Joseph J. Christiano takes readers back to the moon with the release of the Author’s Edition of his best-selling novel, MOON DUST.
 
The luxury starliner Sovereign of the Stars makes an unscheduled and unannounced landing at Armstrong Base, mankind’s first permanent facility on the moon. Armstrong’s commander, Colonel Michael Hansen, boards the vessel and discovers the mummified remains of the passengers and crew.  A single comatose survivor is found.
 
A team from earth arrives to begin an investigation.  They are led by Lindsay Dwyer, a bureaucrat who far outranks Hansen, and who becomes the de facto commander of Armstrong. Things begin to go wrong soon after their arrival.  Several of Armstrong’s personnel are found dead, their corpses mummified.  Hansen orders and evacuation of the facility only to discover the base has been locked down from Earth.
 
Facing a terror of unknown origin and a mutinous executive officer, Hansen must find a way to keep his people alive long enough for them to discover how to defeat their enemy…an enemy that reduces its victims to moon dust. ​

1.You’ve written many bestselling novels-do you have a favorite aside from ‘Moon Dust’?
I do but I’ll never tell. I can’t choose among my “children” in public.

2. Between Hansen and Nixon, which character do you relate to the most?
There’s some of me in both. I guess if you made me choose I’d say Nixon. He’s the more put-upon, he has a shorter fuse. He makes very detailed plans that are can’t-miss, and then some unforeseen x-factor steps in and makes a mess of those plans.  That happens to me. Often. Also, he’s a little more fun to write as a character.

3.Do you see space travel becoming more routine in the future outside of military applications?
I hope so! But if/when that does happen it’ll be well after my lifetime, unfortunately for me. I’d go up there in a second!

4.What is one of your favorite quotes from any of your books?
Man, that’s tough. Since we’re talking about MOON DUST I guess I should pick one from that novel. There’s a scene at the start of the third act where Nixon goes to retrieve the body of one of his friends. At this point the characters believe they are out of danger. The body isn’t there and he gets very angry, thinking someone beat him to it and did so without treating the body with respect.  The scene ends with these two sentences: “It would not occur to him until much later that he had missed something obvious in the security office. By the time he realized his error, he was running for his life.” That line shouldn’t even be in there. It’s the dictionary definition of Authorial Intrusion. But I love it! And my editor must have agreed because that line made the final cut. 

5.What kind of research did you do as you were writing ‘Moon Dust’?
Lots of online research. I also had access to an ex-employee of NASA but he asked not to be credited so I can’t say much beyond that. Every source I researched taught me something I never knew. It was very educational, and the environment within the novel is pretty accurate if such a place as Armstrong Base really existed. 

6.Which of your books would you most like to see greenlighted for film?
Oh man. Ideally? All of them! I write visually so I don’t think it would take much to turn any of them from a novel to a script. Tell Spielberg to have his people call my people. 

7.Who would you cast in the part of Colonel Michael Hansen?
Someone reviewed the novel and mentioned Bruce Willis or Ed Harris. I like both of them but I think Hansen is a bit younger. How about Eric Bana or Cillian Murphy?

8. There is a lot of humor in the interactions between characters in ‘Moon Dust’-is that characteristic of all your writing?
I write pretty dark stuff, very gothic. I try to balance that with humor. There’s usually a character with a wiseass attitude running around to make remarks that lighten the mood. A lot of that stuff comes from how I think I’d react to those situations.

9. Which of the trope themes popular in Scifi and Horror do you think is the most played out at this point, vampires, zombies or superheroes?
Lately? Superheroes. That’s something of an irritating admission for me. I grew up reading comic books. I still do. If these superhero movies had come out when I was a kid I would have loved each and every one of them. Now it’s starting to enter the realm of oversaturation. I doubt zombies and vampires will ever be played out. There’s just so much you can do with them.

10.Who are your favorite authors? Who do you read?
How much time do you have? Stephen King, obviously. Dean Koontz. Alan Moore. Neil Gaiman. Richard Matheson. Agatha Christie. So many more.

11. What’s coming up next? Do you have any events, appearances or conferences planned for 2018? What can readers look forward to as far as future releases?
I’m working on two novels at the moment. I hope to have both finished by the end of the year. I don’t want to say much more than that, though.

12. What advice do you have for aspiring authors based on your own experience in publishing?
Get used to the word “no.” You’re going to hear it a lot more than “yes.”  But keep trying. It took me almost a year to find a publisher for my first novel. When I did, when that contract arrived, I was walking on air for weeks. The wait and the rejection are worth it when you finally get someone willing to take a chance on you. So, yes, keep trying!

 “I’m just realizing that I want something else out of life and if I’m gonna  get it, I’m gonna have to fight.”---Logan, THE VAGRANT CHRONICLES
 
HAIL ME HEARTIES! Your Mistress of Madness, P.Mattern, is steering a course toward a blockbuster dystopian novel, VAGRANT, the first novel in THE VAGRANT CHRONICLES by author Gabe Thompson. Check out the awesome book trailer!

​ Gabe has agreed to come aboard THE WHIMSICAL HERALD  to tell us of the fantastical world he has created to delight his readers. Let's see what he has to say!

Q-WELCOME ABOARD Gabe Thompson! Reading VAGRANT, the reader might get the impression that the futuristic dystopian world you have created could possibly be a harbinger of things to come in the US—was that your intention?

A.  I wondered what would happen if the world was controlled by greedy people concerned only with profit. I imagined how the discovery of a warp-type space drive and planets rich in minerals would effect a world controlled by one large company. The answer was simple. All this company would care about would be profits and making money off these discoveries. Mass conscription of indigent people to mine these worlds would ensue and the spirit of humans would rise and fight this any way possible. People would go anywhere they considered safe. For city people, that meant going underground. We truly think this could happen. Space travel in the U.S. has been turned over to corporations for development. They think there is profit in it or they wouldn’t do it. If something like this happened, the company would need a way to control the population. Corn genetically altered to produce a sedative, was the answer.

Q-What was the first book or story you ever wrote? Can you tell us about it?

A. The first book I wrote is called Soul Taker. It’s a big adventure story. My mother had a theory that the Mayans may have disappeared because they all crossed the Gulf of Mexico and came to Florida. Florida has many small tribes of Indians. Our hero was a cave diver who discovered a sacrificial knife at the bottom of a spring near Tallahassee. The knife led to other discoveries including the bad news that the world was about to come to an end. To stop this, the hero and his friends go to Mayan ruins in Guatemala and the Yucatan. I ended up self-publishing. Soul Taker is available at amazon.com.
 
Q-Does skillful world building come easily to you? Will it be a part of all your novels?

A. I love Science Fiction. I’ve been reading it since I was a child. My mom and I are both dreamers. We brain storm and come up with all kinds of wonderful ideas together. I recommend partners for all writers. Two people can develop and imagine so much together; more than one person alone. Having another person to bounce ideas off is the key for coming up with and developing believable worlds.

Q-Why do you think your main characters Shayna and Logan feel such a connection even though they are from vastly different worlds?

A. Shayna is Logan’s dream girl. She’s an ideal he believes he can never achieve or have. She’s from above. She’s like the sun and he’s the darkness. For Shayna, Logan is the first boy she’s ever met that isn’t drugged on Sopore. He’s like her; sharp and energetic. He makes her feel alive. She’s been told all her life Vagrants are non-people. When she meets Logan, she begins to question everything she’s ever been told. If Vagrants are real people, then what else her parents and authority figures have told her is wrong? She has to find him and discover the answers to these questions.

Q-Do you find that VAGRANT  is geared toward male readers, female readers, or both?

A.  I wanted the book to appeal to both male and female readers.  In the first book, there is a love story between Shayna and Logan that slowly develops into something serious. It’s written from both of their points of view, so both male and female readers can relate. This is a series. Book two is called Mutant and is geared more toward male readers, but there are several strong female characters and a growing love story between Logan’s best friend, Knock, and Deklan Hall’s stepdaughter, Fenfang. In all three books of the series, I worked hard to give girls important roles and make them self-sufficient individuals.
 
Q-Which of your characters would you  like to be marooned on a desert island with?

I’m married, so I’d have to say Helga, the digital maid, because my wife would find a way to that island and kill me. Helga would also probably be able to help me find a way off the island.

Q-Tell us about your future projects? What  works in progress can your readers look forward to?

A. Vagrant is the first book in this series. Mutant is next in the series, followed by a third book, and I am considering offering Tell-Tale yet a fourth. All of these books revolve around the central theme of a company-controlled world and those rebelling against that control. The idea of our world, the newly discovered power to travel to distant planets combined with a profit-driven government is central to all of these books, and I think it’s really interesting.

Q-What take away would you want your readers to have after reading VAGRANT:THE VAGRANT CHRONICLES?

I would love our readers to want more Logan, more Shayna and more books generated inside of this imagined world. When I was a kid, I loved books that created such believable worlds, I felt like I lived in them. I wanted to return over and over, to interact with those characters again and again, and I missed them when the books were over. I want my readers to feel that when they finish The Vagrant Chronicles.  I want them to want more.
 
THE WHIMSICAL HERALD WOULD LIKE TO THANK Gabe Thompson for making us privy to his process and his insights! This is an amazing read and would make a stellar movie! One-click on Amazon will take you on a fast paced journey full of young love, adventure and intrigue! You can read even more about Gabe and how to connect with his social media sites on his author website when we dock at Tell-Tale Publishing! 

Mistress of Madness P.Mattern thinks this Dystopian read will shiver our timbers, me hearties! Listen to the author himself reading from his novel!

​'Vagrant' by Gabe Thompson available in Kindle, Nook, and Paperback TODAY! GRAB YOUR COPY or...walk the plank!

Thank you for  taking this voyage with us, readers!
#PatriciaMattern
@WhimsicalHerald
#MIstressofMadness
​#WeDoMadnessHere