2025 - 10/2025 Meeting

The Saturday, October 8, 2025 General Meeting of the Science Fiction Association of Bergen County was held by zoom video conference. Science fiction author Douglas Phillips was our speaker.

Mr Phillips is a former computer programmer who did not start writing until he retired in 2017. He has written eight books and sold 250 thousand books since the start of his new career. His first five books comprise the Quantum Series. His most recent novel, FIRST ASCENT, kicks off the Ascending Carbon trilogy. He has also written two standalones, PHENOMENA (a neuroscience thriller) and LOST AT L3 (a sf comedy adventure co-authored with his son Bryant, who is a standup comic).

The idea behind the Quantum Series is that the extra dimensions posited by String Theory do in fact exist, and that if you can "squeeze" one of these extra dimensions you can expand one of the dimensions in our universe and get around the speed of light problem (please note, Phil is not an astrophysicist and is undoubtably butchering the concept). The author's handwavium is clever enough to earn him a substantial following in the particle physicist community, Science connections not only slipped him into the line to visit CERN (the European particle accelerator that straddles France and Switzerland), but got him into areas of the facility off limits to visitors. Our guest's slides of his visit were one of the highlights of the evening.

Our speaker's father was a geologist for Gulf Oil. Young Douglas was a geeky kid who did things like launching mice in a baloon. He achieved degrees in Geomorphy and Meteorology from the universities of Berkeley and Utah. He did not work long in those disciplines, however, because there was an urgent demand for people who knew computers. He worked on the first programs for Windows and mastered Java and other programming languages.

It generally takes our guest 11 months to write a novel, which includes 2 months of research and notetaking before he actually starts the book. He is a plotter who needs to know how the story ends and the major steps along the way, although he will write scenes out of order.

Douglas Phillips approaches writing a novel by asking himself an interesting question. This develops inot a basic theme and concept which he develops with a 1 or 2 sentence premise about the nature of the story. He then develops a chapter-by-chapter for the book. It is only at this point that he starts to write. His wife assists hium with dialogue and characterization as his books are plot-driven.

Our thanks to Kathy Cannarozzi for technical support. Additional Notes appear on the club website at 2025 - 10/25 Meeting,

Meeting Notes:

BACKGROUND:

Father was a Gulf Oil geologist.

Met wife in London. Both college students.

Degrees in Geomorphology (UC Berkeley) & Meteorology (University of Utah), but moved into computers because that's where the money was. Worked on first Windows programs. Also Java, and other languages.

Later got interested in particle physics and neuroscience.

Geeky kid. Launched two mice in a balloon.

CHARACTERIZATION

Not a character writer.

Weak characters in first book.

Dialogue - Are your characters speaking or are you speaking through your characters?

Plot can determine the characters.

Sidekicks are useful in exposition.

Wife helps out with female characters and dialogue in general.

Old white men must learn about the rest of the world.

Empathy - Getting into other people's minds.

WRITING

His books generally take 11 months to write, which includes 2 months of research.

Post-retirement writer. Started writing in 2017. Has written 8 books in 8 years and sold 250K copies. Editor taught him how to write a novel.

Eliza Dee is his editor - https://clioediting.com/

Tantor Media does his audio books - https://tantor.com/

K M Weiland

.....Writing Advice - https://www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/

.....Fiction Books - https://www.kmweiland.com/

Critiquecircle.com - https://www.critiquecircle.com/landing

He's a plotter who needs to know how the story will end. Will write scenes out of order.

Figure out you basic theme & concept. Ask yourself an interesting question.

Develop premise - 1 or 2 sentences about what your story will be about.

Develops chapter-by-chapter outline.

His target audience is people who like Andy Weir's THE MARTIAN. Uses Amazon ads to target those people.

QUANTUM SPACE

First novel. Sold 1000 copies in first week.

Amazon advertising.

As soon as you do one thing right with Amazon, other things open up for you.

When you have a second book, set up a pre-order, that sets up a batch of first day sales which push you up the charts.

Sell by word of mouth.

Send me your email. and I will send you something (story, etc).

Star drive - if you can compress one dimension of space, you expand another.

QUANTUM TIME

Second book.

Wanted to write about extra dimensions of time, but he had to do space in book one before he could do time.

QUANTUM PHYSICS

Extra dimensional space.

The Fourth Dimension by Rudy Rucker - Mathematics Book

If you can discover strings, then you have discovered extra dimensions of space.

ASCENDING CARBON SERIES

Planned trilogy. Book One, First Ascent is out.

Wanted to do the first realistic space elevator in science fiction.

International Space Elevator Consortium - https://www.isec.org/

Wanted a fun book that would explore a completely different view of life.

Only carbon is light enough & strong enough for the cable of a space elevator.

PHENOMENA

.....Watched Dan Brown Master Class - Write What You Want to Know & Research It

.....Seattle had open lectures about Brain Science

.....Dream science fiction - untangling how the brain works

.....Christof Koch - Complexity & Diversity of cells lead to consciousness

LOST AT L3

Comedy - Gilligan's Island in Space

Co-authored with son, Bryant, who is a stand-up comedian

CERN SLIDE SHOW

Largest particle accelerator in the world in Switzerland / France.

Has an anti-matter factory.

Scientists are his fans, got to see areas off-limits to the public.