We chat with author Joseph Eckert about The Traveler, which is the story of a reluctant time-traveler and his extraordinary son, and the bond between them that even millennia cannot break. An adventure full of heartbreak, hope, and futures beyond imagination.
Hi, Joseph! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
Thank you for having me on The Nerd Daily! I’m a father, husband, and pet parent living in the Greater Seattle area. Father to an active hockey player, husband to a beautiful wife, and pet parent to a grumpy old cat who is still quite handsome despite his a dancing age, if he does say so himself.
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
I would credit my father for introducing me to novels and encouraging my love of reading. My father always had a book he was actively reading. I learned from that and even to this day I would feel anxious if I didn’t have a book I was working my way through. “Would” being the operative word there beause with so many great things to read out there, I’m never without at least one (if not more) things I’m actively reading.
A love of reading led directly to a love of writing. I think that’s the case for many writers. We read and naturally think “what if” or “wouldn’t it be cool if…” We invent new, vibrant characters inside our own heads. And that leads to the thought, “Maybe I could do that. Maybe I could write that.”
Quick lightning round! Tell us:
- The first book you ever remember reading: The Hobbit
- The one that made you want to become an author: The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F Hamilton
- The one that you can’t stop thinking about: Consider Phlebas by Iain M Banks
Your debut novel, The Traveler, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Time Travel; Family; Logical Extremes
What can readers expect?
Expect a time travel story writ on an vast canvas but one that, at it’s beating heart, is about a father and his son. As Scott Treder starts slipping forward through time—with the length of time doubling each day—his brilliant son, Lyle, tries to figure out how to stop it.
Where did the inspiration for The Traveler come from?
The Traveler came from two places. First, I learned about exponents in grade school and decided to try to fool my mother into paying me huge sums of money. I proposed we change my allowance to just one cent a day, but then double that amount each day thereafter. One cent the first day, two cents the second, four cents the third, and so on. We didn’t even make it to day ten before my mother cottoned on to what I was doing and called it off.
My dreams of becoming a child trillionaire were dashed.
My interest in exponential increases remained, however, and later (this is the second part) I had the aforementioned reader-turned-writer thought of, “What if” and “Maybe I could write this.” I wanted to take an average Midwestern father and place him in the kinds of futures imagined by Peter F Hamilton and Iain M Banks. And I wanted to push farther—push the logical extremes of the entire concept of time travel.
How could I get him to those distant futures? What would the ramifications be on his life, on his family? What would he think of those fantastical time periods?
Thus The Traveler was born.
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
What’s interesting given the time it’s taken for me to publish The Traveler—fifteen years since I sent the original first draft to my father, as he’s always been my first reader—is my life has changed substantially in that time period. I wasn’t married or a father when I first wrote the first draft. Now my child is finishing fifth grade. I would say I enjoyed writing Lyle the most at first, but on returning to the novel and editing it (multiple times) over the years, I’ve increasingly empathized with Scott.
As for moments, the most fun scenes to write were also the ones within which I would most not want to find myself, should I abruptly begin slipping forward through time. I’ll leave it there to avoid spoilers!
What do you hope readers take away from The Traveler?
I think it’s up to readers to take away what they will from any novel, and what they find meaningful may not have been what the author intended.
With that said, I think what I personally take away from my own story is the need to look around and take stock. Appreciate what we have. All of us, in our own ways, sometimes find ourselves slipping forward through time, day after day, missing chunks of our lives. For Scott this becomes painfully literal, but for the rest of us it can be just as real, and just as damaging, albeit hidden under all the constant demands on our time.
Don’t miss out on your own life.
Did you face any challenges whilst writing? How did you overcome them?
As mentioned, it’s taken fifteen years for me to take this book from finished first draft to published work. I’m deeply grateful to Lindsey Hall and Michael Beale at Tor US and Tor UK for taking the chance on the novel, and for Rikki Bergman at WME for her work as my agent to get us here. Fifteen years is a long time. It’s a long time to keep pounding on the door, hoping to be let inside. It’s a long time to keep insisting on pursing the traditional publishing route, to wonder if I was pursing a path of insanity (continuing to try the same thing hoping for a new result). For me, I overcame the challenge of rejections by dogged persistence, and by having a day job outside writing (and a supportive and understanding spouse).
This is your debut novel! What was the road to becoming a published author like for you?
I think I kind of answered that above, in the challenges section. It’s been a very long road, full of bumps and twists and turns. Interestingly, The Traveler movie rights sold before the book rights—years before, in fact. I don’t have much visibility into the movie, other than—so far as I know—it’s still under development.
I think every writer has a different path to getting published. There’s no single (or easy) way that will work for everyone. Some writers put bits of their work online, get attention, and stumble into a biding war. Others might query a handful of agents, get representation, submit to a few editors, and get a bite. Still others might self-publish, find success, and get a traditional publisher interested that way. My own path happened to be a long one.
What’s next for you?
Here’s hoping the next book doesn’t take fifteen more years to publish! I’ve continued writing novels—and I’ll have to leave it at that for now.
Lastly, what books are you looking forward to picking up? Any you’ve read so far this year that you’ve enjoyed?
I never read Latro in the Mist by Gene Wolfe, but I recently bought it—it’s sitting on my To Read shelf right now. I’m looking forward to that one, given my deep appreciation for his The Book of the New Sun and The Wizard Knight.
I’m currently reading 2666 by Roberto Bolaño and it’s hooked its claws in me. What a tragedy that he died so young.
I’ve finished several books this year, but ones I’d call out:
No Man’s Land by Richard K Morgan was awesome. Different for him, but a hell of a good time. WWI vet faces down some very nasty fairies in a plot that twists and turns and doesn’t go where you might expect. I’ve enjoyed everything he’s written since Altered Carbon.
The Everlasting by Alix E Harrow. Don’t be frightened away by the second person narrator. I loved the mixture of sci-fi and Authurian fantasy with time travel and time loops.
The Devils by Joe Abercrombie. Laugh out loud funny, gloriously bloody, and antiheroes to fall in love with.
Sublimation by Isabel J Kim (which came out shortly before The Traveler): another second person narration not to be afraid of, this one has the kind of premise that makes you smack yourself on the forehead as a writer and think, “Why didn’t I come up with that?”
The Franchise by Thomas Elrod (also came out just before The Traveler). Think: the Truman Show meets Game of Thrones/Lord of the Rings and you’ll come close, but also just start to scratch the surface.
I could keep going but I’ll stop there!
