Author Bio: Steven Savile

Our commissioning editor, Sally Malcolm, talks to Steven Savile, author of STARGATE SG-1: The Power Behind the Throne

1) How and when did you become a fan of Stargate SG1?

I always loved the concept of a gateway to the stars. Who wouldn’t want to step through it, seriously? Who wouldn’t want to go out there and find life?

I was always a fan of this kind of journey, be it from Chariot of the Gods to Moorcock’s Behold the Man. There’s something about this kind of science fiction that just inherently appeals to me. Yet, strangely, I didn’t watch Stargate SG-1 until late on. I’d been watching Farscape and when Claudia Black and Ben Browder came over, I followed them. Then I set about watching all of the old episodes back-to-back playing catch up with about one hundred and fifty episodes or something crazy. By then I was hooked.

2) What’s your all time favourite Stargate SG-1 episode and why?

Oh so hard to say…. I can think of two dozen off the top of my head that are a lot of fun, but you’ve asked for one, so I have to decide between Daniel ascending instead of taking retribution in ‘Meridian’, the mirror worlds stuff in episodes like ‘Point of View’ (which I loved I must confess), or the team labouring in the inferno-like power plant in ‘Beneath the Surface’, not knowing who they truly are, or the intensity of ‘Watergate’ or… No, must stop. Just one. Okay, today, right now, I’ll say the season one finale, ‘Within the Serpent’s Grasp’, where O’Neill and Carter are setting the charges to blow up Apophis’ ship – that entire storyline was exactly what good TV is all about.

3) What made you want to write a Stargate novel?

Oh boy, so many factors. In part it was for my sister and her husband, who are huge fans of the show (Hi Sarah! Hi Lee! Got a lot to answer for, haven’t you?), in part it was a case of timing, I had just watched 140 episodes of the show back-to-back for research purposes (that’s my story and I am sticking to it) and it was ALIVE in my head, in part it was because I thought I had a great idea that would make an excellent ‘season arc’ (I think the ideas in the books have a duty to be HUGE so you can get lost in them, not just a forty minute race) and in part I had just finished six medieval fantasy novels and really wanted to flex my muscles in a different direction, and in part because it was Stargate and the idea of writing O’Neill, Carter, Jackson and Teal’c was irresistible. It’s impossible really to say how much of one and how little of the other it was down to, but right at the core, the undeniable part was I wanted to do it because I was a fan of the show. I guess you could say it was a conjunction of the stars.

4) What’s the hardest thing about writing in the Stargate universe? And what’s the best thing about writing in the Stargate universe?

The hardest thing, by far, was placement. You’re writing inside the heads of these very, very well-known characters, people KNOW how O’Neill will react in a given situation, can probably guess just what sort of quip he’ll come out with, they know Teal’c’s eyebrow raise, certain things are expected. Demanded. That, plus almost 200 hundred hours of backstory, and you have to find exactly the right place to put your story, meaning certain knowledge is withheld from the characters, and yet keep within the laws of the show because you know in three season’s time X is going to happen which proves/disproves what you’ve been thinking about, or the threat you’ve been building, or, or, or… you get the idea. So much is known you find yourself working within a fairly strict framework. You can’t take liberties. But that is the same with lots of the stuff I have worked on. It is actually part of the FUN believe it or not.

So what was the best? Oh man, it’s got to be the chance to put words into the mouth of MacGyver…

5) Tell me about your favourite scene in your novel.

There’s one scene that LEAPS to mind reading the question:
I have Teal’c in a war-torn ghetto, lost to the rest of the team, and basically turn him into the Golem of Prague, or any other ‘Robin Hood’ style hero of the common people in need. I had the scene in my head from day one, it was one of those. I could see the burning buildings, the collapsed walls, the smoke, and Teal’c moving from shadow to shadow like a vengeful ghost, doing what Teal’c does best, redressing the balance…

6) What do you hope readers enjoy most about your novel?

Well I hope the fans of the show can feel my own love for it in the characters and really do feel that they’re experiencing an all-new episode with their favourite team. That’s why we do it, after all. I remember growing up reading stuff like Brian Daley’s Han Solo at the Worlds End and stuff like that, and really truly believing these were the adventures my favourite characters were having off-screen. It helped bring the universe alive to me in so many more ways. I’d love to think of some fans of the show getting the same kind of enjoyment out of Power Behind the Throne…

7) How did you become a professional writer? And do you have any tips for budding authors?

I could be flip and say it was a basic lack of other skills, but that would be presuming I have any unique skills that qualify me to be a writer. In truth I came late to writing (I am seeing a pattern develop here) at least if the biographies of friends who wrote their first stories age four are to be believed. I used to bunk off university to write, but what that really translates to would be something more like I used to bunk off university to stare at a white sheet in my typewriter and then go have a beer and lament having not written. I wrote three novels and lots of short stories to no success, and I mean NONE during this time, The Last Angel (which I’ve just made available via the Kindle for a whopping 99c), The Sufferer’s Song (a massive 160,000 word horror novel set in my home town – who doesn’t fantasise about killing friends and blowing up local landmarks? Oh, only me… okay) and Laughing Boy’s Shadow. I went through about eight agents who kept telling me I was a genius, that I was so talented, that these books had to sell, but they never did, and for a long while I lost heart.

I emigrated to Sweden and wrote a few new short stories, and something happened, somehow I was writing with a new voice and a new passion and was (dare I say it) getting better at being me and saying what I wanted to say. Then I wrote Bury My Heart at the Garrick, a story about Harry Houdini, which won the Writers of the Future Award (the only European winner that year from tens of thousands of entrants) and that changed everything. Suddenly, judged by the likes of Tim Powers, Larry Niven, Robert Silverberg, Kevin J Anderson and so many more brilliant writers, I had been found worthy. That was the shot in the arm I needed. I think I worked maybe 3 more years as a teacher, then quit, leaping into the unknown. Hunger is a great motivator.

As to recommendations, don’t get a good job, you know one of those career ones, because you’ll never be hungry and won’t have that same burning need to feed yourself… I practice what I preach. I’ve had dozens of jobs that lasted no more than a few days before I walked out…

But in all seriousness, write. Put your backside in the chair and write. I learn by doing. Read. Not just the kind of genre you want to write in but out in all sorts of other subjects outside of your comfort zone. And THINK… think about what you are watching, about the visual clues and how the writers seed in ideas so nothing comes out of the blue… it’s a craft, and crafts can be learned. You don’t have to be a born writer… I’m not even sure being a born writer helps as, with lots of things, if you are too talented, you have it too easy and aren’t forced to push yourself. In everything I do I want the current thing to be better than the last thing, and so on and so forth.

8) What’s your opinion of fanfiction? And have you ever read or written any?

I wrote about a million words before I wrote anything someone was actually willing to pay for. I’m not sure there’s much difference outside the fact that once I did start selling I was able to publish these ‘trunk’ stories that I always knew were good enough… indeed some of the magazines that had rejected the self-same stories bought them a few years later once my name was starting to get out there…

So I am all for you doing anything that improves your skill and helps you hone your craft.

Equally fanfiction is vital for maintaining the community feel of a show, especially after it goes off the air. It gives the fans more of what they want. And I’ve read some, not a lot, but some. And some of it was great. Some of it wasn’t.

I’ve never written fanfiction though, unless you count the pitch I did for Boxtree for a Quantum Leap novel (Justifying Eden) that never happened…