The following is an exclusive Whispers of the Muse interview conducted by Deborah Riley-Magnus with author, Jeremy C. Ship. For a little insight into the strange, intriguing world of this writer, check out the INTRO from his site:

Hello, welcome to my interweb homestead. This is a place where toasters run free and hippos climb trees. Read what you want. Ignore what you don't. Laugh, cry, and tickle some nuns while you're at it. They won't mind. Throw a stinky old sock in the stinky old well, and all your dreams might come true (depending upon the humidity level). Beware of the garden gnomes lurking in (almost) every shadow. They're waiting for their chance to climb on your head and do a jig. All in all, it behooves you to have some weird fun, and think some weird thoughts. If you don't, the ground will open and an army of polka dot penguins will spew forth and eat up all the fish. And then they'll die of mercury poisoning, and then you'll feel guilty. Oh so guilty.

Muse: Jeremy, first of all, Whispers of the Muse welcomes you and Cursed to the site. Tell us a little about yourself. What part of the world do you live in? Tell us about your background? (And why do I already feel that this interview will be among the strangest I ever conducted?)
Shipp: Thank you for having us.  Me and my book are honored to be here.  A little about myself: I’m a vegan animistic anarcho-tribalist with a passion for writing, animal rights (including humans), body acceptance, and respect.  I live in the part of the world where yard gnomes put on musical productions based on television shows from the 80s; where demonic clowns sneak out of your mirrors at night and battle ninja monkeys in the basement.  As a writer, I often live in my imagination, which happens to be located in Southern California.  In terms of my background, I grew up here, and my life has always overflowed with animals and family and creative energy.  I wrote my first novel at the age of 13, and I’ve been writing almost constantly ever since.

Muse: Who are your favorite authors?
Shipp: Some of my favorites include Arundhati Roy, Franny Billingsley, Madeleine L'Engle, Daniel Quinn, Piers Anthony, Kurt Vonnegut, Jeff Kinney, Brett Easton Ellis, Amy Hempel, Aimee Bender, George Orwell, Haruki Murakami, Chuck Palahniuk, Anthony Burgess, CS Lewis, Douglas Adams, Francesca Lia Block, Roald Dahl.

Muse: Why do you write?
Shipp: I write to live and I live to write.  Writing isn’t an escape from life for me.  Writing is living.  Writing is how I express my soul.  Writing is a conversation between me and the world.  In other words, I would write, even if I were the last person on Earth or if I were trapped on a planet of evil book burning slugs who hate all fiction.

Muse: What is your writing regiment? How often do you work on a novel? Do you set daily time or word goals? What keeps you meeting your deadlines?
Shipp: I’ve been writing about a novel a year since I turned 13, so part of the year is almost always dedicated to novel writing.  The rest of the year I’m working on short stories, comic books, or other creative projects.

I do try to write at least a few hours every day, usually around four or more.  Some days I don’t feel like writing.  And in the past, I let this stop me.  But these days, I force myself to write, even if I’m not feeling creative, because more often than not, I’m just feeling insecure, and once I started writing, I find myself swimming in the creative flow.

Muse: Jeremy, I so enjoyed your work. It intrigues me from the first few words until the final KABLAMM to the brain, and offers an interesting, rather twisted outlook on life. Where does this explosive creativity come from?
Shipp: Thank you kindly! My mind has always been imaginative and strange.  As a child, my brothers and I would play pretend, and we’d come up with rather complex story lines with recurring characters.  We had a mummy, the grim reaper, a wrestling announcer, a sort of demonic mouth that could eat something and send it to another dimension, etc. 

In my childhood, a war was raged between my creative self and the education/social system of our world.  My creativity was on the verge of obliteration on numerous occasions.  But somehow, I’ve always managed to hold on to my inner child.  If I didn’t work so hard to nurture that part of myself, I wouldn’t be the same person I am today. 

Muse: Does the way you personally look at life reflect in your writing style?
Shipp: The way I look at life affects my plots, my characters, and almost every aspect of my style.  Stylistically, I’m quite the minimalist, which means that I obsess over every sentence; every word.  Everything I include in a story has meaning, and often layers of meaning.  This is how I see the world.

Muse: What are the creative jumping off points for you? Are you inspired by dreams? Music? Nature? The occasional black nightmare? What triggers your imagination?
Shipp: I have been inspired by a few dreams and nightmares, but more often than not I’m inspired by people or events in my life.  My wildest ideas have often been sparked by what some might consider to be very mundane happenings.  But I don’t believe in the mundane.  Every part of my life is special when I let myself appreciate it fully.

Muse: Tell us about the story in Cursed.
Shipp: Cursed is the story of Nick.  He joins a sort of informal support group for cursed individuals, and they work together to cope with their problems and to find out who is responsible for their curses.  It’s also a story of love, and friendship, and respect.

Muse: What was your inspiration for this story?
Shipp: Many people and events and social systems inspired this story, but my wife was the major inspiration.  For years, she was disabled and lived in near constant pain.  But what hurt her the most was how people treated her.  Disabled people are often seen as less than whole, and this is what initially motivated me to write this story.  In Cursed, the main characters go through hardships that others don’t see or understand or validate.

Muse: What is your favorite scene from the novel and why?
Shipp: My favorite scene from Cursed is the last scene.  I connect with these characters on a deep level, and so the final scene really affects me emotionally.

Muse: Tell us about your other books?
Shipp: Vacation is a journey into the festering wound of civilization.  Vacation is, in a sense, my fictional autobiography.  In a fun-house mirror sort of way, it reflects my own life and my paradigm shift.  While Vacation is global in scope, Sheep and Wolves is domestic and familial.  The horrors in Sheep and Wolves invade your dreams, your homes, your relationships.  This is my darkest book.

Muse: How do you feel about the current publishing marketplace?
Shipp: The universe of smaller presses is wonderful place filled with passionate people who showcase a wide variety of stories and genres.  The Bizarro Fiction movement is a godsend for writers of weird fiction like me.  On the other hand, the mainstream publishing world seems a bit set in its ways.  I wish there was more diversity in style and substance.  This isn’t to say that the mainstream world doesn’t publish awesome work.  I just I wish they would take more chances.  Of course, big businesses wouldn’t remain as big if they took the chances I’d like them to take.