Interview With an Author: Cindy Koepp

Welcome Adventurers! Today I have a special treat for you. I have guest blogger and fellow author Cindy Koepp.

Well, hello! So good to be seeing you.
Today I’ve brought Mindstorm: Parley at Ologo to share with you. Mindstorm was published by Grace Bridges at Splashdown Books on Spookday in 2014.

Tell my adventurers about the world you created.

Mindstorm: Parley at Ologo takes place in the future on a space station and a planet. Interstellar travel is possible, and humans have gone forth and established colonies and business interests all over the place including on a planet that has had an on again, off again war among the two sentient races that are native: the arboreal Gotrians and the amphibious Olvians.



Earth, itself, has had its own troubles. Geneticists monkeying around with human DNA have created an offshoot of humanity. This offshoot has enhanced psionic ability. They communicate telepathically and most of them can teleport even across interstellar distances. Mistreated by their human masters, the psionics rebelled, took over the Haidar Space Station, and called themselves Haidarians. Although mostly self-sufficient, they deal with other races using the only commodity they have on the space station: their people. Haidarians hire out their experts to other races to help them solve major problems.
As the war on Ologo escalates, a plague breaks out, and both the Olvians and the Gotrians assume the other is responsible for breaking the galactic ban on biological warfare. They hire the Haidarians to figure it out.
That’s when our two main characters join the fray.

What inspired you to write about these characters?

Dr. Calla Geisman is a fantastically smart psionic medicine specialist with a genetic quirk that limits her psionic ability to a fraction of the “normal” Haidarian. In exchange for the lower power level, she gained a resistance to chemicals and an eidetic memory, but many Haidarians consider her to be crippled. Some extremists think people with her genetic quirk should be eliminated to avoid contaminating the gene pool.



I identify with Calla because I have a pretty good (but not nearly eidetic) memory and a disability that carries a stigma even into the modern era when people are supposed to be enlightened and tolerant of differences. Writing about Calla was a way for me to explore some of the difficulties being disabled but capable while being perceived as useless by certain parts of society.



On the other hand, nothing’s ever that clear cut. To provide a bit of balance to the tale, I wrote Thomas McCrady. His complicated past has led him to hate people like Calla. Although he has cause to be extremely cautious, he struggles with what he knows to be intellectually correct and what he feels as a result of a prior encounter with someone else who had the same genetic quirk as Calla.

How long has this character been in your thoughts?

Um… Calla? IIRC, the character started poking around about the time I started teaching, so about 20 years ago. I had to fight a major university to finish my teaching degree because my disability freaked them out. A not-so-highly-regarded movie that I actually enjoyed rather a lot came out about that time, and between the event and my brain going “what if” with the movie plotline, the story that eventually mutated into Mindstorm came into being.
Thomas came a year or two later when I realized she needed a foil to make this more interesting.

What is the one trait you wished you shared with your main character?

I wish I had Calla’s eidetic memory. My memory is pretty solid, but not half as good as hers. I often have trouble recalling the names of things and people. I can list off characteristics of the thing I’m thinking about, picture it in my head, and come up with obscure details … but the name? Pfff… Having Calla’s memory would be much less frustrating.
I also wish I had Thomas’s teleportation ability. I hate traveling. Teleportation would make doing so much less annoying.


Thanks for letting me come play today!

I'm so glad you could come.

Cindy Koepp

After hatching years ago in a land very far away, Cindy tried to hide under a secret identity, but she finally gave that up and started openly telling people she was an alien capable of adopting many forms. To her surprise, with the exception of one class of elementary students, no one believed her. They assumed she was joking, thereby giving her the perfect cover story.

She spent 14 years mutating the minds of four-footers – that’s height, not leg count – but gave that up to study the methodology needed to mutate the minds of adult humans. In her off time, she writes about her adventures under the guise of telling science fiction and fantasy stories, records her blog articles, and reads wonderful books in exchange for editing help.

Originally from Michigan, Cindy Koepp has a degree in Wildlife Sciences and teaching certification in Elementary Education from rival universities. After teaching for fourteen years, she pursued a master's degree in Adult Learning with a specialization in Training and Performance Improvement. Cindy has five published science fiction and fantasy novels, a serial published online, short stories in six anthologies, and a few self-published teacher resource books. When she isn't reading or writing, Cindy spends time whistling with a crazy African Grey. Cindy is currently working as a tech writer in Iowa and as an editor with Barking Rain Press.