2015 Piedmont Laureate, Speculative Fiction
In the course of entertaining my readers with imaginary worlds, I hope to provoke them into thinking deeper about our own world, and our shared responsibility to improve it.
James Maxey’s mother warned him that reading all those comic books would warp his mind. She was right. Now an adult who can’t stop daydreaming, James is unsuited for decent work and ekes out a pittance writing down demented fantasies about masked women, fiery dragons, and monkeys. Oh god, so many monkeys.
In an effort to figure out how Superman could fly, James read books by Carl Sagan and Stephen Jay Gould and Stephen Hawking. Turns out, Superman probably wasn’t based on any factual information. Who would have guessed? Realizing it was possible to write science fiction without being constrained by the actual rules of science proved liberating for James, and led to the pseudo-science fiction of the Bitterwood series, superhero novels like Nobody Gets the Girl, the secondary world fantasy of the Dragon Apocalypse series and the steam-punk visions of Bad Wizard.
James is a graduate of the Odyssey Writing Workshop where he studied with Author in Residence Harlan Ellison, as well as a graduate of Orson Scott Card’s Literary Boot Camp. He honed his craft over many years as a member of the Writer’s Group of the Triad and continues to be an active part of the Codex Writers’ online community.
James lives in Hillsborough, North Carolina with his lovely and patient wife Cheryl and too many cats. For more information about James and his writing, visit jamesmaxey.net.
Reflections
I write fast-paced, action-driven pulp fiction with strong emphasis on character growth and world building. At first glance, my work appears cartoonish; I deal with larger-than-life characters adventuring in exotic worlds. Readers who delve past the dragons and superheroes on the covers will discover stories that explore the deeper aspects of the human condition, from the highly personal—love, hate, grief, anger, faith and hope—to larger societal issues, like the balance between individual freedoms and social order, the inevitable conflict when society is built of unequal classes, and mankind’s relationship with the natural world.
In the course of entertaining my readers with imaginary worlds, I hope to provoke them into thinking deeper about our own world, and our shared responsibility to improve it.
Piedmont Laureate 