from:http://www.thrillerwriters.org/2009/10/greensword-a-tale-of-extreme-global-warm.html

Greensword: A Tale of Extreme Global Warming by Donald J. Bingle

By Julie Compton | Permalink

The topic is timely, the characters a bit zany. In Donald J. Bingle's Greensword: A Tale of Extreme Global Warming, three slacker environmentalists are in a race to save the world from global warming before the beach house owned by their chief benefactor slides into the ocean, which would mean the end of their funding and, with it, their organization and slacker lifestyle. Booklist says Greensword "may seem an unlikely vehicle for edge-of-the-seat suspense, yet Bingle's satirical ecoterrorist thriller just might haunt readers' nightmares for days."

Bingle talks below with The Big Thrill about the genesis for the novel, his passionate interest in role-playing games, and how his writing has been influenced by the hobby.

As an author of many books in various genres (science fiction, fantasy, horror and comedy), how did you come up with the unique idea to write a novel not only about global warming, but a funny, satirical novel about global warming that features three guys who are more concerned with impressing chicks and avoiding jobs as corporate serfs in the real world?

I first wrote Greensword as a screenplay called "Extreme Global Warming" back in 2001, before I'd ever even heard of Al Gore's global warming slideshow (and later book and movie) and before global warming was the high profile item it now is. Over the years I had done a fair number of role-playing game adventures and other stories about things like time travel, where you focus on issues like the intended and unintended consequences of various events and actions. On the political side, I paid enough attention to know that news reports and campaigns didn't often reflect the complexity and interplay of various issues and policies, and it frustrated me that so much of the discussion of environmental policies was so stark and simple, when the inputs and systems and consequences of actions themselves were so complex. And, since I generally adhere to the maxim "moderation in all things (including moderation)", I thought it would be interesting to explore what could go wrong if the perceived "good guys" actually let their extremism run unfettered. To do that with any hope of marketability, you have to do it as a comedy or it can rapidly turn off a large segment of your potential audience.

You mention the role-playing games. You are one of the world's top-ranked players. How long have you been playing the games, how did you first become involved in them, and which are your favorites?

Although I was a board and strategy gamer (Diplomacy, Napoleon at Waterloo, Civilization, etc.) earlier on, I didn't play a role-playing game (RPG) until after I had graduated from law school and taken the bar exam. My younger brother played RPGs with his friends, and they wanted to attend GenCon (a gaming convention) at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside, back in 1979, but he was too young to have a driver's license, so I drove him and his friends up in the family camper and they introduced me to the games. The RPGA started a tournament points/ranking system in the early eighties and I realized that I was high enough ranked that I could make a push to do better, attend more tournaments, and become the points leader, which I was (in classic games) from about 1985 to 2000. I like Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, 2nd Ed., Paranoia, TimeMaster, Chill, Top Secret, Boot Hill, James Bond, Gangbusters and bunches and bunches of other systems. I've played more than 50 different systems/worlds. Most of all, I like the classic tournament format, which features pre-generated characters with backgrounds, personality traits, and summaries of what my character knows and thinks about all of the other player characters in the adventure. This is because I prefer to play a new character every time I play an RPG, rather than playing the same one over and over. I've probably played more than 600 characters in the 460 (sometimes multi-round) tournaments I have participated in.

Have you always been interested in writing? Is there anyone in your past who you believe influenced this interest?

I've always been a big reader and I've always been fairly opinionated about the books I've read and the movies and shows I've seen, all of which leads you into thinking about what makes good writing. And I was in theatre in high school and wrote some spoofy skits and things in college and law school. After playing a lot of RPGA tournaments, I wanted to give back to the hobby by writing and running them, which led to writing for some game systems, buying a game system (TimeMaster) from the secured creditor of a bankrupt company, then writing movie reviews for gamers, stories set in game worlds, and eventually other stories, screenplays, and books. Through all of this, Jean Rabe (former head of the RPGA, author, and editor) has been a great friend in encouraging me, commenting on my writing, and recommending me for various opportunities.

Have you managed to avoid a job as a corporate serf in the real world like your characters in Greensword?

Dude, I am definitely a corporate serf in the real world, practicing corporate, securities, and mergers & acquisitions law for a big law firm. If I tell you more, I'd have to clear this with the public relations folks, so let's just leave it at that.

Do you think your interest in role-playing games has influenced your writing, and vice versa, and if so, how?

Absolutely. Some day I will peddle an article on the topic to one of the writing magazines. You can't play 600 characters, speaking in their voice, their accent, and their mindset, in what amounts to RPG improvisational theatre for hours on end without learning to maintain character, develop character hooks, adopt a character's point-of-view, and refine dialogue skills. When you've played men, women, children, animals, inanimate objects, elves, dwarves, orcs, monsters, spies, aliens, cowboys, princesses, guardsmen, adventurers, sorcerers, innkeepers, thieves, paladins, clerics, gangsters, and all-knowing, all-seeing and semi-deranged computers, you learn how to pop into character and pop out dialogue efficiently and effectively. When you've run games, dropping hints, developing red herrings, managing pace and tone, handling battle, improvising non-player characters, managing multiple timelines, adapting the story to unexpected situations, and keeping the players entertained, you learn something about pace and plot and subplot and matching characters to the story. When you write source material and monster habitats and adventures about fixing history, you learn how to describe things, how to make them seem real, and about how actions have consequences. I never have writers' block, because if I start to hesitate, I tell myself that if I was playing this character in a game, I'd have to do something right away, so I just do what I think the character would do in that kind of game situation.

Who are your favorite writers, and which writers do you think have influenced your own writing? What are you reading now?

I'm a fan of Niven, Pournelle, and Barnes, especially in any multiple combination. I like Robert J. Sawyer's books. He writes on some themes that I also write about. I think The Princess Bride is a much better book than movie, and the movie is excellent. I've read more "end of the world" books than most people can imagine. I often tell people about Replay by Ken Grimwood. I'm a fan of Elizabeth Vaughan's adventure fantasies. I enjoyed Simon Hawke's entire time travel series. Right now, the third book of Jean Rabe's goblin trilogy is in my briefcase.

Are you working on another book right now?

I'm making a few last minor revisions that my agent suggested on a spy thriller with lots of action, lots of interpersonal conflict, and a few twists that I don't think the readers will see coming. Hopefully, my agent will be marketing it to publishers by the time this article comes out.

To learn more about the author of Greensword, visit www.donaldjbingle.com.

Julie Compton is the author of the critically acclaimed legal thriller TELL NO LIES, published by St. Martin's Minotaur. Her next novel, RESCUING OLIVIA, will be released on February 2, 2010. She lives and writes near Orlando. To learn more, go to www.julie-compton.com.