A Slice of Cake With... Ken Goudsward

This week I am delighted to be having a slice of cake with author Ken Goudsward.

Ken writes codes, poetry, science fiction, games, ontographies, and music. He writes in rusty scratches. He may be found in a tree-top, a mountain fountain, a desert shoreline, or submerged in a musty pond.

What kind of stories do you write?

I write books with robots and humans learning to work together to recover from trauma, survive, and help their friends.

Can you describe your writing why?

I get ideas which won’t leave me alone.

Share with us your favourite passage from the book you enjoyed writing the most

Here’s the opening section from Symphony of Destruction, Book 1 of the Spindown Saga.

Hannah stared at a small dark spot on the grey wall. Perhaps dark was not really the right word though. It was a bit dark-ish. But certainly not dark. Not dark like the dead space through which she sailed. Not dark like the blackness eating a hole in her soul. Hardly dark at all, really.

Hannah barely noticed anymore. She barely noticed the constant whine that pummeled her eardrums. She barely noticed the glaring red emergency lighting. She barely noticed the dozens of corpses surrounding her, coated in clear spray epoxy. More accurately, it should be said that she barely noticed the clear epoxy, body-shaped shells, nearly empty now, save for what appeared to be a few handfuls of dirt, and, judging by the slight bulges of the shells, some pressurized gases whose identity she could only speculate at, having never had any inkling to study the sciences. Probably carbon dioxide though, she surmised. Wasn’t that the fate of all things? Being gradually overtaken by carbon dioxide? But what did she know?

The passage of time was one thing though that had gone far beyond barely noticing. Hannah was acutely aware that she had in fact ceased to be capable of sensing time in any way. This was natural I suppose, given that days and years had been abandoned along with earth, and given that the computer systems were mostly non-functioning and her access had been denied long long ago, and given that anyone who ever gave a shit about what time it was was also long gone. There was of course the shit itself. And the piss. These had become the most reliable markers for time. But that was a very dubious level indeed. And besides, what did it matter anymore. Time was a meaningless vestige of the past. How ironic. A past with people and lives, and planets, and suns. A past with mothers singing sweet little homemade lullabies to their young daughters. “Little babe, blessed babe, there’s nothing to fear, so sleep my dear.” But there were, she knew now, many things to fear.

Tell us about your latest project

I’m currently writing book 2 of my series The Spindown Saga. Essentially, the series is a long, complex time travel story, but it’s not your typical time machine scenario where you hit a button and voila, you are instantly in another time. It turns out, time travel is not easy and it requires huge investments of time and energy. The series also covers a lot of ground in terms of AI and personal growth as well as the nature of culture, civilization, information, computation, with a little bit of economics and religion thrown in for good measure.

What is your favourite cake?

I like lots of kinds of cake. Chocolate, White, Yellow, Cupcakes, whatever, it’s all good. I really like those Duncan Hines or Betty Crocker cake mixes. To me, the thing that makes or breaks it is the icing. I’m kinda picky about it, and if the icing isn’t right it ruins the cake. Also – ice-cream cake is NOT cake!

You can connect with Ken on the Dimension Fold website, Facebook and Goodreads. All his books are on Amazon. 

Join me next week when I'm joined by Justin Lee Anderson. 

If you would like to take part in A Slice of Cake With... please fill in the form found here. I'd be delighted to have you.

You can also support my writing endeavours and buy me tea & cake - it's what makes the world go round! 

Claire Buss is a multi-genre author and poet, completely addicted to cake. Find all her books on Amazon. Join the discussion in her Facebook group Buss's Book Stop.