POD Blog Tour: Guest Post with Stephen Wallenfels

WHY PODs and NOT ZOMBIES?

by Stephen Wallenfels

There’s a question I know a lot of readers are just begging to ask.  When Zombies, vampires, shape-shifting werewolves, wizards, and even a dragon or two, seem to be getting most of the love and attention—why write a book featuring aggressive alien spaceships with a secret agenda, and humans without any super powers?  

In other words, why PODs and not Zombies? Ok, maybe the only person asking that question is me.  And I ask it every time I walk past bookshelf displays dominated with all the characters listed above.  Flip through the channels and there they are.  Walk through the video store and it’s more of the same.  Why not surf the Zombie/Vampire wave for as long as I can?  The answer is simple, and it relates to my first brush with science fiction.
The book was 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, by Jules Verne.  I read it in junior high and devoured every word.  I was breathless and amazed.  He wrote about technology that didn’t exist at the time—but eventually became reality.  A few years later I read I, Robot, by Isaac Asimov, and knew that robots would eventually become as much a part of our lives as televisions and toasters.  The smarter we made them, the greater the potential that they would turn against us.  And then what?  It strengthened my realization that science fiction has the potential to become science fact.  As much as I loved Tolkein’s Lord of the Rings and Richard Adams’ Watership Down, they didn’t touch the potential futures and alternative realities offered by Ray Bradbury, Ben Bova, Robert Heinlein and the like.
Now it’s not so say that Zombies can’t become real.  Any scifi writer knows that there are meteorites streaking through our universe that contain unknown viruses capable of turning us humans into something less human, but what are the odds that we will crave brains?  On the other hand, we all know that Earth, with it’s prime location close (but not too close) to a stable sun, centrally located in a friendly, convenient solar system with easy access to worm holes and time-warps, is highly desirable.  It is not unreasonable to expect that aliens might want to explore this location for future development (or other purposes), and not care too much what the current occupants think of their plan.  
So when I ask myself, why PODs and not Zombies, all I need to do is look at the sky during a spectacular sunset, or ponder the serenity of a mountain lake reflecting the silver of a full moon—and I know the answer.  Zombies have no appreciation for the finer things in life.  Aliens, on the other hand—watch out!

About the Author:

Stephen Wallenfels served as a contributing editor to Club Business International magazine since 1989. During that time he has written over 50 feature articles, columns and interviews with leaders in the health and fitness industry. POD is his first novel and he's is currently working on POD 2. He lives in Washington State.

Visit Stephen at his website - Read the Blurb for POD

So who wants to win a copy of POD? Well ONE lucky UK winner will win a copy! 
All you need to do is fill in this ENTRY FORM
The winner will be picked by Random.Org and announced on September 7th
Thank you to Templar Publishing and good luck everyone! 

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