of all time, followed closely by Christopher Golden's Strangewood, which would be my favourite modern novel. The poet part I can see, in that I tend to fumble my way through language twisting the rules in favour of a rhythm and flavor that sings more often than not – at least in my 'own' work, unlike my media related stuff where I am shooting for a clearer, crisper style, a little less poetry and little more hard hitting, and dare I say simpler. I will admit that I have a slightly skewed view of the world though, and find some of the most mundane things fascinating. It comes down to why things are the way they are – and instead of accepting the first impression, scratching away at the lustre and asking: no, really, why is it this way?

Of course my interest in comparative religions and theosophies might convince some folks I'm a few bricks short of the wall… all I will confess is that strange things tend to happen, all I hope to do when I sit down is catch some of the strangeness and share it.

 2) Last year you wrote an insane number of words, something like 700,000? Temple came to life somewhere in that mad rush. Was it difficult to maintain the level of artistry you expect of yourself?
 
I think it was more like 750,000 words sold. Was it difficult? Mate, seriously, it was a nightmare at times trying to switch gears and maintain any sense of momentum with what was essentially a wandering Knight Errant's dark tale… I didn't have a clue where the story was going when I set down the first word – which for a guy who outlines pretty rigorously was very much like writing without a net. Every couple of months I would be suddenly worried that I had no idea WHO Temple was, and if I didn't know how could he hope to discover the truth? But I kept faith in my instinct, which was that in this case the point of the journey was not to arrive.

Oddly though, I felt considerably more pressure on Temple than I have on just about anything outside of Dr Who – for 18 months I had been writing IP stuff pretty much exclusively – IP's being other people's Intellectual Properties, things like Warhammer, Slaine and Dr Who. Temple was mine, all of it, especially the warts. His post apocalyptic world of silver-eyed dead was mine. I knew I wanted to wander, have his story reflect the aimlessness of waking up and not knowing who he was. The entire thing is about his quest for identity, just as any true grail quest is. The thing I decided along the way was that, surprisingly, who he was really wasn't as important as what he was…

3) You won the Writers of the Future contest in 2002. What was that experience like?

In personal terms – amazing, I came away from it with a couple of friends that I think will be there right until the bitter end, you are treated like royalty, spoiled like a film star and pampered. Professionally, the impact has been indescribable – I went into it as someone who wanted to be a writer, who had played around and written stuff but who had a long way to go to becoming a professional. I came out of it changed. A week long workshop with Tim Powers taught me why I do the kind of things I do when I am writing, and offered alternatives that helped me move to the next level, while in business terms Kevin J Anderson really impacted on the way I approached the business – essentially reminding me that it is a business. 

I'd recommend it to absolutely everyone who is serious about testing their skills.

4) Any tips on how to sway the judges?

Having done the workshop, and getting to know a lot of the judges personally, yes. Am I sharing them? No. Heh, sorry, mate. My advice is pretty simple, you are writing a genre story, make sure the genre is present up front and centre, write with clarity, tell the story you want to tell, don't get lost in pretty little details, and if at first you don't succeed, fire off another for the next quarter, and the next.

5) You've done a handful of novels with licensed properties, such as the Warhammer 40k series and most recently, Slaine. Do you find it difficult to switch from the mindset of a constricted world to your Savile originals?

To be honest, yes, it takes a huge shift in the old mental gears, each series has its own unique voice and style while still being recognizably 'Savile'. Hardest of all is probably the pressure of Dr Who (self inflicted) and the shift into anything else – I grew up with Dr Who and want all of my offerings in the Whoniverse to be the best they can be.

If you like Temple, you will probably like Slaine and the vampire novels, and Laughing Boy's Shadow and Angel Road, if you dislike any one of them you'll probably hate them all – they all come from the same well of creativity after all. That said, I have had some downtime for the last month, and I have spent it world-building which is something I haven't done since I was 19. It's been an absolute blast, and I have essentially created my own universe, politics, religion and geography… I have already sold one book of four novellas set in Thera, and have an offer for a second, so hopefully a lot more original Savile stuff will sneak out over the next few years.

6) You touch upon many things in Temple...religion, love, social hierarchy, loyalty...do you believe these are symptomatic to a crumbling society (as they are in Temple)?

Back when I started writing I heard about this 'movement' in the UK called Miserablism – I always considered myself something of a 'social fantasist' in that I wanted to tell stories of Urban Decay and have them brush with magical realism and wonder – but almost always my world view has the guy not getting the girl, the day not being saved, at least not completely, and the leprechaun squatting on an empty pot where the gold ought to have been. In other words, so much for rainbows, let's just enjoy the rain for a while. There is a downbeat power to a lot of my older work, like the chapbook Icarus Descending, and my novel Laughing Boy's Shadow – the heroes in these stories walk in the shadows, kicking cans along the curbs. They aren't the beautiful people, they're the normal ones, like me.

Am I as bleak as I used to be – well wait until you read the final epilogues of the Von Carstein and Slaine books and tell me what you think.

7) There's a door marked "The Gates of Heaven" early in the novella that leads to Temple witnessing some terrible crimes. Symbolism?

Or a load of old symbollics? Actually I tend to enjoy a lot of irony in my visuals – so as the descriptions of places grow richer so too does the wry voice of my storyteller more often than not. The grass is always greener on the other side, no?

8) If there's one thing you'd want your readers to take from Temple: Incarnations, what would that be?

I think the "Death of Self" contains some of my very best writing – it came from heart and head and flowed, it's honest, sad and hopeful, so I think, if I could, I would like the readers to experience the love and beauty of it, even as the bittersweet aftertaste enters their minds… I wouldn't presume to suggest it has the power to change anyone one, but I certainly made me look at my own life – the artist reflected in his art and all that…