Posted December 10, 2002

TWC: No, it wasn't stressful. It just became an evening and weekend habit--more than a habit, an addiction almost.

P: You must have spent a lot of time imagining what it's like to be on Mars. Was that easy to do?

TWC: Yes, I did spend a lot of time imagining the view from the surface of Mars. It wasn't that easy, even though I've got a very vivid and colorful imagination, and a clear grasp of how Nature works. It did take work.

P: Can you give me an example?

TWC: Well, take the landscape in the western Kasei Valley region. We have a wealth of satellite images, and, of course, the ground images from the Pathfinder and Viking missions. That data from Mars let me visualize pretty accurately what you would see if you were standing at a specific spot in the Kasei Valley region, looking in any direction, at any time of day, and at any season of the year; but to reach that correct visualization I first had to do a great deal of calculation based on the raw data.

P: And you think it was important for you to be able to accurately visualize the parts of Mars you were writing about?

TWC: Yes, because the story events are taking place in a specific region of Mars that is integral to the story both in very big ways, and in small, almost incidental ways.

P: Could you explain what you mean by a specific region of Mars being integral to the story in very big ways?

TWC: The story is deeply rooted in the Kasei Valley region centered on Leaf Valley and Elbow Plain. If you tried to move it even twenty-five miles in any direction, there'd be no story. This is quite different from the other Mars stories that have been published in recent years. It seems to me that you could easily move them hundreds of miles without much effect on the story--with the possible exception of Gregory Benford's Martian Race. That obviously can't be moved out of Gusev Crater--but Gusev's a very big crater, 100 miles across, and anywhere inside would probably have done equally well.

P: And what about a specific region of Mars being integral to the story in small, almost incidental ways?

TWC: That's hard to explain, but it's as if the terrain was in sympathy with the events of the story.

P: Can you give me an example?

TWC: Let me see. Take this short passage from the start of Chapter Eleven:

     . . . On the west side of the valley, opposite the rampart, Outlook Shelf lay bathed in morning sunshine, glowing bright orange. However, befitting the occasion perhaps, a deep shadow lay on the road down from the shelf, along the side of its north-facing escarpment.
        Two rovers were making their way slowly down the steep escarpment road. The Zen master was driving the lead rover. . . .

It's a very sad occasion, as the rovers travel down that steep road, and Mars appears to sympathize by keeping the road in deep shadow. And if you were there, at that time of day, and that season of the year, the escarpment would be in deep shadow. At other times of the day and year, it would not.

P: I see. And you say that in the process of continually visualizing that part of Mars, you almost became addicted to the place?

TWC: Yes, maybe like Denise in the story. She was so attached to the place she couldn't bear to leave it.

P: Do you mean that you could feel yourself how she must have felt about the place?

TWC: Yes, I suppose so.

P: That probably explains why her attachment to her Martian home comes across so powerfully. And I suppose if you had been in her shoes you wouldn't have wanted to leave either.

TWC: No, I would not. I'd have fought to stay, just like her. I think many readers would too.

P: Do you think that in the future, when human beings finally do set foot on Mars, that they'll want to stay too?

TWC: I'm convinced of it, especially if they land in a place like Kasei Valley. I've often heard NASA engineers say that it's no problem getting humans to Mars--the problem is the hardware to get them back to Earth. I've a feeling they may have it all wrong: The problem may well be that the first humans on Mars won't want to come back, once they get there. I can imagine a scenario ...

P: Did you ever find yourself with writer's block when you were writing Give Us This Mars?

TWC: Not really, but at one point I had to stop writing for about four months.

P: Because you couldn't decide how the story should unfold next?

TWC: No, not at all. It was because I couldn't decide on the correct way to tell the story. I mean, what to put in, and what to leave out. My problem was coming up with the most effective way to relate what was going on in a particularly critical episode. Where I was forced to stop, at the start of Chapter Eight, which is about dramatic events in the labyrinth, I realized I didn't like the way I had originally planned on telling the story, and couldn't see a better way to do it. So I just stopped.

P: How did you eventually solve the problem?

TWC: The way all writing problems are solved. The rule is simple: You can't write writing; you can only write about something. So you must first visualize very carefully the scenes, events, and characters you want to describe. My problem was that I hadn't done enough visualization, but by the end of that 4-month period I had visualized events in great detail. I could clearly see then that there was only one way to tell the story, a way very different from my original plan. I threw out the last 20% of Chapter Seven, and then went forward into Chapter Eight at full speed. Sometimes you have to go backward first, in order to go forward.

P: Were there any other problems?

TWC: Yes, I had trouble with the beginning.

P: With how the story started?

TWC: No, that was a given. Again, it was with the best way to relate the beginning. In As It Is On Mars I got flak from some quarters for starting on Earth and not on Mars. With that book, I could indeed have started on Mars, but I would have needed to use flashbacks to cover the important events on Earth that triggered the story. The problem is that I detest flashbacks. I much prefer chronological order.
      Anyway, with Give Us This Mars, the first version had the story starting on Mars with the arrival of Richard Derk's Mission. But when I got to the end of the first draft of the book I realized the beginning wasn't good enough. So I did a second version. This time, the story started on Earth just after Derk landed, with the U.S. President having a strategy meeting in the Cabinet Room in the West Wing. I soon found I didn't like that version either.
      The problem, as usual, was due to not visualizing events clearly enough. Anyway, I went on a visualization tour of the beginning of the story, imagining myself living on Earth as it was unfolding. Then I saw the answer. It was far better, and I really liked it. The correct way to start was where the previous book left off, proceed chronologically, and include only what was essential to the plot. Some readers may prefer differently, but given the story, I'm convinced that the way the novel begins is the very best beginning I'm capable of.

P: In our interview two years ago, about As It Is On Mars, you mentioned that Mars has a very great potential that nobody seems to have thought of. Is this potential revealed in Give Us This Mars?

TWC: No, it isn't. I had hoped to, but there was no space for it, because the story of the struggle over Leaf Valley took longer to relate than I thought originally.
      As you know, I had trouble getting the story finished in a reasonable number of pages. It was supposed originally to be a 15-chapter book, but ended up as 18 chapters--the downside of that being the increased printing cost, as you know. But there was nothing I could do about it, without seriously impacting the quality of the story. Every story needs it own specific number of words to tell properly; any more is wrong, and any less is also wrong.
      So there was just no possibility of including that potential I mentioned two years ago. There are only hints here and there.

P: Can we look forward to that in the next installment?

TWC: Probably. I haven't written anything yet. I'm still in the visualization stage. Of course, if Give Us This Mars is not a modest success, then there'll be no point in writing the next installment.

P: You said that two years ago about writing Give Us This Mars.

TWC: Well, I do need some encouragement, if I'm to give the next installment serious attention. Pennsylvania School Library Association's rating of As It Is On Mars among their Top Forty books published in 2001 was just the impetus I needed to do the very best job I possibly could on Give Us This Mars. But if too few people care enough to buy a reasonable number of copies this time around, it'll be impossible for me to care enough to write the next installment.

P: You must know that's highly unlikely. The early reviews all say Give Us This Mars is fantastic, as good a page turner as has ever been written, and even better than As It Is On Mars; and those reviews are mostly from readers who are certainly not Mars enthusiasts, and hardly ever read a science fiction novel.

TWC: I suspect that's because those early reviewers were mostly non technical people, and the book has almost no technical descriptions of how things work on Mars. For example, in As It Is On Mars, I felt I had no choice but to explain, as simply as possible, how the nuclear-powered rovers worked, and even how the portable nuclear power plants worked, even though I suspected most readers wouldn't be all that interested. But the story had to be credible, since what those survivors accomplished is quite fantastic.
      In Give Us This Mars, there are few such explanations. The technical and scientific background is mostly taken for granted. If you want the technological underpinnings of everything, you have to read As It Is On Mars.
      Give Us This Mars concentrates much more on things like strategic maneuvering, human interaction in both a cold and hot war setting, the human desire for something for nothing, and the issue of property rights on Mars.

P: By the way, have you any regrets about As Is On Mars?

TWC: I couldn't have written it differently, and still wouldn't. The nature of the story dictated the way it was written, and just about everybody who has read it, and written about it, liked it. Some of them liked it a lot, although some did not like the way it started.
      My only true regret was accepting responsibility for checking the final page proofs of As It Is On Mars. I'm not a good typo-spotter and I missed too many.
      At least this time, with Give Us This Mars, there were two hot-shot typo-spotters to do that job. And I've been extra careful too.

P: Yes, that was a mistake, that time. This time, we're doing it a lot better. One last question: The ending of Give Us This Mars is quite spectacular and unexpected. Did you always have that ending in mind?

TWC: No, I didn't. I did have an ending in mind as I wrote the book. But when I got to near the end, I realized that the inevitability of the story dictated a quite different ending, which I had not foreseen at all, but still one that lay within the parameters of the overall saga.

P: So as you wrote the book, you truly did not know the ending?

TWC: No, I did not.

P: Well, thank you very much for this, and good luck with the next installment.

TWC: You're very welcome, and thank you.