The Inspiration for Strange Angels

a.k.a. Battling Imposter Syndrome by Giving Credit Where It's Due

I don’t have writer’s block. Years ago (probably 2014 or 2015), I read an interview with Guillermo del Toro, and when he was asked about writer’s block, he said, “I don’t have it.” He then went on to explain how he had so many ideas in his head that he would never find enough time to write them all down and that his default methodology was to write as much as possible. He said, if you think you have writer’s block, then maybe you weren’t meant to be a writer.

I thought about that for a long time, and figured he was probably correct. Since that moment, I’ve had too many ideas to ever have to stop writing. They might not be good ideas, but they’re there.

However, I do hit lulls where I have multiple books on the hard drive in various stages of development, and for whatever reason, I simply can’t figure out how to move forward in any of them. It’s not writer’s block, because the ideas are there, the desire to write is there, but it’s…something else.

Then, the other day, I saw a clip from an interview with Jerry Seinfeld. In the short clip, he said,

“There’s no writer’s block. There’s lazy. There’s scared. But there’s no writer’s block. Just sit down and realize you’re mediocre, and you’re going to have to put a lot of effort into this to make it good. That’s what writing is.”

I’m no fan of Seinfeld. I’ve found his comedy more amusing than funny, and I think his show was overrated. (Although worth watching for Jerry Stiller and Jason Alexander’s performances.) But he is correct in this statement.

These lulls I hit come from that little voice in the back of my head that constantly tells me I’m not good enough, I should quit.

In the twenty years I’ve been in publishing, I have yet to lose the war to this little voice, but man—it has won some battles here and there.

This week is one of those battles where the voice is winning. I was not capable of writing last week due to a wicked illness that laid me low for almost two weeks. I tried to write, but the head-fog was too powerful. I spent most of those two weeks either struggling through shifts at work or sitting in a recliner under a couple of blankets with a cat on my lap.

When I finally got back in front of my trusty computer, Scrivener open on the main monitor, a work-in-progress staring at me, fingers on the keyboards—I couldn’t make my fingers make the words my brain knew I need to make. I just sort of…stared.

And then I distracted myself by watching old episodes of Flip or Flop and mocking Christina Haack’s design choices.

Even now, I should be making the words, but I’m just…not. So, I’m distracting myself by writing this post.

The problem comes from a wicked case of imposter syndrome.

And this always happens to me in that lull where I’m waiting on a new book to launch into the world. For some reason, the existential dread of dreaming up worst-case scenarios for the book’s reception by the world at large paralyzes me and prevents me from moving forward with any other projects for a week or three.

Once the book is out there, and I know there’s nothing further I can do about it, I usually shrug off the imposter syndrome and get back to work, but for now, it’s landing some good haymakers on the ol’ ego, and making me question every sentence I write. This is how imposter syndrome does its best damage.

Imposter Syndrome is one of the biggest challenges many independent writers like myself face. We are flying solo far too much. From the conception of the idea, to the writing, to the editing, to the layout, to the publishing, to the marketing—we’re doing it all ourselves and hoping for the best. We know the odds are very long against us, but we still push forward either out of stupidity, bravery, or a need to throw middle fingers at the system (sometimes a combination of all of them).

The problem arises when the solo artist stops letting the process be the reward and seeks external validation, whether it’s recognition, reviews, or sales. Those are all factors out of the control of the writer. The only thing we can do is write the next one.

Whenever I speak at libraries or to classrooms about the writing process, that’s what I always tell them:

Don’t worry about the things you can’t control.

Just worry about the things within your control, and write the next one.

It’s all you can do.

I’m just as prone to hypocrisy as the next person, particularly when I am about to throw another one of my literary babies to the proverbial wolves. I worry about the external issues, the things I can’t control, and that worry summons the whole domino process of falling victim to the dreaded imposter syndrome.

No previous reviews or good things said about my books matter when a new one is about to be released. It doesn’t matter that 2024 was my most financially successful year as a writer. It doesn’t matter how many Kindle Unlimited pages have been read of my books. It doesn’t matter how many copies I’ve sold over the years. It doesn’t matter that I got a Starred Review from Kirkus. No one cares that Abe & Duff got optioned for television twice because nothing happened to it either time. Any success I’ve had in the past is moot because the new book is all.

No matter how much I enjoyed writing it and editing it, and no matter that I have good hopes for it—it’s no longer my book once it gets put on that final conveyor belt to publication, and that causes that unholy fear of being outed as a fraud to ramp into overdrive.

So, since I cannot currently push forward on one of the works-in-progress, let’s talk about where Strange Angels came from, shall we?

Firefly/Serenity

Take my love
Take my land
Take me where I cannot stand
I don’t care, I’m still free
You can’t take the sky from me…

The opening notes to the theme song for Joss Whedon’s Firefly hooked me on the series instantly. Space western? Yes, please.

The premise of Strange Angels is an homage to Firefly, and I’m not going to even try to hide that fact.

But I think I took my version down some different roads. Less western, more 1970s truckers in space.

The corporations are still the bad guys, but there are more of them. It’s not the Alliance vs. the Rebels—it’s all the various corporations against everyone, with the consumers and the regular people paying the price for their greed.

The main crew of the STS Shy Opal is inspired by the crew of Serenity, but they’re a very different bunch of down-on-their-luck spacers. The captain of Opal is Nathan Pageant, and that’s a direct nod to Nathan Fillion who played Capt. Malcolm Reynolds in Firefly.

Gareth L. Powell’s Embers of War

I started writing Strange Angels in 2016. I think I hacked out the first five or six chapters, and then the premise I had in mind sort of went away. I pushed the manuscript to the back burner for a time and forgot about it.

A few years ago, I followed Gareth L. Powell on the app formerly known as Twitter and became a fan of his social media presence. Powell was a well-established Sci-fi author who seemed like a genuinely good dude. He very much wants others to succeed in their writing endeavors, and often takes time to answer questions, give advice, and encourage other writers.

Because of his social media, I bought a copy of his book Embers of War after it was released in 2018 and enjoyed it immensely. I followed it with the other two books in the trilogy, Fleet of Knives and Light of Impossible Stars when they were released, as well. If not for those books, I don’t know that I ever bother to return to Strange Angels.

The idea of sentient spaceships was always fun, and Powell’s Trouble Dog was a brilliant ship, just a wonderful vehicle in the cannon of great space vessels.

I had known something about Shy Opal’s design and story before I read Embers of War, but those books helped solidify it better in my mind and gave me a better grasp on how to write a book about the birth of robotic sentience.

I have not read any of Powell’s other books as of yet (crime fiction has been dominating my reading for a while), but they’re on the list.

Megan E. O’Keefe

Not long after I read Embers of War, I stumbled across Megan E. O’Keefe’s Velocity Weapon and devoured it in a week.

Much like Powell’s books, this was another great book about a ship controlled by Artificial Intelligence. I never got around to reading the other two books in this series because I ended up going back to writing Strange Angels after reading Velocity Weapon. And then Abe & Duff took off for me, so I threw some concentration behind crime fiction for a while.

Star Wars - the Witches of Dathomir

One of the fundamental ideas of Strange Angels came about while I was reading an article about Star Wars. The writer mentioned the Witches of Dathomir, and the phrase space witch became lodged in my brain.

Without that idea as the first seed, I don’t think I start writing this book. Space Witches + Firefly + Robotic Sentience + Space Opera + 1970s Truckers.

That’s where this book came from.

Strange Angels officially comes out 2.25.25. One of my ARC readers called it a “cozy Sci-fi,” and I don’t know if that’s entirely accurate, but I like that summation, so I’ll run with it.

It’s a novel that’s concerned about the relationships between the crew members. It's a novel with some humor and some heart (I hope), some general stupidity disguised as heroism, and some fun twists and turns in a traditional space opera that’s more about a single ship than warring armies.

The hard copies are out in the world right now. I’ve already mailed out five hard copies to people who requested personalized books, and there are signed copies currently available at Mystery to Me and Ink Cap Books.

I am a longtime Sci-fi nerd. When I was five, my chosen Halloween costume was one of those old Ben Cooper “Buck Rogers” costumes.

I lived and breathed Star Wars and Star Trek growing up. (Still do, really…) I devoured Doctor Who, Red Dwarf, Battlestar Galactica, and countless other Sci-fi properties throughout my life.

Strange Angels is a book that was a long time coming, and I sincerely hope you’ll enjoy it.

If you do, please tell friends.