Featured Interview With Jim Cronin
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
My story began in Kansas City, Missouri where I was born, but soon journeyed to Arlington, Virginia where we lived until I was about twelve years old. At that time, my family moved to Denver, Colorado where we have been ever since.
I attended Colorado State University, where I majored in Zoology and received a Masters in science education. I also met and fell in love with the woman of my dreams and married her soon after we graduated. We raised two wonderful sons who are now grown and have children of their own. As required in the grandparenting handbook, we spoil the grandkids rotten every chance we get.
I retired a few years ago after spending thirty-five years as a science teacher, mostly at the middle school level. Now I work part-time at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science as Educator/Performer. This means I get to become an astronaut on Mars and talk to visitors about what it’s like to be on Mars, or I am a pirate bacteriologist, or drop water balloons on visitors to demonstrate Galileo’s experiment at the Leaning Tower of Pisa. All the fun of teaching, without the papers to grade!
Somewhere in all of this I found the time to write a science fiction trilogy, The Brin Archives. This proved to be an exciting new challenge for me and, now that the trilogy is completed, I have ideas for several more novels and short stories to write in the near future.
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
I have always loved reading, even as a child. Unfortunately, I had to put aside reading for fun during my school years, but as soon as I got away from text books, I returned to the world of real novels. I love almost any genre, except maybe romance, but science fiction, fantasy, and historical fiction are my favorites.
I began to write after I retired from my teaching career. It was actually a dare from my brother who was writing a book of his own. It turned into an exciting adventure and I fell in love with the challenges of not only writing a novel, but the editing and reworking the story to make it something worthy of publishing.
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
I love reading the classic scifi authors, Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke,Robert Heinlein, as well as Orson Scott Card, Greg Bear, and others.
These authors have inspired much of my writing in that they often tackle current social issues and bring awareness to the issue by turning it into a crisis among aliens, the distant future, or some other science fiction context. I love this about scifi. Readers can often tolerate the fictionalization of our social issues when reading a more realistic account is too much to handle.
Tell us a little about your latest book?
Empyrean is the conclusion to The Brin Archives trilogy. In this story, we pick up where Recusant, book two, left off. We learn that the Skae, the alien beings who saved the Brin from extinction back in Hegira, book one, are not who they have portrayed themselves to be. The offspring of a Brin and Kolandi coupling, known as Kolbri, have a unique ability to telepathically connect with any technology. This is the result of a genetic alteration caused by the biocomuter implanted in several of the Rockers in previous books. The Kolbri also can connect to, and control travel along cosmic strings not only through space, but through time.
A small group of Kolbri, and must travel back in time to discover the origin of the interstellar war between the Skae and their enemy, the Gorvin. The Skae claim the Gorvin want to prevent them from developing a massive energy source which would provide free energy to all. But the Gorvin fear the project is fatally flawed and will destroy have the galaxy. Who can the Brin believe? Must they turn against their old friends? Only travel to the distant past can uncover the secrets and lead to the truth.
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