Mornin’, all. Here’s the next installment of my series of quick interviews with the other authors involved in the Indie Superhero StoryBundle offer (still available, hint hint). Today’s guest is Adam Oster, so let’s hear from him now.

1) It’s high-concept pitch time. In 20 words or fewer, what is your book about?

Buddy Jackson is the world’s greatest superhero. He just doesn’t know it.

2) Why did you decide to tackle a superhero story as a prose novel rather than as a traditional comic book/graphic novel?

First reason: I can’t draw and can’t be bothered to convince someone to draw for me.

Second reason: I think we’ve got enough superheroes in the visual medium, but in pure prose, there’s so much more that is capable. Novels allow for much more subtle storytelling that can have so much more of a connection to everything. I’m not going to pretend that The Legend of Buddy Hero is literary fiction, but it has a lot to do with the human condition and a whole host of other things that aren’t overtly related to superheroes.

3) One of the notable earmarks of our current Indie Superhero StoryBundle is that “indie” part. Are you an independent author by choice? And what are the big pros and cons of life as an indie author?

I’m indie both by choice and not by choice. I did initially attempt to get myself representation or a publisher (or, preferably both), for The Legend of Buddy Hero, but quickly realized that it wasn’t where I needed to be with my work. The interest in the superhero genre was small enough to begin with, and they all just wanted it to be a Young Adult novel, which would be a very different story. So, I went indie because I needed to be able to do it my way. And, I was really tired of sending out query letters.

4) Superheroes are well-established archetypes, and their stories have their own sensibilities and internal logic. How did you play with or subvert the tropes of superhero fiction in your story?

The Legend of Buddy Hero is all about trope subversion. Well, you know, at least as far as the humor aspects of it go. There’s your character who talks like Adam West, your over-sexualization of women, your caddy artificial intelligence, and a whole ton of other things that regular comic book readers will find quite amusing. In fact, one of the reviews Buddy Hero received is that it reads like a comic book. There’s a lot there to show where the story comes from, while also completely separating it as a new and unique concept.

5) Beginnings, middles, and ends. What is your favorite/the easiest part of a story to write and which is the hardest/least favorite?

I’m a really big fan of the middle. You know, the point where you can just write whatever crazy thing you want and make the future version of yourself deal with trying to tie up the loose ends. It’s where I get to really let my imagination fly. I’m also a really big fan of the moments before actually writing, where the idea begins to meld into a solid concept. I spend a lot of time working in that headspace where I’m trying to figure out how to tell the stories I want to tell.