Author Spotlight: SFF Author Karen Lucia
Karen Lucia (she/her) is a Minneapolis author. The long Minnesota winters taught her the value of a good story. Growing up on authors like Piers Anthony and Ursula K LeGuin she developed an interest in Science Fiction and Fantasy that has shaped her writing today. Throughout her life, Karen has had a small handful of adventures that help her craft the stories she writes, ranging from her time abroad, to becoming a mother, or her years spent as an Army Officer, working on a mass casualty response force, and her time in cybersecurity. Always on the hunt for strong female leads, Karen decided to write some of her own leading to the Warriors of Helsvern series. THE GOLDEN VALIA is her debut novel and the first book in the Warriors of Helsvern.
Author Links:
Website: KarenLuciaWrites.com
TikTok: @KarenLuciaWrites
Instagram: @karenlcreates
BlueSky: @karenlucia.bsky.social
We’re here to spotlight your gaslamp fantasy, Landbringer, and your Sci-Fi novella, Blackburn Station. Tell us what it’s like to hop from one genre to another – does your writing process change between the two, do you find yourself worldbuilding differently, was one more challenging than the other, etc?
When I write sci-fi it is generally soft sci-fi, so I don’t have to dive too deep into the science of it all. That helps smooth the jump between genres. I don’t think I my process changes (if you can classify how I write as having a process), but I do find sci-fi more challenging. I’ve always read sci-fi, but I have also been intimidated by writing it. I’ve read a lot of hard sci-fi, so I got hung up on the idea that the science needs to be explained and seem somehow feasible. But I have learned to let go. My writing is more character focused, and my sci-fi works so far have been novella length, so while the worldbuilding is there it doesn’t require the nitty-gritty details I am used to reading. I would say my process changes more based on the length of the work, and how much depth and development is needed, than based on the genre. I love genre jumping because it gives me room to try new things.
Tell us about your process for character development – how do you create your characters, and is it the same process for each project?
My process at the start of every story could generally be classified as chaos. When I am finding my character, I usually have a scene that I want to write and the unknown person moving through it. So, I will usually write the scene, see if I have a drive to write on from there, then see where the story is being pulled and how the characters feel in the space before putting more structure to the development. In a lot of ways, I let the characters and the story find themselves in the early phases of my messy drafting, then I think more critically about the characters and how they are interacting once there is more structure to the world around them. Landbringer came about because I was bored at work one day and decided to write a few pages focused on hands and that morphed into a character and a world and a novel.
Tell us about Landbringer and the world you built for this book. What drew you to gaslamp fantasy particularly for this story, and how does gaslamp fantasy lend itself to the world of intrigue, gods, and ghosts, that you created?
I actually had no idea Gaslamp was a thing until a few months after publishing Landbringer. I saw the word in a reel or something one day and looked it up and realized it fit what I had created. What drew me to it, though, was that I liked the steampunk aesthetic, but I wanted more magic and spooky ghosts in my story. The society structure of the era/locale of Gaslamp lends itself really nicely to quiet plotting and conspiracy with a twist of magic and behind the curtains workings.
Tell us more about your Sci-Fi novella, Blackburn Station. How did you worldbuild for this, and what were your influences?
Okay, so Blackburn Station came out of a weird place. I was attending a Suicide Intervention course and while I was there, little scenes and snippets of this story started taking shape. In terms of my influences for sci-fi, I am heavily influenced by Mass Effect. I love that game. Also, The Expanse. If you read it, I’m curious if you catch any of those vibes.
Grief seems to be a central theme of both books, with the ghost in Landbringer needing justice, and Jane’s grief as driving force in Blackburn Station. What draws you to write this, and what other themes do your works tend to share?
That’s a great question. I hadn’t ever really called that out for myself, but grief is definitely there. I feel like most authors would agree that writing is a means of processing and coping. As I have sort of collected more of these moments of strong emotion in my life, I think they tend to bleed out onto the page. My latest novella, A Second Life Worth Living, is very driven by a darker dread fueled by the current situation in our world. Funeral Singer is all about finding purpose and moving forward in your life. I think my novels are my place to explore a new world and really dive into characters and intrigue, while my novellas are where I process myself more.
What future works can we look out for from you?
I’m working on an epic fantasy now. I want something sprawling and massive and full of magic. I’ve been circling it for a while, and throughout writing it, I have sidestepped to write a few novellas, so I wouldn’t be surprised if a few other surprise stories come out before I have my epic fully drafted…
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