Interviews

interview by Vianne Venter

Like a lot of my stories, this one showed up one morning as a fully-formed image: of a man in overalls disintegrating as he’s shuffling down the street. Figuring out who that man was and what was happening to him created the story.

Issue 18 (Feb 2012)
Read more »

interview by Vianne Venter

I’ve worked in three different research labs with rats, mice, pigeons and monkeys. Since quitting that line of work, I’ve done the proverbial one-eighty and am now an animal rights advocate.

Issue 18 (Feb 2012)
Read more »

interview by Joe Vaz

Oh see, this is where I reveal what a sad person I am. The title was a pun and a really, really pointless in-joke. Jack of Spades was a play on jack-of-all-trades, and Jacek is the jack of spades to Queen Vicky's queen of hearts. Um, also, you can't reverse a jack of spades. You can however, reverse a page of swords. So yeah.

From Issue 17 (Jan 2012)
Read more »

interview by Joe Vaz & Karen Jeynes

I OFTEN WISH I could bring the readers of Something Wicked along with me to the interviews I do. They are always a lot more fun and interesting than comes across on the page, mostly because for the written interview I have to edit all the tangents out for brevity. Sam Wilson and Charlie Human were no exception.

From Issue 17 (Jan 2012)
Read more »

interview by Joe Vaz

It's a ballad about ghosts and a lighthouse, but the similarities end there. The ghost in the rain was inspired by the ghost in the song.

From Issue 17 (Jan 2012)
Read more »

interview by Joe Vaz

The initial seed came from a radio documentary on one of the last great castratos (though I forget the name of the individual). They talked in great detail about how the best castratos were adored and pampered and doted on by the aristocracy. That germinated and ended up combining with an old idea (the floating cities on a flooded

From Issue 17 (Dec 2011)
Read more »

by Joe Vaz

I’m really lucky. I can work within an established world/setting/context with the same zeal that I approach creating my own worlds. There is a different framework of rules, but the work is essentially the same. Create a hero, give him/her something interesting to do, add lots of conflict, and keep the pacing up.

From Issue 17 (Dec 2011)
Read more »

interview by Joe Vaz

As I was setting the story from the zombie's viewpoint I figured grunts would not be the way to go. A narrative of grunt, grunt, grunt, ugh, argh, grunt, grunt might have been off-putting.

From Issue 16 (Dec 2011)
Read more »

interview by Joe Vaz & Vianne Venter

DANNY TREJO HAS ONE of the most iconic faces in movies today, yet very few people know his name. Ask anyone if they’ve ever heard of him and most people will say no, then show them a picture and watch the recognition bloom across their face.
For nearly three decades Danny Trejo has been playing every type of convict or bad guy under the sun but thanks to Robert Rodriguez’s casting of him as a Mexican “Q”, who provides all the gadgets and toys to the heroes, in his Spy Kids movies, Danny Trejo’s popularity has evolved beyond “bad guy to have in your film”, to “fun guy to have in your film”.

From Issue 16 (Dec 2011)
Read more »

interview by Joe Vaz

I think we're only a few mutations away from a serious pandemic at any time. All you need is one really nasty airborne virus with a two-week incubation period, and WHAM, it's bye-bye humans.

From Issue 16 (Dec 2011)
Read more »