With so many authors currently working in the adventure fiction genres, I thought it would be a good time to bring back the Independent Author Spotlight. Each week will feature a different writer, starting with Ken Lizzi, author of… well, he’ll tell you himself!

Please introduce yourself and tell us about your background as a writer.
Hello readers. My name is Ken Lizzi, writer of two-fisted fabulism, lawyer, husband, and father, aficionado of that glorious marriage of hops and barley. I've been writing stories for as long as I can remember. It wasn't until the early 2000s, however, that I began to seriously apply myself. I placed several short stories with anthologies, and ratcheted up my confidence and competence to the point I felt comfortable writing novels. I sold Reunion to Twilight Times Books in 2014. I've been at it ever since, with nine books total under my belt as of today.

What are the most prominent influences on your writing? How do you incorporate those influences without being derivative?
The writers that I consciously consider (or even emulate) are Glen Cook, Elmore Leonard, and to a lesser extent, Bernard Cornwell. I have a suspicion that unconsciously there is a deal of L. Sprague de Camp lurking in diction, word choice, and tone. But I wouldn't swear to it. Rewriting a work I enjoyed doesn't appeal to me. I have no interest in filing off the serial numbers of someone else's creation. So I don't worry about being derivative. I'm more interested in my own spin, or what I think is a new spin. Yet there are certain stylistic notes that a writer can incorporate without reaching the level of slavish mimicry. For example, in Thick As Thieves (a book deliberately evoking Elmore Leonard's style) I would employ Leonard's tick of writing "he was verb-ing" rather than "he verbed" along with certain other characteristic quirks. In later drafts I went back through and eliminated or smoothed off some of the edges to ensure that the book was Leonardesque in spirit rather than merely pastiche.

Many authors say marketing is one of their biggest challenges. What tactics have you found to be most effective for getting your name out there?
I am one of those authors. I'm still floundering. But what my marketing manager (aka My Beautiful Wife, aka MBW) is currently playing with is Tik Tok videos. It does seem to be improving my name recognition. Will it translate into increased sales? Only time will tell.

How much do your audience’s expectations factor in to what you write? Does this ever cause you to hold back from experimenting?
I write what I find entertaining. I can only hope that readers developed the same narrative instincts I did, reading and watching similar things, learning the same storytelling traditions. It is fun sometimes as a writer to zig rather than zag, but I don't go out of my way to subvert expectations. The avant-garde wouldn't have me as a literary trooper even if I wanted to enlist. My preferences are rooted in the likes of Robert Louis Stevenson, H. Rider Haggard, and Louis L'Amour. I appreciate R.A. Lafferty, but I wouldn't try to write like him.

Have you had any new stories published recently? Are you currently working on any?
I've placed a couple of short stories that should be released this year, one with Tales From the Magician's Skull and one with Cirsova. I've signed a contract for the fourth book of my Semi-Autos and Sorcery series (the first three are available from Aethon Books) but I don't know when it might be on the publisher's schedule. So I guess the answer to the first question is "no." Currently I'm working on a novel, the first book of a planned trilogy. It is coming along, but it is a rather ambitious project for me. I don't intend to rush it.

Name one newer and one older book you have read and enjoyed recently. (“Newer” meaning from the past year or so, and “older” meaning written before 1980.)
The God is Not Willing by Steven Erikson. I enjoyed revisiting the world of the crumbling Malazan Empire. I finished the anthology Heroic Fiction almost a month ago and reviewed it on my web log. Spoiler: I liked it.

Any final words?
If you, like me, enjoy action oriented fiction (S&S, HF, SF, Historical Novels, hard boiled crime, etc.) I invite you to check out some of my work. Look wherever you buy online, or view my web log or my Amazon Author page. I'd like to add my thanks to Dave for this interview and for allowing me to play in his sandbox on occasion.