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Overviewing the situation

interview with Donna Maree Hanson

Donna Maree Hanson is the author of Australian Speculative Fiction: a genre overview, a comprehensive work documenting Australian sf writers publishied during the last five years. A review can also be found in this issue of TiconderogaOnline. Shortly after the publication of this exciting work, Donna graciously agreed to be interviewed by Russell B. Farr.

Where did science fiction begin for you?

Oh when television was invented… from the age of four… I was brought up on a diet of Lost in Space, Star Trek… UFO (my favourite!). Serious reading began for me at the age of 19, with Asimov's Foundation series. I read before then but didn't get the compulsive addiction disorder until that time. I don't think I understood the Foundation series then but I was hooked.

My introduction to fantasy in written form would have to be Lord of the Rings and Stephen Donaldson, Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. Let's just say that my enthusiasm for reading SF and Fantasy had a serious impact on my interpersonal relationships.

Where did your interest in Australian SF begin, and what keeps your interest going?

My introduction to Australian genre began with discovering Sara Douglass. I know this is quite ignorant but I didn't know Australians wrote that stuff and wrote it well. But that was in the dark days before I got to know the scene, before I even came across the Canberra Speculative Fiction Guild. After that I discovered Dave Luckett and read his Tenebran series and I read Traci Harding. But I think it was people like Maxine McArthur and my own desire to write that led me on the big path of discovery. Now I've read Terry Dowling, Cory Daniells, Kim Wilkins, Sean Williams, Sean McMullen, Glenda Larke, Trudi Canavan, Jenny Fallon… (better stop or I'll be doing the overview thingy again!).

Congratulations on the publication of Australian Speculative Fiction: a genre overview. What inspired you to produce this tome?

Thanks for the congratulations, Russ. The idea came when I was driving to Maxine McArthur's house… I think we were working on the Encounters anthology when this idea came down from the sky and struck me in the head. I wrote to Van Ikin and Sean McMullen to ask for letters of support and put a grant application in. It was refused but the idea was so darn good (in theory) that I couldn't let it go. It was then a matter of emptying the life savings to make sure I could produce the book to the production quality I wanted. I also had to save like mad to afford it as well. Somehow I didn't enjoy that part much. (Picture exhausted woman on computer answering hundreds of emails and no $ to spendy.)

As for out and out inspiration… I wanted to share what I like with others. Australian Speculative Fiction can be invisible on the book shelves. Often the booksellers don't know what is Australian and what is not. Also, small press gets such a difficult time. I knew this from distributing for CSFG for a couple of years. There were so many barriers to entry into the big booksellers. I could see we needed something to shout 'here we are!' However, I don't think the big booksellers are listening…

The launch went off very well. Jack Dann and Janeen Webb came up from Victoria. Jack to launch the book! Nick Stathopoulos came down from Sydney. Cat Sparks, Robert Hood, Richard and Eileen Harland came from the coast and Bill Congreve drove down too. It was great to have this support for the book. The local crowd came, Maxine McArthur, Kaaren Sutcliffe, Kim Westwood, Derek Smith, Gillian Polack, Stu Barrow, Michael Barry… and many more… and the venue, the National Australian Archives' Treasure Gallery was very swish (good food too).

Do you think it's fair to say that works of this nature will be judged by some critics on omissions as much as those people included?

There is a very strong critique culture out there among the fans. I found out about it when I was researching for this book. I found the furore over the MUP Encyclopaedia [of Australian Science Fiction and Fantasy (1998)] to be quite disturbing. Lucky for me this is a readers' guide and not an academic work or an attempt at an encyclopaedia or a history.

However this isn't to say that people are not missing from the book. By its nature as soon as you start looking you know for every person you find there is bound to be another somewhere you don't know about… and then there are the authors who don't answer interviews… or are too busy or definitely don't want to be in there.

In using an interview based approach I set myself up for some problems… what do you do with the people you want in and can't find any where? You have to make strategic decisions…

For example, one author didn't want to be in the book and refused permission to use any information on his website. I had to respect his right not be included.

Another example I can give is that I really wanted a prominent children's author and an illustrator to be in the book. I travelled to Sydney where they were giving workshops to personally give them letters inviting them to participate. (They are impossible to contact via email). That was the only reason I went and I got nothing from that. You can't force people to be included and if they are successful or too busy can you blame them for ignoring me?

Another approach may have worked and I'm open to discussion on that. What I'm saying is that there are many ways to do this type of book all of them have problems. I chose this way because I wanted to promote the genre, making Australian Speculative Fiction: a genre overview readable and well-presented were my main considerations. Comprehensiveness was a major factor but trying to or claiming to have an exhaustive, definitive guide was not what I was aiming for.

There is also the issue of timelines. Some great names aren't included. Mostly because they haven't published since 1998. However, some authors from 1998 are included, well at least one. I found that book in a bookstore and it was not until I contacted the author that I found they weren't publishing in the genre anymore. What do I say to them? Thanks but no thanks! I included them because it gives some perspective.

I think when people see what the book is and what it does then any perceived faults will fade in comparison.

How did you go about putting Australian Speculative Fiction: a genre overview together?

There was a research component that took time. Compiling lists of authors asking people to tell me if I missed anyone. Scouring book stores, scouring the internet, asking, hassling, begging — you name it.

Then there was trying to contact people. From Conflux I had a good base to start from because I'd emailed many authors personally to ask them to come to Conflux. I'd also travelled all over too. I worked from there. Publishers were able to assist in most cases.

I must say that almost all the people I contacted were helpful and giving in their time. You see there wouldn't be a book without the authors. It was their support that helped put the book together and my capacity for long hours on the internet.

Basically all but two of the interviews were done via email. Then I took the answers and selected parts to put into a feature. Some of these worked really well, especially when the author gave me material to work with. Some responses were very short and I had to do my best. Sometimes I was inspired and other times I was tired.

I read quite a bit of work as sometimes there were no review comments. A few times I had to buy the book because the interview was so interesting.

Van Ikin provided editorial comments supported by Maxine McArthur and Gillian Polack. (These two didn't have a place to hide at the time.)

The artwork is by Nick Stathopoulos and Cat Sparks did a great job on design. She sweated blood mostly during the project but she still speaks to me so I think that is good. You're still speaking to me even though I left you out!

How do you see the state of the genre in Australia at present, and how do you see things developing over the next five years?

Well there are differing opinions out there. I think what the book shows is that there is a lot of stuff out there. Not all of it published in the mainstream.

It will be interesting to see if and when there is a second edition whether there will be more or less writers. I'd bet on more writers. I currently have about five writers that I didn't know about at the time of publication. I'm sure there are more.

The interesting thing about putting this book together is that the more I found out the more I realised I didn't know and then again as I delved deeper I found more that I didn't know and realised I would never find or know it all.

Perhaps my highly paid team of researchers should be horsewhipped!

I can't say for sure that the market is expanding with regard to investment, in particular, in the large mainstream publishers. The market is very much based on sales. I think books continue to be a leisure choice and if I use my own purchasing habits to go by then DVDs are a tough competition.

Short fiction continues to be a hard sell. The feedback I've had from booksellers is that collections and anthologies don't move well. Genre magazines too don't sell well in mass market. There isn't a big mark up on the magazines and booksellers want mark up (except for the really dedicated genre sellers).

However, what I did see more of when putting the book together is small press (both local and foreign-based) and more self-published books. I see no reason for this trend not to continue. After all Matthew Reilly and Simon Haynes were picked up by publishers after they had put out their own self-published work.

With print on demand, editing, desktop publishing services around, presenting a well turned out book is not that difficult or expensive. What is hard is marketing it and selling it. Extrapolating that a bit further, the situation could arise where there are more books and more authors but not necessarily increased or booming sales.

However, I hope for more books and more sales but then I'm infected with the capitalist bug.

With regard to ezines… this is harder to judge. These take just as much work and presentation as print 'zines to do well. They may be a little cheaper but I'm not convinced. Shadowed Realms is offering pro rates on stories of up to 1,000 words. I think they've got their niche sorted and the site is certainly impressive. In my time on the Australian scene I've seen a few mags come and go, Dark Wine Sea, Redsine for example. TiconderogaOnline with its fiction, reviews and interviews has come back into the fore. But I think that, like other small press, ezines are labours of love. They are important to the genre but not huge cash-raking ventures.

Several states have very solid and well-organised writer groups, especially Queensland and the ACT. How important do you think these groups are in developing the genre in Australia, and do you see them forming their own isolationist blocs to the expense or detriment of less organised states?

There is a lot of organisation going on. I think it creates healthy competition between States as each one tries to out do the other. There is also a bit of crossover with fandom... writers are fans too. Conventions have worked well for writers to meet other writers and to market their work. I think the writers' groups work amazingly well to promote the genre, improve writing and to grow the genre. I am a lost soul who found out so much from being a part of the Canberra Speculative Fiction Guild. I discovered conventions through this group.

I don't think these groups are isolationist. I could be naïve in this sense. I see lots of sharing, a lot of cross mailing to email lists, multi-membership and a lot of working together. I also think there is a sense of helping each other because someone's success is a shared thing. It reflects on us all.

The less organised states still benefit from the well organised ones. Writers get to submit work to anthologies and participate in lists which share information and industry information. I think it is rare to see someone hoarding information. You never know these writers groups may inspire others to aspire to better things.

Given the recent discontinuation of SciFiction and the general struggle for ezines to gain recognition, where do you see their role in the genre and what future do you think they have?

The news about SciFiction is tragic because it was such a well paying and prestigious market. Ezines can be powerful tools and I can't confess to knowing what all the challenges are in running one of these. It's a transient medium. A well run ezine needs good organisation, good archiving and needs to have a good client base. I have been published in ezines but I think it is hard. Reading from a screen is hard. That's just my view but I think the medium hasn't taken on as well as it should.

I went to a conference on Archiving the Web. There are academics who curate the web, from its art, to blogs, to 'zines. There is an organisation in the USA that archives the entire WWW. It is seen as an important aspect of modern day culture. Blogs for instance are an amazing phenomenon. Hey I blog and I'm not sure why I do. It's like a dear diary for the whole world to see. Pretty scary when you think about it.

This is entirely my point of view but humans need to communicate and we'll do it by any means. I think there is a future in ezines… I don't think they will replace print ones very easily. There is something about a glossy mag, its smooth lines, its concreteness… I remember thinking that when I laid my hands on Cosmos Magazine.

You also manage the Australian Speculative Fiction website, where the work of other independent publishers can be purchased online. How did you set that up, and how successful do you feel the site has been?

Setting this up was rather easy. It is a template with the shopping cart included. I pay a monthly fee. It seemed like a good idea. However, there are drawbacks. Apparently the template uses frames so most of the content is hidden. Hence my constant splattering of book names on the home page. It is not very useful as an info site, which was part of the vision. Mainly because I get charged bandwidth when people go there. So I pay to give information… sounds silly doesn't it? I've costed the option to do an info site and basically I don't have the cash at present.

I'm happy to promote small press, self-published works (usually I read these first) and other stuff. I do it for free because part of what I want to do is promote Australian Speculative Fiction. The main thrust behind the site was to become a distributor, in particular to large book chains. This has proven hard. I haven't given up yet. I have a timeline for when I will but it isn't for a while yet. I think the practices of the large books stores and some of the lesser ones are restrictive trade practices because they don't allow entry into the market. They say go to a distributor but the distributors don't want to take small press either. It is a bit circular. You need to get books into shops so people can buy them… or have something very hot that readers will seek you out.

As far as book sales go there have been hardly any on the website. I don't know why. I think there is consumer loyalty elsewhere and that's fine by me. I want people to see the books, to see them everywhere so that one day they'll say 'I keep seeing this I'll buy it'. I don't care who they buy it from.

Of course, I can't support the site forever so if it doesn't take off then I guess I'll have to change what I do. Merchant fees have to be paid monthly along with the website fee. I don't think these costs are onerous though… not prohibitive by any means.

I sell more books at cons, to tell the truth. I always feel good when I write that cheque out to the author or publisher for books that were sold.

How important do you think independent genre publishers are to the present and future state of sf in Australia?

It is very important… it is the life blood if you ask me. Mainstream is driven by market or by PR departments. The discerning reader is looking for more, I think — looking to be challenged. I'm not saying all small press publications are perfect. They aren't but there are some diamonds among the stones for sure. I would look to small press to give me the pulse of the genre… the SF!

Small press is a labour of love. It's not cheap and it doesn't make a profit. Even then there is something alluring in it. Look at The Black Crusade and how well it did. Look at Lucy Sussex's collection, A Tour Guide to Utopia, put out by MirrorDanse, superb! There is so much richness there that you don't find elsewhere.

Small press is important and will stay important.

What's next for Donna Maree Hanson?

Blah… ugh… well let me see I think I have about two years selling Australian Speculative Fiction: A Genre Overview ahead of me. I have a scheduled publication of Kered's Crown by Kaaren Sutcliffe, launching at Conjure and I have a history book under consideration for publication. I have submission guidelines to write and my own writing to do. I have abstained from fiction for over a year now. I really do want to write. However, if the book doesn't sell then I guess there will be little working capital for other publications.

Donna Maree Hanson has been writing creatively since November 2000. With ten short stories and some feature articles published, Donna is a keen organiser and is very active in the Canberra Speculative Fiction Guild. In her spare time, when she is not running science fiction conventions (she was chair of the National Science Fiction Convention in Canberra in April 2004 and Conflux 2 in April 2005) or working in her real job as an auditor, Donna works on her novel length manuscripts and jots down the occasional short story.

Donna has also co-edited Encounters: An Anthology of Australian Speculative Fiction, (CSFG, 2004) with Maxine McArthur and edited the groundbreaking single author collection by Aurealis Award winning author, Kaaron Warren entitled, The Grinding House (CSFG, 2005).

In 2004 she started Aust Speculative Fiction, a small business to promote, distribute and publish Australian Speculative Fiction. She is currently the Treasurer of the ACT Writers Centre and lives in Murrumbateman (NSW) with her family, grapes, dog, two goats and a few ducks.

Australian Speculative Fiction: a genre overview is Aust Speculative Fiction's first publication.

Donna can be found online at Australian Speculative Fiction.