Episode 153: Mark Morton – The Headmasters

A chat with author Mark Morton about his new young adult dystopian science fiction novel, The Headmasters, published by Shadowpaw Press.

Website
markmorton.ca

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@NotromKram

Facebook
@Mark.Morton.Author

Amazon Links
Amazon.ca
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Publisher’s Book Page

About the Book

How do you learn from the past if there isn’t one? 

Sixty years ago, something awful happened. Something that killed everyone except the people at Blue Ring. Something that caused the Headmasters to appear. But Maple doesn’t know what it was. Because talking about the past is forbidden.

Everyone at Blue Ring has a Headmaster. They sink their sinewy coils into your skull and control you, using your body for backbreaking toil and your mind to communicate with each other.

When someone dies, their Headmaster transfers to someone new. But so do the dead person’s memories, and if one of those memories surfaces in the new host’s mind, their brain breaks. That’s why talking about the past is forbidden.

Maple hates this world where the past can’t exist and the future promises only more suffering. And she hates the Headmasters for making it that way. But she doesn’t know how to fight them – until memories start to surface in her mind from someone who long ago came close to defeating the Headmasters.

But whose memories are they? Why aren’t they harming her? And how can she use them to defeat the Headmasters? Maple has to find the answers herself, unable to tell anyone what she’s experiencing or planning—not even Thorn, the young man she’s falling in love with.

Thorn, who has some forbidden secrets of his own . . .

Praise for The Headmasters

“Mark Morton’s The Headmasters is a brilliant science-fiction debut from one of Canada’s best-loved nonfiction writers. This compelling YA novel is a spot-on updating of Robert A. Heinlein’s classic The Puppet Masters for the new millennium, with intricate world-building, a great science-fiction puzzle, and — ironic for a novel about suppressed memories — a main character you’ll never forget. I loved it.” — Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo Award-winning author of The Downloaded

About Mark Morton

Mark Morton is the author of four non-fiction titles: Cupboard Love: A Dictionary of Culinary Curiosities (nominated for a Julia Child Award); The End: Closing Words for a Millennium (winner of the Alexander Isbister Award for nonfiction); The Lover’s Tongue: A Merry Romp Through the Language of Love and Sex (republished in the UK as Dirty Words), and Cooking with Shakespeare. He’s also written more than fiftycolumns for Gastronomica: The Journal of Food and Culture (University of California Press) and has written and broadcast more than a hundred columns about language and culture for CBC Radio.

Mark has a PhD in sixteenth-century literature from the University of Toronto and has taught at several universities in France and Canada. He currently works at the University of Waterloo. He and his wife, Melanie Cameron, (also an author) have four children, three dogs, one rabbit, and no time.

The Headmasters is his debut novel.

Episode 146: L. Jagi Lamplighter

An hour-long chat with L. Jagi Lamplighter, author of the YA fantasy series The Books of Unexpected Enlightenment and the Prospero’s Children series.

Website
ljagilamplighter.com

SuperversiveSF Blog

Fantastic Schools and Where to Find Them

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@lampwright4

L. Jagi Lamplighter’s Amazon Page

The Introduction

L. Jagi Lamplighter is the author of the young-adult fantasy series The Books of Unexpected Enlightenment, the third book of which was nominated for the YA Dragon Award in 2017, the fourth book of which won the first YA Ribbit Award, and the fifth book of which also won two small literary awards. She is also the author of the Prospero’s Children series: Prospero LostProspero In Hell, and Prospero Regained, and has published numerous articles and short stories as well as an anthology of her own works, In the Lamplight. She also edits for Superversive Press and teaches The Art and Craft of Writing.

When not writing, she switches to her secret identity as wife and stay-home mom in Centreville, VA, where she lives with her dashing husband, author John C. Wright, and their four children, Orville, Ping-Ping Eve, Roland Wilbur, and Justinian Oberon.

Episode 140: Edo van Belkom

An hour-long chat with award-winning Canadian horror writer Edo van Belkom, author of the Wolf Pack YA books, now a Paramount+ TV series.

Website
edovanbelkom.com

Twitter
@edovanbelkom

Instgram
@edovanbelkom

Facebook
@edo.vanbelkom

Edo van Belkom’s Amazon Page

The Introduction

Edo van Belkom is an award-winning Canadian author who began his career as a reporter for newspapers in and around Toronto, mainly covering crime and sports. His first sale as an author of fiction was a short story called “Baseball Memories” in 1990, which earned him his first Aurora Award nomination and was published in both the Year’s Best Horror Stories edited by Karl Edward Wagner and The Grand Slam Book of Canadian Baseball Writing

He went on to win the Aurora Award for his novel Wolf Pack in 2005. The novel was subsequently awarded the Silver Birch Award from the Ontario Library Association after participating students in Grades 4, 5, and 6 voted it their favourite novel in 2006. The novel and its sequels has now been turned into a TV series from Paramount+, the first season of which released in January of this year.

The author of numerous novels and some 200 short science fiction, horror, and mystery short stories (and, mostly under the pen name Evan Hollander, erotica), Edo has also won the Bram Stoker Short Fiction Award.

He lives in Brampton, Ontario.


Episode 132: D.J. Williams

An hour-long chat with D.J. Williams, author of Hunt for Eden’s Star, Book 1 of the new Beacon Hill series: “Harry Potter meets Young Indiana Jones.”

Websites
djwilliamsbooks.com
thebeaconhillseries.com

Twitter
@djwilliamsbooks

Instagram
@djwilliamsbooks

Facebook
@djwilliams316

D.J. Williams’s Amazon Page

The Introduction

With the DNA of a world traveller, D.J. Williams was born and raised in Hong Kong, igniting an adventurous spirit as he ventured into the jungles of the Amazon, the bush of Africa, and the slums of the Far East. His global travels submerged him in a myriad of cultures, providing a unique perspective that fuels his creativity.

As a fresh voice in mystery, suspense, and YA fantasy, his novels have garnered stellar reviews from Kirkus Reviews and climbed the charts on Amazon Hot New Releases, ranking as high as #1. Leading up to the launch of his latest YA series, Beacon Hill, and an eighteen-city book tour, the trailers and web series teasing the first book, Hunt For Eden’s Star, have reached more than one million views. Hunt For Eden’s Star is also currently under consideration for film & television optioning by the producers, production companies, and studios who created the most successful YA franchises of all time.

Residing in Los Angeles, Williams continues to develop new projects for television, film, and print.

Episode 126: Robin Stevens Payes

An hour-long chat with Robin Stevens Payes, author of four novels in the Edge of Yesterday series, intended to entertain young adult readers and spark an interest in STEM/STEAM careers, especially for girls.

Website
edgeofyesterdaybook.com

Facebook
@RobinStevensPayesAuthor

Twitter
@robinstevenspayes

Instagram
@robinstevenspayes

Robin Stevens Payes’s Amazon Page

About the Author

Robin Stevens Payes is the author of four novels for middle-grade to YA readers. She offers workshops on storytelling and is in the process of launching a company that focuses on relationship solutions for mothers and their teen daughters. She was founding editor-in-chief of LearnNow, an online publication on the science of learning, and has written for The American Leader, Discovery Education, the National Girls Collaborative Project, and the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Her Edge of Yesterday series is intended to entertain young adult readers and spark an interest in STEM/STEAM careers, especially for girls. Robin lives around the DC beltway in Maryland.  

Episode 121: Joan He

An hour-long chat with Joan He, bestselling author of The Ones We’re Meant to Find, Descendant of the Crane, and Strike the Zither, the first in a duology, recently released by McMillan.

Website
joanhewrites.com

Instagram
@joanhewrites

Twitter
@joanhewrites

Joan He’s Amazon Page

The Introduction

Joan He was born and raised in Philadelphia but still will, on occasion, lose her way. At a young age, she received classical instruction in oil painting before discovering that storytelling was her favourite form of expression. She studied Psychology and East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of Pennsylvania and currently splits her time between Philly and Chicago.

She is the bestselling author of The Ones We’re Meant to Find, Descendant of the Crane, and Strike the Zither, the first in a duology, recently released by McMillan.

Episode 112: R. S. Mellette

An hour-long chat with R.S. Mellette, author of the Billy Bobble middle-grade science fiction novels and the new YA science fiction novel Kiya and the Morian Treasure, and writer of the first web-to-television intellectual property, “The Xena Scrolls,” for Universal Studio’s Xena: Warrior Princess.

Website
rsmellette.com

Facebook
@MelletteRS

Twitter
@RSMellette

R.S. Mellette’s Amazon Page

The Introduction

R.S. Mellette, originally from Winston-Salem, North Carolina, now lives in San Clemente, California, where he toils away at turning his imaginary friends into real ones. While working on Xena: Warrior Princess, he created and wrote “The Xena Scrolls” for Universal’s New Media department and was part of the team that won a Golden Reel Award for ADR editing. When an episode aired based on his “Xena Scrolls’” characters, it became the first intellectual property to move from the internet to television.

Mellette has worked and blogged for the film festival Dances With Films as well as the novelist collective, From The Write Angle, and he is on the board of the L.A. region of the Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators.

Episode 107: Sherrilyn Kenyon

An hour’s chat with New York Times #1 and internationally bestselling author Sherrilyn Kenyon, author of numerous popular series, with more than 70 million books in print worldwide.

Website
sherrilynkenyon.com

Facebook
@MySherrilyn

YouTube
@DarkHunterSeries

Twitter
@mysherrilyn

Pinterest
@sherrilynkenyon

Sherrilyn Kenyon’s Amazon Page

The Introduction

Defying all odds is what #1 New York Times and international bestselling author Sherrilyn McQueen writing as Sherrilyn Kenyon does best. Rising from extreme poverty as a child that culminated in being a homeless mother with an infant, she has become one of the most popular and influential authors in the world (in both adult and YA fiction), with dedicated legions of fans known as Paladins–thousands of whom proudly sport tattoos from her numerous genre-defying series.

Since her first book debuted while she was still in college, she has placed more than 80 novels on the New York Times list in all formats and genres, including manga and graphic novels, and has more than 70 million books in print worldwide. Her current series include: Dark-Hunters®, Chronicles of Nick®, Deadman’s Cross™, Eve of Destruction™, Nevermore™, Lords of Avalon® and The League®.

Over the years, her Lords of Avalon® novels have been adapted by Marvel, and her Dark-Hunters® and Chronicles of Nick® are New York Times bestselling manga and comics and are #1 bestselling adult coloring books.

A Small Sampling of Covers

Episode 100: Michaelbrent Collings

An hour-long chat with Michaelbrent Collings, internationally bestselling author of thriller, fantasy, science fiction, mystery, romance, humor, young adult, and middle grade works.

Website
writteninsomnia.com

Facebook
@MichaelbrentCollings

Twitter
@mbcollings

YouTube
@michaelbrentcollingsauthor

Michaelbrent Collings’s Amazon Page

The Introduction

While he is best known for horror (and is one of the most successful indie horror authors in the world), Michaelbrent Collings has also written internationally-bestselling thriller, fantasy, science fiction, mystery, humor, young adult, and middle grade works, and romance.

In addition to being a bestselling novelist, Michaelbrent has also received critical acclaim: he is the only person who has ever been a finalist for a Bram Stoker Award, a Dragon Award, and a RONE Award, and he and his work have been reviewed and/or featured on everything from Publishers Weekly to Scream Magazine to NPR. An engaging and entertaining speaker, he is also a frequent guest at comic cons and on writing podcasts like Six Figure Authors, The Creative Penn, Writing Excuses, and others.

Episode 98: James Kennedy

An hour-plus chat with James Kennedy, author of the speculative thriller Dare to Know and the YA fantasy The Order of Odd-Fish, and founder of the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival.

Website
www.jameskennedy.com

Twitter
@iamjameskennedy

Facebook
@james.kennedy.942

Instagram
@theonlyjameskennedy

James Kennedy’s Amazon Page

James Kennedy is the author of the speculative thriller Dare to Know, which the Guardian praised as “a fascinating, compulsively readable thriller” and SFX Magazine called a “superb piece of storytelling: vivid, thought-provoking and unsettling.”

James is also the author of the young-adult fantasy The Order of Odd-Fish and the founder of the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival, in which kid filmmakers create short movies that tell the entire stories of Newbery-winning books in about 90 seconds, which screens annually in a dozen cities nationwide. He also co-hosts the Secrets of Story podcast with Matt Bird. James lives in Chicago with his wife and two daughters.