Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s stories have appeared in places such as Imaginarium 2012: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing. She operates a micro-press, Innsmouth Free Press, in her spare time. This Strange Way of Dying, now on sale, is her first collection. You can find her on Twitter @silviamg or at silviamoreno-garcia.com. Her story “River, Dreaming” appears in Issue #17.
Tell us how “River, Dreaming” came about.
I wrote “River, Dreaming” because flash fic is the easiest way for me to be lazy and still write. Eventually I imagine I’ll end up penning haikus.
Your first short fiction collection will be released later this year and you have also crowd-funding your novel, YOUNG BLOOD. Tell us something about both projects.
My collection is called This Strange Way of Dying. It has a bunch of reprints and two originals. The fiction is tied by the theme of Mexican folklore and culture, whether it’s science fiction (aliens visiting Mexico) or the magic realism international audiences associate with Latin American writing (like a historical story). Everyone must buy 10 copies so that I can make some cash out of this! Short story collections don’t exactly pay big advances. Short literary collections probably even less.
Young Blood got funded! Yay! It started as a short story published in the Evolve 2 anthology and then I decided to expand it. It’s set in Mexico City, like much of my work, and focuses on the encounter between a teen garbage collector and an Aztec vampire. There’s narcos and bad cops. It’s YA and it’s a little noir. It’ll be out next year, so I guess I need to get back to that and finish it.
Dead North, Sword & Mythos, Fungi. You edit as well as write. Which appeals to you more, or does it depend on the day of the week? Does one fuel the other?
I’m a mercenary and perpetually broke, so I’ll do anything for money. You want me to write a story about tentacle porn set in Vancouver? I’ll do it. Want me to edit an anthology of punk mermaids? Hey, I’m there. The publishing and editing earns me more money than the short stories or novels, so I’ve been doing progressively more of that. I like publishing more than editing, but overall I like all three. It’s a different experience with editing than with writing. If I had a rich patron, maybe I’d do more writing. So if you’re reading this and you are a millionaire, call me, maybe.
What is currently in your cd player/iTunes/Spotify/8 Track?
Daft Punk! I don’t normally listen to music and when I do it’s old stuff (Abba and Journey and random stuff), but they have their new album and I like their sound, so I thought, let’s buy it.
What is your favorite Bradbury story/novel?
I read all his short stories when I was a kid because my mother had this big omnibus of his work. I haven’t gone back to it in years, but there were these stories about a weird family of monsters and creatures. There’s one story about a boy who is normal and how badly he wants to be a monster to fit in. It was cute. “The Small Assassin” is about this evil baby. It was memorable. I also watched the TV show where they adapted his stories, the one that ran back in the 80s. Man, that was a while back!