Joseph Sale should be an international, bestselling author who doesn’t reply to my emails or DM’s.

I’m just going to lay that out there before we get going. I think he’s such a splendid author, a mind like no other and a truly talented editor as well. His work always provokes, pushes the reader and stays strong to its emotionally grounded core. Yet – I find he’s criminally overlooked.

So, I am truly excited for Joseph to join us today and I hope those who’ve not read his work yet, discover him and dive into the phenomenal worlds he has conjured.

Please, do welcome, Joseph!

Steve: Question 1 What does your writing time look like? Do you try to write at the same time each day? Do you have a word count you attempt to hit?
Sale: The answer to this question has changed quite a bit over the years, so I hope you don’t mind a long-winded reply!
I personally believe that writing at its best is not an act of output, but paradoxically of input. In other words, not speaking but listening to the inner voice. My best writing feels like someone else wrote it, and I think in one sense this is literally true. The Greeks referred to this as the Daemon. We also have the term “Muse”.
In addition, as authors (or Artists if we want to go that far), we are constantly evolving and changing due to new experiences, and the creation of each new project is therefore a process of self-discovery and initiation. As a result, I find it very difficult to replicate any previous creative process and re-use it. I couldn’t, for example, just sit down and write another novel like Beyond The Black Gate. That book came from a very specific place in time, from specific feelings, and was channelled in a very specific way. If I tried to replicate it, the result would be something inferior to the original, a pale imitation of myself. Some writers do seem able to write very consistently in one genre and with one aesthetic to their work, but I find my writing has to change with each new concept.
This doesn’t mean, of course, that I just sit down and wait for inspiration however! That way lies stagnation and procrastination. What I tend to do is try to gently invoke and invite the creative fire, whether this is through meditative practices, illustration, painting, listening to or composing music, or journalling. Usually, with a combination of these practices, I find the kernel of an idea. I then will likely experiment with some writing to see if the idea captures the imagination and is sustainable. With prose I normally aim for 2,000 words in a day. With poetry, I will content myself with one stanza, because poetry is far more creatively demanding and distilled.
I abandon many, many projects because they are simply not good enough (I once abandoned a novel 50,000 words in). Maybe they have a great setting but the characters aren’t right. Or maybe the characters and setting are strong but there simply isn’t a story I can conjure out of them that will capture the reader’s attention. I used to feel bad about these “lost projects” but now I really come to see them as a natural part of the creative process (one of the few parts that does remain a constant, actually). Usually the idea I end up running with long term has some elements from all the abandoned ideas, a kind of Frankenstein’s monster of hodgepodge parts!
In terms of timing, I used to write a lot in the mornings, but now I generally find I’ve become an afternoon writer. I have no idea why this change has occurred! Maybe it’s due to me shifting to self-employment. I no longer have to get the words out before the commute.
If anyone reading this is interested in learning more about my creative process, I actually have a book coming out August 11th entitled The Divine: unlocking the magical creator within which is a book on writing craft and channeling creative inspiration.

Steve: If you could write a story for another author’s fictional world/series, which would it be and why?
Sale: This is an awesome question! There are so many great worlds to choose from. What I think is interesting, though, is that sometimes the best worlds are not the ones you want to write in, because they’re already so perfect. For example, I would never dream of trying to write in Middle Earth; what could I possibly add to Tolkien’s world?
Lovecraft’s universe is always an interesting choice, of course—those cosmic gods were so influential on me—but much of his world is freely available to use anyway, so I won’t choose him. The same goes for Carcosa, which is another fictional world that fascinates me (if you haven’t already, you should definitely read the original Robert W. Chambers stories, and the contemporary short story collection by Brian Barr—his reinvention of Chambers’ work is ingenious and enthralling).
I would probably therefore have to pick Quiddity, which is the secret world of the dream-sea in Clive Barker’s amazing but unfinished Art series (currently composed of The Great and Secret Show and Everville). It is such a fascinating world and even after two books we only really get glimpses of its strangeness. There is so much unexplored territory and that is what makes it interesting to contemplate as a guest in its vast splendour.
I am almost ashamed to admit I once had a dream in which Barker had passed away and his ghost came to me and demanded I write the third and final book of the Art series. I woke up distraught with grief and had to check the news—relieved nothing had happened and it was just my overactive imagination (though it felt disturbingly real).
I hope people will not interpret this dream as ego (I was quite panicked and horrified by the prospect of taking on something so important). I love Barker’s world so much, and the characters within it are so fascinating, but I know I am not on his level, not even in the same stratosphere, and the only person who can finish that series is the genius Barker himself.

Steve: Tell me about your newest release (novel/story/poem/novella) and why someone should read it!
Sale: Very kind of you! My most recent release is actually the third book of The Illuminad trilogy: The Tower Outside of Time. It is probably a book best enjoyed having read the first two books in the sequence. Book 1, Dark Hilarity, is currently only 0.99c on Amazon, if you are at all curious.
The Illuminad series is about friendship, friendships which will be put to the ultimate test in a dark fantasy world… It features four female leads, a serial killer rockstar, a Laughing God, and scenes of pure horror. Funnily enough several authors have compared it to Barker’s work in terms of its feel and genre, so if you like horror mixed with dark fantasy, it might well be your cup of tea!

Steve: Bonus Question! Do you have a cherished book?
Sale: I have so many! This is a positively cruel question, haha!

However, I would probably have to say my copy of Grady Hendrix’s Satan Loves You, signed and personalized by the author himself, would have to take the biscuit. I will never forget my meeting with Grady Hendrix and how insanely kind and generous he was. When I brought him this book at the book-signing he was genuinely shocked and surprised to see it in the wild, and I think quite humbled to realize how long I had been a fan of his and collecting his books (I had all of his books except one with me, a total of seven in all). Satan Loves You is not my favorite Grady Hendrix book (that award goes to My Best Friend’s Exorcism) but there is something totemic and magical about that book—perhaps it’s simply that I connect overmuch with the main character of Satan?—and this has only been amplified by its rarity.

A good book can be a friend in hardship, speaking to you on not just a surface level, but a subconscious and spiritual one. Sometimes the narratives contained in books can help us re-write our own. That’s the power but also responsibility we hold as authors!

Thanks so much for having me!

That is amazing!

Thank you so much, Joseph!

To find out more of his work – check the links!

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Joseph-Sale/e/B00MEHVY5W

Twitter: https://twitter.com/josephwordsmith

Website: http://themindflayer.com/