Michael Stephen Fuchs Q&A

“…I do expect I’ll go to my grave believing stories are how we learn to be human.”

Have you read Michael Stephen Fuchs’s series, ARISEN : Raiders? Maybe this is the first you’re hearing of it—in which case, where have you been?!— but more likely, you’re one of the legions of rapt fans who are about to get what has felt like a very long time coming: the audiobook version of Dead Men Walking, narrated by the inimitable R.C. Bray. 

If you ask us, Bray is the perfect narrator for a series of such dizzying intensity, one that fans have described as both thoughtful and utterly harrowing. ARISEN : Raiders (along with its predecessor, ARISEN) is a true military sci-fi epic which spans the globe and is set during a zombie apocalypse; and folks, this is truly some edge-of-your-seat reading, or as will soon be the case, listening. Seriously. Just wait till you hear what R.C. Bray does with this! 

If you're among those who haven’t yet experienced the thrill of either the main series, or the prequel series we’re discussing today, know that Fuchs's ARISEN : Raiders series works as a standalone. That said, you do need to start with volumes 1 and 2, (the audio version of which was also performed by Bray, and are available together for just one credit, lucky you!) so make sure to grab those before diving into this one. 

Now, we know you want to hear more about Dead Men Walking, and we are here to deliver! So with that, we invite you to settle in and enjoy our interview with Michael, where we discuss the origins of this incredible series, writing life, and more!

DSF: Before we dive into Dead Men Walking specifically, we want to acknowledge how incredible your ARISEN : Raiders series is as a whole! We’d love to hear more about the creative roots of this project.

MSF: Cheers. The main ARISEN series is fairly unusual in that it starts two years into the end of the world. (It’s also unique in being, as far as we’re aware, the only epic zombie apocalypse series, in the senses of being 16 books long, spanning the entire globe, and showing how the actions of one family or tribe ultimately decide the fate of the world.) When I got to the end (rather, by some damned miracle, pulled off the impossible climax and conclusion—with about 500 named characters, dozens of intersecting storylines, and outrageously high expectations), that still left the entire first two years of ZA to explore. The biggest, most obvious, and most compelling untold story was that of the John F. Kennedy carrier strike group and their Marine Raider security force, which showed up at the end of Book One to escort our heroes on their series of increasingly impossible missions. What the hell were those guys doing in the post-Apocalypse for two years? Now we know.

DSF: How would you describe the series to someone just getting into your work?

MSF: It’s perhaps the most explosive over-the-top-action you’ve ever encountered in any medium, all underpinned by ruthless realism and detail in special operations military tactics, weapons, and mindset—all of it disguised literary fiction with complex and contradictory characters battling their demons and destinies while embodying critical thematic concerns about what it means to be human in the world.

DSF: How does Volume 3 pick up from where Volume 2, Tribes, left off?

MSF: Volume 1 was the Fall of human civilization, as experienced on the ground by the Marines, as their new arrival—and our hero and POV character, Doc Yaz, who is a SARC (Special Amphibious Reconnaissance Corpsman, a special-operations medic usually embedded with SEALs and Marine special operators)—battles both to survive and to fit in. Volume 2 shows the first desperate missions for supplies and ammo, where everyone is learning, at great cost, the rules of this new fallen world and what’s required to survive together. (Volumes 1 and 2 are available now for a single token on Audible. And all of it performed, in a much better turn of luck than I deserve, by the best audiobook narrator in the history of the universe, the great and lovely R.C. Bray.) Volume 3 is the beginning of the long hard months and years of the end of the world. Our heroes think they’ve found their rhythm. But of course everything changes and goes wrong. And Yaz is still battling to find his place.

DSF: ARISEN : Raiders has garnered reviews such as “Blows World War Z out of the water,” “The Game of Thrones of the Zombie Apocalypse,” and “Like a Michael Bay movie on steroids.” If you were to write a crossover novel between ARISEN : Raiders and a hit TV show or movie, which would you choose and why?

MSF: Not the kind of thing I would do, or think to do, sorry. I think reviewers are just trying to get across their sense of a certain superlative level of quality, drama, and action. (And for which I thank them very humbly and very much.)

DSF: Without giving too much away, can you tell us a little bit about what to expect in Dead Men Walking?

MSF: The unexpected—breath-stealing action and drama in unforgettable set-piece locations such as Dubai (the marina and the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building), as well as a remote American combat outpost in the Hindu Kush mountains. Heroism and tragedy. Inter-team conflict and recrimination. Some hot (ill-advised) sex. Even a (false, very temporary) paradise when the strike group sets up on a remote atoll of tropical isles.

DSF: Who is your favorite character from the ARISEN : Raiders series and why?

MSF: Probably Master Sergeant Saunders, the senior NCO (later, commander) of Team 1. He’s one of the few Marines never even mentioned by name in the main series but who completely came to life in this prequel/spinoff series. He’s both a complete badass and a total hardass but in an amusingly sardonic way that beautifully counterpoints Master Gunnery Sergeant Fick (the series consensus favorite character, and an even more amusing hardass).

DSF: How did you research topics in special operations military to write ARISEN : Raiders? Do you have a specific background in these subjects?

MSF: I do not have that honor. I do have the honor of being able to count as friends a tiny handful of people in and out of the special operations community who have helped me and the work in indispensable ways. But mainly, like most writers, I write from research. This is the wall of military books:

DSF: What is one thing that has surprised you while writing the series?

MSF: Probably that I could do really great work in a way that wasn’t all-consuming and ultimately self-destructive. (As alluded to above, finishing the main series literally nearly killed me, not least since I basically had to put myself into isolation for a year to generate the focus needed to do work of that complexity and quality.) A lot of readers, to my great pleasure and surprise, actually like Raiders better than the main series. And the process of producing it was much less bloody.

DSF: What is your favorite part about writing within this genre, and do you see yourself breaking out of this subject to explore other types of stories?

MSF: I don’t care about this genre, or any genre, really. As one of the members of Alpha team put it in Book One, the least interesting thing about a zombie apocalypse is the zombies. What’s really gripping and wrenching and awful was what it does to the survivors. I’m interested in my characters and their humanity (and their superheroism). It’s axiomatic that all drama is human drama. And the core themes of human life and survival are timeless. (The dead and the apocalypse are just forces of antagonism.) That said, after another ARISEN prequel/spinoff series—ARISEN : Operators, which I’m working on now, or rather not working on right now—I have a special-operations military NON-zombie apocalypse series lined up.

DSF: Finally, every author’s favorite question…How did you get into writing and why did you choose to become an author?

MSF: Because I’m an idiot. For many years, I imagined there were two types of people: those who had written and published novels, and those who had not. And, even more bizarrely, that it was critically important to any happiness or success I was going to have that I get into the first group. If I’d had the vaguest idea how long it was going to take, or how hard it was going to be, I’m sure I never would have persisted. Now, getting to wake up every morning and do this work certainly beats what was my day job for many years (web development and IT consulting), but it’s also a hell of a lot harder than my day job was. That’s actually why I’m answering these questions right now—it’s easier than writing. Everything is! But I do expect I’ll go to my grave believing stories are how we learn to be human. And, despite the difficulty, or impossibility, of telling even a single great, original story, it’s still an incredible privilege to get up every day and try.

Check out the complete ARISEN : Raiders series on audio here.