Måndagsmöte: Scott Westerfeld

I min bokcirkel tipsas jag ofta om nya ungdomsböcker (eller gamla). Scott Westerfelds ”Ful” hörde jag för första gången talas om där. Jag läste ”Parasit” och blev nyfiken, ”Ute/inne” och blev än mer förtjust, sedan serien om Tally Youngblood i rask takt (kirrade ”Specials” i NY). Scott har en hemsida och en blogg, som uppdateras regelbundet om man är nyfiken på att läsa mer om författaren.

What are you reading at the moment?

”The Forest of Hands and Teeth” by Carrie Ryan. It’s a zombie novel set seven generations after the apocalypse and quite a romance as well.

Do you like reading? Do you think of yourself as a reader?

I read pretty much all the time, blogs, newspapers, and many overlapping books. I wish I had more time to read, actually. Writing tends to eat up my ”eye time,” that is, the amount of hours I can look at text in one day. Then I need to go outside to recharge myself for more reading.

Can you mention a book that’s been very important for you? Why that book?

Hmm. So hard to narrow it down. I’m never good with favourite book or band or food questions, so I shall gracefully pass on this one.

Do you feel that your reading habits have changed over the years? More, less, different genres, etc?

As my career writing novels has gone on, I have tended to read more non-fiction. Somehow that balances the act of creating fiction. Plus my own books seem to need more research than they used to.

How’s a ”good book” for you?

A good book changes the way you see the world. In my field, science fiction and fantasy, books often take you to another world, so that when you come back to this one, you see it like a traveler returning home. The familiar looks strange, and the old conventions and traditions are brought into question.

Do you feel that books you like tend to be similar to your own style of writing?

Not really. If anyone wrote like me I’d probably be bored by them. I like writers who are much more complex at the sentence level, like Ursula K. Le Guin, or much more spare, like Elmore Leonard. I guess I’m too used to my own voice to enjoy anything too near it.

Fotograf: Samantha Jones