Jul 22

Jul 22 Scott Michael Decker

Author Scott Michael Decker

Biography

Scott Michael Decker, MSW, is the author of nearly thirty novels in the Science Fiction and Fantasy genres, mucking about among the sub-genres of space opera, cyberpunk, paranormal, spy-fi, and sword and sorcery. His biggest fantasy is to sell a book or two, maybe more.

The author never set out to write a novel. A friend saw the author writing a journal and said he’d always wanted to write a book. After the friend described its plot over a cup of coffee, the author asked if he could give it a try. A month later, the author was still writing. Two years later, he had a novel. No intention to write one.

Among his favorite topics is alien encounters, frequently postulating aliens will come in forms humans won’t recognize or occupy dimensions humans can’t sense. Perhaps they’re among humans now, a topic the author has also explored.

Another domain that the author explores is linguistic, cultural, and religious derivations, believing that humanity will take its myriad identities to the stars. Among the cultures he has explored are the Celts and its offshoots, the Galicians and Galatians, the Aztec, the Japanese, the Chinese, the Russian, the Rajasthan, the Tamil, and the Bantu of Zimbabwe. In these explorations he has incorporated various aspects of the associated religions and their pantheons.

The author isn’t always so serious. Some novels are toss-offs, written purely for the hell of it, dashed off in a blizzard of writing with no particular goal or agenda, popped out with nary a glance back. Others are labors of love, the lives of characters lived out through the magic of the written word. How, you ask, can something so daunting as writing a novel—or painting a portrait, penning a book of poetry, writing a screenplay, composing a symphony, or making a movie—ever be considered a toss-off? Well, an acquaintance of the author taking an art class said one of the assignments was to compose a piece of art, didn't matter what it was, what materials were used, what its subject matter was, and display it prominently somewhere in public. And leave it. Yes, leave it. Abandon it. Foist it upon the world and let them have it and have at it. When asked about the reasoning behind such an assignment, the instructor said, "What good is art if it isn't displayed, consumed, destroyed, and replaced?" Somewhat like an Ozymandias of art, where the colossal wreck of the artist’s vanity is left to the depredations of time, erosion, and subsidence, where the wind, rain, and sun reveal those works to be the impermanent folly they are, where the artistry on display today is replaced by the artistry created tomorrow.

The author particularly likes to mock the audacity of humans to call themselves “sapiens,” an affront to every intelligent life form in the universe. In doing so, the author mocks himself, frequently asking, “Are we so poor in spirit that we can't laugh at our own expense?” As one protagonist wrote in her declaimer, which followed the author’s disclaimer, “I've changed the names, the characters, and the events portrayed to brighten the dim, implicate the innocent, mock the guilty, and prod the indifferent clod from a stupor.” If imitation is the highest form of flattery, then mockery must surely be a close second.

The author lives in the real world, too, having fifteen years of experience working with high-risk populations. Formerly interested in engineering, he's now tilting at the windmills he once aspired to build. When asked about the MSW after his name, the author is adamant it stands for Masters in Social Work, and not “Municipal Solid Waste,” which he spreads pretty thick as well. He also has a BS degree from MSU, a bull&*%$ degree from making stuff up. The Buddhist in him swears he’s empty inside. He lives and dreams happily with his spouse near Sacramento, California.