Your characters, human and alien alike, are very believable. They seem familiar and comfortable. Do you find that there is a little bit of you in any of them? And if so, do you find it difficult to be less than nice to them?

Why do you work in childrens’ SF and what began your interest in it?

You have written teacher resources, sci fi novels for adults, and collections for young readers. Which area was really your starting place? And do you think it is a good idea for young writers to try lots of different types of writing, or to just concentrate on one type?

Thank you,
Del

My interest in science began soon after my exposure to science fiction at a young age. You have long been involved in promoting the use of science fiction literature in elementary and secondary schools, as a means of getting students excited about science. How did you come to be an advocate for this idea? Have many schools adopted your philosophy? Have you received much feedback from schools regarding its impact on the students?

Your education and training as a biologist has had an obvious influence on your writing. What prompted you to pursue a career in biology, as opposed to one of the other sciences?

Your love for biology comes through in your writing, especially in your Web Shifter series with Esen (my favorite character). You have a knack for really letting the reader experience being alien from a first hand account, and do a tremendous job of making the “feel” and “taste” of the alien tangible. How do you do it?

I know…it’s a vague question, sort of like how did you come about your style of writing. In a sense…how do you wrap your own mind around these concepts to relay them to us?

Make sense?

Hi,
I’m 50years old with a four year old son (Max). If only we knew how much fun it was going to be, we would of started a lot sooner :-)
BTW, Whomever stated that kids will keep you young was a major science fiction contributor.

I’d love to start a library of SF for him and hope that you’d share some other favorite titles with us. I can’t wait to read Tales from the WonderZone. It’s a great title and while our made up stories aka Tales from Spooky Woods is a favorite of his now we will switch to the tongue in cheek first millenium Viking edition of Tales from the WOMDERZOME, ie YK2, until we get the book.
Sincerely,
Mark Lawson (Lawson2k@Juno.com)
Lubbock, By God, Texas

Julie,
You have developed some wonderful aliens in all your stories, consistently making them individuals we can care about and not just something included to be different from the humans: not a ‘token alien’, as it were.
“In the Company of Others’, the alien presence is very unusual compared with your previous works. What inspired you to create the group entity that accidentally develops due to unwitting human intervention? Was it the ‘one tree is a forest’ concept?
Cheers!
Amanda :D

One of the things that first attracted me to your writings was your ability to convey the humanity of your aliens. Your stories fill me with such a sense of empathy for the characters; several of your books have caused me to tear up.

My question is how are you able to cause the reader to identify with your characters so well?

Is this empathy, shared by many thousands of your fans, a result of the reader seeing a little of themselves in each of your characters? If so, can you tell us how conscious the decision was to create these characters with foibles that we all share?

For example, many times Esen is confused by the events of her life. Another example would be the many times when Esen tries to do the right thing, but her actions cause the situation to quickly escalate out of her control. These are things that everyone has experienced and identifies with. Do you feel that this is the reason that Esen (and other character’s) suffering is so poignant when it occurs? Or are there other tricks up your sleeve that you would care to share?

Julie, do you feel that your previous history worker as an editor, effected your approach to becoming a writer? If so, what did you do differently because of your ‘insider knowledge’?

Given the recent advances in genetic engineering, the near term potential to design and/or re-design the human genome, do you feel that we are standing on the cusp of becoming something more than human? Would you care to speculate on what that ‘more than human’ would be like?

How do you feel nanotechnology (specifically, the potential creation of protein based nanites that live within our system maintaining vital organs and monitoring all the variables that keep things working) will shape humanity?

Lastly, would you be willing to be a first generation (after clinical tests had been performed and it became available to the general public) adopter of such genetic manipulation and or nanite adoption?

Every science fiction author is always asked this question…so here it is again. Who are your favourite sci-fi authors? The ones that you read now and the ones you read as a youngster that gave you the inspiration to pursue a life of science and eventually science fiction.

I am writing a science fiction story which takes place on a very large, artificially constructed planet that was built by intelligent spider-like creatures around 7 million years ago. There was more living space on it than there is on 100000 Earths. They lived on it for about 4 million years, all the while improving it. I think that this indicates that it must have been shaped like a disc, because if it were a spherical planet then it would have to be almost the size of the sun. But I am not sure that a large spinning disc can exist either. Please tell me if you can, if this idea is workable or if I have to think of something else. My website is baeba.com but there is not much about the story on there yet.