I had the opportunity to interview science fiction author Tom Tinney. He’s probably best known for the novel Blood of Invidia, a Dragon Award Finalist co-written with his son. His freshman effort was a space opera novel Threads.

 

Tamara Wilhite: Blood of Invidia has vampires, werewolves and aliens. Is it fair to say it is an alien invasion novel where they use the worst horror tropes against us?

Tom Tinney: I’d say an Alien assimilation novel. Humanity is an outlier in a populated galaxy, drawn into long standing rivalries and events that paly out here. It was a departure from my first book, Threads.

With Threads, the intent was to put the reader into a state of mind where they had a pretty good bead on the universe I had built and the direction things were going. Then, halfway through that book, I turned everything on its ear and everything they thought they knew was just misinterpretation of what had been written.

I know that sounds strange, but people have emailed and texted me when they hit the middle….and they were a little miffed. Mostly because they hadn’t seen it coming and had to go back and see if I had cheated to get to that point. And I hadn’t.

With “Blood of Invidia”, Morgen and I wanted to be more linear in its approach, with the surprises coming from every direction. I will say this, the key to both of my books is in the Prologues.

 

Tamara Wilhite: What inspired you to write “Blood of Invidia”?

Tom Tinney: There were 50 text messages with my son, Morgen Batten. Up to that point, he and I had never met in person (I didn’t find out about him until he was an adult). We were doing one of those “Wouldn’t it be cool if a story had…” back and forth sessions from halfway across the globe. The messages were just spit-balling and happened well before I wrote my first novel “Threads”. I saved the message thread, like I do most things when to comes to him. About a year after “Threads” was published, I went back to those text messages and decided it was time Morgen and I did a real Father and Son project. I’d read some of his musings, so I knew we could do something.

 

Tamara Wilhite: It was supposed to start a series. Is there a sequel to it?

Tom Tinney: This collaboration complicated by distance and the fact that we are father and son. We are slowly working on the sequel called “Legacy of Invidia”. The first book was about establishing the universe and capabilities of the various species, as well as developing the characters. We also smoothed out our combined writing styles into a seamless storyline with the first book. We really ratchetted up the action and intensity in it. Now we have to top that. This book is a deep dive into the cultural nuances between the species in our galaxy and a drive to the bigger arcs. Oh, and LOTS of action as our human characters come into their own.

 

Tamara Wilhite: You’ve written quite a bit of science fiction flash fiction. Your stories have appeared in “The Future is Short – Volume 2”. Where else have your short stories popped up?

Tom Tinney: A few other books and on my website, where I set up my own Patreon system. One of my stories “Pest Control” appeared in “Moons of Saturn”, an anthology edited by Carrol Fix. That story got a lot of press at the time and has become one of my all-time favorite pieces to re-read. I have given serious thought into turning it into a series of shorts.

 

Tamara Wilhite: Congratulations on “Blood of Invidia” becoming a Dragon award finalist. Can you tell me more about the award and the book itself?

Tom Tinney: Making the final cut was exciting. I was even more exited for Morgen, since it was his first effort and it got on everyone’s radar. That’s when a bunch of little agenda-driven turds decided to take shots at it based on the grouping of other nominees. They discounted it and tried to cubby-hole based on the synopsis.

None of them read it, which is a good thing because it was written for people with a maturity level above “Oooh, look, I got fuzz growing on my naughty parts”, so it was way beyond them. I did not take that well. Not for myself, because I give a crap what those virtue signaling morons think, but that they went after our effort. Attack my kid? Bad idea.  That included the likes of the perpetual “I’m so enlightened” mouth the roared, John Scalzi. So, I kinda wrote this rant about what idiots they were.

Well, it was more of an epic rant. Around that same time, Larry Correia read the rant and did us a solid by posting a drive-by about us on his page. Sales lit up. We made enough in royalties to cover airfare, so I was able to fly down to Australia and meet my son for the first time. We have a video of it on YouTube (Look up Father and Son authors meet for first time on YouTube)

Tamara WIlhite: When will the “ManaTech: Mages” magical alternate history book come out?

Tom Tinney: That’s a passion project that I have not treated fairly. It’s FantaSci (Fantasy and science fiction), so I wanted to write it in epic fantasy form. Tesla, Edison, Elves, dwarves and dragons? It’s a blast to write. But it really needs to be a series of novellas. That’ll allow me to move the story along and jump forward in history as we follow the thirteen mages and the worlds they discover.

 

Tamara Wilhite: Does your love of motorcycles influence your writing beyond writing about bikes and interviewing bike builders?

Tom Tinney: Writing about events, bikes, and bike builders for “Quick Throttle” Magazine helped me develop my skills. It also made me fearless. I had carte blanche on what I wrote with very little boxing by the editor-in-chief. He was pretty much up for anything I wanted to rant about. That let me meet interesting people, see remarkable pieces of rolling art, and put a lot of miles on the bike.

The riding keeps me centered and lets me clear my head. When you crack the throttle on a long piece of highway, the motor thumping, just you and the road? That’s nirvana. The mind clears and that opens my head up to possibilities. I just moved to Texas from Wisconsin, so there’ll be a lot more pavement time in the coming years.

 

Tamara Wilhite: What are you working on now?

Tom Tinney: “Legacy of Invidia” is the priority, as is “ManaTech: Mages”. My “stick with me” fans are starting to ask about a sequel to “Threads”, as well. Sprinkle some more short stories (Including more G-Raff) and Webisodes, and I’m going to busy for a while. Since I started making my own cover art using Poser11.3, I must work that in as well.

 

Tamara Wilhite: Is there anything you want to add?

Tom Tinney: I enjoy reading and writing in numerous genres. This experience has been awesome, since my mild success has led to me meeting some Icons in the industry and interacting with them. And I am excited for Morgen, because he is at the beginning of his writing career and will do great things.

 

Tamara Wilhite: Thanks for your time.