Joe Mahoney‘s first novel, A Time and a Place, was published in 2017 by Five Rivers Press.
His memoir, a behind-the-scenes glimpse of working for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Adventures in the Radio Trade, was published in 2023 by Donovan Street Press.
Joe has worked as a story editor on multiple radio, television and film projects. He’s best friends with a Sheltie and bakes a mean lasagna.
He is a member of SF Canada and SFWA, and you can find out more about his work at joemahoney.ca
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If you had to choose between fighting 100 duck-sized robots or one robot-sized duck, which would you pick and why?
If I had to choose between fighting 100 duck-sized robots or one robot-sized duck, I would choose one robot-sized duck, as long as the robot-sized duck is a duck-sized robot, which it would be, wouldn’t it? Cuz it’s literally a robot of a duck, and ducks generally come duck-sized. I mean, if it’s huge, like the size of a bear, it’s not a robot-sized duck anymore, it’s a robot-sized duckbear, and I would NOT want to fight any amount of robot-sized duckbears.
If you had to choose between having the ability to speak with animals or plants, which would you choose and why?
If I had to choose between having the ability to speak with animals or plants, I would choose speaking with animals, cuz I think the conversations would be a lot more interesting, depending on the animal. I mean, I can already pretty much speak with my Sheltie, and those conversations are already interesting, to me, at least. They’re like, “My God, could you please stop barking,” and “How now, brown dog?” and “Ha ha! I can’t believe you fell for that again!” and “Stop harassing the cat!” and “Again with the barking?” and even (quite often, actually), “Good dog!” cuz she really is a good dog and we love her. I have yet to try talking to any of my plants, mainly cuz they’re not even mine, they’re my wife’s, and if I were to actually have a plant of my own, any conversations would likely be along the lines of, “Oh really? You insist on dying too, just like all your other plant friends that I appear to have accidentally killed for no reason that I can discern?”
If you had to choose one of your books to be turned into a cheesy made-for-TV movie, which one would it be and who would you want to play the lead roles?
If I had to choose one of my books to be turned into a cheesy made-for-TV movie, I would choose A Time and a Place, because most authors want their books adapted into movies or TV shows, and I’m not sure we care much whether the adaptations are cheesy or not, because who cares? Hey, they’re making my book into a movie! It would be almost as exciting as being interviewed for a column in Amazing Stories. Anyway, A Time and a Place is about a high school English teacher trying to save his nephew who’s been recruited by an alien to fight in a war to save a bunch of alien cats from a race of hideous slime aliens collectively named Jacques, which would be completely ridiculous if it wasn’t also about the importance of family and taking responsibility and the nature of evil and whether or not there’s such a thing as free will and so on). I’ve always pictured Hugh Laurie as the English teacher cuz the English teacher means well but he’s kind of sad and a bit ridiculous and I think Laurie could pull that off in a sympathetic, dignified way. As for the nephew, a Family Ties era Michael J. Fox would have been perfect, cuz who wouldn’t want to save Michael J. Fox from a race of hideous slime aliens collectively named Jacques?
If aliens were to visit Earth, what do you think their first impression of humans would be?
The question is: if aliens were to actually visit Earth, what would their first impression of humans be? This is actually a heart-breaking question because it reminds me of all our flaws as humans. Sadly, we have many. We are only human, after all. But I am reminded of the words of Walter Savage Landor who says ““We must not indulge in unfavorable views of mankind, since by doing it we make bad men believe they are no worse than others, and we teach the good that they are good in vain.” So much of this question depends on what the aliens are like and which humans they happen to meet. If the aliens are emotionally intelligent and empathetic and they meet your average run-of-the-mill humans I’d think they’d actually have a positive impression. After all, most of us know at least a few humans we like with whom we would hoist an ale or two. But if they’re the kind of aliens who rush to judgment and have the misfortune to run into some loud-mouthed, opinionated, bigoted, ignorant, conspiracy-wielding imperialistic jack-ass then we’d better hope the alien doesn’t represent the vanguard of some intergalactic pest control agency responding to a complaint about us, likely from our dolphin neighbours.
If you could have scripted Stanley Kubrick’s Moon landing hoax, how would it differ from the original?
If I could have scripted Stanley Kubrick’s (alleged) Moon landing hoax, it would have differed from the original in that A. it would have been an actual hoax instead of some absurd conspiracy theory likely perpetuated by some conspiracy-wielding jack-ass, B. I would have painstakingly addressed all the incontrovertible evidence that humans actually did land on the moon, such as (and I quote) “8,400 publicly available photos, thousands of hours of video footage, a mountain of scientific data, and full transcripts and audio recordings of all air-to-ground conversations” and “382 kilograms of Moon rock that Apollo astronauts brought back to Earth,” not to mention a lunar laser ranging retroreflector array that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin left on the surface that’s still operational today, and that allows us to reflect lasers off of it and measure the distance to the Moon down to the centimetre. (Check out the Institute of Physics, from which I derived some of this response, for more info). I’d also ask Hans Zimmer to do the soundtrack, cuz his work on Interstellar is just outstanding.
Which trope of science fiction (phasers, transporters, time machines, much more) would you like to see put into our own reality? And how would you use it in a mundane way?
If I could place one science fiction trope into our reality it would be a time machine to address my many social faux pas. You know, the kind of faux pas that makes you close your eyes and curse out loud in the shower when you remember them. I would have it strapped to my wrist, set to one minute in the past, and every time I said something stupid or made a joke that didn’t land or accidentally insulted someone or farted loudly in public (or the many other examples I could trot out that are far too embarrassing to mention here) I would go back in time just one minute for that precious do-over. I might also use it to go back in time for a few more bites of whatever delicious food I happened to have just finished eating, especially those times I was absolutely certain there was still one or two more chips or Hawkins Cheezies or chocolate-covered almonds left but (cruelly) there wasn’t. Zip! Back in time to have another crack at those last few Cheezies.
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Joe‘s latest book is Adventures in the Radio Trade, available in all the usual places. You can also find Joe on Substack where he pens a weekly newsletter called Assorted Nonsense, completely free to subscribe. Joe is co-host of the podcast Re-Creative with Mark A. Rayner, which finds Mark and Joe in conversation with all sorts of creative people about the wild and wonderful art that inspires them.
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