Guest Blogger Rob LaPointe

Good morning! Welcome to Sci Fi Sunday! Today I have Sci Fi author Rob LaPointe, and he's not only going to tell us about his book, but he's answered my infamous Rick Reed questions. So while he and I wait for our drinks to arrive, I'll let him get started. Hmm, think we can get the band to play a little something?

The Questions 

·         You’re marooned on a small island with one person and one item of your choice—who is that person and what item do you have?

Miss January 1984 (like she was in 1984).  A luxury yacht.

·         Which musical would you say best exemplifies your life – and which character in that musical are you?

Musicals are one genre I never really got.  Every time I watch one I ask myself, "but wait, why are all these people suddenly singing and dancing, and where is that music coming from?"

·         Take these three words and give me a 100 word or less scenario using them:  pack, favorable, firm

Maxwell Comfort (character name copyright Robert J. LaPointe 2012) would pack his small tool case and leave soon.  For now he sat slumped in a chair and considered the cheap hotel room where he'd spent the last three days.  An old bed, stained carpet, dated draperies, mismatched lamps.  The impression was not favorable. A half ray of flickering light seeped from the bath room.  A bloody foot with only a sock on it hung over the edge of the tub.  Max shook his head in resignation.  There were times when one had to be firm.

·         You’ve just been let loose in the world of fiction, with permission to do anyone you want. Who do you fuck first and why?

Don Draper.  He's got it coming.

·         What is your idea of how to spend romantic time with your significant other?

Sailing.

·         When you start a new story, do you begin with a character, or a plot?

Plot.

·         If they were to make the story of your life into a movie, who should play you?

Someone younger.

·         Who’s your favorite horror villain and why?

Lens Larque from the novel The Face, by Jack Vance.  Not a horror villian per se, but what he does to his enemies definitely takes mordant wit to extremes.

·         Do you have an historical crush and if so, who is it?

Not really.

·         Is there a story that you’d like to tell but you think the world isn’t ready to receive it?

The satire I'm currently working on will hopefully catch an entire industry unready and unamused.

Rob, can you give us an excerpt, please?

Excerpt from "Shirabe" in my short story collection:

Each afternoon toward dusk the shadow of Doom would pass over Yutaka's house.  For a moment the sky would darken and a stillness would enter the dwelling. After an extended instant the shadow would slip away across the field, over the neighboring homes and businesses, down to the beach and out over the churning waters of the Sea of Japan.  Yutaka, who was only six,  watched with lighted eyes as the ship rose higher and higher, up into a realm of wind and clouds, into a radiant infusion where nothing had changed since the day of creation.

Excerpt from "Bow to the Moon" my novel: 

The Sudd are an old race.  They have had time to mature, sour into over-ripeness, convulse through several reformations, and settle at last into an indolent sophistication of no ordinary attainment.  Their astronomics are coeval with their mystic perceptions.  They have developed an elaborate science in conquering the stars, then made, some would say, the final exploration by turning that science inward.

I visited their mausoleum on Uytron III.  The halls were pervaded with an austral despair that haunts me still.  Midnight arrases hung from towering pedestals whereon perched elder gods of worlds visited then forgotten.  Spires of cinnabar and onyx rose ever into a nocturne vault.  Devices of alien wizardry were stacked against the walls, spying us from the shadows.  Alembics and sistrums of uncouth usage called silently, and in the beckoning gloom I sensed the heave and sink of ancient behemoths.

I was unsettled by what I saw, but my hosts only regarded me with flat, parchment eyes, all the while smoking their small pipes.

Barclay’s Travel Guide, Anniversary Edition

Now tell us a bit about you, if you would?

Sparring and Pushing Hands Gold Medalist Rob LaPointe is a native of Austin, Texas, where he graduated from the University of Texas in 1982.

He began his martial arts training in 1973 as a "backyard" student of Tony Esqevido, a marine who had just returned from Viet Nam, where he learned Tae Kwon Do while assigned to a Republic of Korea commando unit. When Tony moved, Rob took up training at a formal martial arts school, studying Kenpo.

He eventually earned his black belt from Brian Duffy, a student of the late Ed Parker. After receiving his M.A. from the University of Essex, U.K., Rob settled in Washington, D.C. There he began studying Tien Shan Pai Kung Fu in Washington's Chinatown. He was fortunate enough to learn from Chao Chi Liu who is a disciple of the late Chu Jen Wang.

Rob is currently a 4th degree Black Sash under Chao Chi Liu.

In 1989 he founded White Birch School of Kung Fu & Tai Chi. Though the martial arts schools he received his training in were traditional rather than "tournament" schools, Rob has judged and competed on the national and international levels. In 1994 he attended the 1st World Tai Chi conference in Beijing, China, where he received a certificate in Taiji, Meditation Qi Gong, and Chinese Health Massage.

In the year 2000, to mark his 40th birthday, Rob competed at Wong's Traditional Kung Fu Tournament - the largest All Traditional Tournament on the East Coast - in Washington, D.C., where he won Gold Medals in both Pushing Hands, and Advanced Sparring.

In addition to Tien Shan Pai and Yang Style Tai Chi training with Chao Chi Liu, Rob has studied Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (at camps and seminars featuring Helio, Rorion, Relson, and Royce Gracie), and the followingQi Gong: Soaring Crane (fron Niam Zu Li), Eight Pieces of Brocade (from Shawn Liu), Six Healing Sounds (from Nian Zu Li), Qi Gong Wu Xhi Wah (from Chao Chi Liu), Micro-Cosmic Circle Qi Gong (from Shou-Yu Liang), and meditative Qi Gong (Conference Staff, Beijing).

Being located inside the Washington Beltway has given Rob some unique opportunities. In addition to teaching martial arts and presenting workshops to members of all the Armed Services, including special forces members, as well as CIA, DEA, FBI, Department of State Foreign Service Officers, U.S. Customs Officers, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and Exxon-Mobile Corporation, Rob has presented numerous health and fitness demonstrations and workshops to Washington, D.C. area law firms, businesses and agencies, including Georgetown University Hospital, Northern Virginia Hospital Center, Alexandria Hospital, Arlington Public Schools, USA Today, and Intelsat.

In 1999 he received an invitation from the American Physical Therapy Association, and was a featured speaker at their Annual Convention, which took place that year in Washington, D.C.

Rob is a freelance writer who has sold articles and fiction to Inside Kung Fu Magazine, Black Belt Magazine, Tai Chi Magazine, MA Success Magazine, and Aboriginal Science Fiction Magazine. His articles have also appeared in numerous on line publications. Additionally, he has been adjunct faculty in writing and social sciences at National Lewis University.

Rob lives on a shady street in a quite neighborhood with his family, and their cat Happy.


Thank you so much for joining me today, Rob, it's been a pleasure. I wish you well with your books, and everything.


Have any questions for Rob? Any comments? He'd love to hear them!


Until next time, take care!


♥ Julie