Pat Daily - Riveting Story Set in a Theme Park For Gamers

Pat Daily is an engineer and former Air Force test pilot who worked at NASA’s Johnson Space Center on both the Space Shuttle and International Space Station programs. When not writing or trying to bring new airplane designs to life, Pat can be found gaming online. He is a fan of role-playing games – particularly open worlds with engaging storylines where actions have consequences. Pat and his wife spent twenty years in Houston before moving to central Washington. As our Author of the Day, he tells us all about his book, SPARK.

Please give us a short introduction to what SPARK is about.

SPARK is a tale of two young people, Will Kwan and ShaChri Patel, who have figured out how to stay overnight in an Augmented Reality theme park. They discover that SPARK has secrets. There are quests that blend the virtual and the real, creating completely different worlds and challenges for gamers. They discover complexities and levels to the quests that aren’t advertised and aren’t meant for everyone. Will finds an eerie and compelling connection when a character in a game uses the same words his mother used in a letter she left for him: Find me. Save me.

SPARK is set against the backdrop of two intertwined and very disruptive technologies: sentient AI, and the solar power plant it controls that is so efficient, that people are willing to kill anyone to get their hands on it. SPARK stands for Solar Prime Augmented Reality Park. I know that technically, that would make the acronym “SPARP” but that doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. The novel is set in the not-too-distant future; close enough that they remember Covid, yet far enough away to have had a second Korean War.

What inspired the concept of a theme park for gamers? What made you want to write this story?

I love Role Playing Games (RPGs) and wanted to extend the concept into the real world. As much as I love gaming online, at the end of the day, when the quest is done, you pull off your headset, put down your controller, and you’re alone. It can be jarring, even depressing. How much cooler would it be to have the same quality adventure in the company of real people? To be able to high-five the rest of your guild, be hugged by the lovely Sorceress, and then sit down and rehash it over dinner? That’s what SPARK offers.

The original concept came from Niven’s Dream Park. As I got more into role-playing games, I often wondered what it would be like to live the games. Live-Action Role-Play was unsatisfying at best. VR is promising but constrains you into a fixed volume of space and tends to be inconvenient for those around you. Augmented Reality – the blending of virtual constructs over a real background – seems the best bet. Theme parks offer lots of space and the perfect getaway from reality.

Tell us more about Will. What makes him tick?

Will is a second-generation gamer. His parents were gamers and included him in their quests and raids from an early age. As soon as he was old enough, his parents took him to SPARK. At age ten, he was living his best life. Then he lost his dad in the Second Korean War, and his mom gradually sank into the worst type of hoarding – not even trash could be thrown away. Will spent several years living in a house where the debris just got deeper, and rats became constant housemates. Other vermin came as well, but it was the rats that haunted, and haunt, Will’s dreams. The scratching and skittering of rats in the walls became the staple of Will’s nightmares. He started carrying a knife to protect himself at age 12, even to the point of holding a knife when he slept. When his mother died, Will was put into the foster care system. Foster parents balked at a child holding a butcher knife in his sleep and Will got bounced from group homes to foster families and back. At 16, he ran away to the last place he remembered being happy: SPARK.

At SPARK he found his niche – thinking beyond the surface level of the games and growing more socially adept. He met Feral Daughter. They butt heads and hold hands.

Besides writing, what other secret skills do you have?

I’m a world-famous fighter pilot and test pilot. The “world-famous” part might be my own delusion, but the fighter pilot and test pilot bit is true.

What did you have the most fun with when writing this book?

I really loved writing the Mars scenes. They fed my science geekery and made me think about Mars’ most prominent geologic feature – Mariner Valley. They also let me delve deeper into Will’s character – his tenacity and his ability to approach problems from a completely different perspective than anyone else.

This is your debut novel. What has the experience and the feedback been like so far?

The experience has been tremendous. I’ve met writers who are brilliant and very helpful. They skillfully checked my ego and helped me improve. I received some actual fan mail. The first was from a young man who read SPARK and loved it. Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, and the haters are very few.

You worked at NASA's Johnson Space Center. How has this influenced your writing?

Yes, my years at NASA gave me a much better sense of the scale of things. The universe is enormous. That’s why so many SciFi authors use something like hyper-space, or Warp Drive.

What are some of your favorite online RPGs? How do they inspire you?

Elder Scrolls Online and Dark Souls. As I get busier, it’s harder to coordinate with my guild and I end up playing good single-player RPGs like Skyrim, Mass Effect 2, or Witcher 3. The best ones remind me that actions have consequences that may not be immediately apparent. That helps with character agency. Will is a completionist, just like me, and will finish every side quest. He likes to think his way through a situation. Feral is a shoot-first player and is all about the combat. I’ve played with, and as, both types of character. Remembering that, and situations I’ve seen, helps me make the characters truer to their traits.

Do any of your characters ever take off on their own tangent, refusing to do what you had planned for them?

All the time. It’s really irritating until I realize that they had a better path.

Did you plot out your entire story before you started writing, or did some of it just "happen" along the way?

I plot out my stories in broad strokes, generally knowing where things will start and end, and then let the details fill themselves in along the way. Some things change. If I write for several days without checking my outline, I find that my characters had other ideas. Sometimes I slap them back into position, and other times, I see that their choices are better or more authentic.

What is your favorite line from the book and why?

“What color are my eyes?” It’s early in the romantic subplot of the book and establishes Will as someone who is both honest in his affections and observant of those around him.

Do you have any interesting writing habits? What is an average writing day like for you?

I have a writing playlist. Lots of classic rock. rock anthems, and ballads. They loop as background music that I can tweak depending on what I’m writing. The standard tempo would be Iron Butterfly’s In-A-Gad-da-Da-Vida. For serious action, I’ll turn to Def Leppard or Guns n Roses. If I want to slow it down, I’ll put on some Elton John or Disturbed’s version of Sound of Silence. There are lots more, but those are my go-to tunes.

I get up early and savor the quiet. Most of my writing is done before anyone else is up and around. Occasionally, I’ll write in the evening, but mostly I’ll dedicate that time to blogging and social media maintenance.

What are you working on right now?

SPARK’s sequel, Fire, is well into revisions and I’m spending most of my effort there. I’ve got two other projects that I work on when I’m stuck or frustrated with that. One’s called gGodz. It’s a little more adult in theme and content – far future galaxy-spanning fiction that is making me question if there really are any good guys, the other is being kept a secret for the moment.

Where can our readers discover more of your work or interact with you?

The best place is my blog: feraldaughters.wordpress.com.

I’m working on my website, thepatdaily.com, but it won’t be fully functional until late this summer.

I’m also on FB at patdailyauthor, Insta at patdailypics, and Twitter as @patdailyauthor.

I look forward to hearing from people.