Why I Write SF/F
Every once in a while I’ll get the question, why do I write science fiction and fantasy?
The answer is: because I liked explaining my problems by saying a wizard did it.
But that’s not the whole of the answer, it’s just the shortest one. Really, I started writing science fiction at a time when urban fantasy made up a lot of my reading list. I was playing a lot of fantasy games and spent time outside the game thinking about how magic could work, how it could interact in real environments. I didn’t know a lot about genre back then, so I wasn’t thinking about creating secondary worlds or high or low fantasy. I just liked magic and science.
Liking something, however small, is at the heart of making creative works around it. I liked the idea of magic interacting with the world in ways that were both well mapped out for me the author and less well understood by my characters, the users. The idea of science in so many different offshoots of what we know today is tantalizing and a ripe ground for fiction. I love steampunk, and when I read other steampunk stories, I think about how I would write my own.
That’s a gift! When a story makes you think about your own work or how you might do it yourself, when that inspiration hits, that’s a gift. Not every story or piece of media does that. Some are just to be enjoyed. Inspiration is like an energy drink on demand that goes straight into your creative brain. I love that feeling; there are few things better. An idea that gets into my skin and won’t let me go is one of the reasons I like writing, because I can make that idea into real words and progress and keep that energy on the page.
The longer answer is I write science fiction and fantasy because I’m inspired by what I can create and what’s already out there, because for me getting caught up in a good story starts with an author that absolutely has to write their book. My energy and inspiration come better when I’m excited about my projects, and I love the intricacies of world building and mapping out complex systems for secondary worlds.
What excites you when you read it? What genres of movie are you drawn to?