Featured Interview With A.S. Norris
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
First raised in Virginia before my family moved to southern California when I was a teenager. Since then I’ve lived in Japan, Florida, and now Louisiana. Had a very adventurous life growing, between backpacking/camping with the Boy Scouts, a pilgrimage to France and Italy, and, of course, the obligatory Griswold family vacations my father would take us on. The adventures continued when I entered the Navy after college, spending several deployments traveling the southeast Asian region. Now I’m married with a daughter, yet that adventurous side of me hasn’t stop burning deep within me.
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
I never really had a fascination with books (blasphemy! I know). But I did grow up reading dumbed-down versions of classics from the likes Robert Louis Stevenson, The Hardy Boys, and some others. Getting older I found Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Brian Jacques, and Susan Cooper, among others. Adventure and fantasy books are my go to for fun. On a more serious side, I like history books.
To say I’ve been writing since a kid would be cliché and only partially true. “Writing” then was me inserting myself into Disney stories and the like. It wasn’t until senior year in high school that I really started writing something unique. I finished my first book in college, but it never saw the light of day beyond a few chapters I posted on an old forum. It was tragically lost when both my laptop crashed and burned and my backup hard drive disappeared off the face of thh earth within the same week. There was a long drought after that until in mid-2020 a dream inspired me to write it down. That funny little dream would become the beginning tavern scene in my first published book, “The Wayward Mage,” and I haven’t stopped writing since.
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
My favorite authors depends on my mood at the time. But Tolkien ranks up there. For humor and interesting ideas, Terry Pratchett’s “Discworld” series is a favorite. As you can probably tell, fantasy and adventure are my go-to genres. As for inspiration, should I mention Tolkien again? Truth is that every author I’ve mentioned so far has in some way inspired my writing style. I also can’t forget to mention God, because there’s no way a simpleton like myself could have dreamed up that elaborate tavern scene and have it play out with any sort of clarity; nor could I continue to jot down ideas for future books if it was just up to me.
Tell us a little about your latest book?
“The Forbearing Mage,” which debuts on Amazon April 25th, is the second book in “The Adventures of Jack Wartnose” series. It continues a couple months after the events of the first book, “The Wayward Mage,” and follows Jack Wartnose as he now must confront his estranged daughter, Margaret, who’s come to kill him over what happened between him and her mother decades ago. At the same time, he draws the attention of the Mage Council, who did not approve of his quest to retrieve the potentially cataclysmic Tome of Time, and a hidden dark lord who has his own designs for the fabled Tome.
At its core, this series is a tale of a man seeking forgiveness for his misspent youth while learning to be a better husband and father to his growing family, all told through the lens of an epic fantasy journey. It’s a family friendly fantasy adventure with a slight edge for older children and adults, ala Princess Bride or Pirates of the Caribbean, while still offering clean humor and romance. I hope you all will join me along for this adventure!
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