Shooting the Shit with Larry Kollar

Larry Kollar is an indie author of "strange fiction" with several books already under his unique belt. Earlier in the week, Indie Angie talked with Larry about his writing. Now, let's get to know him a little better... 

Favorite Food and Drink
Food: pizza, and just about anything spicy. I don't get to eat Thai food as much as I'd like.
Drink: for writing, rum is how I shut up my internal editor. In general, I like fruit juices, beer, wine, and unsweet tea. Just not all at once.

Favorite Books
In general, F/SF are my primary vices, but I've been exposed to all sorts of different genres in the last couple years. Specific books would include:

LoTR (of course) - Tolkien set the standard for world-building and epic fantasy, and is often imitated and all too often duplicated.

The Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson - a superb story revolving around the first settlers of Mars, their children, their fights and loves. Great world-building, and the story's about building a world!

Duma Key by Stephen King - as a writer, I see the echo of what drives the main character to create. In my case, it's not an inimical force, but I do recognize the imperative to create, that need that eclipses everything else and is angered when disturbed by outside forces.

Favorite Music
Progressive or melodic trance. I spend a lot of bandwidth streaming ah.fm or soma.fm, especially when I'm writing.

Favorite Movies
I like the ones that surprise me—the ones I go in, expecting a cheesy flick with great special effects, and find something with unexpected depth. Two that stand out are "The Last Starfighter" and "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow." Both turned out to be lots of fun.

Favorite TV
I don't watch much TV these days. I think I got out of the habit around the time "X Files" started deteriorating in the next to last season. But that's one. I loved "Hogan's Heroes" when I was in high school, and "Max Headroom" in early adulthood. If DVRs had been invented in the 80s, I might have watched more stuff. With a 3 year old grandkid running loose in the house, we mostly have PBS Kids on. We don't have cable or satellite, but we do have Netflix.

Best memory from childhood
Games with friends, first kiss, books, campouts… how am I supposed to pick one?

Best memory from adulthood
The pediatrician handing me each of our newborn kids, not quite two years apart. The boy got his feet in the crook of my elbow, kicked, and launched himself. Fortunately, the pediatrician was there to catch him. And (the kids were both C-section) how many guys have heard the question, "You wanna see a uterus?"

Life of the party or stand back and observe?
Both. I'll stand back and observe at first, then start to mingle once I've got the lay of the land.

What makes you rage?
Deliberate, calculated ignorance. Unfortunately, there's plenty of that in this part of the world.

What makes you giggle (or in your case, manly laugh)?
Lots of things (I'm easily amused). In the general questions, I mentioned getting two very different reactions from two different reviewers to the same thing. When I realized, I laughed loud and long. Mason (the grandkid) is always doing something silly.

Find Larry's books at Amazon.

Follow Larry at his blog, Twitter, and Goodreads.