• Will we have to wait another three years for A Method For Madness?

Oh, God, I hope not.

At this point, there's more than 50,000 words of book five written, but I have no idea how long it will be. It's going to be u very difficult book to write.

A Matter For Men was 155,550 words, A Day For Damnation was 144,500 words, A Rage For Revenge was 180,600 words, and this book, A Season For Slaughter, is 222,000 words, so it's almost a third longer than the longest previous book.

• Can you give us a little preview of A Method For Madness?

Um, sure. Okay. The chopper crashes, they get captured by worms and turned into worm slaves, everybody grows pink fur and goes crazy, we find out that the worms are really four-sexed insects with a shared consciousness, Jim gets brainwashed by the worms and kills Lizard and her baby, then he kills all the other babies in the camp, and then after he's rescued he's put in an insane asylum, but he breaks out and adopts a baby worm of his own and becomes a deranged renegade.

• You're not serious.

I guess you'll have to wait for the book, won't you?

• The sequence in this book about Daniel Goodman and Lester Barnstorm-is that based on a real experience? Did you have a specific producer in mind?

No, not at all. I suppose some people are going to imagine a specific producer, and I can't stop them from doing that, but Lester Barnstorm is not based on any real person, living or dead.

The anger in that sequence is real, of course. Lester Barnstorm represents every sleazeball producer who ever lied to, cheated, bullied, or abused a writer. If any producer who reads it recognizes himself, he should be ashamed.

I'll tell you what that sequence is really about. It's about revenge.

The only specialists in revenge in this world are writers. Everybody else is an amateur. Think about it; how many books have you read, or movies have you seen, where the essential motivation is revenge? Most of them, right? Revenge is almost always a key part of the story. This isn't an accident. Writers lay awake nights thinking of ways to get even. Nobody else spends as much time working on grudges as a writer. Anybody who bites a writer is asking for trouble-food poisoning at the very least.

• Which of the characters in the book are based on you?

All of them. None of them.

Every character I write represents some part of my experüce with people. Of course, it all gets filtered through my own objective world-view, but I've given parts of myself equally all of my major characters, so it's hard to point the finger and say, "Ahh, that's what the author really thinks."

It's a lot safer to point a finger at the whole book and say, "Oh, that's what the author is really thinking about."

• Are any of the characters based on real people?

Yes, and no. Some of the characters have the names of real people who paid big bucks for the privilege of having characters named after them. The money went to my charity, the Necessities of Life Program of the AIDS Project Los Angeles. But none of the characters are specifically based on the people they're named after.

As it worked out, almost every one of the namesake characters became more fully fleshed out than they would have been otherwise, because I spent much more time thinking about them as real people. I wanted the people who paid to have characters named after them satisfied that they got their numey's worth. Some of the characters had to do some very nasty stuff, but I tried to balance the nastiness with a human side too.

• How did you get started on this fund-raising project?

Almost by accident. I don't go to science fiction conventions very often, sometimes it just seems frivolous. And sometimes, I wonder if what we're doing-dealing in dreams-might ultimately be irrelevant to the real world. The thought troubled me. I wanted to do something more immediate, something that would make a difference now.

One day, I realized that I could go to a convention and use it to serve a larger purpose. So I put out a big jar and every time someone asked for an autograph, I asked them to put a dollar in the jar for the AIDS Project Los Angeles. And it worked. Must people have really liked the idea. It makes the autograph mean something. In the past four years, since I started doing this. I've raised nearly $I5,000 this way. I'll probably attend more conventions just to see how much more money I can raise for APLA.

I've been teaching Screenwriting at Pepperdine University In Malibu since 1982. For the past six years, I've also taught a weekend intensive course called Writing On Purpose. Eventually, I hope to tape the course, and extract a book on writing as well—-except that there are so many good books on writing already, that the world may not need another one. And secondly, I'd rather write than write about writing.

But I start with the premise that writing can't be taught; it can only be learned. You learn it when you sit down to write. So I don't even try to teach writing; I train writers. The course ih an inquiry into the nature of the craft of writing; we look at some definitions and distinctions about the way we work, and that lets each individual create a solid foundation for understanding what he/she is up to. I act as coach while each student develops his or her own skills. It's been very effective, and I've been very gratified that the course has been so useful to so many people.

• When will you be teaching the course again?

Anyone interested in the dates of the next course should write to me at 9420 Reseda Blvd., #804, Northridge, CA 9132A-2932. (Include a large self-addressed, stamped envelope.) I'll be happy to send out the course information.

• Do you teach your class like Dr. Foreman teaches the Mode Training?

Some people think so. Except I don't use blanks.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

DAVID GERROLD is the author of the most popular episode of the most popular science fiction TV series in history-"The Trouble With Tribbles" episode of the original Star Trek TV series.

Since 1967, he has story-edited three TV series, edited five anthologies, written two non-fiction books about television production (both of which have been used as textbooks), and over a dozen novels, three of which have been nominated for the Hugo and Nebula awards.

His television credits include episodes of Star Trek, Star Trek Animated, Superboy, Tales From The Darkside, Twilight Zone, The Real Ghostbusters, Logan's Run, and Land of the Lost.

His novels include When H.A.R.L.I.E. Was One, The Man Who Folded Himself, Chess With A Dragon, Voyage of the Star Wolf, and the four volumes of The War Against the Chtorr: A Matter for Men, A Day for Damnation, A Rage for Revenge, and A Season For Slaughter. His short stories have appeared in Galaxy, If, Amazing, Twilight Zone, and Isaac Asimov's Adventure Magazine.

Gerrold also writes a column in PC-Techniques, a computer magazine. He averages over two dozen lecture and convention appearances per year, and he teaches screenwriting at Pepperdine University.

He is currently working on a new novel.