Outer Alliance Spotlight #42: Sandra McDonald July 23, 2010
Posted by juliarios in : interviews , trackbackWelcome to Outer Alliance Spotlight #42. Each week the Spotlight features an ally who writes, reviews, publishes, or is in some other way involved with LGBTQI speculative fiction. Our guest this week is Sandra McDonald, author of Diana Comet and Other Improbable Stories.
Sandra McDonald has written several short stories and novels, including “The Ghost Girls of Rumney Mill”, which was shortlisted for the Tiptree award in 2003, and the science fiction series, The Outback Stars, The Stars Down Under, and The Stars Blue Yonder. Her latest book, Diana Comet and Other Improbable Stories follows the coverging paths of three people including an openly gay character and a genderqueer character.
Sandra has an MFA from the University of Southern Maine, and spent 8 years traveling the world as a Naval Officer. In addition to her personal site, she keeps a LiveJournal where she posts about writing.
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OA: Diana Comet and Other Improbable Stories features some gay and transgendered characters in an alternate Earth. How is their world like ours, and how is it different in the ways its societies treat LGBTQI people?
SM: Geography is a fun aspect of the book, and I like the idea that they’re in an alternate Earth or dimension. Another way of looking at it is to treat their world as our own, with an ongoing game of names. Ed McBain did this in his famed 87th precinct novels by using “Isola” instead of “Manhattan.” In fact, he renamed all five boroughs, and critics have argued over whether he meant to make a truly fictional city or a simple copy of New York City. However we treat the places, the people in Diana Comet are exactly like the people here, with a wide variety of orientations, prejudices, hopes and secret desires.
OA: You’re organizing the writing workshops for next year’s Gaylaxicon in Atlanta. What can writers expect to get out of these workshops if they attend?
SM: We’re aiming for that half-day, Milford style experience you see at other cons, with a small group of writers and lots of respectful, honest critiques. The difference with ours is that we will be encouraging positive portrayals of gay, lesbian, transgender and other characters. We’re all really excited about this. I first attended one of these workshops at Boskone, and our group was run by Theodora Goss and David Alexander Smith. It was a great learning experience for a fledgling writer like myself and I want to pay it forward to new writers now.
OA: When did you get the idea to make a periodic table of awesome female SF writers, and how did you decide who to include?
SM: Web surfing one night (as many writers are known to do), I came across Squidspot’s Periodic Table of Typefaces. It’s a very cool chart if you’re into web or page design. That meshed up with some thoughts I had about one of the footnote characters in Diana Comet, a female science fiction writer in the 1940′s. Soon I started fooling around on Macromedia Fireworks. Six weeks and 300 objects later, I had my own chart! The names were drawn from Hugo, Nebula and other awards lists, and I think represent a solid foundation of fabulous women writers. I wish I’d had room for dozens more. At the same time, the chart and the accompanying video point out some areas where we can improve – gaining Nebula nominations for urban fantasy writers, for instance, or seeing more women in leadership at SFWA.
OA: You were in the military for 8 years, and you’ve lived on at least 3 different islands in your lifetime. How has occupation and habitat influenced your writing?
SM: Being in the Navy was a great experience and definitely exposed me to a lot of different cultures and customs. At the same time, it opened my eyes to the hypocrisy of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and how great sailors were being discharged only because of their sexuality. Being on islands helped me appreciate small communities and how people function when they’re not part of the “the norm.” I still love the military- Navy jets fly over my house several times a week – and still love islands, especially Key West.
OA: Writers have cats like planets have moons (they’re not a given, but it’s hardly surprising to find a few hanging around). Will you tell us about yours?
SM: I love that analogy. Right now I have three official cats and one unofficial stray, plus another on extended vacation with grandma. I never intended to be the cat lady of my neighborhood, but all animals deserve good homes and I’m happy to do what I can. The only time I regret having adorable small furry animals around is when one decides to plop down on the keyboard while I’m typing. 
OA: Are you working on anything new? What might we hope to see from you in the future?
SM: I’m working on lots of new things, but also very excited about my stories being published this year. Over at Futurismic, I had a great time with “Tupac Shakur and the End of the World”. It’s my tribute to disaster movies. Clarkesworld just published “Beach Blanket Spaceship”, which is an homage to all those Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello movies I used to watch as a kid. And soon Strange Horizons will publish “Seven Sexy Cowboy Robots”, which was inspired by a great video called Brokeback Skaters. Really, check it out. Lots of fun!
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Thanks, Sandra! Join us next week for another Spotlight, and in the meantime, check out Diana Comet and Other Improbable Stories.
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