Interview with Steve Exten

Emma Dhesi  00:00

Steve Exten believes in the weirdly possible, and that in the vast starry soup we call The Universe is certain we are not alone. He says there are such things as fair folk and the woodland Green Man. And why shouldn’t there be ghosts? What are ghosts anyway? Steve reads maps as you might read a book, especially the Ordnance Survey maps, they have, he says so many stories to tell, and on so many different levels. Not surprisingly, he has a love of geography, as well as social and mediaeval history. When Steve started writing about the atom spheres, mobile phones were still the size of suitcases and smartphones weren’t even a smart idea. He lives with his wife in South Gloucestershire, just across the river Severn from Wales. Let’s find out what these atoms fears are anyway, shall we? Welcome to the turning readers into writers Podcast, where we teach beginner writers how to find the time and the confidence to write their first novel. I’m your host, Emma Desi. And I’m very excited that you’re here. Thank you for joining me today. Because if you’ve been longing to write your novel for forever, then this is the place to be. Think of this as your weekly dose of encouragement of handholding and general cheerleading, as you figure out how you’re going to write your first novel. Trust me, as a mom of three young kids, I know how tricky it can be to tuck some time aside for yourself on a regular basis. And even when you do find that spare five minutes, you can feel so overwhelmed that new writing gets done. Trust me, I have been there. But this podcast is going to help you in practical ways. Because once a week, I’ll be delivering an episode that gives you steps to building a writing routine, encouragement to build your confidence and cheerleading until you reach the end. Okay, let’s start. Well, thank you, Steve, for joining me today. Thank you so much. I really appreciate your time. And I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got into writing?

 

Steve Exten  02:18

Well, I started writing, trying out children’s stories and things. And some strange ideas about different things, different influences on that. But so I wrote some storage children’s stories for my granddaughter who was about five at the time. Now she’s 35. And I never actually finished them. So I thought about I was I thought the only way into writing was through traditional publishing, I didn’t really understand how it worked. So I just wrote anyway, because I liked it. So that was about 30 years ago. And then life happens, doesn’t it so you everything gets in the way you move house or you you’ve got a job or whatever. So so everything sort of went on the back burner for a while. And then and then I did I did write some stories that were absolute rubbish and really boring. Even even after I’ve read them myself. I thought they were great at the time. But after reading them, I thought this is terrible. And then I thought I had this idea about Have you seen the film, little soldiers, small soldiers had this idea about what what if we were invaded by a small, but an army of Small Soldiers. And I had this idea about writing a story around that, but they they grew in size from 12 inches tall to about six foot. And so then I had another idea. What What if there was people around that there there but you can’t see them? A bit like elves and fairies. So then I’ve thought wonder if I could write a story that would would like if I could hold a story together over 100 pages? Well, 190,000 words later. Wow. Yeah, I had I had this huge story which I started in 1998. Before technology was really as it is now. You know, when when when a mobile phone was the size of a suitcase and and things like that. So now we got smartphones. So I wrote this huge story, which ended up as about 670 pages. But in that story I created History. And I, and I based it around a holiday resort in space. And then, and then a disaster, found the family on a one time holiday, and then something goes wrong, and then it gets fired back in time. And then it pops up 30 years later, and you have created a time scale and a landscape. So now I thought, Well, I’m not gonna be able to, because I was still thinking you still had to go down the traditional route, I didn’t really know, when you go on Amazon, and you see all those books, you think, Well, they’ve all been lucky, they’ve all managed to find publishers and agents, I didn’t realise you could do it, publish it yourself. So once I found out you could do that, I thought no one’s gonna want to buy 670 pages of a story they never heard before. So I wrote another, which are published at the end of September, about two of the main characters and how they got together. It’s sort of a lead in it’s a it’s a magnet to the other one, which I’ve now written the magnet for that one. So it’s, it’s, it’s a leading story about two of the main characters and how they get together and how the disaster happens. And what are the instances that creates everything else?

 

Emma Dhesi  06:33

I see. So I can tell from what you’ve said, then. So you’ve been writing a lot over the last 30 years or so. So you’ve got a real big back catalogue of words there. So how do you balance your writing time with the rest of the family life and, and that, you know, the paid job that we all have to do.

 

Steve Exten  06:55

And when I wrote the big one, started in 98, since I started writing that one, I moved house twice. I’ve had lots of different jobs, I’ve worked to work too broad. So and I’ve been to college, so that just got interspersed with what I would how I was living. Like, when I have time, I write a lot. When I don’t have time I fit it in in between times, I work 37 hours a week, I start work very early, I finish about three in the afternoon, I usually have a sleep, and then I then I in the evenings, I write for two or three hours before I go to bed. And Fridays. While I was right, I was designing, I was doing cover design this morning. So I’ll do my own cover doing that. And over the weekend, I might do some writing, I don’t really have a routine, I do it. Do it when I’m in the mood. And I might write for an hour. And then I might have an hour’s break and have a coffee, then I’ll start again.

 

Emma Dhesi  08:05

And when you when you do have a writing session, do you do you have a goal for that session? Do you use it just for a set period of time, or maybe to write a scene or perhaps to write a certain number of words.

 

Steve Exten  08:23

If I can get writing and I’m in the flow, I can probably do a couple of 1000 words, two or three hours. And, I tend to write. And then the next day I’ll read it through and edit it. And I tend to go back several, pages or several chapters and read it through. So it always, even if I’m to two or three months apart, it’s always going to have the same flow to it. So when I wrote the 190,000 word one, and I’d left it for two or three years, because of circumstances, I went back and re read it. So all of the current flow at the time. So I don’t necessarily have a set goal. So at the moment, I’m trying to design the cover, so I’m spending all time on that. It is however it happens at the time really can’t be more specific than that. 

 

Emma Dhesi  09:27

That’s fine. That’s just that’s the way you write. But some people do have a kind of word count they work towards others. It’s just the amount of time we’ve got available and others, you know, as the Muse takes them, so it’s that for everybody.

 

Steve Exten  09:40

Now, I tend to sort of randomly, really. So I’ve decided to write the collection of stories around that instance, that caused everything. But I’m not going to write them in order. I’m going to write them how I feel at the time.

 

Emma Dhesi  09:57

Is that the same for your novel writing as well? Do you write in a linear fashion, or do you write depending on which scene it is, and what’s taking your, your inspiration that day?

 

10:07

When I wrote the longer one, but got a got the whole basic story written, but then I realised I got an awful lot of loose ends. So then I had to go back into it and tie up all the loose ends. When I wrote, the short one I’ve just written, I used quite a bit of work from one of the other story, took a section out, and then wrote it in a linear manner. And also, when I wrote the one I’ve just published that was, I wrote it all in one draft, and then went back in and then seeded in other little bits. So they all tie up with the other stories as well.

 

Emma Dhesi  10:46

Nice. And with your stories, I guess more with the big one that you wrote. Did you plot that? Or did you did that sort of was that more discovery writing and you what happened happened kind of thing?

 

Steve Exten  11:02

I tend to start off with a plot. And then it tends start writing itself. I tend to try and stick to the plot as best I can in general. But if it looks like it’s going in an interesting direction, I’ll follow that direction. And then at the end, it seems to have worked quite nicely. The general idea is I know what how it’s going to start, I know how it’s gonna finish. What happens in the middle is what happens really.

 

Emma Dhesi  11:39

I’m guessing then that because of the size of this, your first one, the big one, that is an epic story is an epic, sci fi. 

 

Steve Exten  11:50

Well, I’ve been trying to analyse that it’s not really really sci-fi at all it’s, it’s, it’s common, everyday life in a extraordinary situation, really. Because I’ve created my own universe. So I’ve got once one set of peoples living in the other side of the galaxy, in a society that’s advanced of our own, but it’s everyday life. That way, you don’t have to explain anything. So that’s based around everyday people, but they just happen to be on different planets. So they’ve got a society that’s that planet hops, where we hop between towns, That way, I can create a bigger landscape, and I can have more races of people. And then, because of this thing that goes wrong on this holiday result, they pop up in England, just before the Norman Conquest, so then I’ve created a history that goes up to the First World War. So then you end up with a fairly advanced technology meeting up with a primitive, a relatively primitive technology and people. That’s because they’re from this as survivors from a different metabolism and a different spectrum. They can’t actually be seen by the people they’re living parallel with. So you’ve got modern technology, relatively primitive modern technology, and people that have had to develop that don’t have much technology at all. All at the same place, at the same time. 

 

Emma Dhesi  13:43

Okay, so chaos ensues.

 

Steve Exten  13:48

It was one point I had three different, no five different races of people, all in the same place at the same time.

 

Emma Dhesi  13:56

Right. Interesting. And a lot for use, keeping your head all these different, different peoples. 

 

Steve Exten  14:04

Yeah, it was tricky, but I’ve got two races of people who are who are advanced, I’ve got Englishman. So you got upper and lower class Englishman? And then you’ve got three, three races of people who were survivors, and one race of people who are a mixture of the two. So all in the same place.

 

Emma Dhesi  14:32

So when I was reading about the about you and about the books. I thought to myself, no, what is an AtomSphere? So I wonder if you could tell us what that is.

 

Steve Exten  14:44

Yeah, AtomSphere is the holiday resort. Imagine, imagine Disney World in space. So it’s an orbiting satellite holiday is Have a series of spheres that are collected together that looks like the atom emblem you see on nuclear devices. 

Emma Dhesi  15:10

Okay. Okay. So where where does the inspiration for all of this come from?

 

Steve Exten  15:16

Right at the top of my head. I don’t know that I wanted to come up with a, an explanation for green men, fairies, elves and fairies and mythological green men of the forest. I also wanted a story that involves stone circles. And so that’s all to do with the survivors from the AtomSpheres disaster. So what what happened was these spheres which are huge, about two kilometres in diameter, gravitational engineering, masterpieces, things that each one is a holiday resort all on its own. And they’re all joined together by loops and circles. And and what happens is purely by accident, they’ve got randomly floating spheres, which they have adverts on called ad spheres. Getting in, in line, and when they all get in line when they, they shouldn’t get in line. But when they do get in line and the sun’s rays are on them, it creates a force field, one of them disappears.

 

Emma Dhesi  16:34

So that feels like an echo of the standing stones perhaps?

 

Steve Exten  16:40

Yeah, well, the standing stones, I’m not going to give too much away. The standing stones link up, the standing stones are all to do with the beacons that are on the outside of the spheres. And the skin, the skin of the spheres, when that crashes into the planet and gets buried in the landscape, the standing stones, or the circles have beacons that are left behind. And they and they’re still emitting a signal. And it’s that signal that’s being emitted that they pick up 30 years later.

 

Emma Dhesi  17:16

I see yes. Okay.

 

Steve Exten  17:18

So that’s, that’s the big story. And the little story I’ve just published, is about the last people to see that sphere before it disappears. And what it does to their families. And coming back later, and then it’s and then you’ve got to the main characters, how they get together. So the one I’ve just published, which is Club 5 Eight Zero 6, is the romance between two of the main characters. And then the reader magnet that I’ve just written, which I’m just drafting and doing the code for, explains the disaster again from a different angle. So and then what I’m going to do is break down the large story into two separate stories, and they’ll stand up quite nicely on their own. And that will just let them take shoot, they all pivot on the instance of the of the disaster but from different directions.

 

Emma Dhesi  18:32

I wonder if I can just take you back a moment. And just for those listeners who don’t know what that is, can you explain what a reader magnet is?

 

Steve Exten  18:41

Well don’t really know much myself, but I’m having having gone into this publishing business and signing up on that SPF 101 course (Self Publishing Formula) , and all that sort of stuff. First thing that Mark Dawson said was you need a reader magnet. And basically, from how I understand it, giving something away for free to encourage people to to sign up. So anybody who’s on my mailing list, which is 11 people at the moment, next month is going to get a free a 40 page short story.

 

Emma Dhesi  19:23

That’s marvellous. Well done. I’m getting your first 11 people because everybody’s got to start somewhere. You know, everyone’s got to start with that first person. So Fantastic. Well done you you’re growing your list steadily steadily. So yeah, that’s a nice way of introducing people to your characters and to to your your big body of work. So I was interested that your and said that the the big piece does not have a title by the way.

 

Steve Exten  19:49

The big one?

 

Emma Dhesi  19:50

Yeah. Or a working title.

 

Steve Exten  19:54

I had it published and printed through Ingram spark a about four years ago. But I never really did anything with it. And I gave it the title of Spherios. Okay, that’s, that’s the name of the sphere that disappears.

 

Emma Dhesi  20:09

And so Spherios, you mentioned that you were thinking, what you’ll do is you’ll split it into two. Is that right?

 

Steve Exten  20:14

Yeah, so I’m gonna split Spherios into two. So one will be called Spherioa. And the other one will be based around a journalist. And that’s probably going to be called Lomax, which is what her name is. So two of the main characters.

 

Emma Dhesi  20:33

And well, those books, will you be able to read them as standalones do you think? Or will they be very much that have interlinked, you know, a sort of overall story?

 

Steve Exten  20:42

I think, all four, which would be the magnet, club 5 Eight Zero 6 Spherios, and Lomax, you can read them all individually, I’m going to give them numbers, because they’re going in a collection, it’s the number, it’s the order I’ve written them in. But you don’t have to read them, you can read them in any order you like, because they all do sort of linking together. And I also think, I’m also going to do the big body of work under the name of the AtomSpheres and its Legacy. And I’m going to publish that one as well.

 

Emma Dhesi  21:19

And so the legacy suggests that maybe this is the next generation along or the outcome

 

Steve Exten  21:26

Yeah, so I’m calling it a legacy, the leg, it’s, it’s all derived from that instance, where it all went wrong. So they’re all derived from that. They’re all linked to that. And because it’s a legacy, it means I can write about anything that relates or refers back to that. 

 

Emma Dhesi  21:51

Okay, you’ve got big plans. There’s lots of hair, there’s no stopping, you now,

 

Steve Exten  21:57

Yeah. I started writing it. The idea was to supplement my pension. And now I’m not sure not sure what’s going to happen. But yeah, I hope to retire soon.

 

 

Emma Dhesi  22:13

And now you’ve you’ve said in your bio, that you’ve got an interest in the faerfolk and the Green Man mysteries. So do you have a love of, I want to say the sort of pagan stories, as well as history, you’ve said that you’re interested in history as well. But I wonder if you kind of enjoy the kind of fairy stories as well.

 

Steve Exten  22:35

Well, if you think of it as Midsummer Night’s Dream, and so yeah, I like pagan stories. I like history. I like Bernard Cornwell, the mediaeval Saxon Viking histories. Well, I like any history and the pagan stuff, yeah, stone circles.

 

Emma Dhesi  23:00

I love a good stone circle myself.

 

Steve Exten  23:04

I also like the ones like Terry Pratchett and, and his satire, which was good, which is quite a lot of satire and Shakespeare, like Shakespeare. Yeah. Green Man.

 

Emma Dhesi  23:25

Well, listen, I’m, I’m conscious of time, we’re just supposed to run out of time. But we do have enough space to ask you to let people know where they can find you and your books online.

 

Steve Exten  23:37

I’ve got a Facebook page, and Steve Exten and the AtomSphers Legacy. And I’ve also got a book, which is on Amazon at the moment, at £2.99 ebook.

 

Emma Dhesi  24:03

Fantastic. Well, I’ll make sure I link to those in the show notes. Well, Steve, thanks so much for your time today. I really, really appreciate you taking time out of your day to speak to me. Thank you.

 

Steve Exten  24:13

Thank you very much. Thank you.

 

Emma Dhesi  24:17

Thank you for listening to today’s show. Now if you’d like to find some more ways to write, you can download my free cheat sheet 30 Top Tips to find time to write by going to Emma dhesi.com forward slash 30 top tips. If you’d like to connect with me, you can find me on Facebook at Mr. Desi author. And if you’re enjoying the podcast so far, please don’t forget to leave a review wherever you download your podcasts. It really does help new listeners find the show and of course I appreciate your support. Until next time, keep writing

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Emma Dhesi

Emma writes women’s fiction. She began writing seriously while a stay at home mum with 3 pre-school children.

By changing her mindset, being consistent and developing confidence, Emma has gone from having a collection of handwritten notes to a fully written, edited and published novel.

Having experienced first-hand how writing changes lives, Emma now helps beginner writers find the time and confidence to write their first novel.