Robert Lowell Russell (a.k.a. Rob, Dad, that weird dude) lives with his family in southeastern Ohio. He’s a former cardiac nurse, and currently manages continuing education events for nurses and osteopathic physicians. He’s had more than fifty short stories published over the years, and we’re pleased to have published a number of them.
Rob’s first appearance in our pages was one of the funniest stories we’ve ever published, “Elves Are Douchebags,” which you’ll find for a little while longer on the original SHOWCASE web site. Read it now. He followed that up with “Here There Be Monsters?” the story that put “reptile dysfunction” into our vocabulary and introduced us to, well…
“We’re experimenting with meta-bullying,” a girl explained. “We think if we plant certain words often enough in the media, people will be afraid without even really knowing why.”Brilliantly prescient, I think.
In last week’s deep dive through our old archives I found another of his stories, “Best in Show,” on our short-lived and unlamented “crevasse” site, so named because it was all pale blue and white, and stories fell into it, never to be seen again. If you like stories about cats, and especially stories about cats behaving very badly, you really need to read Rob’s play-by-play of the 2028 CFA World Cat Spectacular competition. Read it now.
Most recently, Rob’s story, “Days of Love and Loss: A Prologue to the Cat-borg Apocalypse,” capped off Stupefying Stories 24, and if you haven’t read it yet, you’re missing a real treat. Stupefying Stories 24 is free on Kindle Unlimited, so if you have a KU subscription, you owe it to yourself to check it out.
With all this as history, this seemed like a good time to catch up with Rob and see how he’s doing. Here we go!
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SS: What is the first SF/F book or story you remember reading?
RLR: My first exposure to speculative fiction was when my mom read The Hobbit to me and my younger brother. Later, when I was in the second grade, she started reading The Chronicles of Narnia to me, but I got impatient with her pace and started reading the series on my own. I haven’t stopped reading since. Thanks mom!SS: Who was your most significant influence?
RLR: By far, the biggest influence on my writing has been Glen Cook, particularly his Black Company and Garret P.I. series. I enjoyed Cook’s first-person narratives as well as his humor. I emulated his style when I was first starting out, and I’ve frequently adapted my own humor into my writing.
SS: When you write a new story, are you a plotter or a pantser?
RLR: I’ve always been a pantser when it comes to writing short stories because I can usually keep all the story elements in my head and get them down intact. However, trying to be a pantser with some of the novels I’ve started has gone… poorly.
SS: If you could change one thing about the way you write, what would it be?
RLR: I’d like to be able to blast out a novel and not worry about its quality before making revisions, but I tend to revise as I go, leaving the first parts of my projects polished, and the latter parts a jumbled, unfinished mess.
SS: How do you balance writing vs having a life?
RLR: I wrote most of my short stories while I was going to nursing school. I found that I could squeeze out a new short story between my studies and exams as a way of taking a break. Now that I’m working full-time (though thankfully without the crazy hours and crazier patients, in my current role), I find it harder to write new things and not have it feel like extra work. I guess I’m still figuring out that whole writing/life balance thing.
SS: What's next for you? What are you working on now?
RLR: My fiction writing has tapered off considerably over the last few years. I have a half-finished, middle school-level humorous novel I’ve been sitting on for years now. I’d like to actually finish it (after doing some necessary plotting instead of trying to pants it) and then run it by the writers group that was so helpful to me when I first started writing. If that plan works out, I’d like to see if I can get my first novel published. It’s all fame and fortune after that, right?
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- Pete Wood - "Birds of a Feather"
- Beth Cato - "Monsters of the Place Between"
- Andrew Jensen - "Running Away with the Cirque"
- Avery Elizabeth Hurt - "Sanctuary"
- Mike Adamson - "Last Stop Paradise"
- Carol Scheina - "The Burning Skies Bring His Soul"
- Phllip C. Jennings - "Mother's Day"
- Jamie Lackey - "The Gentlepeople"
- Karl Dandenell - "Krishna's Gift"
- Robert Lowell Russell - "Days of Love and Loss: A Prologue to the Cat-borg Apocalypse"
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