Acclaimed comic artist, and fantasy satirist with the gift of being able to make us chortle as well as contemplate – Liam Stirling is one talented guy. Following the release of his latest work, The God Particle, What We Reading sat down with Liam to talk about everything from how he discovered he could make people laugh with his writing, his love for Terry Pratchett and what his hopes are for the future!
Thanks for speaking with us, Liam! First off, tell us a bit about yourself and what led you to the world of writing.
I’ve always loved stories and writing. My Mum was a librarian and the best person in the world for helping out with homework when I was younger. I would ask “Mum, do you know…?” to which she would invariably reply “No, but I know how to find out.” Which was the best kind of help I could have had because it taught me self-reliance and it pointed me towards books.
An early favourite was The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, which prompted me to keep my own diaries. Of course, Adrian doesn’t mean to be funny, but his guileless sincerity and the scenarios Sue Townsend creates for him are hilarious. Inspired, I began to keep my own diary, which was something of a parody of my own life. One day I came home to find my Mum and Sister in hysterics. They had found my diary and were reading it aloud to one another amidst fits of laughter. Through my, perhaps overplayed, outrage, I was secretly delighted that they found my writing so funny.
I guess it started there.
Talk to us about your Hercules Leek Series and its first entry, The God Particle. What is it about and where did the inspiration for it come from?
In a nutshell… The God Particle is about 2000 demons, some neo-nazis, a jihadi and the dead guy who has to save Creation.
But underneath all that, it’s about Truth.
There is an apple on a table. One half is red, the other green. Two people sit on opposite sides of the table. Each can only see one side of the apple. What colour is the apple?
“Red,” says one.
“Green,” insists the other.
We know, because we have all the facts of the scenario, that it is possible for them both to be correct. But we live in a world where increasingly the folk that see the apple as green vehemently deny the possibility that the apple could have a red facet, and vice versa. I think society is in danger of forgetting to remember that the truth can be bigger than the facts we have on hand and that others can have facts that we don’t have access to. And people being able to see the world differently from others is not, in itself, a bad thing.
What is the number one goal you want your work to have with readers?
Oh, that’s easy. I want to make them laugh. But I also have a secondary goal. I want to make them think.
What do you think makes you stand out as an author?
Well, the last one was easy, so there had to be a hard one, didn’t there? I’m not sure I do stand out as much as I would like to, and even then, I wouldn’t like to. What I would like is to stand among the likes of the people who have inspired me and made me laugh and think with their own novels.
What would you say has been your biggest success so far?
As an indie author, I think the big successes are a way off yet, and I’m learning to celebrate the little ones. Hitting the first 100 book sales quite early was something I celebrated. I’m on Kindle Unlimited, so I see the page reads through the Amazon dashboard and I’m closing in on 400,000 Kindle pages read – which feels like I’m doing something right.
If you could go back in time to one book you read for the first time, what would it be and why?
That’s the amazing thing about books, isn’t it? Every time you read or re-read one you discover something new. Even if it is one you have read before. So I don’t feel any particular urge to break the (currently understood) laws of physics. I’m currently re-reading Terry Pratchett’s DiscWorld novels, starting at the beginning and working through. Beyond the obvious enjoyment and laughs that the books give me, there is also a more forensic angle to my reading where I consider how he sets up jokes and what makes the DiscWorld so captivating.
What’s one tip you would give your younger self if you had the opportunity?
Do whatever you want to. Follow your heart. But if you are going to do something, do it like you mean it.
And finally, what do you hope the future holds for you and your writing?
I would love one day to be able to support myself from my writing. Because as Sir Terry said, writing is “the most fun a person can have by themselves”.
Follow Liam and check out all of his work at website, Amazon or on Twitter/X
Part-time reader, part-time rambler, and full-time Horror enthusiast, James has been writing for What We Reading since 2022. His earliest reading memories involved Historical Fiction, Fantasy and Horror tales, which he has continued to take with him to this day. James’ favourite books include The Last (Hanna Jameson), The Troop (Nick Cutter) and Chasing The Boogeyman (Richard Chizmar).
