I talked about James T. Lambert’s first book, Aether Powered, last month–and he participated in a Q&A about it and his writing in general (both the book and his answers are well-worth your time). Now he’s back with some thoughts about the writing life in Southwest Idaho and some related things, too. I had a blast with this one, I hope you do, too.
Before we get into things, why don’t you give the reader a brief introduction to you and your work.
My name’s Jim Lambert, but I write under James T. Lambert (my real name, lol) for that sweet, sweet Star Trek cred. I have read a lot of science fiction and fantasy for a long time. I always loved reading. I saw a NaNoWriMo poster up in a game shop back in (I think) 2009 and thought that would be fun. But it was already November 15th so… next year (NaNo runs from 11/1 to 11/30 with a goal of writing a 50,000 word novel in that time). Next year I did a little better. I was only a week late. In 2011 I remembered it on 11/3. “I’m a fast typist. I can catch up. Now what am I going to write about?” Yeah, pretty silly.
But I came up with an idea and made it to 50,000 words (barely). I did it for several more years, ending up succeeding four times early on, then falling apart in 2016. I didn’t get anything substantial written for several years, but this year is my ‘Year of Getting Stuff Done.’ Last year I finished polishing a novel from 2014, and Indie published it in January. That was Aether Powered, a ‘modern steampunk’ novel. I also did some work on a non-fiction book and with my co-author we put The Tao of Trek out in March. I Indie published a science fiction novel, Proxies, in August. My next book comes out mid-November: Steam Opera, a more traditional steampunk novel. I’ve got another science fiction novel ‘in the pipe’ for next year, Relics of War.
You can find my books through my website http://jamestlambert.com/ or directly through my Amazon author page http://amazon.com/author/james.t.lambert.
What brought you to Idaho in the first place? What is it about Idaho that keeps you here?
I’m not a native. My family moved here in 1976 when I was between third and fourth grade. I grew up in Meridian, took a job in Bend, Oregon for a couple of years before moving back to Boise. I like a lot of things about Boise. It’s a small city, so you get the advantage of a city, but not nearly as many of the disadvantages. It’s clean, the people are friendly, and it’s safe. Well, all mostly. It’s a rough world and that affects everywhere. But I do like running into people I know all over town.
I had to grin at “Well, all mostly.” It’s easy to forget both the friendly and safe parts if you spend too much time online (and easy to forget the “mostly” part, too). What’s one thing that you find yourself telling people who aren’t familiar with Idaho about the state (after the obligatory “we do more than grow potatoes here”)?
That we’re in the Pacific Northwest and that’s where most of the hops for beer for the US comes from. Yeah, strange factoid, but I’m a craft beer guy so I like that one. I often mention the geographic isolation of Boise. We’re 300 miles from the next ‘major’ city (Salt Lake City). 400 miles from Portland and 500 from Seattle. Other than the string of cities right next to us (Nampa, Caldwell, Meridian, Eagle, etc) we’re a long way from anywhere. That has a lot of impact on us. There’s not nearly as much ‘through traffic’ since anyone going somewhere on the ‘other side of us’ is going to be best off flying and skipping the 700 miles to get from Portland to SLC. It really depends on what the person I’m talking to is interested in. If they like the outdoors, there’s a lot of good stuff here. Fishing, the same. Major concerts? Not so much. Book tours? Not so much. Conventions? Yeah, there’s a few, but being isolated makes it tough for people to come here.
Are you tied into some sort of local author/bookish group/culture? If so, tell us about it and how it helps you as an author. If you’re not, is there a reason for it?
At one time, early in learning to write novels, I was in five critique groups and a member of the Idaho Writers’ Guild. I’m still a member of one of those critique groups and I’ve recently rejoined the Idaho Writers’ Guild after a few years out. I’m on the board of directors and hope to help make the Guild more valuable to its members. I’m in the Boise Speculative Writers Support Group, where we compare notes and encourage each other. I’ve also been involved with the NaNoWriMo community here and attended some of the writing-related (and science fiction/fantasy-related) conventions in the area or nearby.
I think it’s important for everyone to ‘find their tribe’ and surround themselves with supportive people interested in the same things you are. I have many friends from the writing community I can ask for help or for recommendations for things like editing, proofreading, beta readers, and publishing. My good friend, fellow writer, co-author, freelance editor, and partner in publishing I met in my critique group. Another of my good friends came from that group and she’s also a partner in publishing. We formed a group called Bert Books, https://bertbookspub.com/, since we all (at one time) had last names with ‘Bert’ in them. A member of the critique group when I joined, but who has since moved away, just finished proofreading my latest book. A friend from the Spec Fic Support Group will be joining me on the board of directors. When we all pull together, we can do just about anything we set our minds to.
What kind of events in the area do you attend—either to sell/promote your books or to network with authors? Are there any outside of this area that you hit regularly and wish we had something like it here?
There used to be a science fiction/fantasy/etc convention, Fandemonium, which has since missed several years. I enjoyed going there and meeting with genre authors and going to panels and talks about writing for that fanbase. I’m still friends with the founder.
I go the Idaho Writers’ Guild annual conference, which doesn’t focus on my genre, but has a lot of great material.
A new annual event Boise Books and Brews, began this year and I’m part of the group organizing it.
I missed out on the Boise Comic Arts Festival this year, but plan to catch it in the future.
I made it to the Nampa Festival of the Arts and had a booth there.
Idaho Writers’ Guild schedules author networking events.
Some of the local libraries schedule author events (I should be at one in Eagle in December). (clearly, there’s a gap between when he responded and now…be sure to come back to The Irresponsible Reader to learn all about the events you could’ve attended months ago)
I attend a few conventions outside the area, mostly ones that specialize in my genre. A particular favorite is LTUE (Life, The Universe, And Everything), which happens in Provo Utah, is inexpensive, and has a wide variety of topics covered. Another is Fyrecon, which is now a virtual convention, which I’ve attended every year since they started. Missoula has Miscon, a long-running genre con with amazing guests. In the past they’ve had George R.R. Martin, Patrick Rothfuss, and Christopher Paolini. FanX in Salt Lake City, Rose City ComicCon and Emerald City ComicCon are all big events with tens of thousands of fans.
I’d like the strong program of LTUE, the dedication of Fyrecon, the guest list of Miscon, and the big crowds of the comic cons to happen more often in our area.
I heartily recommend the Library’s Comic Arts festival (I spend more there than I budget for every year, it seems) and am glad I saw you at the Nampa Arts festival this year. The Books and Brews event looked great—glad to hear it’s going to be an annual thing. Outside of sales (can’t minimize their importance), what for you is the best part of these events (Books and Brews/Nampa Arts/Library events) where you can interact with readers/browsers? Are you picking up enough readers at events like these to justify them, or is this a long-term plan—if you keep showing up, people will pay attention?
I like meeting people (although as an introvert it wears me down some) and it’s an opportunity to find out what readers are reading. When I’m asking about what they like to fit them with one of my books I’m also finding out what they like in general and getting a sense if that would be a good fit for me to write. I’d like to think I’m getting some regular readers from being there and being friendly with folks, but it’s hard to gauge. I plan on continuing to do these since it’s the only way to get that in-person feedback. Economically it’s not bad either. Eliminating the extra expenses of resellers means I can make more money per sale even if I lower prices a little. It’s not a perfect system and there’s definitely limitations to how much you can sell at an in-person event, but I like it for now. I do keep in mind the advice I’ve heard “would I be better off writing?” Big name authors (Brandon Sanderson for example) have to balance going to a convention every weekend with getting new books written. His big Kickstarter talked about how the pandemic prevented him from touring and gave him enough time to do four extra novels. I remember Terry Pratchett saying he quit his day job when it was costing him money to go to work instead of staying home and writing. My goal isn’t to be a speaker and make money from appearances, I want to write some books and have people buy those. I do want to be well known enough that I can go to some of the cons and hang out with the ‘cool kids’ but if that doesn’t happen I’ll hang out with the cool kids I already hang out with, lol.
What’s the breakdown of your audience—do you have a strong local base, or are your readers from other parts of the world?
I’m just getting started, so my main audience is family and friends (many from the writing community) so far. I’ve had a few sales overseas, the UK, Australia, and Germany for example, but I’m still building my audience and getting ramped up. I’ve done stand-alone books so far, so I haven’t been able to take advantage of the series readers returning to the next book in the series. My next book kicks off a trilogy, and some of my stand-alone books have the potential to turn into series, so that may change in the future.
Fair enough—so, let’s tweak things a bit. Based on what you know from your local contacts, how would you expect/hope things to go and how are you working to that end? Or do you have a plan yet?
I don’t have a firm plan for an end game. I’m at the ‘get some books out there’ stage. I figure people can’t buy my books if I don’t have any out there to buy. So I’m building my backlist. That being said I am doing some things to try and get some readers involved. I’m advertising on Amazon. I’m planning on getting some series going. I’m planning on publishing some short stories that are in a series. I hope that will give people a series to link into and since they are shorts maybe make it easier to write a new one on a faster schedule. Maybe even get involved in Vella and publish some things through there. Mostly I need to work on getting some regular sales so I know I’m doing things right and then just keep moving in that direction. One specific thing I haven’t gotten rolling yet is an email list and newsletter. I know they are important and effective, but I’ve just not gotten them going.
Do you think there are particular challenges or advantages to being a writer in the Treasure Valley? (possibly both)
With our geographic isolation (nearest big city is SLC, and the next three nearby ones are over 8 hours away by car) it’s not easy to jump over to a convention or event outside the valley. I’ve driven to Seattle for one day visits twice to see authors who are my particular favorites (Lois McMaster Bujold once and Terry Pratchett {GNU} once). We do get some ‘big’ authors here at times. I saw Margaret Atwood at BSU.
This same problem combined with a relatively small population leads to more niche interests having smaller representation. I’ve an interest in Steampunk, but we only had a dozen or so active steampunk fans in the area. The club for it eventually faded away.
But if you do find your ‘tribe’ here it’s much more likely you can get involved in activities with people who ‘get’ you. You aren’t one of dozens trying join a particular group, but probably someone that group is trying to seek out.
Of course, if you appreciate isolation and a distraction-free environment we have lots of natural areas close by where you can sit and write until your laptop battery runs out. And then switch to pen and paper! Several groups have sponsored retreats to cabins in nearby areas where a small group can isolate and really dig into their writing.
I definitely get the small population leading to small representation and how that impacts things here. When I brush up against someone with similar likes in the area, I’m always surprised (not sure why, but I am). A few years ago, when Scalzi was at the Boise Library! my reaction was kept bouncing between “I can’t believe this many people turned out” and “Of course he’s this popular.” If you were new to the area, how would you go about finding a tribe here? Google?
Google is a great place to start. Facebook is another, as it allows creations of groups. I’m interested in boardgames and there’s a Boise Area Boardgaming Enthusiasts group on FB. The Library used to have a club registry (last time I looked at it was pre-Google) so they probably still have something like it. The Boise Weekly has an events calendar which can get you to an event where people interested in your topic are going to be. I remember way back in the 80’s when a local comic book store owner did a talk at the library he had a signup sheet for forming a local club. He just waited for the first person who called interested in how the club was going and put them in charge. I was the second person, lol. We started a Science Fiction club that lasted a decade or so and many of the people from it are still friends. Offering to do a community education class on something you are interested in will bring in some people to meet. Once you meet a few people you can ask them for introductions or information about more.
Do you bring Idaho (or some sort of Idaho-sensibility, assuming one exists) to your work? Whether or not anyone else sees it, can you look at some aspect of your writing and think “That’s Idaho” or “I would do ____ differently if I was a Kentuckian or from Illinois?”
I do steal settings from around me. I have a partially completed book where the beginning is all set in an unnamed city which I used Boise as a model for. Characters visit 8th street to have coffee, go to a Rave at the Mardi Gras, and visit a local library.
I’m almost finished with a short story set in downtown Boise featuring Meriwether Cider, the Idanha, and the Owhyee Plaza. Okay, and the Chinese Tunnels under downtown.
I’d probably use locations from whatever place I was living. When I visited my hometown in 2011 I was doing a NaNo project and visited a coffee shop that made a big impression. I used it as a setting for a short story I wrote later.
I’m sure some of my language, colloquialisms and such, are based from Idaho, or at least the Pacific Northwest, but I don’t think my stories have much flavor from here beyond using real locations for models or as settings.
One final question, is there a book (or two…or 18, if you get really carried away), that embodies Idaho/the Idaho spirit to you to recommend to my readers?
Oh, that’s tough. Hmmm. A friend wrote Fearless about the guy who started Fearless Farris Stinker Stations, that’s pretty Idaho.
My friends Troy Lambert, Danielle Parker, and Marlie Harris all wrote some stuff that is set in Idaho.
Troy and Dani each wrote a novella which ended up combined in Incidents in Idaho. They are in the same universe, our Monster Marshals stories. One is set in Boise during a snow storm in July. The other in a mine (Troy has a deep background in mining history (yeah, I know what I did there)).
Troy and Marlie wrote a story collection called Into The Darkness about evil spirits in mines and in reservoirs in Idaho. So that one really has Idaho ‘spirits’ lol.
I haven’t read a lot of books that are set in Idaho and give a deep feel for the state. I know some authors who write stuff set here, but it’s not really in a genre I read. A former Idaho Writer’s Guild president I knew wrote a book about Bogus Basin history I enjoyed.
So I don’t have any I strongly recommend for their Idaho-ness, but the Monster Marshals stories are good. And Into the Darkness is good if you like horror (not my favorite genre, but they submitted some to the critique group I am in so I did read most of it. I might have beta read it later too, it’s been a few years, so memory is a bit fuzzy).
Thanks for your time and participation! Hope you enjoyed it!
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