photo credit: Sasha Todorovic
By Cecilia Nasmith/Today’s Northumberland
A Godfather story set in the clouds of Venus starring Quebecois separatists – that’s how Cobourg’s own master of science fiction Derek Kunsken describes his new book.
It would be the simplest of summaries to say The House of Styx features inter-family intrigue and clashing agendas among settlers on Venus, but the book is attracting significant notice in advance of its release in the form of a review in Publishers Weekly – a starred review at that.
Publishers Weekly can review whatever it wants, the author explained in a recent interview. The fact of a review at all is a milestone in his career, but a starred interview (one of the most prestigious designations in the book industry) ranks it as a superlative read.
“I was super happy,” Kunsken stated.
Then, like icing on a cake, he saw they’d put his agent’s name at the bottom of the review for the simple reason that, if anyone else is interested in his work – publishers for future books, or perhaps someone interested in Hollywood adaptations – they would need to be able to contact his agent.
“I have had a lot of luck with my career, but that’s a new experience,” he said.
“Every writer hopes there will be some sort of fame with their book that makes it take off – though if you write for that, every book is a lottery ticket. But in the end, we have to write. I am very, very satisfied with the way my career is going right now. I have only great things to say.”
Currently a resident of Gatineau, Que., Kunsken was born and raised in Cobourg. Following his 1990 graduation from Cobourg District Collegiate Institute East (now Cobourg Collegiate Institute), he went on to get undergraduate and master’s degrees in biology at Guelph and McMaster respectively.
He has enjoyed a long career in the Federal public service, but always made time for the science-fiction writing he loved.
Kunsken has gained fans literally around the world with his Quantum series – The Quantum Magician published in 2018 and Quantum Garden in 2019.
The House of Styx is the first of a duology written in the same world where the Quantum series takes place, but about 250 years before that.
United Kingdom-based Solaris Publishing has signed him up for both books in the new duology, as well as a third Quantum book.
While many publishers are being hit hard these days by the downturn resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, laying off editors and buying fewer new properties, Solaris is part of a larger company called Rebellion which – among other things – is big into video games.
Kunsken has just finished a four-year leave to take care of his son Josh. He shouldered a lot of responsibility in those years, but each school day when Josh was in class, he took some of that time as writing time.
You aren’t on fire every day, he allowed. But if he could get in three good solid hours of writing, he counted the time well spent in crafting the world he made up and the lives it contains.
“I am good at imagining things, and I love imagining other places – I suppose you are kind of every character as well. But I never lose sight of the fact that I’m sitting here in Gatineau.”
Kunsken thoroughly enjoyed the experience of producing his first book in this new series, calling it something of a palate cleanser after the two Quantum books.
It was also like cleaning up unfinished business, as it followed up on a novelette he had published in 2014 in Analog Magazine.
“I had wanted to do a story set in the clouds of Venus, because I had some idea what kind of alien life might be there,” he recalled.
“The story didn’t come together until I figured what kind of being would live there.”
The answer came from his own life – his own mother, actually, who came from Quebec. Separatist Quebecois would be the inhabitants, evoking the old names and the old places he had visited every summer while he was growing up.
“So that was published, and it went well in the magazine. But I knew there was a bigger story I wanted to tell,” he said.
That would be his new book.
Enter the D’Aquillons, the Corleone family of this unusual Godfather-type saga, emigrating from Quebec instead of Italy to start a new life that has a strong element of shifting alliances in grasping for advantage, all playing out in the deadly environment of Venus.
“You don’t see Canadians a lot in science fiction, and it was a lot of fun to imagine the culture that’s so homey to me in some place as inhospitable as the acidic clouds of Venus – a Godfather story set in the clouds of Venus starring Quebecois separatists,” he summed up.
Kunsken’s heritage is important to him, that history of colonialism that began in the 1750s when England and France fought a war that ended with Quebec an English territory. The decades thereafter saw every institution, from the Anglo banks to the church itself, aimed at controlling Quebec.
With the audiobook rights sublicensed to Penguin-Random House Audio, Kunsken has meetings scheduled with them about the voice actors, and an important point for him is to ensure the reader can do Quebecois French well – not Belgium French, not France French, but Quebecois French, so the names that resonate in his mind and heart come out sounding as they should.
“This book is so focused on the Quebecois culture. I’ll try to make sure they know it’s important.
“They have studios in every city, so I will be hoping they have a studio in Montreal,” he said.
He is also hoping for the same positive experience he had with the audio versions of his Quantum books, when he learned of the exhaustive work done behind the scenes.
“In science fiction, there are a lot of made-up names. I had a lot of French names, African names, Latin American – they have pronunciation guys for all these languages. Some of the African names I had, I didn’t know the precise pronunciation.”
Once they completed their meetings, they sent Kunsken three audio files of three different voice actors – all of them so good, he could not choose among them. They chose T. Ryder Smith in the end, and the audiobooks were released to strong reviews (which, for audiobooks, includes critiques of the voice actors).
The passage that was read aloud in those three audio files was off the first page of each book, with few names on it. This time, he hopes to pick a passage for actors to read that has representative samples of the names that matter to him.
“This is an artistic consideration integral to me and me alone,” he allowed. But it’s a point he will fight for.
You can hear the results when Kindle releases it in August, with the hard-cover book due out in April of 2021.
Looking ahead beyond the House of Styx duology, Solaris has signed him up for a third Quantum book. But recently, given the growing success of his work, negotiations have begun for a fourth Quantum book.
Beyond that, he is thinking of two draft books he has in a back drawer, a horror story and an epic fantasy story. His agent is interested in the epic fantasy.
“It’s at a Draft Five, and it’s not bad. She will figure out how many more drafts I need to do before showing it to a publisher,” he said.
For now, Kunsken is back at work as of February. Because he’s tired after work and ready to spend time with his son, he actually gets up early to put in two hours of writing each day from 6 to 8 a.m.
Being a father has taught him how much is actually not in a parent’s control, and how hard both parents must work to impart the values and lessons that help a child become a caring, empathetic person who treats others with respect. And it’s a joy to see those values and lessons take hold.
“I am pleased and proud as a father,” he said.
“You can only create opportunities for learning. In the end, it’s on him that he learns those things from his mother and I.”
Asked if his son is a fan, Kunsken pointed out that he was 13 when Quantum Magician was published and that was rather heavy reading.
“It’s quite involved with a lot of science. People who really love their science love Quantum Magician – though he had just read a physics book I read when I was at the end of high school.
“But he’s very proud and supportive.”
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
