An Interview with Sorin Suciu

Welcome to an Interview with:

Sorin Suciu        

Author of:

The Scriptlings, a tongue-in-cheek contemporary fantasy aimed at geeks and mortals alike.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A brief synopsis:

The Scriptlings is the unlikely, yet strangely charismatic lovechild you would expect if Magic and Science were to have one too many drinks during a stand-up comedy show in Vegas.

In short, it follows the story of Merkin and Buggeroff, two magician apprentices in a world where magicians are capitalists, computers are quasi-magical, and goats are sometimes invisible – all under the watchful eye of a wandering tribe of monosyllabic demigods.

David: With Such a Canadian sounding name share your bio?

Sorin: The Suciu’s were among the first European settlers to establish a community in Canada, around the late 15^th century. They were led by my ancestor – Beaver Mapleleaf Suciu, a brave explorer and prolific patriarch. Alright, the last part might be a slight exaggeration.

I was born and raised in Bucharest, Romania; but I went and fixed this about three years ago, when I immigrated to Canada along with my wife and parrot. I bet Beaver Mapleleaf Suciu didn’t have a parrot. In your face, Beaver Mapleleaf!

David: What made you decide to write this book?

Sorin: Ever since I’ve learned English, I’ve devoured an inordinate, and quite possibly unhealthy, quantity of Humorous Fantasy. The fact that I started writing is merely a result of the old adage “what goes in, must come out.”

The Scriptlings was originally written for the second edition of the Terry Pratchett First Novel Award, which, and this here might come as a shock, it didn’t win. The winner hasn’t been announced yet, but I bet it’s going to be an awesome book, as were the two first prize winners of the first edition.

David:Where did the title come from?

Sorin: A Scriptling is a Magician apprentice, and also a completely made up word. It comes from the word “script” as used in computer jargon – meaning computer program, more or less. In this book universe, Magic and Computers have a lot in common, so the concept is not as farfetched as it might seem at a first sight.

David: I understand this is your first book in English, why this genre?

Sorin: Quite simply, I’m not sure I can write anything else. I’ve tried really hard to write something “serious,” but I kept swerving into humor alley at every possible turn. And if there wasn’t a turn, I would just make one. It’s not that I want to mock about, throwing jokes left and right. It is, most likely, a function of the fact that I’ve learned my English from Pratchett, Adams, Monty Python and Blackadder. Humor, just as grammar, seems to be a building block of the English language; and to me, English is a language to be witty in.

David: If you ruled the World what would be the first thing you’d banish? ( You’re not allowed to say nosy interviewers).

Sorin: The Imperial measuring system. But I wouldn’t banish it completely. I would keep it locked in a museum of horrors, for future generations to see and judge.

David: Boo, Hiss, keep Imperial and banish metric, the fact we have 10 fingers and ten toes ( nothing personal Anne Boleyn) is mere coincidence. I like my measurements in old money.

David:What was your destination to publishing? ie are you self published.

Sorin: I started by going the traditional way, which is to say, I went on a search for that elusive creature known as the Agent. I then learned the hard way that the Agent is a finicky critter, whose reaction to the words “I’m a new author” is to hit you with an unsavory template answer, or to ignore you completely. To this day, I’m not sure which is worse.

Luckily, someone mentioned AEC Stellar Publishing to me, and I can’t thank that someone enough for this. They are a relatively new and small publisher, with an author-oriented business model and a heart of gold. I love working with people, as opposed to working with corporations, and this is exactly what I got from them.

David : OK, What’s your fee for an introduction, grovel, grovel.

David:Share with the readers one little known fact about yourself. Not the one about being a retired pole dancer from Bratislava, we all know that.

Sorin: That Bratislava gig was just a phase, alright? But I did break some hearts when I left, if you really must know. I still get fan letters, and it is probably a mercy that I don’t speak Slovak.

What else… Well, before being a wannabe writer I used to be a wannabe musician. However, this plan was somewhat thwarted by the fact that I was tremendously unskilled with musical instruments. You might even say I swerved towards literature because a keyboard is much more forgiving than a piano.

David: You obviously haven’t duse mi kyebroad.

David:Do you have a website to share?

Sorin: Sure, it’s www.sorinsuciu.com and I advise you to enter at your own risk.

David:Any Link to the Book?

Sorin: The Scriptlings is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Goodreads. You can also find plenty of news and updates on my website, and on www.facebook.com/TheScriptlings.

David:Please feel free to share an excerpt.

Sorin: Alright, here is the passage that might explain the mouse-shaped door knocker on the front cover:

“He climbed up the steps to the massive front door and reached for the knocker. He paused, regarding the thing with mild disbelief. It was, at least judging by its placement on the door, very much a knocker. It also had the familiar shape of a computer mouse decorated with an engraved motif resembling an eye. Wonderful craftsmanship, Simon decided with the expert eye of one who had played enough computer games to know art when he saw it.

Despite his best efforts, his attempt at using the knocker in the traditional way proved unsuccessful. The thing was stuck to the wood frame, and although a crowbar might have been useful in these circumstances, Simon had completely neglected to bring one to the interview.

But say what you will about Simon, he was, by no means, a man without problem-solving skills. In fact, Simon was one of those rare people who were naturally unhindered by their own lack of expertise and who also had an uncanny ability to find shortcuts where no shortcut ought to be. Simon did not solve problems, he just shamed them into going away. As he held his palm over the brass mouse, years of muscle memory kicked in, and he double-clicked. His brilliant efforts were rewarded with a ding-dong.”

David : Thank you Sorin for such an entertaining interview though we should impress on the readers that your book is entirely autobiographical but written by someone else about someone else completely.