An interview with Mr. Paws…
[If you don’t know it already, Mr. Paws, a super-intelligent cat who does mathematical research, is a main character in my YA novel The Secret Lab (adults have also found it enjoyable). He visited me from his parallel universe recently to talk about “The Chaos Chronicles” and sci-fi in general. I include here only the pertinent parts. We were sidetracked at times by unsolved mathematical conjectures about gaps between primes and whether there’s just one Higgs boson or many, but I’ll spare you those details.]
Steve: Good to see you again. Have my muses been taking good care of you?
Mr. Paws: I’m purrfectly independent, you know—I don’t need babying. I do miss the kids. Although I can wander freely about that futuristic International Space Station you created, Shashi and all the gang [Steve: ISS tweens who become Mr. Paws’ friends on the ISS] are off doing other things. So, yes, your muses are useful in keeping me on my toes with provocative questions. They helped me come here to visit, though, because I have some questions for you.
Steve: You mean, you want to interview me?
Mr. Paws: Don’t let your ego inflate, pal. No, I’m just here to chat. By jumping around through the Nexus in time and space, I’ve been able to explore some of the places you talk about in “The Chaos Chronicles.” They’re quite interesting. My adventures in The Secret Lab can be considered a prequel to all those adventures, of course. In “my time,” they didn’t know about the Nexus. Humans were just exploring the solar system.
Steve: Which places are most interesting?
Mr. Paws: The original three interstellar Human colonies, all very different, enjoyed varying developments during the pre-FTL [faster-than-light] days, which made them rather unique. When it all came together with the FTL and ITUIP [Interstellar Trade Union of Interdependent Planets], they preserved much of that uniqueness. From the sociological point-of-view, that’s very interesting. I couldn’t have predicted that. Of course, you wrote it, so you could.
Steve: Well, they were isolated a long time due to the Tali invasion of Earth after the Chaos. Sing a Samba Galactica documents that. Mathematicians can’t be expected to be good historians or good sociologists. Even with the superstring drive, it takes a long subjective time to travel between the ITUIP worlds. That’s sort of the theme in Come Dance a Cumbia…with Stars in Your Hand!
Mr. Paws: By the way, you recently released Pasodobles in a Quantum Stringscape. I enjoyed those Dr. Carlos stories. But are you some kind of Fred Astaire wannabe?
Steve: Well, yes and no. I have two left feet. But I admire Latin American dances and music.
Mr. Paws: I have two left feet too, but they don’t stop me from dancing. Like Fred, I love the Fox Trot, but I prefer to call it the Cat Trot. I recognized a certain predilection for Latin music and dance in your titles. Humans dance Latin from the waist down—doesn’t work for me. Let’s see. The samba is from Brazil, the cumbia from Colombia, and the pasodoble from Spain, right?
Steve: Well, the samba I’m talking about is the folklore song form from Argentina, not the Brazilian Carnival dance. Two out of three isn’t bad, though.
Mr. Paws: Back to “The Chaos Chronicles.” You say it’s your version of the Foundation Trilogy. Why is that?
Steve: That’s more of a deep bow to Isaac Asimov. That master wrote the original trilogy and then brought it masterfully together with the robot novels and The End of Eternity. ITUIP is my Foundation, in some sense. I even have a mule, the villain in Come Dance a Cumbia, although I’ve covered mutants in another trilogy.
Mr. Paws: And with me, thank goodness. I think your trilogy is a bit darker than Asimov’s, so much so that George Lucas won’t use your ideas. What do you call it? Dystopian sci-fi. Back to the mutants, though. Sometimes I feel abandoned by you. While that gives me time to ponder the details of my mathematical research, it’s nice to know you’ve not completely forgotten me by telling the muses to drag me across space and time to do this interview.
Steve: Forget you? Never! Many times, I’ve even considered writing a sequel to The Secret Lab. But those muses take me elsewhere.
Mr. Paws: They’re OK, but they can be overbearing and stubborn, I’ll admit. Maybe you can work me into a short story somewhere. I’m willing. Here’s a critical question: Do other kids love me as much as Shashi?
Steve: I can’t really tell. Young adults seem to be more into fantasy these days, not real sci-fi. If they’re reading at all. It’s hard to criticize, though, when adults don’t read much either.
Mr. Paws: That brings up a point. Neither group likes mathematics either, in general. My book, Calculus for Humans, doesn’t do well at all. I’d think it’d be a bestseller. I wanted to call it Calculus for Idiots, but that’s a bit insulting and those books’ titles are already taken.
Steve: Besides mathematics, what do you like to read?
Mr. Paws: I’m into romance and cozy mysteries. They make me feel warm and fuzzy all over—not a bad thing, because they’ve lowered the heat on the ISS lately to cut costs. That’s probably a throwback to those Obama years when NASA suffered a thousand cuts. No wonder the Chinese beat the Americans to Mars.
Steve: You’re familiar with Jenny Wong, who was born on Mars, right?
Mr. Paws: Sure thing. She and Brent Mueller are my two favorite characters percolating through “The Chaos Chronicles Trilogy.” Too bad Brent abandoned The Way—I’m still a believer, by The Way. [Steve groans.] You really put the screws to them both. The Battle of Sanctuary, for example, and the kidnapping of Jenny by Ship. I guess those are the thriller elements in your sci-fi thrillers. Asimov was a bit blasé—more cerebral than thrilling. And he only thought about Human mutants and couldn’t invent an ET to save his life.
Steve: Back to The Way. I didn’t know cats were religious.
Mr. Paws: Throughout history, we were called agents of the Devil. That’s a bad rap, so it’s natural that some of us are religious. But The Way isn’t religion in the normal sense of the word. You know that. I consider it a celebration of life in an indifferent universe. By the way, I noticed your Detective Castilblanco became a Buddhist in Teeter-Totter between Lust and Murder. A salsa-dancing Buddhist. Now that’s a hoot!
Steve: Sometimes my characters do surprising things. You, for example. Any extreme adventures in your life since The Secret Lab? They would give me some story ideas.
Mr. Paws: You should know. I’m not your ghostwriter. Just write the damn sequel.
In libris libertas….
