If you thought that you would never hear anything more about Starcraft: Ghost when Blizzard put the console shooter on indefiniate hold a few months ago, you would be wrong. This fall Pocket Books will release Starcraft Ghost: Nova, a prequel to the game's storyline. FiringSquad got a chance to chat with the novel's author Keith R.A. DeCandido to find out more about the book and other topics.

FiringSquad: First can you give us a brief look back at your writing career?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Well, I spend most of my time looking =forward=, but sure....

I started writing when I was six years old. However, nobody really was interested in paying me for what I wrote until much later, for reasons that should be fairly obvious. When I was in college, I sold some reviews and articles to LIBRARY JOURNAL and THE COMICS JOURNAL, and that started a career writing nonfiction for various magazines (and later web sites).

My first fiction was in 1994, a collaborative Spider-Man short story called "An Evening in the Bronx with Venom," written with John Gregory Betancourt. My first novel was also a collaborative Spider-Man tale, VENOM'S WRATH in 1998, written with Jose R. Nieto.

Since then, my career's blossomed. I've written over 30 novels, over a dozen short stories, a few novellas, and a mess of eBooks, essays, etc.

FiringSquad: How did the deal come about to write your first Blizzard based game novel based on World of Warcraft?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: A big chunk of those 30+ novels have been for Pocket Books. The editors there like my work, and there was a WARCRAFT slot open that they thought I could fill nicely.

FiringSquad: Why did you want to set the novel's storyline before the events of the game?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: The plot of the book came out of a lengthy conversation with Chris Metzen at Blizzard. We both liked the idea of doing a book that took place between WARCRAFT 3 and WORLD OF WARCRAFT, one that explored the difficulties that the humans and the orcs would have living together on Kalimdor after the Burning Legion was driven off. Yes, Jaina and Thrall get along, but that doesn't mean their people will. I also personally wanted to address the notion of what happened to Aegwynn -- her story hadn't had an ending yet, and I thought she deserved one.

FiringSquad: So far what has the response been like to your World of Warcraft novel?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Mostly positive, which is very encouraging, as I know how fussy WOW fans are....

FiringSquad: How did the deal to write the Starcraft: Ghost novel come about?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Chris loved my work on CYCLE OF HATRED, and they were developing GHOST and wanted to do a novel that served as a prequel to the game. Everyone thought it was a good fit, and I found myself truly captivated by the character of Nova.

FiringSquad: What can you tell us about the novel's storyline at this time?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Well, like I said, it was originally designed as a prequel to the game. The game was going to be a first-person shooter, in which you-the-gamer play Nova, a Ghost -- basically a powerful telepathic and telekinetic assassin with excellent martial arts and weapons skills. What NOVA the novel does is tell the character's backstory and show how she got the point she's at in the game.

Nova Terra started out as a scion of the Old Families on Tarsonis. Because of her family's position, her telepathic talents have been kept a secret -- both from the Confederacy of Man and from Nova herself. At least, it's kept secret until tragedy strikes the Terra family, and Nova finds herself in the worst part of Tarsonis City, being chased by a Wrangler, a special agent trained to seek out telepaths to be brought into the Ghost program. The novel follows Nova's tribulations in "the Gutter," and the Wrangler's attempts to track her down.

FiringSquad: How much input did you receive from Blizzard on the novel?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Oh, quite a bit, on both books. Blizzard in general and Chris in particular are =very= hands-on with these books. It's a lot of fun, actually -- there's a true sense of collaboration, and I've really enjoyed the way the two of us bounce ideas off each other. It's a great creative buzz, working with Chris.

In the case of NOVA, the basics of Nova's backstory was already laid out. I fleshed it out some, particularly the culture of Tarsonis City and especially of the Gutter, the sleazy underbelly of the Confederacy.

FiringSquad: Did you feel that you had a lot of freedom to expand upon the storyline that the Starcraft: Ghost game was supposed to have?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Well, I wasn't so much expanding on the GHOST storyline as I was filling in background stuff. Having said that, I was given quite a bit of leeway to fill in the side alleys, as it were, of the STARCRAFT megastory.

FiringSquad: As you know, Blizzard decided to put Starcraft: Ghost on "indefiniate hold" a few months ago. What was you reaction when you heard about the news?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: "Are they still doing my book? Yes? Whew..."

FiringSquad: Do you think that fans of the game will get something out of your novel even though the game itself won't be be released?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Oh, absolutely. It's still, if I do say so myself, a perfectly good STARCRAFT book, and it fits into the universe right alongside LIBERTY'S CRUSADE, SHADOW OF THE XEL'NAGA, SPEED OF DARKNESS, and QUEEN OF BLADES.

FiringSquad: Are you a video-PC gamer yourself and if so what are your current favorites at the moment?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Ironically, I'm not much of a gamer, mainly because I simply don't have =time=. I'm too busy writing, and besides, I've seen what these games have done to people......

FiringSquad: What upcoming novels do you have in the works?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: Well, in addition to NOVA this fall, I've got two BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER novels coming: BLACKOUT in the fall and THE DEATHLESS in the spring. My STAR TREK: S.C.E. eBook MANY SPLENDORS will be out in August, and I've got two more TREK works coming in 2007: THE MIRROR-SCALED SERPENT, which will be the VOYAGER part of the STAR TREK: MIRROR UNIVERSE event in the early part of the year, and then one of the 20th-anniversary NEXT GENERATION novels entitled Q&A, which will be out in the fall. I've also got a comic book coming from Platinum Studios next spring called DARK FORCES -- it's a romantic comedy about demonic possession.

FiringSquad: Finally is there anything else you wish to say about your Blizzard novels?

Keith R.A. DeCandido: I think the fan response to NOVA will be as good as it has been to CYCLE OF HATRED. The Blizzard universes have some wonderful characters -- it was a joy and a privilege to get to write the likes of Thrall, Aegwynn, Jaina, Nova, and Arcturus Mengsk. I think the books help the game come alive for people -- or, at least, I hope they do....

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