Twenty questions for authors, none about writing. Some questions are not in the form of a question. (Previous Q&As may be found HERE.)

This week we have SHANE JONES, author of Daniel Fights a Hurricane, released this week, and Light Boxes. (See below for purchase links, along with a Daniel Fights a Hurricane book trailer.)

SJ: Jocular Ford.

2. Satan hoofs up and says two words to you. What are they?

SJ: Not sure.

3. Give us an A+ summer song.

SJ: The only thing I think of when I read this question is that song that goes “summer summer summer time, summer time…” which is Will Smith maybe?  [Youtube]

4. What is the worst injury you’ve ever sustained?

SJ: I’ve been really lucky. I’ve never had stitches or broken any bones. When I was a teenager I remember crashing my mountain bike into a tree. I can still see the moment where the right handlebar hit the tree, and I can still feel the fear when I flew over the handlebars and landed on my back. Wind-knocked out of me, I remember lying on the dirt path trying to breathe in the middle of the woods.

5. Form a supergroup using any four musicians, living or dead, that would be thoroughly awesome to experience, for better or worse.

SJ: Oh, wow. I’d like four identical versions of David Byrne at different ages on the same stage. Like David Byrne age 15, age 35, age 45, and age 60. I’d like to see them looking at each other and interacting with each other. This may or may not be a music video already.

6. What was your best Halloween costume?

SJ: Robo-Cop when I was a little kid. My father and mother spent weeks on it. The legs and arms were these plastic pipes spray painted silver and like molded around my arms and legs. The mask was really expensive. The gun was from my laser tag set.

7. Tell us something you built.

SJ: Tree fort when I was maybe twelve years old. It’s a sentimental and sappy story I’ll probably tell kids when I’m nuts and super old, but the entire neighborhood kind of came together to build this really elaborate tree fort in my backyard. There were different levels and balconies and something called a “Yo board” which was a board that bounced up and down and was painted with the word Yo in dull orange. Eventually it got so out of control that a neighbor, a man who looked like a giant bird and who loved to use a leaf-blower while shirtless, complained and we had to tear it down. Building it was really fun, but breaking it apart was amazing.

8. If you could safely have one non-domesticated animal as a lifelong companion, what would it be? (Fantasy creatures are allowed.)

SJ: I first thought sloth. But they are a bit creepy. Can you imagine waking up and a sloth is slowly crawling across you? I don’t know. Probably just a huge fucking pig that fills an entire bedroom.

9. What do you like to grow?

SJ: Crack cocaine motherfucker!

10. Name a thing you love that nobody else you personally know also loves.

SJ: That’s a really good question. I’m thinking hard about it. I guess I love my personal mind/dream/space where I go and think up ideas. Who else would love that? It’s egotistical and selfish and doesn’t make any money. But I love it. I love sitting and thinking and going deeper and deeper into my mind, digging around for ideas. I don’t know anyone who loves that.

11. How would you like those eggs?

SJ: I usually say scrambled. But scrambled can get boring. Maybe over-easy. A nice pair of over-easy eggs. That sounds really nice.

12. What’s the worst thing about your favorite holiday?

SJ: I actually really like The Fourth of July. I don’t know why exactly. There’s something so disgustingly patriotic and beautifully ridiculous about that holiday. The drunkenness, our sad country celebrating for the sake of celebrating, the fireworks, the lotioned skin of people, the grilling of cheap meat. It’s somehow the best holiday and worst holiday simultaneously.

13. You’ve just been turned into a lousy superhero. Who are you, and who is your nemesis?

SJ: I don’t know.

14. Name a thought that has profoundly scared you in the night.

SJ: I’m alive.

15. You’re stinking rich. What’s the first thing you add to your home?

SJ: Gold coin filled room Scrooge McDuck style.

Light Boxes

16. What are you up to this weekend?

SJ: My sister is going to her high school prom. So I’m going to visit my parents and see her and take pictures and stuff and just be a supportive brother.

17. Which color makes you feel the most comfortable? The most anxious?

SJ: Blue makes me feel comfortable. Red would be the most anxious. That answer seems pretty boring.

18. What is the strangest job you ever had?

SJ: I worked as a lifeguard at a really shitty motel when I was 19. This was a place just filled with alcoholics, deadbeat fathers, drug addicts, people killing themselves in their $40 a night rooms, etc. It was amazing. I remember one guy, out of his mind, at the pool wearing black shorts. He had long black hair and wore sunglasses. All over his body he had written in black ink about how he was a pilot. Like, he had written types of planes, engine details, ways to fly from one airport to the next, etc. That was strange. I let him swim. He went down the slide and it was like someone had just pushed down a sack of potatoes.

19. I mean honestly: aren’t you better off living without ___?

SJ: The bag of chips I just ate.

20. James Cameron discovers something new at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. What do you hope it is?

SJ: I don’t know. I guess just something really weird and new? A new breed of horse maybe?

Shane Jones lives in upstate New York. His first novel, Light Boxes, was originally published by Publishing Genius Press in a print run of 500 copies in 2009. The novel was reviewed widely, the film option purchased by Spike Jonze (Where The Wild Things Are, Adaptation), and the book was reprinted by Penguin Group in 2010. Light Boxes has been translated in eight languages and was named an NPR best book of the year. In August of 2012 Penguin released a new novel, Daniel Fights a Hurricane. Shane is also the author of the novella The Failure Six.

Previous Q&As may be found HERE.

Web site: Daniel Fights a Hurricane Facebook Page

Buy his books:

Daniel Fights a Hurricane

IndieBound
Barnes & Noble
Amazon

Light Boxes

IndieBound
Barnes & Noble
Amazon