{"id":34476,"date":"2024-01-24T06:30:41","date_gmt":"2024-01-24T11:30:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/?p=34476"},"modified":"2024-01-25T06:39:03","modified_gmt":"2024-01-25T11:39:03","slug":"interview-with-aaron-ryan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/interview-with-aaron-ryan\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Aaron Ryan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome, travelers.\u00a0 Our stop in the Otherworld today brings us into the dark shadows of Earth, after an intruding force of aliens has come to wipe us out.\u00a0 We listen quietly to author Aaron Ryan, who gives us glimpses into the version of our world that he is building, and into what molded him into the sort of storyteller he has grown to be.\u00a0 Read on to learn more about the author, and his book, Dissonance: Volume I: Reality<\/em>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tellest:<\/strong> Greetings Aaron!\u00a0 I wanted to thank you for introducing me to your story, and to the greater Dissonance series.\u00a0 You\u2019ve tackled something that\u2019s been done before\u2014the alien invasion story\u2014but you\u2019ve injected it with so much character growth, ethos, and introspection among the thrills and chills that it really stands on its own.\u00a0 I know that it took a long journey to arrive here, and that this is just one stop among many.\u00a0 I\u2019m excited to learn more about you and the worlds you\u2019ve built, and the ones yet to take form!<\/p>\n

Aaron Ryan: <\/strong>Thank you for having me, I\u2019m very grateful!\u00a0 I\u2019ve loved writing Dissonance, and grateful for where it\u2019s taken me.\u00a0 I feel very much a part of the characters\u2019 arcs and journeys and have thoroughly enjoyed partaking of their journeys.\u00a0 There\u2019s really a strange phenomenon that happens when you author a novel: you start to ruminate on the characters often to the point where they actually exist somewhere in your day; they really seem like reality, and it\u2019s easy to miss the fact that they\u2019re only fictional: you care so much about them.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> To fully appreciate a favorite new storyteller, I\u2019ve found that you need to understand the path they\u2019ve traveled.\u00a0 Most of my interviews start with a foundational question: What was it that inspired you to write your first words?\u00a0 Did you have a favorite author growing up?\u00a0 Or did you have other family members, or people in your community that helped to foster a creative spark?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Well, I do mention in my About the Author sections that I wrote a fictional story when I was in second grade called \u201cThe Electric Boy.\u201d\u00a0 It was SUPER lame, haha!\u00a0 But I was only 7 or 8, so that can be excused.\u00a0 I still have it in a box somewhere.\u00a0 It was an assignment given to me by my teacher, of course, and I was heavily influenced by E.T. at the time.\u00a0 So that influenced my formation of the character, and his story.\u00a0\u00a0 I absolutely love J.R.R. Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings.\u00a0 It\u2019s been foundational to my creative journey and is the first creative work I remember partaking in that really tremendously inspired me.\u00a0 My parents were very formative in my journey, recognizing right away that I was fairly right-brained, and they encouraged me to push forward in all kinds of creative pursuits: writing, music, poetry, dance, acting, etc.\u00a0 My authoring has really come full circle in that I\u2019ve pursued so many other creative ventures over the years, and only recently came back to this.\u00a0 I appreciate dystopian novelists such as Suzanne Collins and Marie Lu along the way, and Stephen King for the way that he handles horror.\u00a0 They\u2019re all brilliant.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> How many of your previous creative pursuits have found their way into your written stories?\u00a0 Music and poetry can lend a cadence and pacing to your story.\u00a0 And I\u2019m sure you could attribute dance to things like choreographing action.\u00a0 You\u2019ve done things like tech support, videography\u2026 It\u2019s almost like you\u2019ve run the whole gamut.\u00a0 Do you try and incorporate all these experiences into your stories where you can?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>That\u2019s a really interesting question, and something that I hadn\u2019t really thought about.\u00a0 But I suppose subconsciously, that\u2019s pretty true.\u00a0 There are definitely elements of cinematography I\u2019ve tried to consider while fleshing out the story.\u00a0 I have a picture in my mind of how this or that scene plays out, blocking, where things flow from and to, etc., and I try to really envision it with clarity.\u00a0 So, for videography or cinematography, yes, that has found its way into it.\u00a0 With poetry, yes, I think there\u2019s something to be said for the rhyme and meter of your story, how the pendulum swings, and is there a symmetry between what you\u2019re writing and where the story needs to go.\u00a0 What people are saying, and is it in tandem with the story, and all that.\u00a0 Again, on a subconscious level, I think that\u2019s factored in, yes.\u00a0 Poetry is, after all, creative writing, as is writing a novel.\u00a0 And lastly, for music, yes, there has to be a musicality in what I write.\u00a0 Music tells a story; songs tell a story, and that\u2019s all I\u2019m doing here too, is telling a story.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t have quarter notes or treble clefs, but it does have a musicality to it, and hearkening back to the cinematography aspect, I can imagine a running score flowing through certain scenes of my novels: stirring, compelling, quiet and pensive, evocative, rhythmic, terrifying, arcane, loud and obnoxious at points, etc..\u00a0 Rises and falls.\u00a0 Crescendos and decrescendos.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> Let\u2019s, as you put it, swing the pendulum the other way.\u00a0 While you\u2019ve certainly done plenty with your life ahead of writing this story, were there any quirks, hobbies, or interests that your characters had that you\u2019ve brought into your personal life?\u00a0 Or at the very least, were there things they had done that interested you enough to go down a rabbit hole or two?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Well, I\u2019d say the reverse is truer.\u00a0 There are phrases attributed to some characters that are totally what I, or my wife, or others in my life, are either notorious for saying, or would<\/em> say.\u00a0 There are two different words at play in authoring: exegesis (pulling out of the text what you think it means), and eisegesis (putting into<\/em> it what you think it means based on your own values and perspective).\u00a0 I\u2019m much more an \u201ceisegetic\u201d writer, and an \u201cexegetic\u201d reader.\u00a0 But that doesn\u2019t mean to imply that I pull things out of the writings and incorporate them into my own life\u2026it feels more natural the other way around: I incorporate into the stories familiar elements of my own life, thoughts, experiences, etc..<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> Though your Dissonance project is your focus now, you\u2019ve been creating for years, and this is not your first fiction project.\u00a0 And whether it was intentional or not, you\u2019ve felt the loss of creating a story and losing it to the aether.\u00a0 Can you tell us what that was like, and how you were able to pick yourself up after staring down the digital oblivion?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Oh man, that\u2019s a hard story.\u00a0 My first felt authoring tragedy came when I inadvertently deleted my only copy of \u201cThe Omega Room\u201d when I was in my early twenties.\u00a0 I had no intention of doing so\u2026it was a complete accident.\u00a0 I don\u2019t remember the computer I was working on at the time but it was incredibly rudimentary: it had a screen that had four colored graphic blocks on it, and one of them was a word processing solution.\u00a0 I wish I could remember what it was!\u00a0 I don\u2019t even remember if it had an accessible file system.\u00a0 It was some kind of visual DOS interface, but beyond that, beats me.\u00a0 Anyway, I deleted the file and remember sitting there staring at my computer for a hot five minutes, mouth agape, and coursing with horror.\u00a0 There was no CTRL-Z back then.\u00a0 It was gone.\u00a0 It disassembled me.\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall how, but I eventually scraped myself off the floor and regathered.\u00a0 I figured \u201cif at first you don\u2019t succeed, try try again\u201d was good enough for me.\u00a0 And in the end?\u00a0 The next iteration proved to be better and richer than the first.\u00a0 So \u2018all\u2019s well as ends better,\u2019 they say.\u00a0 Man, I\u2019m full of idioms today!\u00a0 But this project never saw the light of day as, at the time, it wasn\u2019t where I wanted to go with my career: I was much more into pursuing music at the time.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> With you writing your latest trilogy as quickly as you are, do you see yourself ever returning to The Omega Room?\u00a0 Or is that something that will be from a previous life, and used to inform parts of the Dissonance books, and nothing beyond that?\u00a0 What about a reboot or a sequel to The Electric Boy?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Wow, no is the short answer on that one, only because I only have fragments and bits in my memory of what it was about, who factored in it, etc.\u00a0 I remember two characters: Will and Marshall, and there was the villain who smashed one of his erring subordinates in a swiftly closing electronic hatch, and something about being surveilled and tailed, and the Omega Room being where the climax happens.\u00a0 But other than that, no, I think it\u2019s six feet under, for good reason: it was only my first work, and a draft at that.\u00a0 BUT\u2014the Electric Boy has DISNEY written all over it!\u00a0 Wouldn\u2019t that be something.\u00a0 I should run THAT one up the flagpole and see who salutes!<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> You\u2019re certainly able to visualize your stories cinematically.\u00a0 Have you thought of the Dissonance stories the same way?\u00a0 Do you envision these getting that sort of treatment in a perfect world?\u00a0 And with that in mind, do you ever sort of fancast any of the characters in your mind?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>No, not really.\u00a0 But truth be told, in the writing, I was acutely aware that I wanted it to eventually become a screenplay and see it adapted into movie form.\u00a0 That would be SUCH a huge payoff, and utterly thrilling.\u00a0 I can conceptualize everything to a degree, and cast the imagery only so far in the realm of my imagination, but to see it take shape on the silver screen: I would probably pass out from delight.<\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> When it came time to write Dissonance: Volume I: Reality<\/em>, how did you know that story was one that needed to be committed to page?\u00a0 Was it an idea that was always taking shape in your mind, or was it something that had a sudden spark, and lit a fire in your imagination?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>I relate very well to trauma, and I was going through a bit of a traumatic period after the death of a dream to return to music in 2023.\u00a0 I figured, if I can\u2019t write it and set it to melody, then I\u2019ll write it and set it to page.\u00a0 So, this story is basically music\u2014albeit haunting\u2014without the treble clefs, bass clefs or quarter notes.\u00a0 But it has to have a cadence and a rhythm to it.\u00a0 I feel pretty naturally inclined and gifted to write out something compelling, but I knew it had to come from a place of trauma: something dystopian in nature, and something that stacked the odds against our hero(es).\u00a0 I really have a great fondness for Suzanne Collins\u2019 \u201cThe Hunger Games\u201d series, and Marie Lu\u2019s \u201cLegend\u201d trilogy, and knew those would be ideal starting points.\u00a0 And, I knew that in order to be successful, the threat (in this case being the alien beings) had to be real and unique: stemming from ideas and visions that had always terrified me.\u00a0 Thus, I went back to Greek mythology and started from Medusa the gorgon.\u00a0 Don\u2019t want to spoil anything, but that\u2019s how it started and that\u2019s where it went.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> Since it has served you well, do you see yourself reimagining other famous monsters with sort of new flavors in order to craft additional thrilling tales?\u00a0 Do you imagine you would stick to dystopia, or would you explore other genres?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Possibly, but this one just felt so natural to me.\u00a0 However, in all fairness to the story, and transparency for me, the monsters were originally called druids, and they were too conspicuously close to The Lord of the Rings\u2019 <\/em>Nazgul, or Harry Potter\u2019s <\/em>Dementors.\u00a0 They needed to be adjusted, and so I thought about what terrified me, and as my kids are constantly rehearsing scenes from 1981\u2019s Clash of the Titans <\/em>Medusa scene (that\u2019s the only scene they\u2019ve seen from the movie; I promise I\u2019m a good daddy) the name \u201cgorgon\u201d was a natural fit, especially since their paralysis ability pre-existed them actually taking on the moniker of \u201cgorgon.\u201d\u00a0 It just fit.\u00a0 I do appreciate dystopia, but I don\u2019t have to remain there.\u00a0 I can expect that my next book or series would be about something different: exploring undiscovered country as an author is pretty stretching and satisfying.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> That is a very good point, and it could very well have you stretching other parts of your creative muscles.\u00a0 While your book was dystopian, it was still kind of constrained into the land mass and landmarks of this fictional version of Tennessee.\u00a0 But crafting something from scratch has its own intrigues and challenges.\u00a0 Do you think that excites you more, or terrifies you more?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Well, I think everyone authoring a fictional tale today that takes place on Earth really has a leg up on those of years past.\u00a0 There is SO much information readily available now, free for all finders, and I found myself tracking my characters\u2019 movements along the ground in satellite view, sometimes even in Google Street View, and I found that incredibly helpful to see where they exactly were. It also greatly aided me in the storytelling, because I had written passages, for example at the church in the chapter \u201cHoly Ground\u201d, but for anyone who goes there, they would instantly know I was off kilter, because they were at first factually incorrect; Google Street View rectified that for me by showing me precisely<\/em> where they could get in, and where they couldn\u2019t, for example.\u00a0 And the characters threading their way through the cities, I could watch all of that overhead and plot it correctly.\u00a0 So it was more or less fiction transposed as a film over real-life terrain.\u00a0 Much like \u201ctracing\u201d for kids when they\u2019re learning to draw, I had my boundaries, and now I just had to fill them in with what I wanted to see in there.\u00a0 It was never really from scratch.\u00a0 I think if you are crafting something from scratch that has no basis in actual tangible Earthly reality as we know it, you have far more freedom.\u00a0 Rules can be broken with little consequence because our rules don\u2019t apply there.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> The gorgons being a part of the invasion of Earth is obviously a huge, central aspect of what is going on with your story.\u00a0 But they came from somewhere.\u00a0 Do you know where that is?\u00a0 Do you think you\u2019ll ever explore the planet or place they came from?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Once the rights are granted and contracts are in place for the movie trilogy adaptation, I\u2019m sure we\u2019ll find that out in the prequel(s). \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> A dystopian version of our world has to be difficult to truly appreciate building.\u00a0 As much as you are tearing down, you\u2019re creating in some ways.\u00a0 And you went deep into a research hole to truly get an understanding of the part of the world that you constructed.\u00a0 What was your process like in building a version of Tennessee after what must have felt like our world had ended?\u00a0 How did you get into the minds of those who surely felt like they had lost everything?<\/p>\n

AR:<\/strong> Well, Tennessee is the microcosm of course; the Earth being the macrocosm.\u00a0 I did do my research, and took my cues from both literal and fictional pointers.\u00a0 Fictional from movies like \u201cI am Legend\u201d, and \u201c28 Days Later,\u201d and literal from friends and colleagues who had working knowledge of what the earth might function and appear like after such an apocalypse.\u00a0 How would we survive?\u00a0 What would we eat if nearly all the animals were eviscerated?\u00a0 If humanity itself were annihilated, where would we find solace?\u00a0 How long would it take to build up some working defenses and the ability to mount a counteroffensive?\u00a0 There couldn\u2019t be any kind of immediate panacea; that would be too easy.\u00a0 But little by little, scrape by hard scrape, humanity is finding ways to claw back from the brink, because that\u2019s what we do.\u00a0 However, yes: as Cameron (\u201cJet\u201d) and his cohorts go through their odyssey, you are greeted with traces of dissonance, disunity, discord, disadvantage, and all other dis-\u2019s, and they see evidence of the initial invasion and its ensuing aftermath, all around them.\u00a0 (I had some great help from some trusted friends, but I\u2019m positive that there will be a gaping hole or two, some yawning chasm that I hadn\u2019t thought to leap prior to publishing.\u00a0 But that\u2019s what revised second editions are for, ha!). Additionally, however, Cameron begins to see evidence of these dis-\u2019s in humanity itself, and that leads to the greater struggle.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> While the first Dissonance novel is very much an alien invasion theme, it\u2019s also, as you mentioned, a study on the failings of humanity.\u00a0 In a lot of ways, the creatures feel like variants of zombies, as in zombie mythology, a lot of the time it is humans that are the true monsters.\u00a0 Was that the route you intended on going when you developed this tale?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>It wasn\u2019t at first, no. But with any good plot twist, it\u2019s the things that you don\u2019t see; you have to peel back the onion and expose the subterranean elements of what\u2019s really going on.\u00a0 There\u2019s always someone behind<\/em> the someone: you point at \u201cthat\u201d and say \u201cthat\u2019s\u201d the problem, when really that other<\/em> thing is the problem behind it.\u00a0 It\u2019s cause and effect.\u00a0 And it\u2019s a sad\u2014but true\u2014reflection and indictment on modern society and the \u201ccellulizing\u201d (I just coined that) that social media and narcissism has wreaked on our society.\u00a0 We\u2019re all so nuclear and isolated, and that breeds mistrust.\u00a0 It\u2019s about asking a fundamental question: can we ever really trust a person unless we\u2019re right there with them and seeing who they really are and what they\u2019re really doing and saying?\u00a0 Is everyone<\/em> nefarious deep down?\u00a0 That\u2019s the problem.\u00a0 Here we all are fighting gorgons, and yet you have these distracting elements that are eroding your support and causing you to lose focus.\u00a0 And they\u2019re supposed to be on your side!\u00a0 They\u2019re your fellow humans, for crying out loud.\u00a0 They should be supporting you.\u00a0 In a sad way, it\u2019s an invoked echo, crying out down through time from Rodney King: \u201cCan we all get along?\u201d<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> In a lot of ways, stories like these help us to understand the concept that humanity is not monolithic.\u00a0 Sometimes that can be helpful, and sometimes it can be a hindrance.\u00a0 Our differences can make us or break us.<\/p>\n

But with something like the gorgons, who can feel so primal, it might be hard to see them as anything other than monsters.\u00a0 Do they have these sorts of ethical failings too, do you think?\u00a0 Or is keeping them the boogeymen in the shadows something that works well enough for you and the tale you aim to tell?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>One of the greatest movies of all time, I consider, is the original Predator<\/em> movie with Arnie.\u00a0 That movie had its plot, its mission, and these guys were all seasoned commandos who could handle anything.\u00a0 But what the heck is this<\/em>?\u00a0 We went into the jungle to rescue Hopper or whoever it was, but all the sudden their standard plot and mission are completely and unexpectedly interrupted by something no one has ever seen before.\u00a0 It\u2019s a massive disruption and diversion from everything the characters, and us, have ever known.\u00a0 In that light, I think keeping the gorgons as unexpected monsters serves the greater subtext, and that is that the real enemy is still out there.\u00a0 At that point, the gorgons become little more than a nuisance as our protagonists find they\u2019re dealing with something far more nefarious.\u00a0 Think Burke in \u201cAliens\u201d sabotaging the Marines\u2019 escape from LV-426, because he works for The Company, and they have aims of their own.\u00a0 Those<\/em> are the ethical failings that I\u2019m really much more interested in.<\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> You set out to create a terrifying creature with the aliens you\u2019ve brought to Earth in your series.\u00a0 How did you conceptualize these frightening beings, and what ideas raced through your head as you were coming up with some of the scenes in which we experience their nature?<\/p>\n

AR:<\/strong> 1981\u2019s \u201cClash of the Titans\u201d was a staple of my youth.\u00a0 I remember running home from school, putting on some beef Top Ramen, and eating a whole pack while watching that movie before my parents came home.\u00a0 In all of the scenes, I couldn\u2019t wait to get to the one with the gorgon slithering around her temple seeking her prey, Perseus and his fellow warriors.\u00a0 Granted, there was primeval CGI back then, and it was nothing flashy.\u00a0 But it did the trick: the way that they had Medusa\u2019s stop-motion face emerge from the shadows, and her eyes light up bright green like sickly torches, accompanied by that frightening high-pitched strain\u2026.yeeshk.\u00a0 Still terrifies me to this day.\u00a0 I wanted something like that.\u00a0 Something that had the potential to completely immobilize you, and then feast on your flesh.\u00a0 I suppose, to that effect, that there may also have been a germ of thought in my brain harkening back to the dilophosaurus from Jurassic Park: spitting its paralyzing venom onto its prey before it consumed it.\u00a0 Overall, I knew it couldn\u2019t just be a capture-you-and-claw-you-to-death kind of alien.\u00a0 It had to possess some creepy additional element which would further restrict your ability to fight back.\u00a0 A truly \u201cno fair\u201d aspect.\u00a0 Thus, the \u201cYou just\u2026don\u2019t\u2026look\u201d tagline.\u00a0 You could swing your fists at it, but it would just be shadowboxing, because you weren\u2019t looking; and if you did, you were toast.\u00a0 That concept terrifies me more than being mauled by a bear, a lion, or anything.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> I definitely sensed a bit of Jurassic Park in there as well.\u00a0 The gorgons have a bit of a hard time seeing as well, so in some ways it evens the playing field a little bit.\u00a0 As much as they might feel like the dilophosaurus, they also feel like the T-Rex.<\/p>\n

Even early on, though, you allude to other versions of the gorgons.\u00a0 Do you think we\u2019ve seen them all by the time the final page is turned in Reality?\u00a0 Or are there more to come in subsequent books?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Spoiler alert!\u00a0 Oh no.\u00a0 You will see different adaptations of gorgons.\u00a0 They are evolving too, just as we are, and the universal principle of \u201cadapt and overcome\u201d: well, they\u2019re not immune to that either, and they are far from home, on an alien world for food and water, and they have to figure out how to fulfill their needs.\u00a0 But you have to remember that they\u2019re essentially drones: and drones aren\u2019t independent; they\u2019re tethered to, and controlled by, something greater.\u00a0 That\u2019s all I\u2019ll say about that part of it.\u00a0 But the berserkers, too: you learn about them in the first volume as well, and why they\u2019re \u201cspecial\u201d, and more terrifying.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> Once you put aliens on Earth, you answer the time-old question: are we alone in the universe?\u00a0 But with that in mind, are there other lifeforms in the Ryan-verse?\u00a0 Is that something that you might explore in the future?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Hey, it worked well (at first, kinda) for Aliens vs. Predator<\/em>, right?\u00a0 I think Aliens vs. Gorgons<\/em> would be an entertaining movie to see.\u00a0 Not sure who I would root for there.\u00a0 I think it\u2019s safe to say that there are, but Earth has been around for at least 6,000 years\u2026and, at least in my story, this is the first major contact that we\u2019ve had where mankind has been flipped on its head so severely.\u00a0 It\u2019s pure comedy to have the gorgons come wipe out eighty-five percent of mankind and then have a more dangerous species come wipe out eight-five percent of the gorgons shortly after that.\u00a0 Kind of like when a team like the Yankees beats our Mariners in the playoffs, we want the Yankees to then beat the next team that they face off against, because then it might make our elimination more worthwhile and those who eliminated us more formidable.<\/p>\n

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T:<\/strong> You completed this story in a very short timeframe.\u00a0 Did you know ahead of time the breadth of what you were going to be describing?\u00a0 Or was it a sort of \u201cseat-of-your-pants\u201d storytelling experience?<\/p>\n

AR:<\/strong> Oh it was definitely seat-of-my-pants organic storytelling.\u00a0 However, there were chapters like \u201cLoJack\u201d and \u201cHoly Ground\u201d during which my fingers just flew off the keyboard.\u00a0 I swear that if I hadn\u2019t written those two chapters, I\u2019d still be writing the book today.\u00a0 They just propelled me forward like a red-lining superset: I sped through those like a missile, and they became powerful.\u00a0 The rest of the story, particularly while they\u2019re journeying on the road together, took some time to write, as I had to plot their courses, literally, from aerial Google maps, using actual street names, and determine how long it would take between each point.\u00a0 And for the twists and turns, those came pretty naturally.\u00a0 Some wonderful \u201cAha!\u201d and \u201cWhat if?\u201d moments reared their heads pretty readily, which surprised me.\u00a0 I don\u2019t want to give anything away but you\u2019ll find them too, and I pray they accomplish their purpose: to terrify, inspire, delight, move deeply, and more.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> Did you have to do any sort of railroading for your characters?\u00a0 Did they want to go off and do their own things, or did you keep them in line, and they behaved for you?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>No, not really.\u00a0 I think I get a good sense of the character when I first envision them.\u00a0 Sometimes, if they appear villainous at first, they\u2019re actually noble.\u00a0 If they feel decent at first, they\u2019re really inherently evil.\u00a0 I think Cameron, or \u201cJet\u201d, is the only one whose vantage point you\u2019re seeing it from anyway, being first person.\u00a0 Because of that, you\u2019re learning organically with him, and he tends to make decisions in the heat of battle too, that take him in different directions than originally planned. \u00a0Sometimes emotions begat by certain developments necessitate that the character change, whether that\u2019s the protagonist, a supporting character, a villain, a gorgon, whomever: and you just have to roll with the punches and see where it leads from there.\u00a0 It\u2019s all a fairly natural evolution, like dropping a Plinko puck down the board on The Price is Right.\u00a0 You never know where it will go.\u00a0 Or like Forrest Gump\u2019s box of chocolates: \u201cyou never know what you\u2019re gonna get.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> While you\u2019ve just released this first book, you have two others that you\u2019ve committed to telling through 2024.\u00a0 Is that where the story definitively ends, or have you had ideas to tell spinoffs, prequels, or other parts of this universe?<\/p>\n

AR:<\/strong> Oh, I\u2019ll never tell, haha!\u00a0 Like the character of Bassett, I have to keep those cards close to my chest.\u00a0 Yes, I have to leave room.\u00a0 I\u2019m fond of cliffhangers, and I\u2019m equally fond of the absence of any finality.\u00a0 Any good story can be continued: if there\u2019s a worthy seed of continuance in there that can be harvested, any gem of furtherance that can be mined, I like to keep the doors open for that if I can.\u00a0 For now though, I had always envisioned a trilogy, although I didn\u2019t have the epiphanies of the subtitles for each book at the outset.\u00a0 That took time.\u00a0 Speaking of time, time will tell.\u00a0 Sign up at the blog at www.dissonancetheseries.com\/blog<\/a> for updates!\u00a0 But I did know that I sought to follow the pattern of Beginning-Middle-End: three acts in a play, like any of the great magnum opuses.\u00a0 I\u2019m a great fan of sequels, like so many are.\u00a0 You develop a relationship with the characters in a book or a movie, and you want to know how their life pans out, because you care deeply for them, good or bad.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> So then, Dissonance aside\u2014and we did mention other books earlier, but we\u2019ll dive in a bit further here\u2014what sort of stories are you itching to tell as you work your way through your current to-do list?<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>For now, I\u2019m super absorbed with this series, and that\u2019s all I currently see.\u00a0 But I do keep coming back to a possible storyline with a being like The Phoenix from X-Men that is terrifyingly powerful and uncontrollably deadly, and what do you do with such a being?\u00a0 If they truly are immortal, will they be noble or ruinous?\u00a0 Will they work for us, or against us?\u00a0 I\u2019ve always been impressed and interested in the indestructible antihero, like Doomsday actually <\/em>killing Superman.\u00a0 Whoa.\u00a0 They\u2019re so interesting to me, because you thought your superhero was indestructible!\u00a0 So\u2026maybe.\u00a0 We\u2019ll see.\u00a0 The gorgons have to be driven off first, and mankind has to settle back into some semblance of unity first.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> So, just to clarify, that would be part of the Dissonance part of your universe?\u00a0 That\u2019s spectacular.<\/p>\n

AR: <\/strong>Ha!\u00a0 I don\u2019t know.\u00a0 Although now you\u2019ve got me thinking SuperGorgon <\/em>wouldn\u2019t be so bad of an idea.\u00a0 *scribbles down ideas furiously*<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> With the first book having released, and the sequels soon to follow, readers are going to want to know more about you and the world you\u2019re building.\u00a0 If fans wanted to discover more about Aaron Ryan, or the Dissonance series, where could they find you online?<\/p>\n

AR:<\/strong> Well there you go!\u00a0 I\u2019d love that.\u00a0 Nothing more fulfilling than when someone buys my books or signs up on my blog for more information.\u00a0 It\u2019s such a rich reward when they do.\u00a0 So thank you for asking!<\/p>\n

My website is at https:\/\/www.dissonancetheseries.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Subscribe to my blog at https:\/\/www.dissonancetheseries.com\/blog<\/a> for updates!<\/p>\n

Follow, like, subscribe and more at https:\/\/dot.cards\/authoraaronryan<\/a>, which includes Facebook page, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok.<\/p>\n

And thank you for the interview!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

T:<\/strong> And thank you as well, Aaron!\u00a0 I appreciate you spending time with me getting into some granular details with your version of Earth, and the stories you tell.\u00a0 I also appreciate you clearing up some of the fog, and helping to give readers a greater sense of who you are, and how you came to walk down this leg of your journey.<\/p>\n

And now, to those readers: Do yourself a huge favor and check out the Dissonance series.\u00a0 You can use any of the links that Aaron Ryan has provided here, and if you want, you can check out Dissonance: Book 1: Reality<\/em> on Amazon<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Welcome, travelers.\u00a0 Our stop in the Otherworld today brings us into the dark shadows of Earth, after an intruding force of aliens has come to wipe us out.\u00a0 We listen quietly to author Aaron Ryan, who gives us glimpses into the version of our world that he is building, and into what molded him into […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34478,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[463,145,350,462],"tags":[3665,3663,303,379,3666,3664],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/Featured-Aaron-Ryan-Interview.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1UVey-8Y4","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34476"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34476"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34476\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34501,"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34476\/revisions\/34501"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tellest.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}