In this lively and surprisingly candid 45th episode of The Science Fiction & Fantasy Factory, Mookie Spitz sits down with fantasy author Catherine Cruzan for a deep dive into storytelling, publishing, creativity, and the realities of trying to build an audience in 2026. What starts as a conversation about conventions like WonderCon quickly turns into a masterclass on what separates compelling fiction from genre sludge.

Catherine opens up about being an introvert forced into the uncomfortable role of marketer, publicist, and salesperson. She discusses her Elfkind trilogy, the recently released Winter Forest, and the upcoming fourth book, Crown of Fire. More importantly, she explains why character always comes first, why worldbuilding often gets abused, and why readers crave emotional investment more than endless lore dumps.

The conversation ranges across the giants who shaped her imagination: J.R.R. Tolkien, Tad Williams, Raymond E. Feist, Terry Brooks, and Guillermo del Toro. Catherine shares mentorship moments that kept her from quitting, including advice to stop comparing herself to giants and simply tell her own story.

Mookie and Catherine also get brutally honest about modern publishing: the myth of being “saved” by a traditional publisher, the rise of platform-first book deals, the need for writers to build their own communities, and how millions of books including many if not most from non-human authors now flood the market every year. If you think writing the book is the hard part, think again. That may be where the real work starts.

They also tackle AI head-on. as Catherine draws a hard line: use tools if helpful, but don’t outsource your soul. She talks through her meticulous editing process for ensuring genuine dialogue, honest character voice, compelling pacing, and proven structure, making clear that authentic fiction comes from lived experience, emotional nuance, and relentless revision, not prompt shortcuts.

Catherine Cruzan brings intelligence, humility, and real craft talk to the table. Mookie brings the extraverted-introvert hand-wringing energy. Together they deliver a conversation about why stories matter, why hope matters, and why creators need to keep going even when silenced by a crowded and over-saturated media landscape.

The Guest

Catherine Cruzan grew up in Bloomington, MN, but Southern California has been her home for many years. After graduating from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, with a B.S. in Aerospace Engineering, she has worked as an engineer for a number of aerospace companies in the Los Angeles area.

Catherine’s interest in books began as a child with a voracious appetite for reading. She fondly recalls piling onto her parent’s bed with her two brothers while her mother read the Chronicles of Narnia, Treasure Island or Black Beauty. She moved on to The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings as a teenager, and Fantasy stories remain her favorite to this day.

Her writing career started with poetry and short stories published in the school newspaper. As an adult, she writes character driven Fantasy, Horror and Science Fiction. Her writing education includes Long Beach City College and the UCLA Writers Program.

Her Books & Socials

Website: www.CatherineCruzan.com

IG: @Catherine.Cruzan

Good Reads: Catherine Cruzan (Author of Elfkind) | Goodreads

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In this 44th episode of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Factory, Mookie dives in deep with science fiction author James Kenwood to explore his themes and best practices for storytelling. The discussion ranges from war and political power to moral responsibility, flawed heroes, pacing, worldbuilding, and the hard truth that readers do not owe writers their attention.

James explains how military history and recurring cycles of conflict shape his fiction. His serialized, work-in-progress novel Mars Fire examines settlers on Mars trapped between rival Earth powers, while his shorter fiction delivers concentrated bursts of action, sacrifice, and moral tension.

Mookie pushes the conversation further, contrasting noble archetypes with comic antiheroes, asking whether fiction should inspire, expose hypocrisy, or simply entertain. Together they dissect why some stories grip readers for life while others evaporate in their first few pages.

Together they share several best practices for authors:

• Start with pressure, not scenery. Readers care more about a problem than your skyline, spaceship, or kingdom. Introduce tension early.
• Make every chapter cost something. If nobody risks losing status, love, safety, freedom, or identity, the chapter is filler.
• Use worldbuilding in motion. Explain the Mars rover while someone is fleeing in it. Explain the airlock while it malfunctions.
• Create moral crossroads. Force characters into decisions where every option hurts. That is where personality is exposed.
• Cut repeated explanations. Once readers understand the setting, move on. Trust them.
• Give characters competing agendas. Drama spikes when smart people want different things for valid reasons.
• Build consequences forward. Every major action should create a new problem, not restore comfort.
• Use flaws strategically. Vanity, cowardice, greed, laziness, obsession—flaws generate plot better than perfection ever will.
• Earn speeches. If a character delivers philosophy, make sure tension surrounds it. Nobody wants a TED Talk in chapter six.
• Track narrative momentum. Ask constantly: does this scene increase curiosity, dread, conflict, or desire? If not, fix it.
• Write scenes readers postpone sleep for. Aim for “one more chapter” energy. That is the gold standard.
• Know your story’s fuel source. Is it suspense, wonder, romance, revenge, mystery, satire, politics? Feed that engine consistently.
• Use action to reveal worldview. A selfish character grabs the parachute first. A noble one pushes someone else toward it.
• Don’t confuse complexity with depth. Ten factions and three timelines mean nothing without emotional stakes.
• Respect the reader’s intelligence. Suggest, imply, dramatize. Stop overexplaining everything.
• Leave residue. The best stories continue in the reader’s head after the final page.

Join two writers for over two hours as they explore what stories are for, why conflict matters, and how to write fiction that actually hits.

The Guest

James Kenwood is a part-time historian and a full-time reader at night; by day, he works as a specialist in the banking industry. He currently resides in Western Europe after a recent immigration, along with his wife. He has one cat – Raver (name was inherited, not chosen) – and spends far too much time looking at the contrails over his town and dreaming of flying.

On Substack

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Saddle up for a wild ride into one of speculative fiction’s coolest frontier mashups: the science fiction western. In this episode, Mookie stirs it up with debut novelist Rick Cutler, author of Colt Ostergaard: A Man with a Gun, to talk about laser six-shooters, frontier justice, worldbuilding grit, and how the cowboy archetype still hits hard when launched into the future.

Rick breaks down why science fiction westerns work so well. The two genres combine the raw freedom and danger of the Old West with the limitless imagination of sci-fi. That means lonely gunslingers, lawless territories, strange technology, alien landscapes, and moral showdowns where survival is never guaranteed. If you love Firefly, The Mandalorian, classic Star Trek, or pulp adventure with brains, this conversation lands squarely in your lane.

The episode also tracks Rick’s impressive rise as a debut novelist. He didn’t stumble into success. He wrote for years, sharpened his craft through trial and error, submitted boldly when opportunity appeared, and turned a short-form concept into a full-length novel that found the right publisher at the right time. His story is a reminder that “overnight success” is usually built on years of quiet persistence.

For writers, Rick delivers practical no-nonsense advice:

• Treat writing like work, not waiting for inspiration
• Write consistently, even when you don’t feel like it
• Stay true to your characters and let them behave honestly
• Know your audience and write with readers in mind
• Ignore discouraging voices that kill momentum
• Find other writers who challenge and support you
• Use rejection, luck, and setbacks as fuel instead of excuses

Rick also shares his old-school writing method: drafting longhand on legal pads, rewriting by hand, then typing later. Slow, deliberate, disciplined. No gimmicks. Just craft. Their convo is a fun, insightful conversation about creativity, persistence, publishing, and why the future still has room for a man with a gun riding into the unknown.

The Guest

Writer Rick Cutler works in both Science Fiction and Fantasy, but is most famous for his Colt Ostergaard stories in the Raconteur Press “Space Cowboys” series. He also has multiple stories in other anthologies such as ‘Glitched Grimm’ and ‘Uncanny Valet’. Rick graduated from Graceland University with a degree in Sociology, followed by a Computer Tech degree from Rockhurst University. He has been an usher and a tour guide; worked on an archeological dig; and sold vacuum cleaners door-to-door before settling down to sell advertising for 20 years in the South and Midwest. He retired, then jumped into a new career for 21 years doing tech support and data management for a major corporation. Colt Ostergaard: A Man with a Gun is his first published full-length novel. He now lives in Kansas with his wife Doris Day. No cats. No dogs. But that could change at any moment.

His Books

His Website

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In this episode of The Science Fiction and Fantasy Factory, Mookie sits down with Michael A. Clement, a former finance professional turned speculative fiction writer, to trace the unlikely path from spreadsheets to stories, and why it worked.

Clement didn’t come up through the usual writer pipeline. No MFA. No lifelong literary obsession. Just a late-life pivot sparked by a single idea: what if a machine chose not to obey? From there, things escalated into asteroid-mining AI blackmailers, homicidal appliances, buffoonish aliens, and deeply human stories about loss, memory, and moral consequence.

Mookie and Michael dig into:

• The moment creativity ignites—and why it sometimes waits decades
• How classic influences like The Twilight Zone shaped Clement’s moral, allegorical style
• Writing as a second-act reinvention, not a lifelong identity
• The power of speculative fiction to tackle real-world issues without triggering defenses
• Microfiction, AI-assisted storytelling, and the strange new tools reshaping creativity
• The uncomfortable truth about publishing: slush piles, gatekeepers, and a system begging to be disrupted by AI helping creators connect to consumers

They also dive the looming collision between human creators and AI—where convenience, creativity, and obsolescence start to blur. Is AI a tool, a collaborator, or the thing that replaces you? Michael's answer is pragmatic: create anyway, write anyway, and leave something behind.

The Guest

Michael was raised in San Diego, California. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the University of Southern California and a Master of Business Administration from the University of San Francisco. Most of his career was spent in financial services. Since 2006, Michael has made Hong Kong his home. Now retired, he writes science fiction as a hobby. Michael has written seven books: five novellas: Khrysos, This Book Is A Murderer, Chasing Roswell, Pan-ego, and Zogtopia (which have been combined into a collection, Alien Journey Ahead); one collection of short stories, Cosmic Portal, and one novelette, Alien Daydreams (his latest book).

His Writing

https://www.facebook.com/Michael.A.Clement.Books

http://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelaclement

http://www.amazon.com/author/author_khrysos_book

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On this 41st episode of The Science Fiction & Fantasy Factory, Mookie sits down with Cannon Publishing founder and Editor-in-Chief John F. Holmes. He's a former platoon sergeant who runs his publishing outfit with the same mindset: train the talent, build the unit, execute the mission.

Cannon gives military science fiction authors a real path between doing everything yourself and waiting years for a traditional deal that may never come. You bring the manuscript, Cannon brings the machine: Editing that improves the book, covers designed to sell, full production handled without cutting corners. Distribution across the channels that matter, with no upfront costs, and a straight profit split. If the book wins, everyone wins.

Then there’s the part most writers underestimate—the team. Cannon is a working group participating in monthly sessions, shared universes, writers cross-checking each other’s work. Veterans help newer authors avoid the mistakes they already made. Holmes treats development like training.

Holmes lays out exactly what he looks for, what gets rejected immediately, and why most books never gain traction even if the writing is decent:

• Submit like a professional
  Send a clean plot synopsis and your first three chapters. No rambling pitches. No half-finished ideas.
• Write for story, not agenda
  Strong characters and momentum win. Message-driven writing usually collapses under its own weight.
• Be ready to collaborate
  Expect feedback. Expect edits. Expect other authors to weigh in. If you want total control, go solo.
• Show you can produce consistently
  One book every ten years is a dead end. You need follow-through and output.
• Build your own presence
  Social media, conventions, reader interaction. If no one knows you exist, the book won’t move.
• Engage like a human, not a billboard
  Talk to readers. Share interests. Don’t just scream “buy my book.”
• Understand the business model
  It’s a partnership. Profit split. No guarantees. You’re expected to help drive sales.
• Know the catalog before you pitch
  Read Canon titles. If your work doesn’t fit the lane, don’t waste time forcing it.
• Stay coachable
  The whole point is improvement. If you fight every note, you’re done.
• Bring something to the table
  Talent helps. Discipline matters more. A voice, a perspective, a willingness to grind. Visibility, consistency, and personality matter. If you’re not willing to show up and engage, you disappear.

The Guest

J.F. Holmes is a retired Army Senior Noncommissioned Officer, having served for 22 years in both the Regular Army and Army National Guard. During that time, he served as everything from an artillery section leader to a member of a Division level planning staff, with tours in Cuba and Iraq, as well as responding to the terrorists attacks in NYC on 9-11. From 2010 to 2014 he wrote the immensely popular military cartoon strip, "Power Point Ranger", poking fun at military life in the tradition of Beetle Bailey and Willy & Joe.

His books range from Military Sci-Fi to Space Opera to Detective to Fantasy, with a lot in between, and in 2017 two are finalists for the prestigious Dragon Awards. In 2018, he launched Cannon Publishing, specializing in military science fiction, fantasy and thrillers, with an emphasis on works from up and coming authors.

Cannon Publishing

www.cannonpublishing.us

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In this episode of The Science Fiction & Fantasy Factory, Mookie sits down with the elusive author Saengard, who emerges from behind a pseudonym to talk about his debut novel The World Ender—a fast-moving, idea-heavy sci-fi story decades in the making that answers the question: "What happens when the system meant to save humanity becomes the thing that destroys it?

At the center is George Greycloud Guess, a physicist who creates a revolutionary energy source meant to save a collapsing world. Instead, it triggers a chain reaction: rogue machines, shadowy global power structures, nanotech gone sideways, and an extinction-level asteroid barreling toward Earth. Governments promise salvation through massive domed cities, but their real agenda flips the plot and humanity's destiny upside-down.

Mookie and Saengard talk about systems: how they grow, how they rot, and how they inevitably turn on the people they were built to serve. Saengard breaks down the core tension driving his work: technology versus humanity, control versus freedom, and the uncomfortable truth that even utopias carry a dark undercurrent.

They then get into bureaucracy as a living organism, capitalism versus centralized control, and why every system—left unchecked—drifts toward authoritarianism. Then their chat spirals into bigger territory: AI, consciousness, and whether machines can ever truly “be,” or if they’re just high-powered mirrors reflecting our own patterns back at us. Along the way they share notes on collapse, control, and the strange human need for struggle, and why every attempt to engineer a perfect world seems to backfire.

The Guest

Saengard is the author of The World Ender, an apocalyptic sci-fi thriller. This debut novella began over 25 years ago as a small comic strip in a monthly periodical in Sarasota, Fl. Since then, the story has grown into a series. But don't worry, every book is a satisfying stand-alone story, each one in the series building on the last, charting the rise and fall of Meteora - also known as Punk City.

His Website

https://punkcitybooks.com/

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In this 39th episode of The Science Fiction & Fantasy Factory, Mookie brings Michael S. Clarke onto the factory floor to dissect the craft, the grind, and the brutal reality of trying to write—and sell—serious sci-fi in a world drowning in noise.

Clarke is deep in the trenches with Synthetic, a novel about mind uploading, identity duplication, and what happens when “you” becomes plural. Mookie, never one to let a concept sit quietly, pushes it further: if you copy your brain into a machine, who’s the real you, and which one gets screwed in the divorce?

Along the way, the conversation veers into the stuff that makes this genre fun:

• Mookie lays down a hard rule: no string theory allowed. Mention it and you get metaphorically gonged off the show.
• A spontaneous rant breaks out about why Superman is a fundamentally uninteresting character—invincible equals zero vulnerability, the real kryptonite is boredom.
• Clarke walks through the nightmare of editing your own work, including the moment you realize two pages of your novel are just… intellectual soup.
• The two tear into the publishing ecosystem: agents, vanity presses, self-publishing, phishing, and scamming, including the most uncomfortable truth: nobody is there to promote your book but you.

Underneath the jokes and jabs is a serious throughline: good science fiction isn’t about the science—it’s about what people do when the science breaks them. Mookie and Michael break into craft, ego, failure, persistence, and the uneasy partnership between imagination and reality.

The Guest

Michael S. Clarke is a speculative fiction author obsessed with the "what if" of artificial intelligence. His work delves into the philosophical and practical implications of mind uploading, AI agency, and what it means to be human in an age where biology is becoming optional.

His Blogs

https://qtility-mike.blogspot.com/

https://michaelsclarke.online/

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What happens when a pandemic kills your D&D campaign? If you’re Rachanee Lumayno, you don’t sulk or bake bread—you construct an entire fantasy universe instead.

In the 38th episode of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Factory, host Mookie Spitz sits down with Rachanee, the indie author behind the Kingdom Legacy series. She describes how she turned an abandoned gaming character into a seven-book saga spanning interconnected kingdoms, shifting protagonists, and themes of identity, power, and found family. Her approach flips the usual fantasy model on its head: no bloated continuity, no homework for the reader—just modular storytelling that lets you jump in anywhere and still get hooked.

Together, Rachanee and Mookie conduct a working session on what actually gets books written—and sold. They dig into:

• Why most writers stall out—and how Lumayno cranks out full novels in months
• The plotter vs. pantser divide, and why she didn’t even fully world-build until book three
• Using tarot cards as a storytelling engine, and why it sometimes works better than outlining
• The indie author reality of choosing the best covers, editors, cons, and why human connection beats online ads
• YA fiction that isn’t soft, and how darker themes can hit younger audiences without dumbing anything down
• Why reading your work out loud might be the single best editing tool you’re ignoring

They also go beyond the books and into creative discipline, the grind of self-publishing, and the uncomfortable truth that thinking too much is often the enemy of writing anything at all.

If you’re trying to write, publish, or just stop screwing around and finish something, this one lands. And if you’re a reader you’ll walk away with a new fantasy world to explore, and a sense of wonder and appreciation for Rachanee's enthusiasm and creative process.

The Guest

Rachanee Lumayno is an actress, voiceover artist, screenwriter, avid gamer and amateur dodgeball player. She grew up in Michigan, where she spent way too much of her free time reading fantasy novels. So when she decided to try her hand at writing a book, it made sense that it would be in her favorite genre. The Kingdom Legacy series marks her debut as an author. She is also a staff writer for two comics and an upcoming video game.

Her first novel, Heir of Amber and Fire, was named a Best Book Winner for Young Adult - Fantasy / Sci-Fi in the 2024 Spring PenCraft Seasonal Book Awards.

Her Books & Resources

https://www.rachanee.net/

https://www.rachanee.net/newsletter

https://www.rachanee.net/books

https://www.instagram.com/rachaneelumayno

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